Looking for Pieter Bruegel

Author(s): Perez Zagorin

Source: Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 64, No. 1 (Jan., 2003), pp. 73-96
Published by: University of Pennsylvania Press
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 Looking for Pieter Bruegel

Perez Zagorin

I. Since the late nineteenthand early years of the twentiethcentury,when

PieterBruegel ceased to be seen simply as the naive artistPieter the Droll and
PeasantBruegel, chosen, as his first biographerCarelvan Mandersaid, "from
among the peasants"to be "thedelineatorof peasants,"'he has been generally
ranked among the foremost artists of the Netherlandsand northernRenais-
sance as well as one of the greatestof Europeanpainters.His oeuvre is broad,
consisting of moralallegories and satires,panoramiclandscapes,religious and
biblical themes, and a variety of genre and secular scenes. Anyone who looks
attentivelyat his forty-oddpaintings, his drawings, and the prints made after
the latteris likely to notice not only theirstrongformal structureand outstand-
ing skill in organizingpictorialspace, their commandof the complex disposi-
tion of large masses of figures, and their masterly sureness and economy of
figuraldraftsmanshipin the depictionof humanbeings in every kind of posture
and action, but also that many of them seem to be animatedby some idea.
Gazing at such engrossingand intensely vital images of humanlife and nature
as his paintings of proverbs and children's games, festive peasants, the sea-
sons, and religious subjectslike the tower of Babel, Christon the road to Cal-
vary,andthe triumphof death,the viewer is boundto recognizethatthe painter,
in the words of EdwardSnow, quotingCezanne,was "a thinkerin images."2It
is accordinglynot a denial of his characteras a profoundand originalobserver

1
Carelvan Mander,Het Schilder-Boek(Haarlem,1604);VanMander'sbiographyof Bruegel
is reprintedin Englishtranslationby FritzGrossmann,Bruegel ThePaintings: CompleteEdition
(London, 1955), 7-9, and in NorthernRenaissanceArt 1400-1600: Sourcesand Documents,ed.
Wolfgang Stechow (Englewood Cliffs, N. J., 1966), 38-41. R.-H. Marijnissen,Bruegel TheEl-
der (Brussels, 1969), reprintsthe Flemish text in his notes, 87-98, with an English translation,
12-16;the Flemish text is also reprintedin Hans-JoachimRaupp,Bauernsatiren.Entstehungund
Entwicklungdes bduerlichen Genres in der deutschen und niederldndischenKunst ca. 1470-
1570 (Niederzier,1986), 322-23.
2 Edward
Snow,Inside Bruegel: ThePlay ofImages in Childrens Games(New York, 1997),
15; see the whole discussion, "Thinkingin Images," 13-32.
73
Copyright2003 by Journalof the History of Ideas, Inc.
74 Perez Zagorin

of humanbehaviorand the world aroundhim that one cannot help wondering

what attitudes,values, and particularphilosophy underly his works. On this
question, however, there has never been agreement.His monumentalpeasant
scenes, for instance,like the Peasant WeddingFeast (see figure 1) andPeasant
Dance in Vienna, which are among his most famous works known through
thousandsof reproductions,have elicited very divergentreadings.3They have
been variouslyperceived as comic and sympatheticrepresentationsof peasant
life by a humaneobserver,as detachedand accuratedescriptionsby an objec-
tive recorder,as graphic allegories of human folly, as visions of an organic
communitywhich is passing away, as productsof a literaryandpictorialgenre
of satiricalcommentarieson peasant crudity,gluttony,and lechery, and as an
expression of the social condescension and moral superioritywhich humanist
intellectuals and the dominantlanded and urbanclasses of the painter'stime
are said to have felt toward peasants and popularculture. These differences
and contradictionsrespecting his peasantpaintings are merely an example of
the more generalproblemof interpretingBruegel which is repeatedlyencoun-
tered in discussions of many of his compositions. There is no other sixteenth-
centuryartistwhose works have been understoodin such differentand oppo-
site ways.4
Bruegel's era was of course a period of great conflict and religious and
political division caused by the advance of the ProtestantReformationand its
conflict with the Catholic church. During his lifetime, Lutheranism,Calvin-
ism, and anabaptismwere spreadingthroughoutthe Netherlandsand northern
Europedespite censorshipand persecutionand many people of all classes un-
der Catholicrule were changingtheirreligious allegiance. In the years priorto
his death in 1569 he also witnessed the growing manifestationsof religio-po-
litical opposition followed by the outbreakof armedresistanceand revolution
in the Netherlandsagainst the policies and governmentof its absentee sover-
eign, Philip II of Spain. Among the disputed issues in the understandingof
Bruegel's work is how he reactedto these momentousevents and whetherthey
were reflected or alluded to in some of his compositions. In trying to answer
such questions and to elucidatethe meaning of variousof his works, arthisto-

3 For some reviews of these

divergentreadings,see Raupp,Bauernsatiren,271-73; Walter
S. Gibson, "Bruegeland The Peasants:A Problemof Interpretation," Pieter Bruegel TheElder:
Two Studies (Lawrence, Kan., 1991); Ethan Matt Kavaler,Pieter Bruegel: Parables of Order
and Enterprise(Cambridge,1999), 24-28.
4
Bruegel scholarshave often commentedon the differencesand contradictionsin the inter-
pretationsof the painter's work; see, for example Grossmann,Bruegel The Paintings, 37; the
remarksby Marijnissen,passim; John E. C. White, Pieter Bruegel and The Fall of The Art
Historian (Newcastle, 1980); Raupp,Bauernsatiren,ch. IV. The collection of essays in the vol-
ume on Bruegel in NederlandsKunsthistorischJaarboek,47, ed. Jan de Jong et al. (1996), 247-
71, contains a comprehensivebibliographyon the artist.
Figure 1: Pieter Bruegel, the Elder (c. 1525-1569), Peasant WeddingF
KunsthistorichesMuseum, Vienna, Austria.
76 Perez Zagorin

rians,beside examininghis artisticinheritance,milieu, and imageryin relation

to the productionsof contemporaryartistsand predecessors,have also looked
for clues to Bruegel's thought in the influences that might have shaped his
outlook as result of his personal, social, and intellectualaffiliations.
Unhappily,the establishedfacts of Bruegel's biographyare few and much
smallerthanfor thatof any majorartistof the sixteenthcentury.The section on
his life in the catalogueof the outstandingexhibitionof his drawingsandprints
in 2001 at the MetropolitanMuseum of Art (New York)rightly describedhis
personalhistory as "still largely a mystery."5Thereis no recordof his place or
date of birth,althoughhe is generallybelieved to have been bornbetween 1525
and 1530. Nothing is known of his formal schooling, if any, or abouthis train-
ing as an artist.In 1552-54 he made a journey to Italy perhapsas far south as
Sicily, but except for his contact and collaborationin Rome with the eminent
painterof miniaturesGiulio Clovio, little is known of whathe did there.He left
behind him no letters or writings of any kind, nor are there any reportsof his
beliefs or opinions from eitherfriendsor witnesses. Nearly all the information
we have about him comes from his brief biographyin van Mander'sfamous
Painter's Book, publishedin 1604, thirty-fiveyears afterhis death. Occasion-
ally, a new piece of informationconcerningthe artistcomes to light. Thus, it
was recently discovered that at the bankruptcysale in 1572 of the propertyof
the merchantJean Noirot, the Masterof the Mint at Antwerp,his possessions
included a large collection of about fifty paintings, five of which, a winter
scene and four peasantscenes, were by Bruegel. Since Bruegel apparentlydid
no public commissions for churches,religious foundations,town councils, or
otherbodies, and, except for his prints,which were sold to the public, worked
solely for privateindividualsand patrons,6this informationis valuablein add-
ing to whatis known aboutthe earliestowners of his paintingsandtheirtaste as
collectors.7
The sparsenessof documentedknowledge abouthim has neverthelessnot
deterreda successionof Bruegelscholarsfrompropoundingunsupportedspecu-
lations and hypotheses concerninghis life, career,and associations.An early

