The Battle of Alexander at Issus
The Battle of Alexander ( Battle of Issus ) is regarded as the most famous large painting by the German painter Albrecht Altdorfer.
Description
The picture was taken in the period 1528-1529. Was commissioned by Duke Wilhelm IV of Bavaria. It shows the struggle of Alexander the Great against the Persian king Darius.
" A Composition in the higher historical styles, as in antiquity, or at Rafael, we must not look for sure, but we want to find a real knight battle with thousands of figures on foot and horseback; all heads, armor, grasses ec. executed with incomparable care, and behind it a fantastic landscape with mountains, rocks, towns and the sea, in which gold glowing rising sun reflected, while the moon is pale, symbols of victory of Alexander and the defeat of the Orientals. "
Altdorfer has meticulously reproduced the riders of the two armies in contemporary armor with pennants and banners, and the tent camp outside the city. In the foreground, the Greeks and the Persians fight. The Greeks are recognizable by their blue and white uniforms. The Persians fight in red clothes and wear some turbans. Due to the amount of the soldiers shown the impression of vast armies created. But the special of the painting is the depiction of the landscape and the setting sun, facing the rising moon.
In the left image center of dreispännige, überproportionierte chariot of Darius can be seen, which is followed by Alexander.
On the left side there is a mountain with ruins and castle rises. Links from the ruins fleeing soldiers can be seen. Further back, the city of Tarsus is shown.
In addition, Altdorfer has incorporated a map, in which, however, the south is on top. So is the middle ground and background to see as a representation of the Eastern Mediterranean: In the middle of the island of Cyprus lies behind the Red Sea can be seen right next to Egypt with the Nile, whose delta is seen by seven arms.
In between the clouds floating panel at the top of the screen is in Latin:
Translation:
"Alexander the Great defeated Darius for the last time after slain in the ranks of the Persians 100,000 infantry and 10,000 horsemen and mother, wife and children of Darius the king had been caught with no more than 1,000 fleeing in resolution horsemen. "
History
Altdorfer was awarded the contract to show for the Munich Residence, the battle between Alexander the Great and the Persian king Darius at the Battle of Issus in the context of a cycle of the ancient battle scenes by the Bavarian Duke Wilhelm IV in 1528. He refused to him being transferred mayor of Regensburg to complete this painting. It was shipped to Munich, where it remained for the next centuries.
In 1800, however, plundered French revolutionary troops Munich's collection of paintings and took 70 selected pictures to France. The Battle of Alexander Napoleon Bonaparte liked so much that he let them hang in his bathroom. In 1815, after the end of Napoleonic rule, however, it came back to Munich in the Alte Pinakothek.
The image no longer has its original size, because it was all around circumcised. In addition, the German text has been repainted in the Font box in the 17th century and translated into Latin.
Comment
Altdorfer one of the first creators of pure landscape painting without human figures. The Battle of Alexander is atypical for his work both in terms of size as well as on the subject, which is attributable to the contracting authority.
Altdorfer knew the image at the left bottom of the screen with his signature, the year 1529, and added to Latin added: ALBRECHT ALTORFER TO REGENSPVRG FECIT ( German: ., Albrecht Altdorfer to Regensburg has painted this picture ')
Rising Sun ( = West )
The fleeing Darius
The haunting Alexander
The battle is to act as a natural process or a cosmic confrontation, because this world-historical event was seen as a victory of the Greek West over the Persian acres of land. The crescent moon is the same as in the flag of the Turks, who were standing in front of Vienna in 1529. So Altdorfer conjures given the Turkish threat, the victory of the West ( the Sun) about the Orient ( the moon).
The painting should keep the memory of the strategic performance of Alexander awake, who had defeated a multiple odds. According to the figures in the painting Darius commanded 300,000 foot soldiers, Alexander only 32,000; Darius had 100,000 horsemen, Alexander only 4,000. One of the sources may have been the World Chronicle by Hartmann Schedel, with the most consistent numbers. The book was published in Nuremberg in 1493, 35 years before Altdorfer started painting the Battle of Issus. The mountain next to the Nile does not reflect reality, but agrees with the Schedel 's map match.
Altdorfer did not, however, to his written statements because of a superior numbers of the Persians is nothing to see on the picture. He also dresses the characters like people of his presence.
The philosopher Friedrich Schlegel saw the picture in the 1803 restoration hall of the Louvre ( after which it was located until 1815 in Napoleon's bathroom in Saint- Cloud) and wrote overwhelmed in his image Description:
"Should I call it a landscape, a historical painting or a piece of battle? "
The landscape Schlegel identified as " the ocean; then left the setting moon, right the rising sun; an equally significant as a great symbol of the history represented "by which he, however, was wrong. He was right but with his interpretation of the light mood as the last flash of the sun in the evening, to the ancient sources, the battle in favor of Alexander was decided.