Arti­cle Marriage in the Early Modern Imagination

Focus on the Peck Feature

Mar­riage cel­e­bra­tions were a com­mon motif in early mod­ern Euro­pean art. This Focus on the Peck Col­lec­tion instal­la­tion fea­tures two engrav­ings from the six­teenth cen­tu­ry and one prepara­to­ry draw­ing for an engrav­ing from the eigh­teenth cen­tu­ry depict­ing nup­tial rit­u­als. These three images demon­strate the wide appli­ca­tion of wed­dings as a theme to com­ment on social issues as diverse as class, reli­gion, and race.

This Focus on the Peck Collection instal­la­tion jux­ta­pos­es three Euro­pean med­i­ta­tions on mar­riage cer­e­monies, demon­strat­ing the wide appli­ca­tion of wed­dings as a theme to com­ment on social issues as diverse as class, reli­gion, and race. Hans Sebald Beham’s series of four minia­ture engrav­ings depict­ing fig­ures in a pro­ces­sion offers a com­i­cal, if not con­de­scend­ing, look at the cel­e­bra­tions of six­teenth-cen­tu­ry Ger­man peas­ants. Dirck Volk­ert­sz Coornhert’s print of a New Tes­ta­ment para­ble explores the idea of reli­gious sin­cer­i­ty through prop­er nup­tial eti­quette, while Bernard Picart’s draw­ing of an Inca wed­ding, though imag­ined through a Euro­pean lens, high­lights the uni­ver­sal impor­tance of fam­i­ly and tradition. 

Despite the sim­i­lar sub­ject mat­ter of the three works, each offers a spe­cif­ic moral les­son. Beham’s peas­ants rein­force class dis­tinc­tions, while Coorn­hert empha­sizes reli­gious earnest­ness. Picart’s draw­ing was made into an engrav­ing for the wide­ly print­ed book Reli­gious Cer­e­monies and Cus­toms of All the Peo­ples of the World (1723-37), a ground­break­ing pub­li­ca­tion which pro­vid­ed Euro­peans a glimpse of reli­gious and cul­tur­al prac­tices from around the globe and stressed the need for tol­er­ance of other races and religions. 

Viewed togeth­er, these objects demon­strate the ways in which the same cus­tom can inform many dif­fer­ent soci­etal issues through visu­al representations.

An Inca Wed­ding, 1723

An imagined ceremony of two indigenous people by a white male artist in Europe. A robed elder clasps the wrists of a young Inca couple about to be joined in marriage, surrounded by an animated crowd in an open town square.

Bernard Picart, French, 1673 – 1733, An Inca Wed­ding, 1723, pen and gray ink, gray wash on paper, The Peck Col­lec­tion, 2017.1.116.

See An Inca Wed­ding in more detail here. 

A robed elder clasps the wrists of a young Inca cou­ple about to be joined in mar­riage, sur­round­ed by an ani­mat­ed crowd in an open town square. Although the artist advo­cat­ed for the appre­ci­a­tion of for­eign cul­tures, Bernard Picart never left Europe and instead depend­ed on descrip­tions from trav­el accounts to cre­ate his draw­ings. Orga­nized like a grand eigh­teenth-cen­tu­ry his­to­ry paint­ing, fea­tur­ing clas­si­ciz­ing gar­ments and domed archi­tec­ture, only the elab­o­rate jew­el­ry and feath­er head­dress­es vague­ly ref­er­ence Inca culture. 

This imag­ined wed­ding cer­e­mo­ny accom­pa­nied a text which stressed the high­ly orga­nized soci­ety of South America’s indige­nous peo­ples. Picart delib­er­ate­ly avoid­ed more dis­parag­ing themes, such as human sac­ri­fice, and instead focused on the com­mon­al­i­ties between cul­tures. The wed­ding motif used here high­lights the shared devo­tion to fam­i­ly between the Inca and Europeans. 

The Wed­ding Pro­ces­sion, mid-1530s

A miniature engraving of a medieval peasant couple dancing.

Hans Sebald Beham, Ger­man, 1500 – 1550, Cou­ple Danc­ing to the Left, from The Wed­ding Pro­ces­sion, mid-1530s, engrav­ings, Bur­ton Emmett Col­lec­tion, 58.1.227

A miniature engraving of a medieval peasant couple walking. They both have stern facial expressions; the man holds an ax and the woman points in the direction they are walking.