5 Nadine M. Orenstein,"The Elusive Life of Pieter Bruegel the Elder,"in Pieter Bruegel
TheElder: Drawings and Prints (New Haven, Conn., 2001), 2; this work is henceforthcited as
CatalogueNew York2001.
6 VanManderrecords,however,thatat the end of
Bruegel's life the city council of Brussels
commissionedhim to paintsome pieces commemoratingthe completionof the Brussels-Antwerp
canal,but thathis deathpreventedthe execution of this project;NorthernRenaissanceArt 1400-
1600, Sources and Documents,40.
7 Luc Smolderen,"Tableauxde JeromeBosch, de Pierre
Bruegell'Ancien et de FransFloris
Disperses en Vente Publique a la Monnaie d'Anvers en 1572," Revue Beige d'Archeologie et
d 'Histoirede I 'Art,64 (1995), 33-41; see also the discussionof Noirot andhis picturesin Kavaler,
Parables of Orderand Enterprise,51-54.
Pieter Bruegel 77

instancewas Charlesde Tolnay's importantbook of 1935, which attemptedto

"penetratethe artist's secret thought"and "stripaway his masks" in orderto
identify his philosophy.8Tolnay visualized him as a culturedRenaissancehu-
manistwho associatedin Antwerpwith a groupof distinguishedscholars,art-
ists, and authorssuch as the celebratedgeographerAbrahamOrtelius (1527-
1598), the greatprinterand publisherChristophePlantin(c. 1520-89), and the
Dutch writer and engraverDirck Coornhert(1522-90), all described as reli-
gious libertineswhose unorthodoxopinionsBruegel shared.Among these men,
some belonged to the religious sect known as the Family or House of Love, of
whichTolnaysuggestedthatBruegelwas also a member.He believed the source
of the painter's ideas lay in fifteenth-centuryPlatonic philosophers and hu-
manistslike Nicholas of CusaandMarsilioFicino andin the writingsof Erasmus
and SebastianFranck.As the dominanttheme in his depiction of humanlife,
Tolnayattributedto him the conceptionof an upside-downor topsy-turvyworld,
the realm of absurdity,fools, and folly. Bruegel was the "platonicien"of this
"monde renverse,"contemplatingit with the same detachmentas he would
anotherplanet. In contrastto this attitudewas the artist's conception of the
greatness and impersonalityof nature,to whose eternal laws human beings
were subject.9Otherthan Bruegel's friendshipwith Ortelius,however, which
can be documented,Tolnayhad no proof of the artist'srelationshipsin Antwerp
and the conclusions he drew from them or any evidence that Bruegel could
have been acquaintedwith the works of the particularthinkerswhom he iden-
tified as sources. Later Bruegel scholarshiphas been much less inclined to
such over-intellectualizedexplanationsof the artists's work. Thus, a leading
contemporaryhistorianof Bruegel andNetherlandisharthas cautionedagainst
exaggerating the philosophical aspects of his art, noting that "there is little
evidence ... that Bruegel's pictures are as recondite or cryptic as is so often
believed."10In the scholarly literature'sattempt to uncover the meaning of
Bruegel's workthroughan examinationof his biographyandpersonalrelation-
ships, it is easy to find repeated examples of questionable suppositions and
doubtfulinferences presentedas facts. Tolnay was the first to affirm that the
artistwas a religious libertine,a memberof the Family of Love, andconnected
in Antwerp with intellectuals of heterodox beliefs in religion. Although the
only one of these claims that can be substantiated,as I have said above, is his
relationshipwith the geographerOrtelius,they have neverthelessbeen repeated
by Benesch, Stechow, and other noted Bruegel scholars.1 PierreFrancastel's

8 Charlesde
Tolnay,Pierre Bruegel l'Ancien (2 vols.; Brussels, 1935), I, intro.and 20.
9Ibid., 7-19.
10WalterS.
Gibson, Bruegel (London, 1977), 10, 11.
n Otto Benesch, TheArt TheRenaissance in Northern
of Europe(Cambridge,Mass., 1945,
96; Wolfgang Stechow,Pieter Bruegel the Elder (New York, 1959), 19, 22, 25.
78 Perez Zagorin

book on Bruegel of 1995, while rejecting the importanceof Platonist influ-

ences in the painter's art, speaks nevertheless of his possible contacts with
hereticalgroupsandconsidersit certainthattogetherwith Orteliushe frequented
a select libertinemilieu of cultivatedfriends such as Plantinand Coornhert.12
In some recent essays by David Freedberg,we encounter,along with many
helpful observations, similar instances of questionable statements about the
artistsuch as thathis knowledge of antiquitywas "acrucialpartof his culture,"
that he belonged to "the most refined and serious of Antwerp's intellectual
circles," that he appearsquite frequentlyin the correspondenceof Abraham
Ortelius,and that he was not an orthodoxCatholic.13
Actually, all that it is possible to ascertainof Bruegel's knowledge of an-
tiquity is what can be surmised from his compositions, which are far from
suggesting thatit was a centralingredientof his culture.While evidence of the
influence of Raphael,Michelangelo, and other Italianartistshas been seen in
some of his works, it is evident thathe was not a classical artist.He was much
more strongly affected by the pictorialtraditionsof Netherlandishart and the
creationsof predecessorslike the fantasticinventions of Bosch (d. 1516) and
the great landscapes of Joachim Patinir(d. c.1524) than by the classicism of
ItalianRenaissanceartto which he was exposed duringhis Italianjourney and
throughcopies in prints and engravings.14 In The Towerof Babel he used the
Roman Colosseum as a model,15but classical subjects, such as the drawingof
The Calumnyof Apelles, dated 1565, are a rarityin his work. The source on
which he based this drawingis unknown, and we cannot assume because the
allegorical figures in it are designated by Latin names that he could read a
Latinliterarytext.16 As has alreadybeen pointedout, positive evidence is lack-
ing to prove his involvement in a circle of Antwerphumanistsor his religious
heterodoxy.The bulky volume of Ortelius'scorrespondencecontainsno letters
eitherto or from Bruegel. He is mentionedin it only threetimes, thoughnot by

12Pierre
Francastel,Bruegel (Paris, 1995), 36, 91; this work was posthumouslypublished
and edited by Francastel'sstudents.
13 ThePrints
ofPieter Bruegel TheElder, ed. David Freedberg(Tokyo, 1989), intro., 15, 24,
and the editor's essay in the same volume, "AntwerpduringBruegel's Lifetime:The Economic
and HistoricalBackground,"37.
14On the influence of Italian
painterson Bruegel'swork, see, for example, the commentsin
The CompletePaintings of Bruegel, notes and catalogueby Piero Bianconi (New York, 1967),
87, and Gibson,Bruegel, 133-40. In a recentessay Janeten BrinkGoldsmithdiscernsthe inspi-
rationof Italianartin the monumentalcharacterof Bruegel's late landscapesand peasantpaint-
ings; "PieterBruegel The Elderand The Matterof Italy,"SixteenthCenturyJournal, 23 (1992),
205-34.
15 There are two versions of this
painting, reproducedin Grossmann,Bruegel The Paint-
ings, nos. 50-51.
16 The CalumnyofApelles is reproducedwith commentsin both Hans Mielke's recentcata-

logue, Pieter Bruegel.Die Zeichnungen(n. p., 1996), no. 63, and CatalogueNew York2001, no.
104.
Pieter Bruegel 79

Ortelius.Twice an Italiancorrespondentrefersto him in passing, andhis name

occurs again in a letter to Ortelius from Coorhert in July 1578, nine years
after Bruegel's death, expressing thanks and high praise for the engraving of
TheDeath of The Virgin,executed by Philips Galle afterthe grisaille painting
by Bruegel, which Ortelius owned and of which he orderedengravedcopies
made in 1574 to send as gifts to some of his friends. Coorhert's letter,how-
ever, says nothing to imply that he and Bruegel ever knew each otherperson-
ally.17
In additionto Ortelius,contemporaryand near contemporarysources like
van Manderand a few otherdocumentsmentionby name only a small number
of individuals whom Bruegel knew or with whom he might have been ac-
quainted.Among them were Pieter Coecke van Aelst, a distinguished artist
with whom he is reportedto have studied and whose daughterhe married;
HieronymusCock, the well known publisherof his printswhose business was
located in Antwerp;the Antwerp merchantand governmentofficial Nicholas
Jonghelinck,andthe greatprelateCardinalGranvelle,PhilipII's principalmin-
ister in the Netherlandsuntil his departurein 1564, both of whom were admir-
ers and collectors of his work. Neither these nor any of his other known asso-
ciations can license the conclusion of anotherprominentBruegel scholarCarl
GustafStridbeckthatthe artist'sfriendsnumberedsome of the most outstand-
ing intellectuals of the time and that in Antwerp he was one of "a circle of
politicalandreligiousradicalhumanists"thatincludedCoornhertandPlantin.18
In the searchfor Bruegel'sthought,a numberof Bruegel scholarshave also
attemptedto show that his art contains patrioticpolitical allusions expressing
opposition to the Spanish regime in the Netherlands.Francastelmaintained,
for instance, that Bruegel's was "une oeuvre d'opposition"which needs to be
decipheredand whose lessons had to be hidden for political reasons.19This
opinion was echoed In the recent (1999) novel Headlong by the British writer
Michael Frayn, which centers on an art historian'sdiscovery of an unknown

