CHAPTER I.

The Activities of Nuremberg.--The Dürer Family.--Early Years of Albert.--His Studies with Wohlgemuth.--The _Wander-Jahre._

The free imperial city of Nuremberg, in the heart of Franconia, was one of the chief centres of the active life of the Middle Ages, and shared with Augsburg the great trans-continental traffic between Venice and the Levant and Northern Europe. Its municipal liberties were jealously guarded by venerable guilds and by eminent magistrates drawn from the families of the merchant-princes, forming a government somewhat similar to the Venetian Council. The profits of a commercial prosperity second only to that of the Italian ports had greatly enriched the thrifty burghers, aided by the busy manufacturing establishments which made the city "the Birmingham of the Middle Ages." Public and private munificence exerted itself in the erection and adornment of new and splendid buildings; and the preparation of works of art and utility was stimulated on all sides. It was the era of the discovery of America, the revival of classic learning, and the growth of free thought in matters pertaining to religion. So far had the inventions of the artisans contributed to the comfort of the people, that Pope Pius II. said that "A Nuremberg citizen is better lodged than the King of Scots;" and so widely were they exported to foreign realms, that the proud proverb arose that

"Nuremberg's hand Goes through every land."

Nuremberg still stands, a vast mediæval relic, in the midst of the whirl and activity of modern Germany, rich and thriving, but almost unchanged in its antique beauty. The narrow streets in which Dürer walked are flanked, as then, by quaint gable-roofed houses, timber-fronted, with mullioned windows and arching portals. In the faded and venerable palaces of the fifteenth century live the descendants of the old patrician families, cherishing the memories and archives of the past; and the stately Gothic churches are still rich in religious architecture, and in angular old Byzantine pictures and delicate German carvings. On the hill the castle rears its ponderous ramparts, which have stood for immemorial ages; and the high towers along the city walls have not yet bowed their brave crests to the spirit of the century of boulevards and railroads.

With two essentials of civilization, paper and printing-presses, Nuremberg supplied herself at an early day. The first paper-mill in Germany was established here in 1390; and its workmen were obliged to take an oath never to make paper for themselves, nor to reveal the process of manufacture. They went out on a strike when the mill was enlarged, but the authorities imprisoned them until they became docile once more. Koberger's printing-house contained twenty-four presses, and employed over a hundred men, printing not only Bibles and breviaries, but also chronicles, homilies, poems, and scientific works. As the Aldine Press attracted many authors and scholars to Venice, so Koberger's teeming press led several German literati to settle at Nuremberg. For the four first years of Dürer's life, the wonderful mathematician and astronomer Regiomontanus dwelt here, and had no less than twenty-one books printed by Koberger. His numerous inventions and instruments awakened the deepest interest in the Nuremberg craftsmen, and stimulated a fruitful spirit of inquiry for many years.

The clockmakers of Nuremberg were famous for their ingenious productions. Watches were invented here in the year 1500, and were long known as "Nuremberg eggs." The modern composition of brass was formed by Erasmus Ebner; wire-drawing machinery also was a Nuremberg device; the air-gun was invented by Hobsinger; the clarionet, by Denner; and the church-organs made here were the best in Germany. There were also many expert metal-workers and braziers; and fifty master-goldsmiths dwelt in the town, making elegant and highly artistic works, images, seals, and medals, which were famous throughout Europe. The most exquisite flowers and insects, and other delicate objects, were reproduced in filagree silver; and the first maiolica works in Northern Europe were also founded here.

Isolated, like the ducal cities of Italy, from the desolating wars of the great powers of Europe, and like them also growing rapidly in wealth and cultivation, Nuremberg afforded a secure refuge for Art and its children. In Dürer's day the great churches of St. Sebald, St. Lawrence, and Our Lady were finished; Peter Vischer executed the exquisite and unrivalled bronze Shrine of St. Sebald; and Adam Kraft completed the fairy-like Sacrament-house, sixty feet high, and "delicate as a tree covered with hoar-frost." Intimate with these two renowned artificers was Lindenast, "the red smith," who worked skilfully in beaten copper; and their studies were conducted in company with Vischer's five sons, who, with their wives and children, all dwelt happily at their father's house. Vischer lived till a year after Dürer's death, but there is no intimation that the two artists ever met. Another eminent craftsman was the unruly Veit Stoss, the marvellous wood-carver, many of whose works remain to this day; and there was also Hans Beheim, the sculptor, "an honorable, pious, and God-fearing man;" and Bullman, who "was very learned in astronomy, and was the first to set the Theoria Planetarum in motion by clockwork;" and he who made the great alarm-bell, which was inscribed, "I am called the mass and the fire bell: Hans Glockengeiser cast me: I sound to God's service and honor." What shall we say also of Hartmann, Dürer's pupil, who invented the measuring-rod; Schoner, the maker of terrestrial globes; Donner, who improved screw machinery; and all the skilful gun-makers, joiners, carpet-workers, and silk-embroiderers? There was also the burgher Martin Behaim, the inventor of the terrestrial globe, who anticipated Columbus by sailing Eastward across the Pacific Ocean, passing through the Straits of Magellan and discovering Brazil, as early as 1485.