Hans Sebald Beham, Ger­man, 1500 – 1550, Cou­ple Walk­ing to the Left, from The Wed­ding Pro­ces­sion, mid-1530s, engrav­ings, Bur­ton Emmett Col­lec­tion, 58.1.228

A miniature engraving of a medieval peasant couple walking. The man exclaims angrily with his left hand raised above his head. The woman looks at the man, holding her long skirts in her right hand as they walk.

Hans Sebald Beham, Ger­man, 1500 – 1550, Cou­ple Walk­ing to the Left, from The Wed­ding Pro­ces­sion, mid-1530s, engrav­ings, Bur­ton Emmett Col­lec­tion, 58.1.229.

A miniature engraving of a medieval peasant couple walking with an older man. The bride is in the center, being escorted by her bridegroom at the left and her father on the right.

Hans Sebald Beham, Ger­man, 1500 – 1550, Bride and Bride­groom, mid-1530s, engrav­ings, Bur­ton Emmett Col­lec­tion, 58.1.230.

View Cou­ple Danc­ing to the Left, Cou­ple Walk­ing to the Left (a), Cou­ple Walk­ing to the Left (b), and Bride and Bride­groom from the Wed­ding Pro­ces­sion here. 

Peas­ant cel­e­bra­tions were a pop­u­lar theme in north­ern Euro­pean art dur­ing the six­teenth cen­tu­ry. These minia­ture engrav­ings, meant to enter­tain a bour­geois audi­ence, cap­ture the rus­tic and some­what humor­ous guests of a peas­ant wed­ding. In the first image a man exu­ber­ant­ly leads a more reluc­tant part­ner into a dance, while the next depicts a pious older cou­ple with over­ly sober expres­sions. A third pair chats ani­mat­ed­ly, with the man’s face con­tort­ed into a car­i­ca­ture-like expres­sion. The final image depicts the new­ly­weds, iden­ti­fied by their match­ing bridal wreaths, though the bride’s father, shown pro­tec­tive­ly clutch­ing her skirts, seems reluc­tant to let her go. The col­lec­tors of these prints would have delight­ed in the famil­iar tra­di­tions of a Ger­man wed­ding cou­pled with the strange and rough man­ners of the peasants. 

The Fate of the Man who Came with­out a Wed­ding Gar­ment, from The Para­ble of the King who Pre­pared for a Wed­ding, 1558-59

In the foreground, an improperly dressed man enters the wedding feast. He walks in front of the king, who stands in the doorway. In the background, the same improperly dressed man is lowered into a firey pit, headfirst by three men.

Dirck Volk­ert­sz. Coorn­hert, Nether­lan­dish, 1519 – 1590, engraver, Maerten van Heemsker­ck, Dutch, 1498 – 1574, design­er, Hierony­mus Cock, Flem­ish, 1518 – 1570, pub­lish­er, The Fate of the Man who Came with­out a Wed­ding Gar­ment, from The Para­ble of the King who Pre­pared for a Wed­ding, 1558-59, engrav­ing and etch­ing on paper, The Robert Myers Col­lec­tion, 2019.42.2.6.

See The Fate of the Man who Came with­out a Wed­ding Gar­ment in more detail here. 

This image is one of six illus­trat­ing episodes in the bib­li­cal para­ble about a king who pre­pared for his son’s mar­riage feast (Matthew 22:1-14). In this final scene, a man arrives improp­er­ly dressed and is forcibly dis­missed. Two moments are rep­re­sent­ed here, includ­ing the rather dra­mat­ic expul­sion of the man, who is low­ered into a fiery pit in the back­ground. While the king’s actions might appear unjust, the unwel­come guest rep­re­sents those who claim admit­tance to the king­dom of God with­out truly cloth­ing them­selves in faith. Here, full par­tic­i­pa­tion in the wed­ding cus­toms is a metaphor for the life of a good Christian. 

Unlike Bernard Picart’s cel­e­bra­tion of uni­ver­sal cus­toms across cul­tures in the eigh­teenth cen­tu­ry, six­teenth-cen­tu­ry view­ers would have under­stood this image as a reminder of the exclu­siv­i­ty of Chris­t­ian tra­di­tions and salvation.

Sarah Farkas, Ack­land Grad­u­ate Intern and Grad­u­ate Stu­dent in the Depart­ment of Art & Art His­to­ry (as of sum­mer 2021)

April 23 – July 18, 2021