17
Ortelius,Epistulae, ed. J. H. Hessels (Cambridge,1887, repr.Osnabruck,1969), 25, 178.
Bruegel's TheDeath of The Virginis reproducedin Grossmann,Bruegel ThePaintings, no. 77;
Galle's engravingof it is in CatalogueNew York2001, no. 117.
18CarlGustaf
Stridbeck,Bruegelstudien(Stockholm, 1956), 20, 29. Coornhert,an engraver,
lived for many years in Haarlemin the province of Holland and it is hardlylikely that he could
have been Bruegel's friend, even though HieronymusCock was the publisherof some of his
prints.An active supporterof the Netherlandsrebellion and a close associate of its leaderWill-
iam of Orange,in his later life he became one of the foremost advocates of tolerationand reli-
gious liberty in the Netherlands.For his biography,see H. Bonger, Leven en Werkvan D. V
Coornhert(Amsterdam,1978). He consideredmen like Plantinand Lipsius to be "silentsitters"
and "self-lovers,"and once commentedthatwhereas Orteliuspreferred"a safe tranquillity,"he
himself valued"virtuousanduseful activity";these statementsarequotedrespectivelyin Gerhard
Giildner,Das Toleranz-Problemin den NiederlandenimAusgang des 16.Jahrhunderts(Liibeck,
1968), 135, andAlastairHamilton, TheFamily of Love (Cambridge,1981), 72.
'9Francastel,Bruegel, 27, 28.
80 Perez Zagorin

paintingby Bruegel and conceives the artistas a freedomfighteragainstSpan-

ish tyrannywhose worksarefull of politicalreferences.Suchclaims have some-
times sought supportin van Mander's statementthat when on his death bed,
Bruegel instructedhis wife to destroy a numberof his drawingswith inscrip-
tions on them lest they get her into troubleon accountof theirsharpand biting
character.20 These unknown compositions would probably have been moral
satires,though, similarto a numberof othersthat he did, and thereforedevoid
of political reference.VanMander'sbiographydoes not offer any hint thatthe
artistwas ever suspected of religious or political dissidence. In 1563, follow-
ing his marriage,Bruegel left Antwerp at the behest of his mother-in-lawto
live in Brussels, the seat of the Netherlandsgovernment.One of his reasonsfor
makingthis move could have been to obtaincourtcommissions,but whetherso
or not, the change of residence would seem to tell againstthe view thathe was
disaffectedto the existing political order.
It is neverthelessquite possible that,like many Netherlandersin the 1560s,
he could have disliked some of the policies of Philip II's governmentand espe-
cially its persecutionof religious dissent. One of the paintingsthathas seemed
to lend itself to this view is TheMassacre of TheInnocents,of which there are
two versions. Its subject, the biblical scene describedin Matthew2:16, is the
slaughterof the infantmale childrenof Bethlehem at King Herod'sorder.The
settingis a snow-coveredFlemish village where soldiersare shown seizing and
killing childrenamidst the pleas and lamentationsof parentsand villagers. In
the center of the pictureand obviously in commandof the action sits a black-
clad figure on a horse at the head of a crowdof cavalry.21It has been arguedthat
the paintingis an allusion to the cruel and punitive treatmentof a Netherland-
ish communityby Spanishsoldiery and thatthe mountedfigure in black is the
duke of Alva, whom Philip II despatchedwith Spanisharmyunits to the Neth-
erlandsto suppressthe revolt.22Both versionsof the paintingareundated,how-
ever,andwere probablydone around1565-67, hence priorto the dukeof Alva's
arrivalin the Netherlandsin August 1567.23The red-uniformedmen in the
picturehave also been identified as locally raised Walloon troops ratherthan

20 See van Mander'swords in NorthernRenaissance Art 1400-1600: Sources and Docu-

ments,40.
21 The two
versions of this paintingare reproducedin Grossmann,Bruegel ThePaintings,
nos. 110-13.
22
Stanley Ferber,"PeterBruegel and The Duke of Alba," Renaissance News, 19 (1966),
205-19.
23 For discussions of the
date, see Grossmann,Bruegel ThePaintings, 199, and the critical
survey of dates and attributionsin the catalogue of the 1969 Bruegel exhibition in the Brussels
Royal Museumof FineArts commemoratingthe 400th anniversaryof the artist'sdeath,Bruegel:
ThePainter and His World(Brussels, 1969), 96-97.
Pieter Bruegel 81

Spanish.24The biblical episode is presented, moreover, in such a dispassionate,

matter-of-fact manner that it is difficult to regard it as an expression of protest.
If Bruegel meant to make a political statement in this work, it is well hidden.
The Massacre of The Innocents is similar to another of Bruegel's paintings on
a New Testament subject, The Numbering at Bethlehem in Brussels, dated by
the artist 1566, which also depicts a Flemish village in winter.25This suggests
that the two works are related and may both be simply unproblematic illustra-
tions of the gospel story.
Another example of a work that has been taken to contain a political mes-
sage is the enigmatic drawing, The Beekeepers (see figure 2), usually dated
around 1567-1568, whose meaning several Bruegel scholars have recently dis-
cussed.26 It pictures three beekeepers wearing padded garments and protective
wicker screens that completely hide their faces, who are working with some
beehives. Behind them at the right stands a tree holding a man who has climbed
up one of its limbs. A Flemish inscription in the artist's own hand states that
"He who knows where the nest is has the knowledge; he who robs it has the
nest." The eerie impression conveyed by the masked figures, their apparent
unawareness of the man in the tree, and the inscription's implication that he is
robbing a birdnest, although no nest can be seen, all make the drawing appear
something of a riddle.
A recent reading by Jetske Sybesma explains it as a veiled attack on Ca-
tholicism and the Spanish regime, in which the beekeepers represent the secret
agents of the Inquisition who are repairing the hives, the symbol of the Catho-
lic church. She relates it to the notorious anti-Catholic satire, The Beehive of
The Holy Roman Church, by the Calvinist propagandist Philippe Marnix de St.
Aldegonde, who later became the secretary of William of Orange, the leader of
the Netherlands rebellion.27Mamix's tract, however, was not published in Dutch
until 1569 and hence probably postdates the drawing. Aside from this awk-
ward fact, Sybesma's interpretation involves numerous guesses and improb-
abilities, for instance that Bruegel was worried that his widow would be inter-
rogated by the Inquisition, which make it unconvincing.

24
CharlesTerlinden,"PierreBruegel le Vieux et l'Histoire,"RevueBeige d 'Archaeologieet
d'Histoirede l'Art,2 (1942), 244-45. Terlindenis criticalof political interpretationsof Bruegel's
work and sees him as an observer who painted the world as it is, presentedthe truthwithout
criticizing it, and refrainedfrom passingjudgment.
25
Reproducedin Grossmann,Bruegel The Paintings, nos. 115-19, and see the comment,
200.
26
Reproducedin CatalogueNew York2001, no. 107;the accompanyingcommentarybriefly
notes some interpretationsof its content.
27 Jetske Sybesma, "TheReceptionof Bruegel's Beekeepers:A Matterof Choice,"Art Bul-

letin, 73 (1991), 467-78.

82 Perez Zagorin

Figure 2: Pieter Bruegel, the Elder (c. 1525-1569), TheBeekeepers;

StaatlicheMuseen zu Berlin.

