Bowdoin College Museum of Art | - Storks Fighting Snakes

Preview image of work. pen and dark brown ink, brown wash, heightened with white on brown laid paper, Storks Fighting Snakes 4231

1956.24.266

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Storks Fighting Snakes

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Artist

Johannes van der Stradanus (Jan van der Straet, the younger) (Bruges, Belgium, 1523 - 1605, Florence, Italy)

Title

Storks Fighting Snakes

Creation Date

ca. 1596-1602

Century

16th-17th century

Dimensions

7 1/8 in. x 10 9/16 in. (18.1 cm. x 26.8 cm.)

Object Type

drawing

Creation Place

Europe, Flanders, Flanders

Medium and Support

pen and dark brown ink, brown wash, heightened with white on brown laid paper

Credit Line

Gift of Miss Susan Dwight Bliss

Copyright

Public Domain

Accession Number

1956.24.266

Two hunters shielded by a tree witness a fierce battle of storks against snakes. Royal menageries in sixteenth-century Europe featured bloody spectacles of interspecies fights to the death between exotic beasts, such as tigers and elephants. The bird and snake combat recorded in Book 10 of Pliny’s Natural History is described as taking place in Thessaly, Greece, where laws protected storks because of their snake-slaying potency. The engraving after this drawing has a four-line Latin verse below the image. It adds cranes to Pliny’s description and changes the locale: “Vast Appulia nourishes the scaly snakes. The crane and the stork attack their offspring. Here they wage a bitter war with beak and bite. This sportive event is watched by many farmers.”

Keywords: landscape with buildings animal(s) work on paper master drawing landscape with figures