In Germany, as in Italy, the studio of the artist, full of pure and lofty ideals, had hardly yet evolved itself from the workshop of the picture-manufacturer. Nuremberg's chief artists at this time were Michael Wohlgemuth, Dürer's master; Lucas Kornelisz, also called Ludwig Krug, who, though a most skilful engraver, was sometimes forced to adopt the profession of a cook in order to support himself; and Matthias Zagel, who was expert in both painting and engraving. Still another was the Venetian Jacopo de' Barbari, or Jacob Walch, "the master of the Caduceus," a dexterous engraver and designer, whom Dürer alludes to in his Venetian and Netherland writings. The art of engraving had been invented early in the fifteenth century, and was developing rapidly and richly toward perfection. The day of versatile artists had arrived, when men combined the fine and industrial arts in one life, and devoted themselves to making masterpieces in each department. The northern nations, unaided by classic models and traditions, were developing a new and indigenous æsthetic life, slow of growth, but bound to succeed in the long run.

The literary society of Dürer's epoch at Nuremberg was grouped in the _Sodalitas Literaria Rhenana_, under the learned Conrad Celtes, who published a book of Latin comedies, pure in Latinity and lax in morals, which he mischievously attributed to the Abbess Roswitha. Pirkheimer and the monk Chelidonius also belonged to this sodality. Other contemporary literati of the city were Cochläus, Luther's satirical opponent; the Hebraist Osiander; Venatorius, who united the discordant professions of poetry and mathematics; the Provost Pfinzing, for whose poem of _Tewrdannkh_, Dürer's pupil Schäuffelein made 118 illustrations; Baumgärtner, Melanchthon's friend; Veit Dietrich, the reformer; and Joachim Camerarius, the Latinist. But the most illustrious of Nuremberg's authors at that time was the cobbler-poet, Hans Sachs, a radical in politics and religion, who scourged the priests and the capitalists of his day in songs and satires which were sung and recited by the workmen of all Germany. He himself tells us that he wrote 4,200 master-songs, 208 comedies and tragedies, 73 devotional and love songs, and 1,007 fables, tales, and miscellaneous poems; and others say that his songs helped the Reformation as much as Luther's preaching.

Thus the activities of mechanics, art, and literature pressed forward with equal fervor in the quaint old Franconian city, while Albert Dürer's life was passing on. "Abroad and far off still mightier things were doing; Copernicus was writing in his observatory, Vasco di Gama was on the Southern Seas."

"I, Albrecht Dürer the younger, have sought out from among my father's papers these particulars of him, where he came from, and how he lived and died holily. God rest his soul! Amen." In this manner the pious artist begins an interesting family history, in which it is stated that the Dürers were originally from the romantic little Hungarian hamlet of Eytas, where they were engaged in herding cattle and horses. Anthony Dürer removed to the neighboring town of Jula, where he learned the goldsmith's art, which he taught to his son Albrecht, or Albert, while his other sons were devoted to mechanical employments and the priesthood. Albert was not content to stay in sequestered Jula, and, wandering over Germany and the Low Countries, at last came to Nuremberg, where he settled in 1455, in the service of the goldsmith Hieronymus Haller. This worthy Haller and his wife Kunigund, the daughter of Oellinger of Weissenberg, at that time had an infant daughter; and as she grew up Albert endeared himself to her to such purpose that, in 1467, when Barbara had become "a fair and handy maiden of fifteen," he married her, being forty years old himself. During the next twenty-four years she bore him eighteen children, seven daughters and eleven sons, of whose births, names, and godparents the father made careful descriptions. Three only, Albert, Andreas, and Hans, arrived at years of maturity. It may well be believed that the poor master-goldsmith was forced to work hard and struggle incessantly to support such a great family; and his portrait shows that the hand-to-mouth existence of so many years had told heavily and left its imprint on his weary and careworn face. Yet he had certain sources of peace and gentleness in his life, and never sank into moroseness or selfishness. Let us quote the tender and reverent words of his son: "My father's life was passed in great struggles and in continuous hard work. With my dear mother bearing so many children, he never could become rich, as he had nothing but what his hands brought him. He had thus many troubles, trials, and adverse circumstances. But yet from every one who knew him he received praise, because he led an honorable Christian life, and was patient, giving all men consideration, and thanking God. He indulged himself in few pleasures, spoke little, shunned society, and was in truth a God-fearing man. My dear father took great pains with his children, bringing them up to the honor of God. He made us know what was agreeable to others as well as to our Maker, so that we might become good neighbors; and every day he talked to us of these things, the love of God and the conduct of life."