A more subtleandelaborateaccountis given in the recentbook on Bruegel

by Ethan MattKavaler,who associates the drawingwith an assortmentof con-
temporaryprints and literarytexts to perceive its meaning in primarilymoral
terms. In accord with his conception of Bruegel's oeuvre as a whole, he sees
TheBeekeepersas the artist'sdepictionof a society understressfrom the pres-
sure of economic and social change. "Thejuxtapositionof the nest robberand
the beekeepers,"he claims, "suggestsan oppositionof systems."The nest rob-
ber is pursuinga separatepersonalgoal, and "obliviousto the keepersbeneath
him ... has implicitly renouncedthe ideal of harmoniouscollective industry
and mutualdependence;he has climbed above the otherworkersand opted for
free agency."Kavalerrelates this observationin turnto the sixteenth-century
expansionof commercialcapitalismandthe new spiritof self-interestandprofit-
seeking in Antwerp and the Netherlands,which stimulates entrepreneurship
and challenges fortune but underminescommunity ties and social harmony.
Viewing the work in this light as the representationof a communalethic op-
posed to individualenterprise,he arguesthatits distinctivestructure"suggests
a threatto an establishedand effective social hierarchyand the onset of a divi-
sive individualisticethos."More generally,he concludes that it picturesto the
viewer a world in conflict in which the interests of different groups are op-
posed and standardsof behaviorin dispute.28To understandTheBeekeepersin
this way, however, places a very heavy burdenof interpretationupon it that it
can hardlybear.The man in the tree, for example, might be merely a villager

28
Kavaler,Parables of Orderand Enterprise,237, 253-54, and the entire discussion, 233-
54.
Pieter Bruegel 83

robbinga nest, a common-enoughoccurrencethatcauses loss to no one, while

the beekeepers are too occupied with their work to take notice of him. The
drawing'sinscription,moreover,need have no referenceto the beekeepersin
making the practicalpoint that possessing something of value is better than
knowing aboutit.

II. Of all the associationsattributedto Bruegel thatmight throwsome light

on his intellectual development and philosophical outlook, the only one for
which solid evidence exists is his friendshipwith Ortelius, the owner of his
paintingTheDeath of The Virgin.Knowledge of theirrelationship,however,is
almost entirelylimited to what Orteliussays in the Latineulogy or commemo-
ration he wrote about the deceased artistin his AlbumAmicorumor Book of
Friends, which has been called "the most sensitive analysis of Bruegel's art
[that] we have from the sixteenth century."29 Keeping an album of this kind
was a common practiceof many scholarsand literarymen of the time. Its pur-
pose, as in Ortelius's case, was to collect the autographsof friends and their
expressionsof regard.The contentsof such books reflected the classical inter-
ests and humanisticcultureof the collector and the contributors.The entriesin
Ortelius's album included poems, addresses, engraved portraits,and devices
which his friendsoffered him in tribute.In it he also insertedstatementsof his
own, among them his eulogy of Bruegel, written about 1573, which he said
was "dedicatedin grief to the memory of his friend"who had died four years
earlier.30Thick with classical allusions, it extols the artistas the most perfect
painterof his age, so true to naturethat his works were really works of nature
rather than of art. Among his encomia Ortelius also observes that Bruegel
"paintedmany things thatcannotbe painted[Multapinxit, hic Brugelius,quae
pingi non possunt], as Pliny said of Apelles," andthatin all of his works "more
is always understoodthanis painted [Intellegiturplus semper quampingitur],
as Pliny said about Timanthes"(Pliny, Natural History, xxxv.50, 74). These
last comments do not imply that Bruegel's was an esoteric art which hid its
meaning. What they do is exalt the painter'srankby placing him in the same
category as the foremost artistsof antiquity,includingApelles, reputedlythe
greatest of all, whom the elder Pliny discussed in the famous account of an-
cient paintershe gave in his Natural History. Erasmushad previously quoted
the second of these sayings by Pliny, a well known compliment,in referenceto
the work of Durer.3'
29
Gibson, Bruegel, 199. I have used the facsimile reproductionof the album in Album
AmicorumAbrahamOrtelius,ed. JeanPuraye(Amsterdam,1969).
30Ortelius'sLatin eulogy is recordedon f. 12 of the Album;Marijnissen,103-4, printsboth
the Latin original and an English translation;an English translationis included in Northern
Renaissance
Art1400-1600:SourcesandDocuments,37-38.
31 For Erasmus'sstatement,see NorthernRenaissanceArt 1400-1600: Sources and Docu-
ments,123.
84 Perez Zagorin

At the time he penned his eulogy of Bruegel Orteliuswas renowned as a

scholar and erudite geographerand compiler of maps. With the exception of
his friendGerardMercator,he was the most importantcartographerof the six-
teenth century.32The first edition of his atlas, TheatrumOrbis Terrarum,pub-
in
lished Antwerpin 1570 with a dedicationto Philip II of Spain, established
his fame. Beside laterLatineditions, this work was also issued in epitomes and
in numeroustranslations,going throughat least twenty-five editions duringhis
lifetime.33In recognitionof his greatreputation,the king in 1573 awardedhim
the title of GeographerRoyal, which was personallypresentedto him by his
representativethe duke of Alva shortly before the latterdepartedthe Nether-
lands. It needs to be kept in mind that Orteliusreceived this honor at a time
when partsof the Netherlandswere in full revolt againstthe Spanishmonarch's
governmentand the blood was not yet dry from the duke of Alva's repressive
measures as GovernorGeneralof the provinces appointedto crush the rebel-
lion.
The circle of humanistsof which Ortelius was a member, and to which
Bruegelscholarshabituallyrefer,includedthe celebratedclassicalscholar,editor
of Tacitus,andpromoterof neostoicismJustusLipsius;the Spanishpriest,theo-
logian, and HebraistBenito Arias Montano,who spent some years in Antwerp
andwas an adviserto the duke of Alva; andthe FrenchmanChristophePlantin,
the most importantprinterand publisher in the Netherlands,whose firm in
Antwerpbroughtout all the editions of the Theatrumfrom 1579 on. All three
were among the contributorsto Ortelius'sAlbumAmicorum.Because of his
role as publisher,Plantinwas probablythe center of this circle.34A man who
constantlyaffirmedhis loyalty to Philip II's rule, he had the distinctionof pro-
ducingone of the greatmonumentsof sixteenth-century scholarship,the Antwerp
Polyglot Bible of 1572, of which Arias Montano was the editor and the king
32
Unlike Mercator,Orteliusdid not devise any map projectionsbut devoted himself to the
criticalediting and artisticpresentationof maps; see the accountof him in Dictionary of Scien-
tific Biography,ed. CharlesC. Gillispie (16 vols.; New York, 1974), s.v. His work and achieve-
ments as a geographerare the subject of the recent well illustratedcollection of essays com-
memoratingthe 400th anniversaryof his death,AbrahamOrteliusand TheFirstAtlas, ed. Marcel
van den Broecke, Petervan derKrogt,PeterMeurer(Westrenen,1998); see also the biographical
sketch in the introductionto Ortelius'sAlbumAmicorum, 1-8, and the essays by Leon Voet,
"AbrahamOrteliusandHis World,"andMarcelP.R. van den Broecke, "Introductionto The Life
andWorkof AbrahamOrtelius(1527-1598)," in AbrahamOrteliusand TheFirst Atlas.
33 For a list of editions of Ortelius'sTheatrumOrbis Terrarumin Latinand otherlanguages,
see AbrahamOrteliusand TheFirst Atlas, 379-81.
34 On Lipsius,AriasMontano,and Orteliusandtheirassociationwith Plantin,see Hamilton,

TheFamily of Love, chs. IV-V;B. Rekers,Benito Arias Montano (1527-1598) (London, 1972),
passim; Perez Zagorin, Waysof Lying: Dissimulation, Persecution, and Conformityin Early
ModernEurope(Cambridge,Mass., 1990), 122-25; Lipsius's work as a scholarandpopularizer
of neostoicism is discussed by GerhardOestreich,Neostoicism and The Modern State (Cam-
bridge, 1982), pt. I, and MarkMorford,Stoics and Neostoics: Rubensand The Circle of Lipsius
(Princeton,1991).
Pieter Bruegel 85

