1858 Holbein Dance of Death: The Nun

In Holbein’s Dance of Death the scene titled “The Nun” shows a young religious woman kneeling before a small altar in an elegant, bedchamber-like interior, her attention divided between her devotional setting and a handsome young man lounging nearby and playing a stringed instrument. Death slips into this private space and extinguishes the devotional candle, a visual reminder that her earthly desires and distractions have undermined the spiritual “marriage” she has vowed to Christ and that her life, like the candle, is about to be cut short.

Within the moral framework that Douce emphasises in the 1858 Bohn edition, “The Nun” exemplifies Holbein’s satirical treatment of ecclesiastical hypocrisy: a figure who should embody chastity and renunciation is caught in a moment of sensual temptation, and Death appears precisely at that lapse to enforce the equality of all souls before the grave. The richly furnished room, the musician-lover, and the extinguished candle turn the design into a compact critique of corrupted piety, aligning this plate with other ecclesiastical subjects in the series (abbot, abbess, monk, bishop) that expose how worldly comfort and desire have invaded supposedly holy lives.

This is an antique item from the 1858 edition of Holbein's Dance of Death, published in London by Henry G. Bohn, York Street, Covent Garden. See photo for exact citation.

Details

• Subject: Plate XXIV, The Nun, from Holbein's Dance of Death

• Artist: After Hans Holbein the Younger (designs about 1525–26)

• Technique: Wood engraving by Bonner and Byfield, first cut for Douce's 1833 edition

• Source: Leaf from Holbein's Dance of Death, with Francis Douce's dissertation (London: Henry G. Bohn, 1858)

• Text: Latin verse from Proverbs and Douce's description, printed below the cut

• Era: 1858, antique

Condition

Good. The paper has yellowed evenly with age (toning); no foxing to the image. The leaf came from the book's loose pages and shows a little evidence of that.

Please note

• Comes in the black mat with the gold border shown in the photos.

• Blank on the back.