Lot 1574
  • 1574

an English polychrome stone relief of the wheel of life, early 17th century

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Description

  • square section 100cm.; 39¼in.
the wheel centred by a crowned allegorical female figure of Fortune with radiating spokes supporting figures representing the seven stages of man: ENFANS / PUER / ADOLSCENS / JUVENIS / DECREPITU / FINIS and inscribed on the rim between the four outer figures straddling the wheel: LOOK WELL BEFORE / TAKE HEED BEHIND / BEWARE BY ME / MIND WELL THE END, further inscribed outside the wheel: I may and may not / I might and would not / I would and cannot / I will and will not; the wheel in relief against a square section with masks of the four Winds in each spandrel and four protruding tablets with further inscriptions