the patron.As a rewardfor his services, Philip gave Plantinthe title of Typog-
rapherRoyal in 1571 and with it the profitablemonopoly of the printingof
missals and breviariesfor the Spanishclergy.35
Although seemingly a conforming Catholic, it has been known since the
late nineteenthcenturythatPlantinwas a secret adherentof the hereticalFam-
ily of Love sect, with whose founderandprophet,the merchantHendrikNiclaes
(1502-c. 1580), he had close ties. He printedmany of Niclaes's writings,which
the latter's followers in several countries distributedwidely through under-
groundchannels.Niclaes's financialsupportwas vital to him both in establish-
ing his printingfirm and in maintainingits existence throughvariousdifficul-
ties.36When at the end of the 1560s a schism divided the Family of Love in
which Niclaes's formerdisciple HendrikBarrefelt,otherwiseknown as Hiel or
Light of God, emerged as a rival prophet,Plantinbecame one of his followers
and the printerof some of his tracts.37Althoughhe was occasionally suspected
of printinghereticalbooks and holding heterodoxopinions, he was never pros-
ecuted for any of these offenses and remainedunscathedin a period of severe
religious persecution.In the course of the Netherlandsrebellionhe maintained
cordial relations not only with Spanish officials and government authorities
but also with the rebel leaderWilliam of Orange,publishingthe propagandaof
both sides without sufferingharmfrom either.38
The Family of Love belonged to the spiritualistwing of the ProtestantRef-
ormation,a type of religion thatbrushedaside the literalandhistoricalsense of
Scriptureas a dead letterand held thattrueChristianityhad nothingto do with
any visible churchor creed. In their place, it exalted the spiritdwelling within
the individual believer throughwhich God communicates His presence and
truth.Familismdisdainedrites and ceremonies,which it looked upon as child-
ish toys suitable only for the uninitiated.Niclaes's works emphasized love,
peace, and salvationthroughthe individual'sexperientialcommunionwith the
spirit within by which he or she becomes "godded"or deified. Indifferentto
doctrinaldivisions and confessional quarrels,the Familists considered them-
selves as having transcendedthe inferiorexternalreligion of the Protestantand

35 Rekers,Benito Arias Montano, 76.

36 ForPlantin's
relationshipwithNiclaes andthe Familyof Love, see Max Rooses, Christophe
Plantin ImprimeurAnversois (Antwerp, 18902),ch. IV; HermanDe La FontaineVerwey,"The
Family of Love," Quaerendo,6 (1976), 219-71; Hamilton,The Family of Love, chs. IV-V.The
Family of Love and its membersas an undergroundreligious society are discussed in Zagorin,
Waysof Lying, ch. 6.
37 See the accounts in Rooses, ChristophePlantin, ch, IV, and Hamilton, The Family of
Love, ch. V.
38 See Hamilton,passim, andLeon Voet, TheGoldenCompasses(2 vols.; Amsterdam,1969-

72), 1, 55, 66-68, 102-4, 105-13.

86 Perez Zagorin

Catholicchurchesin embracinga spiritualand inwardfaith that aimed at per-

sonal identificationwith God.39
The Bruegel scholars who have spoken of the Family of Love in connec-
tion with the artisthave generally overlooked the fact that the sect's members
considered it licit and justifiable to deny their true beliefs before the world,
convinced that as long as their heartswere inwardlypure, they committedno
sin by conformingoutwardlyto the state churcheswhereverthey resided.As I
have shown elsewhere, the rationalizationand methodicaluse of dissimulation
to avoid persecutionand mislead hostile inquirerswas one of the sect's hall-
marks, causing both Catholic and Protestantecclesiastical and political au-
thoritiesto accuse its membersof religious deceit and hypocrisy.40Its reliance
on dissimulationwas in full accord with the prophetNiclaes's own teaching;
for he himself had almost always lived a clandestine existence under a false
identity and was consistently opposed to martyrdomfor the sake of faith. Be-
cause exteriorprofession was of no importancecomparedto the supremacyof
the indwelling spirit,he instructedhis followers to conform to the worship of
the state-supportedchurchesfrom which they were inwardlyseparated.In tak-
ing this position, Familism was part of the wider phenomenon known as
Nicodemism, a term derived from the Pharisee Nicodemus in the gospel of
John (John3:1-2), who believed in Christbut hid his faith out of fear.It was in
reference to Nicodemus that the French reformerJohn Calvin denounced as
"Nicodemites"the Protestantsunder Catholic rule who concealed and dis-
sembled their faith by attendingCatholic services to evade persecution.41
Ortelius,Lipsius,AriasMontano,andotherassociatesof Plantinwere like-
wise affiliated with the Family of Love.42Rene Boumans's comment on
Ortelius'sreligion applies to all of them:theirCatholicism"was only intended
for the outwardworld."43Connection with the sect, as Leon Voet noted, re-
quiredfrom its adherents"theutmost secrecy and ... the necessity to blend, in
the perceptionof the outer world, with the denominationthat fitted them best,
be it Catholic,Lutheran,or Calvinist."44 The Familists' belief in their spiritual
to
superiority ordinary Christians was well suitedto thesehumanistsandscholars
who regardedthemselves as an intellectualelite. Faced with the contemporary

39 For the natureof spiritualismas a type of religion and Familism as one of its manifesta-
tions, see GeorgeH. Williams, TheRadicalReformation(Philadelphia,1962), ch. 19 andpassim;
Hamilton, TheFamily of Love, chs. I-II.
40 See Zagorin, Waysof Lying, ch. 6.
41 For Nicodemism as a doctrineand rationalizationof
religious dissimulationand Calvin's
polemic against it, see ibid., ch. 4.
42Ibid., 122-24; Hamilton,The
Family ofLove, chs. IV-V;Voet,"AbrahamOrteliusandHis
World."
43 Rene Boumans, "The Religious Views of AbrahamOrtelius,"Journal
of The Warburg
and CourtauldInstitutes, 17 (1954), 377.
44Voet, "AbrahamOrteliusand His
World,"27.
Pieter Bruegel 87

religious quarrels and the rebellion in the Netherlands, they strove to remain
above the battle. At heart they were neutralists, politiques, and dissemblers
who disguised their true convictions behind a facade of religious orthodoxy
and submission to the powers that be. Ortelius's correspondence, as Boumans
observed, gives the impression that he stood "entirely outside the political-
religious conflict of the sixteenth century."45Averse to fanaticism and violence,
inwardly free of allegiance to either the Catholic or any of the great Protestant
churches, and preferring stability and order whatever the price to religious up-
heaval and the misery and slaughter of civil war, he cultivated a privatistic
ethic of political abstention and detachment, desiring above all to live quietly
and to cultivate his own personal interests as far as possible.46
Whether Bruegel himself shared this point of view is an unanswerable ques-
tion. Despite his friendship with Ortelius, no evidence has been produced that
he had any tie to Familism or subscribed to its tenets.47We have no reason to
suppose either that he was ever anything but a Catholic. Some of his religious
paintings are clearly Catholic in character. This is true not only of The Death of
The Virgin, but of such works as The Adoration of The Kings, the Bosch-like
Fall of The Rebel Angels, and Christ on The Road to Calvary.48

III. Among the works that demonstrate Bruegel's exceptional originality

are his landscapes, which have a unique place in Netherlandish and European
art. Traveling through the Alps on his way to Italy, he probably made many
sketches that helped him develop his distinctive vision of nature. Certain beau-
tiful and delicate drawings of mountain scenery previously attributed to him
have recently ceased to be accepted as his.49 A number of his surviving early
drawings, however, dating from the 1550s, like Mountain Landscape with Ridge
and Valley, Mountain Landscape with River and Travelers, Landscape with
Saint Jerome, and Alpine Landscape (see figure 3), reveal some of the charac-
teristics of his approach to landscape aiming at truth to nature. The spaces in
them are vast, reaching far into the distance; the mountain forms are massive,

45
Boumans, "The Religious Views of AbrahamOrtelius,"376.
46
See Nicola Mout's essay, "TheFamily of Love (Huis der Liefde) andThe Dutch Revolt,"
Britain and The Netherlands, 8, ed. A. C. Duke and C. A. Tamse (The Hague, 1981). Mout
emphasizesthe Familists'avoidanceof taking sides and unwillingness to fight or suffermartyr-
dom, and commentsthatthey "chose the middle path, which was the way to safety"( 92).
47 On this point, see also the comments in Gibson, Bruegel, 121.
48
Reproducedin Grossmann,Bruegel ThePaintings, nos. 4, 77, 32-35, 63-74. In a recent
essay WalterS. Melion emphasizedthe fact that Galle's engraving of Bruegel's Death of The
Virgin,which Ortelius commissioned, was a markedly Catholic image; "'Ego enim quasi
obdormivi.'SalvationandBlessed Sleep in PhilipGalle'sDeath of The VirginafterPieterBruegel,"
NederlandsKunsthistorischJaarboek, 47 (1996), 14-53.
49The exclusion of these works from Bruegel's oeuvre was due to Hans Mielke's revision-
ary 1996 catalogue of his drawings;see Nadine M. Omstein's comments, CatalogueNew York
2001, 266-67.
88 Perez Zagorin