Albert Dürer was the third child of Albert the Elder and Barbara Hallerin, and was born on the morning of the 21st of May, 1471. The house in which the Dürers then lived was a part of the great pile of buildings owned and in part occupied by the wealthy Pirkheimer family, and was called the _Pirkheimer Hinterhaus_. It fronted on the Winkler Strasse of Nuremberg, and was an ambitious home for a craftsman like Albert. The presence of Antonius Koberger, the famous book-printer, as godfather to the new-born child, shows also that the Dürers occupied an honorable position in the city.

The Pirkheimers were then prominent among the patrician families of Southern Germany, renowned for antiquity, enormously wealthy through successful commerce, and honored by important offices in the State. The infant Willibald Pirkheimer was of about the same age as the young Albert Dürer; and the two became close companions in all their childish sports, despite the difference in the rank of their families. When the goldsmith's family moved to another house, at the foot of the castle-hill, five years later, the warm intimacy between the children continued unchanged.

The instruction of Albert in the rudiments of learning was begun at an early age, probably in the parochial school of St. Sebald, and was conducted after the singular manner of the schools of that day, when printed books were too costly to be intrusted to children. He lived comfortably in his father's house, and daily received the wise admonitions and moral teachings of the elder Albert. His friendship for Willibald enabled him to learn certain elements of the higher studies into which the young patrician was led by his tutors; and his visits to the Pirkheimer mansion opened views of higher culture and more refined modes of life.

Albert was enamoured with art from his earliest years, and spent many of his leisure hours in making sketches and rude drawings, which he gave to his schoolmates and friends. The Imhoff Collection had a drawing of three heads, done in his eleventh year; the Posonyi Collection claimed to possess a Madonna of his fifteenth year; and the British Museum has a chalk-drawing of a woman holding a bird in her hand, whose first owner wrote on it, "This was drawn for me by Albert Dürer before he became a painter." The most interesting of these early works is in the Albertina at Vienna, and bears the inscription: "This I have drawn from myself from the looking-glass, in the year 1484, when I was still a child.--ALBERT DÜRER." It shows a handsome and pensive boy-face, oval in shape, with large and tender eyes, filled with solemnity and vague melancholy; long hair cut straight across the forehead, and falling over the shoulders; and full and pouting lips. It is faulty in design, but shows a considerable knowledge of drawing, and a strong faculty for portraiture. The certain sadness of expression tells that the schoolboy had already become acquainted with grief, probably from the straitened circumstances of his family, and the melancholy deaths of so many brothers and sisters. The great mystery of sorrow was full early thrown across the path of the solemn artist. This portrait was always retained by Dürer as a memorial of his childhood.

He says of his father, "For me, I think, he had a particular affection; and, as he saw me diligent in learning, he sent me to school. When I had learned to write and read, he took me home again, with the intention of teaching me the goldsmith's work. In this I began to do tolerably well." He was taken into the goldsmith's workshop in his thirteenth year, and remained there two years, receiving instruction which was not without value in his future life, in showing him the elements of the arts of modelling and design. The accuracy and delicacy of his later plastic works show how well he apprehended these ideas, and how far he acquired sureness of expression. The elder Albert was a skilful master-workman, highly esteemed in his profession, and had received several important commissions. It is said that the young apprentice executed under his care a beautiful piece of silver-work representing the Seven Agonies of Christ.

"But my love was towards painting, much more than towards the goldsmith's craft. When at last I told my father of my inclination, he was not well pleased, thinking of the time I had been under him as lost if I turned painter. But he left me to have my will; and in the year 1486, on St. Andrew's Day, he settled me apprentice with Michael Wohlgemuth, to serve him for three years. In that time God gave me diligence to learn well, in spite of the pains I had to suffer from the other young men." Thus Dürer describes his change in life, and the embarkation on his true vocation, as well as the reluctance of the elder Albert to allow his noble and beloved boy to pass out from his desolated household into other scenes, and away from his companionship.

Wohlgemuth was one of the early religious painters who stood at the transition-point between the school of Cologne and that of the Van Eycks, or between the old pietistic traditions of Byzantine art and the new ideas of the art of the Northern Reformation. The conventionalisms of the Rhenish and Franconian paintings were being exchanged for a fresher originality and a truer realism; and the pictures of this time curiously blended the old and the new. Wohlgemuth seems to have considered art as a money-getting trade rather than a high vocation, and his workroom was more a shop than a studio. He turned out countless Madonnas and other religious subjects for churches and chance purchasers, and also painted chests and carved and colored images of the saints, many of which were executed by his apprentices. A few of his works, however, were done with great care and delicacy, and show a worthy degree of sweetness and simplicity. Evidently the young pupil gained little besides a technical knowledge of painting from this master,--the mechanical processes, the modes of mixing and applying colors, the chemistry of pigments, and a certain facility in using them. It was well that the influences about him were not powerful enough to warp his pure and original genius into servile imitations of decadent methods. His hands were taught dexterity; and his mind was left to pursue its own lofty course, and use them as its skilful allies in the new conquests of art.