Figure 3: Pieter Bruegel, the Elder (c. 1525-1569), Alpine Landscape;

Musee du Louvre, Paris, France.

high, and irregular,their sides showing great rock faces or dotted with trees;
the skies arewide andfilled with shapesof clouds;andthe men, animals,houses,
churches,castles, and towns visible upon the landscape appearwithin it as a
small, integral part of the whole. While these works portraythe grandeurof
nature,other early drawingssuch as StreamwithAn Angler and Cow Pasture
beforeA Farmhouse, depict natureon a smaller,more intimate scale with an
aspect of tendernessand serenity surroundingthe figures in the scene.50
In a notable essay of 1979, Justus Miller Hofstede held that Bruegel's
friendshipwith Orteliuswas the only reliablebasis for reconstructingthe intel-
lectual backgroundof his art,and thereforeused it as the point of departurefor
an interpretationof the painter's landscapes.51Addressing the question of
whether Bruegel's feeling for landscape was linked to a more general philo-
sophicalperspective,he finds the answerin the humanistoutlook of Orteliusas

50The
drawingsmentionedabove are reproducedin ibid., nos. 4, 9, 11, 12, 18, 19. I cannot
agreewith the observationof MartinRoyalton Kisch, in an essay that stresses the importanceof
Italian influences upon Bruegel's conception of landscape, that his drawings transformland-
scape into an "idealizedarenawithinwhich figuresandanimalsarepittedagainstnature,andthe
transitoryinsubstantialworks of man againstGod's durablecreation";"PieterBruegel as Drafts-
man:The ChangingImage,"CatalogueNew York2001, 21.
51Justus Miiller Hofstede, "Zur
Interpretationvon Bruegels Landschaft. Aesthetischer
Landschaftsbegriffund Stoische Weltbetrachtung,"in Pieter Bruegel und seine Welt,ed. Otto
von Simson and MatthiasWinner(Berlin, 1979).
Pieter Bruegel 89

shapedby Stoicism, with which he held the painterfelt a kinshipas a landscape

artist.
Ortelius'sStoicism was evident in the sayings by Cicero and Seneca which
he placed as emblems on the world map in the TheatrumOrbis Terrarum's
1592 and latereditions.52Muller Hofstede believes thatthese quotationsserve
as keys to both his mind andhis intentionsas a cosmographer.They all empha-
size the smallness and insignificance of human affairs in comparison with
philosophy'svision of the greatnessof the cosmos as a thoughtthe wise under-
stand.They also pictureman as bound to the earthand yet created,unlike the
lower animals, to reflect upon the universe. The most prominentquotationis
one from Cicero enclosed in a cartoucheat the bottom of the two hemispheres
of the world map, which declares: "Whatcan seem great in human affairs to'
someone who is acquaintedwith eternity and the vastness of the universe"
(TusculanaeDisputationes, 4.17.37). Two sayings from Seneca speak of the
laughablenessof man's ambitionson an earthscarredby the wars of so many
nations (Naturales Quaestiones,I, praef. 8), and express the wish that "as the
entiretyof the world comes into our view, would thatthe whole of philosophy
could occurto us"(EpistulaeMorales, 14.89.1). AnotherquotationfromCicero
affirmsthat "thehorse is createdto pull and to carry,the ox to plow, the dog to
guardand to hunt;man, however, was born to contemplatethe universe"(De
NaturaDeorum, 2.37). MullerHofstede also notes some additionalstatements
of Cicero, not quotedin the Theatrum,thatOrteliuswould have known, which
praise the beauty and orderof the world pervadedby mind, and the admirable
things of the earth, land, seas, and animals. This Stoic philosophy, Muller
Hofstede thinks,recommendeditself the more to Orteliusbecause it lent itself
to a Christianinterpretationand harmonizedwith his religious position which
regardedconfessional strife with indifferenceand dislike.53
In the last partof his essay he arguesthat Bruegel would have been influ-
enced by Ortelius'sphilosophicalview in evolving his own conceptionof land-
scape. This conception picturedthe world as rational,orderly,purposive, and
beautiful, thus combining a rationalisticand an aesthetic attitudeto nature.It
enabled Bruegel to develop his landscapeart into cosmic "Weltlandschaften"
or "worldlandscapes"betokeninga new contemplativeapproachto naturesuch
as appearsin the five greatpaintingsbelonging to the series of The Months or
Seasons in Vienna, Prague, and New York.54These famous works depict the
52
This world map with the engravedcitations from Cicero and Seneca at its bottom and its
four comers is reproducedin Rodney Shirley, "The WorldMaps in The Theatrum,"Abraham
Orteliusand TheFirst Atlas, 180. The Cicero citation at its bottom was alreadyincluded in the
map in Theatrum'sfirst ed. of 1570, reproducedin ibid., 180; the other four citations first ap-
pearedin the copy in the 1592 ed.
53 Muller Hofstede, "ZurInterpretationvon Bruegels Landschaft,"129-37.
54 Reproducedin Grossmann,
Bruegel The Paintings, nos. 79-84, 85-90, 91-98, 99-103,
104-9.
90 Perez Zagorin

changes of the landscapeand the differentphases of natureitself. This vision,

accordingto Miiller Hofstede, reflects the Stoic outlook on the world, and he
observes how the peasant and other figures fit into these various scenes as
creaturesbelongingto a naturalorderthatincludesbothworkandleisure.Along-
side the attitudetowardnatureexpressedin these landscapes,he also points to
Bruegel's recognition of another sphere of existence which he likewise de-
picted,the irrationalandupside-downworldof humanaffairspresentedin paint-
ings like the NetherlandishProverbs,Christon TheRoad to Calvary,andSaul's
Suicide.55In such worksMiller Hofstede discernsthe Stoic wise man'spercep-
tion of the vanity and nothingness of human desires and men's strivings for
fame that was one of the leitmotifs of Ortelius'sphilosophy and a Stoic theme
likewise fundamentalin Bruegel's landscapes.56
Bruegel is widely recognizedas the first Europeanartistto treatnatureand
landscapeas an independentsubjectin its own right.Miller Hofstede's discus-
sion of the affinitiesbetween his landscapeartand Ortelius'sStoic philosophy
may well throw light on some of the origins of the thought expressed in the
painter'swork.His view was acceptedby the late HansMielke, anotherpromi-
nent Bruegel scholar,in his recent catalogue of Bruegel's drawings.57There is
a problem,however, arisingfrom the fact thatBruegel died in 1569, while the
first edition of Ortelius'sTheatrumwas not publisheduntil the following year.
We also have to wonder whether the artist knew or was capable of reading
Cicero and Seneca. As a solution to these difficulties, Miller Hofstede and
Mielke both suppose that Ortelius traveled to Italy with Bruegel and would
then have discussed his Theatrumwith the artist. Although it is possible, of
course, that the two did talk of Ortelius'sbook at some time or other,it is not
likely that they went to Italy together,because if they had done so it would
probably have been mentioned somewhere in the contemporarydocuments
pertainingto one or the other of the two men.58It should be noted, moreover,
that in his book of 1989 on the world landscapein sixteenth-centuryFlemish
painting, Walter S. Gibson presents an illuminating discussion of Bruegel's
treatmentof natureand landscapeover the course of his careerwhich places it
principallywithin the development of NetherlandishRenaissance art. In that
context, which includes both various contemporariesand Patiniras Bruegel's
most importantpredecessorwho was famous for his picturesof saints in pan-
oramicvistas of mountains,valleys, towns, fields, and rivers, the evolution of

55 Ibid., nos. 13-14, 46-47, 63-74.

56
Miiller Hofstede, "ZurInterpretationvon Bruegels Landschaft,"137-47.
57
Mielke, Pieter Bruegel. Die Zeichnungen,25-26.
58 Ortelius'stravels are listed
by van de Broecke, 35-36. Although he traveledwidely and
visited Italy twice in the 1550s, there is no evidence that he did so in companywith Bruegel.
Pieter Bruegel 91

his cosmic vision of landscapehas been explainedwithoutreferenceto Ortelius

or Stoic philosophy.59

IV. It is not his landscapes,however,but his portrayalof peasantsthathas

been the subjectof the widest discussionandcontroversyamongBruegelschol-
ars for the past several decades. In her book of 1994, MargaretA. Sullivan
made Bruegel's relationshipto Orteliusthe key to her study of his paintingsof
peasants.60She based her approachto the problemof interpretationon recep-
tion or reader-responsetheoryand hence, in Bruegel's case, upon an examina-
tion of his audience as an interpretivecommunity.Assuming that he was a
memberof the humanistcircle of Ortelius,she believes his artshows the influ-
ence of this associationandthatthe surestway to determineits meaning,there-
fore, is to establishwhat his humanistfriendsexpected to find in it, since as his
intimatesandpeers they would best know his outlook andaims.WithOrtelius's
AlbumAmicorumas her chief source, she estimates that aroundeighty men
belonged to the circle of Bruegel's associates and compriseda significantpart
of his audience. Consisting of writers,artists,scholars,educators,physicians,
theologians,andpublishers,they constitutedwhat she calls an educatedmiddle
class whose values and interestsshe attemptsto reconstruct.HumanistChris-
tians well readin ancientliteratureand with a strongattractionto Stoicism as a
moral philosophy, they tended to be moderates in religion and admirersof
Erasmus,whom they emulatedin seeking a synthesis of Christianityand clas-
sical thought to guide the conduct of life. Words and images were virtually
interchangeableto them,andpaintingandpoetrysisterartsas vehicles of mean-
ing. As lovers of classical satire, they took a condescending,comical view of
peasants, accordingto Sullivan, regardingthem as crude, foolish, animal-like
beings whose lives were uncontrolledby reason or piety and who indulged
theirpassions andwastedtheirresourcesin immoraldrinkinganddancing.She
holds that the same attitudewas also prevalentin contemporaryart and litera-
ture.
Following this preliminarycharacterizationof the artist'saudienceand its
values, Sullivanproceedsto a close analysisof his two paintings,PeasantDance
and Peasant WeddingFeast.61In a fine display of scholarship,she correlates

59WalterS. Gibson, "Mirrorof The Earth": The WorldLandscape in Sixteenth-Century

Flemish Painting (Princeton,1989), ch. 5. Although Gibson often refers in this book to Ortelius
andhis work as a cartographer,he says nothingaboutthe latter'sintellectualinfluenceon Bruegel
and does not cite MullerHofstede or mention Stoicism, which is not listed in his index.As he has
done elsewhere,he also commentshere (61) on the tendencyof scholars"toexaggerateBruegel's
eruditionand profundity."
60 MargaretA. Sullivan, Bruegel s Peasants: Art and Audience in The Northern Renais-

sance (Cambridge,1994).
61
Reproducedin Grossmann,Bruegel ThePaintings, nos. 129-37.
92 Perez Zagorin

theirdetails with numeroustexts from classical literature,especially Latin au-

thors,andfrom sixteenth-centuryhumanistssuch as Erasmusandothers,which
express a negative attitudeto peasantsand theirfoolish and dissolute behavior
when not engaged in their daily labor.It is such behavior,she maintains,that
Bruegel satirizes and exposes in his pictures of peasants.This conclusion de-
pends upon the essential claim that the friends and peers who made up the
artist's audience and were in the best position to judge the meaning of his
pictures,would probablyhave known the authorsandtexts she quotes, andthat
these texts not only shapedtheirbroaderphilosophy but guided theirinterpre-
tation of the artists'swork as a critiqueof peasantmores and conduct.
Like many previous Bruegel scholars,however, Sullivan accepts entirely
without proof that his friendshipwith Orteliusindicates his involvement in a
company of artistsand intellectualswhose values he sharedand who formed
his primaryaudience. In fact, Orteliushimself had not met personally all the
men whose entries one finds in his Album Amicorum;his sole contact with
some of them, as their inscriptionsreveal, was throughletters. Among those
whom Sullivan includes as members of Bruegel's audience, most may never
even have seen his peasantor other paintings.This is quite likely because his
works were owned only by privatecollectors and could be viewed only in their
houses. Thereis no ground,in any case, for the suppositionthatall these people
were Bruegel's friends or belonged to his "associative network." Save for
Ortelius,the men Sullivan names are only a hypotheticalaudience;if they did
actually see Bruegel's paintings,their personalresponse to them is unknown.
No evidence exists for assuming that the artisthad the eruditionto frame his
peasantswith classical exempla in mind, or that their viewers would all have
understoodhis picturesof peasantsin the same way or looked at them entirely
throughthe spectacles of classical literature.Instead,they might have appreci-
atedandrespondedto the humanityandgenial humorof these paintings,which
are so noticeable in them and may have been partof the reason thatpatronsof
Bruegellike the merchantsNicholas JonghelinckandJeanNoirotboughtthem.
Unmentionedin Sullivan's study was Hans-JoachimRaupp's 1986 book
on peasantsatires,an outstandingwork of art-historicalscholarshipwhich de-
votes its longest discussion to Bruegel and likewise sees his peasantpaintings
as satires.62Rauppcomes to this conclusion throughan extensive investigation
of the genre of peasant satire in German and Netherlandishart in the later
fifteenth and the sixteenthcenturies.He argues strongly that Bruegel's depic-
tions of festive peasantssuch as the Peasant WeddingFeast andPeasant Dance
belong to this graphic satiricaltradition,which served a variety of functions
and appealedto several differentkinds of audiences and tastes. He also main-

62
Raupp,Bauernsatiren,ch. IV; section 3 of this chaptertakes up questions of interpreta-
tion in Bruegel's representationof festive peasants.
Pieter Bruegel 93

tains that in understandingthe meaning of these works that fit into a genre,
questionslike Bruegel's personalattitudetowardpeasantsor his directknowl-
edge of peasantlife are irrelevantor of secondaryinterest.63
Disagreeing with the opinion that Bruegel presents a satirical, negative
pictureof peasantlife and recreations,a numberof scholarshave advancedan
opposing view. SvetlanaAlpers has perceived Bruegel's peasantscenes as be-
nign, sympathetic, and humorous images which the artist depicted in a
celebratoryspirit of festive comedy.64MargaretD. Carrollinsists that a posi-
tive conception of peasants and their festivities was a feature of the art and
literatureof Bruegel's time, quoting such examples as Erasmus'spraise of the
rustic simplicity and festive conviviality of the natives of Brabant.She con-
tends thatBruegel'sprintsof a peasantfair or holiday do not not condemnsuch
occasions and that his Peasant Dance in Vienna is a favorablerepresentation
of a village festival.65Reviewing the entire debate in 1991, WalterS. Gibson
emphasizes the existence of an alternativetraditionin early moder Europe
and the Netherlandsthat looked at peasants favorably as an estate worthy of
esteem because of their contributionto society. He sees the representationof
peasantsin Bruegel's paintingsas a mixtureof sympathyand toleranthumor,
the expressionby a greatrealist of the age-old dreamof rustic felicity and the
country as a place of abundanceand refuge from the city where the goddess
Astraeastill dwells.66
The latest discussion of this subjectis by EthanMattKavalerin his impor-
tant book on Bruegel, which proffers an interpretationof Peasant Wedding
Feast that differs not only from Sullivan's and Raupp'sbut from the view of
otherprevious scholars.In his first chapterhe devotes some pages to Ortelius
and the circle of Antwerphumanistsas an essential context althoughhe makes
no direct connection between the latterand Bruegel's work. In his judgment,
Peasant WeddingFeast shows an integratedcommunity of different estates
comprising both peasants and their social superiors (the picture includes a
Franciscanmonk and a gentlemanor squire seated at the banquettable at the