Wood-engraving was also carried on in Wohlgemuth's studio, and it is probable that Dürer here learned the rudiments of this branch of art, which he afterwards carried to so high a perfection. Some writers maintain that his earliest works in this line were done for the famous "Nuremberg Chronicle," which was published in 1493 by Wohlgemuth and Pleydenwurf.

The three years which were spent in Wohlgemuth's studio were probably devoted to apprentice-work on compositions designed by the master, who was then about fifty years old, and at the summit of his fame. But few of Dürer's drawings now existing date from this epoch, one of which represents a group of horsemen, and another the three Swiss leaders, Fürst, Melchthal, and Staufacher. The beautiful portrait of Dürer's father, which is now at Florence, was executed by the young artist in 1490, probably to carry with him as a souvenir of home. Mündler says, "For beauty and delicacy of modelling, this portrait has scarcely been surpassed afterwards by the master, perhaps not equalled."

It was claimed by certain old biographers that the eminent Martin Schongauer of Colmar was Dürer's first master; but this is now contested, although it is evident that his pictures had a powerful effect on the youth. Schongauer was the greatest artist and engraver that Germany had as yet produced, and exerted a profound influence on the art of the Rhineland. He renewed the fantastic conceits and grotesque vagaries which the Papal artists of Cologne had suppressed as heathenish, and prepared the way for, or perhaps even suggested, the weird elements of Dürer's conceptions. At the same time he passed back of his Netherland art-education, and studied a mystic benignity and dreamy spirituality suggestive of the Umbrian painters, with whose chief, the great Perugino, Martin was acquainted. Herein Dürer's works were in strong contrast with Schongauer's, and showed the new spirit that was stirring in the world.

Next to Schongauer, the great Italian artist Mantegna exercised the strongest influence upon Dürer, who studied his bold and austere engravings with earnest admiration, showing his traits in many subsequent works. Probably he met the famous Mantuan painter during the _Wander-jahre_, in Italy; and at the close of his Venetian journey he was about to pay a visit of homage to him, when he heard of his death.

During his three years of study we have seen that the delicate and sensitive youth suffered much from the reckless rudeness and jeering insults of his companions, rough hand-workers who doubtless failed to understand the poignancy of the torments which they inflicted on the sad-eyed son of genius. But his home was near at hand, and the tender care of his parents, always beloved. How often he must have wandered through the familiar streets of Nuremberg, with his dreamy artist-face and flowing hair, and studied the Gothic palaces, the fountains adorned with statuary, and the rich treasures of art in the great churches! Beyond the tall-towered town, danger lurked on every road; but inside the gray walls was peace and safety, and no free lances nor marauding men-at-arms could check the aspiring flight of the youth's bright imagination.

"And when the three years were out, my father sent me away. I remained abroad four years, when he recalled me; and, as I had left just after Easter in 1490, I returned home in 1494 just after Whitsuntide." Thus Albert describes the close of his _Lehr-jahre_, or labor-years, and the entrance upon his _Wander-jahre_, or travel-years. According to a German custom, still prevalent in a modified degree, the youth was obliged to travel for a long period, and study and practise his trade or profession in other cities, before settling for life as a master-workman. Unfortunately all that Dürer records as to these eventful four years is given in the sentences above; and we can only theorize as to the places which he visited, and his studies of the older art-treasures of Europe. Some authors believe that a part of the _Wander-jahre_ was spent in Italy, and Dr. Thausing, Dürer's latest and best biographer, clearly proves this theory by a close study of his notes and sketches. Others claim with equal positiveness, and less capability of proof, that they were devoted to the Low Countries. It is certain that he abode at Colmar in 1492, where he was honorably received by Gaspar, Paul, and Louis, the three brothers of Martin Schongauer. The great Martin had died some years before; but many of his best paintings were preserved at Colmar, and were carefully studied by Dürer. At a later day he wandered through the Rhineland to Basle, and spent his last year at Strasbourg. His portraits of his master and mistress in the latter city were dated in 1494, and pertained to the Imhoff Collection.

His portrait painted by himself in 1493 was procured at Rome by the Hofrath Beireis, and described by Goethe. It shows a bright and vigorous face, full of youthful earnestness and joy, rich, harmonious, and finely executed, though thinly colored. He is attired in a blue-gray cloak with yellow strings, an embroidered shirt whose sleeves are bound with peach-colored ribbons, and a purple cap; and holds a piece of the blue flower called _Manns-treue_, or Man's-faith.