63
See Raupp'ssummarylist of propositionson the characterof these paintingsby Bruegel,
Bauernsatiren,298-99, and his conclusions on the function of the "festive peasant"theme in
Netherlandishart,316-21. As regardsthe latterhe points out that art scholarshave been almost
exclusively concernedwith the ideological functionof these pictures,while ignoringtheirother
functionsin cateringto differentaudiences and as a commodity in the artmarket.
64 SvetlanaAlpers, "Bruegel's Festive Peasants,"Simiolus, 6 (1972-73), 163-76. Alpers's
interpretationwas challenged by Hessel Miedema, "Realismand The Comic Mode: The Peas-
ant,"Simiolus, 9 (1977), 205-19, who contendedthatBruegel's images of peasantrevelry were
didacticworks reflectinga criticaland disparagingview of theirsubjectsuch as was common in
sixteenth-centurynorthernart.
65
MargaretD. Carroll,"PeasantFestivity and Political Identityin The SixteenthCentury,"
Art History, 10 (1987), 287-314.
66
Gibson, "Bruegeland The Peasants:A Problemof Interpretation,"17-23, 43.
94 Perez Zagorin

right), who are gatheredharmoniouslytogether in a moment of ideal social

relationships.The wedding feast thus provides an occasion to affirmthe iden-
tity of the community,and the picture's essential subjects are animation,en-
counter,and sharedexperience.Kavalersees Bruegel as respectfulof the indi-
vidualityof the peasantvillagers,whom he refrainsfromcaricaturingandtreats
as persons with their own emotional lives ratherthan as types. The basic hu-
manity with which he conceives them transcendstheir rustic manners,while
the painting as a whole reflects an embracing vision of community that ac-
knowledges individuality and subsumes class distinctions within the idea of
society whose membersbelong to a largerwhole.67Kavaler's reading of this
pictureis relatedto his more debatableconceptionof Bruegel's social orienta-
tion as conservative,traditionalist,and nostalgicallyattachedto the past and to
an older social orderwhich the forces of commercialcapitalismand religious
and political revolution were eroding. Bruegel was aware, he believes, of the
emergenceof new values of practicality,social mobility,pursuitof profit, and
individualinterest,which were replacingan ethos concernedfor stability and
the common good. His work accordingly"seems to advocatea returnto a hier-
archicalideal, sound and secure,"but also acknowledges "the passing of this
comfortingtraditionand the coming of a new order."68
Kavaler'sinterpretationof Bruegel's vision of his peasantsubjectsis much
more plausible than that of the historianswho explain its intention as critical
and satiric. A part of the artist's greatness lay in the inventiveness, wit, and
originalitywith which he was able to utilize and transforma familiargenre to
createsomethingstrikinglynew anddifferent.His portrayalof festive peasants
is far superiorin its compositional structureand masterly observationto the
picturesof the same subjectby PieterAertsen,JoachimBeuckelaer,Pietervan
derBorcht,andothercontemporaryartistsreproducedanddiscussedby Kavaler,
Raupp,Gibson, and otherscholars.69In works like Peasant WeddingFeast and
Peasant Dance, alive with energyandunmatchedin theirrealism,Bruegellooks
at his subjectwith an objectivitythatconveys the crudity,rowdiness,andcomic
side of the peasantsin theireating, drinking,and dancing.Yet he endows them
at the same time with a fully realized individualityof person and physical ac-
tivity which blends with theircollective identityas a social class, and he mani-
fests towardthem a sympathetichumanityand good naturein presentingthem
as country people engaged in their simple pleasures. The same qualities are
equally visible in the five magnificentworks that constitutethe survivingpart
of the series of The Months or Seasons commissioned for his residenceby the

67
Kavaler,Parables of Orderand Enterprise,26-27 and ch. 5, esp. 150-51, 183, and see
also the remarkon 258 that Bruegel "rarelysatirizedcommon folk...."
68Ibid., 255.
69Kavaler,Parables Orderand
of Enterprise,ch. 5; Raupp,Bauernsatiren,ch. IV; Gibson,
"Bruegeland The Peasants:A Problemof Interpretation."
Pieter Bruegel 95

merchantNicholas Jonghelinck,in which natureand landscapepredominate.

In this group of paintings, The Hunters in The Snow, The Gloomy Day,
Haymaking,The Harvest, and The Returnof The Herd, natureappearsin its
varied seasonal garb with its different atmospheresand weathers, while the
acutely and eloquently characterizedfigures who are occupied in theirdiverse
activities and labors as hunters,tree pruners,cultivators of the fields, cattle
drovers, and harvesters,all seem in harmonywith the naturalorder that sus-
tains them.70
Bruegel's oeuvre is far too rich and wide rangingfor it to be encompassed
in any single formulaor philosophicaldescription.It could be thathis contem-
porarieshad little problemin understandingmost of his creations,and he was
probablymuch more indebtedfor his themes and subjectsto the artistictradi-
tions of the Netherlandsand to Netherlandishfolklore, religion, and popular
culturethanto the writingsor ideas of philosophersor classical authors.Gibson
has shown in this connection how close the relationshipis between a number
of his allegorical works and the subjects and symbolism in the performances
put on by the rederijkersor chambersof rhetoricthat flourished in Antwerp
and othertowns as a manifestationof the popularcultureof the Netherlandsin
the sixteenthcentury.71 Certainof his greatestworksareclearly satirical,ironic,
andpessimistic in theirview of mankind.NetherlandishProverbs,for instance,
illustratesthe many kinds of foolish, absurd,and sinful behaviorthat are part
of the humanscene. Christon the Road to Calvary,in which we must searchto
find the small figure of Christin the center collapsing underthe weight of the
cross, presentsa vast spectacleof humancruelty,callousness, and indifference
aroundthe figures of the grieving Mary and her three attendantsin the fore-
ground.It also most pointedly and bitterly satirizes religious hypocrisy in its
portraitdetailof the soldiersseizing andforcingthe unwilling Simon of Cyrene
to help Jesus carrythe cross, while he tries to pull away aided by his wife, who
wears a rosary with a crucifix at her waist. The Triumphof Death contains a
fearsomevision of a sinful humanityattackedand overwhelmedby armies of
skeletons and cadaversin a fiery landscapeof apocalypticdevastationlacking
any sign of redemption.72
Otherworks seem so ambiguousor enigmaticthatit is perhapsimpossible
to penetratetheirmeaning and the artists'sintention.TheFall of Icarus can be
interpretedeither as a commentaryon the disastrousconsequences of over-
weening personalambitionwhich ensue when a man aspires to rise above his
station,or on the complete obliviousness and indifferenceof the ploughmanin

70
These paintingsare reproducedin Grossmann,Bruegel ThePaintings, nos. 79-109.
71
Gibson,Bruegel, 21-22, 62, 172-73, and"ArtistsandRederijkersin TheAge of Bruegel,"
Art Bulletin, 63 (1981), 426-46.
72
These three paintingsare reproducedin Grossmann,Bruegel ThePaintings, nos. 13-14,
63-74, 20-29.
96 Perez Zagorin

the pictureto Icarus'sdeath.73The drawingof Justicemade for the set of prints

of The Seven Virtues shows, along with its clerks, judges, lawyers, and the
allegoricalfigure of Iustitia, so many gallows and sights of flogging, hanging,
burning,and torturethat it might have been intendedas a satire ratherthan a
praiseof justice.74Magpie on TheGallows, a landscapepaintingin which three
peasantshave joined handsin a dance beneatha gallows on which a magpie is
perchedand with a cross in the background,certainlyseems to hint at a mean-
ing, but it is one that may be too obscureto fathom.75
With so little knowledge of Bruegel at our disposal, we may conclude that
we are never likely to understandhis mind fully or be certainof the meanings
of a numberof his works. My own view is that he was in large parta moralist
and ironistwith a deep vein of humanityand humorwho perceivedthe grotes-
querieand comedy in the endless spectacle of life, a penetratingobserverwho
had a poor opinion and small expectationsof mankindbut found a compensa-
tion for this pessimistic vision in his contemplationof the majestic,impersonal
orderof nature.Art scholarsand historiansof ideas, the northernRenaissance,
andrelatedfields will of course continueto studyhis creations,but it shouldbe
kept in view that what we don't know of him is perhapsnot very important
when we consider the universal appeal of his art and its incomparableinven-
tivenessandtransfiguringrealism,whichhaveprovidedus with greatandunique
images of his world and time.

Charlottesville,Virginia.

73The two versions of this

paintingare reproducedin ibid., nos. 3-3a; for discussions of its
meaning,see WalterS. Gibson,Bruegel, 40, and "Mirrorof TheEarth," 60; Stridbeck,235-42;
Beat Wyss, LandschaftmitIkarussturz.Ein Vexierbildder humanistischenPessimismus(Frank-
furt, 1990); Kavaler,Parables of Orderand Enterprise,ch. 2. W. H. Auden in his poem, "Musee
des Beaux-Arts,"took it as Bruegel's illustrationof people's capacity for disregardand turning
away in the presence of humansufferingand calamity.
74 This drawingis reproducedin
CatalogueNew York2001, no. 72.
75Reproducedin Grossmann,
Bruegel ThePaintings, nos. 153-54; see Kavaler'sdiscussion
of this painting,Parables of Orderand Enterprise,217-33 and passim.