The Master of the Aeneid (Maître de l’Énéide) is amongst the most celebrated 16th-century Limoges enamellers. Whilst his identity has remained elusive, the master’s existence is attested to by the survival of an important series of eighty-two superbly painted enamel plaques which depict episodes from Virgil’s Aeneid.
The series is unique in the history of Limoges enamelling ‘in its extensive and methodical reproduction of episodes from a single work of literature’ (Usher, op. cit., p. 162). No comparable corpus of Limoges enamels representing secular subjects exists.
The Aeneid enamels stand out for their dazzling visual effect. They are characterised by highly detailed Gothicising compositions, which are filled with action as protagonists strut across landscapes populated with fantastical cities and bordered by swelling oceans filled with medieval galleys. Each of the scenes has been enlived with lavishly applied gilding whilst the enamel itself has been applied over silver foil lending a beautiful shimmer to the deep mulberry, golden brown, dark blue and green hues.
In 2001 Sophie Baratte published the most exhaustive study of the Aeneid enamels to date, counting some eighty-two in public and private collections representing scenes from the first nine books of Virgil’s Aeneid. The largest holdings of Aeneid enamels can be found in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (fifteen); the musée du Louvre, Paris (eleven); the Walters Art Gallery Baltimore (seven); and those formerly in the collection of the dukes of Northumberland at Alnwick Castle in Northumberland. The present four plaques are the most significant grouping of Aeneid enamels to be offered on the art market since the sale of the Northumberland set in these rooms on 9 July 2014, lot 2.
Each of the enamels is unique. It is likely that other plaques existed but are lost to posterity. However, given that no plaques illustrating books 10, 11 or 12 of the Aeneid have been recorded, it has been presumed that the series was never completed due to the death or caprice of either artist or patron (LACMA, op. cit, p. 78).
The Sources for the Aeneid Enamels: Johann Grüninger and Sebastian Brant
The Aeneid enamels were first brought to international attention at the Paris Exposition universelle of 1867 when the playwright and bibliophile Victorien Sardou recognised that the scenes shared the same models as the illustrations to the Opera Virgiliana cum decem commentis published by Jean Crespin in 1529.
The ultimate source of the enamels (and the Crespin illustrations) has since been identified as being the Publii Virgilii Maronis opera cum quinque vulgatis commentarii, an influential compilation of Virgil’s texts with commentaries, published Johann Grüninger in 1502. The 215 accompanying woodcut illustrations by an anonymous printmaker are inspired by the humanist poet Sebastian Brant (1457/58-1521).
The northern graphic sources for the scenic compositions explain the Gothic characteristics of the Aeneid enamels. The bird’s-eye perspective, the armour, the turreted cityscapes and the stylised ships are all essentially Gothicizing elements which recall 15th-century manuscripts and Northern Renaissance painting. This Gothic flavour has led scholars to conclude that the Master of the Aeneid must have been active circa 1525 to 1530, since thereafter Limoges enamellers principally employed Italian models; enamels in the Gothic mode would have been unfashionable by that time (Marquet de Vasselot 1912, op. cit., pp. 17-19; Caroselli, op. cit., p. 79).
The Aenied enamels are not, however, slavish copies of outdated graphic sources. The enameller has sensitively introduced classicising elements which would have appealled to members of the Italophile court of François Ier. Gods are depicted nude and the figures are idealised and more rounded than in the printed sources. The enameller has employed a classicising typeface for the scrolled cartellini used to identify figures and places (as opposed to the uncials seen in the Grüninger illustrations). The effect is a pleasing blend of a Gothic pictorial language with Renaissance classical motifs.
One of the most charming elements (though evident in Grüninger’s prints) is the presence of figures in oriental costume with their Ottoman type turbans which recall the scuole cycles of Gentile Bellini and Vittore Carpaccio in 15th-century Venice. Such costumes appear to have been deliberately employed to signify the foreignness of Aeneas and his companions, who of course heralded from the Eastern Mediterranean.
The Identity of the Master of the Aeneid
Since their appearance in 1867, there has been considerable debate about the identity of the Master of the Aeneid. Darcel's 1867 Exposition Universelle catalogue mentions Couly Nouailher II and, in an article a year later, he defends an attribution to Couly Nouailher I. Terrassant was thought to be the maker of the plaques by the cataloguer of the Hamelin sale of 1867. Jean Penicaud II is said to be the author of the series in an 1874 exhibition catalogue in aid of the Alsace and Lorraine, and, in 1892, Charles Robinson thinks of a young Pierre Reymond in the catalogue of the Magniac sale. (Baratte, 2000, op.cit., p. 56). Wilhelm von Bode's attribution to the school of Jean Penicaud I in the catalogue of the Hainauer sale of 1897 is probably most understandable given the eldest Penicaud's colour schemes, use of gilding as heightening, and inherently Gothic birds-eye view over the compositions. In 1912, however, it was again Marquet de Vasselot who provided the reigning solution: the series is the work of an independent unidentified master active in Limoges whom he named Le Maître de L'Énéide. As Susan Caroselli has noted, ‘there are many enamelers mentioned in archival documents to whom no works have yet been attributed. The Master of the Aneneid may well be one of these, perhaps a particularly promising member of the Pénicaud workshop who, in the interest of advancement and financial security, was willing to accept a commission that might well have occupied his entire professional life’ (op. cit., p. 79).
The Technique
All of the plaques are composed of sheet copper with the verso covered with silver foil. The compositions have then been delineated in russet coloured enamel. The predominant colours are mulberry, brown, blue and green, each of which appear intense, almost iridescent, because of the underlying silver foil. For the figures, the fleshtones are composed of opaque white enamel overlaid on a darker purple ground. A translucent reddish wash adds a rosey tint to the skin. Facial features appear to be created through the removal of the white layer. Costume has been delineated using the darker enamel and much of the detail has been added with gilding. The seas are composed of white enamel overlaid with a translucent wash, with waves created by removing the white to reveal a darker layer underneath. Much or the architectural detail and also armour and other decorative devices are at least partly delineated through gilding. Both the verso and the recto have an upper layer of translucent fondant to the surface. This fondant is thought to have been an innovation which first gained traction in Limoges circa 1520 and so it is one of the key factors, together with the stylistic evidence outlined above, that has led scholars to conclude that the Aeneid enamels date to circa 1520-1530.
The Aeneid and the Present Scene
Virgil’s Aeneid was written between 29 and 19 BC. It is one of the greatest works of Latin literature and one of the three great epic poems, after Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. Virgil’s poem constitutes the founding myth of Rome and played a powerful role in legitimising the Julio-Claudian dynasty.
The Aeneid recounts the story of the Trojan Aeneas, a character from Homer’s Iliad, who flees the scorched ruins of Troy and leads his surviving compatriots to Italy where the gods have promised he will establish a glorious new civilisation. Aeneas is accompanied by his father Anchises and his son Ascanius; together the represent the three ages of man. Virgil tells of their failed attempts to found cities. Storms blow the Trojans off course and Aeneas arrives in Carthage where he briefly becomes the lover of Princess Dido, who later kills herself when Aeneas forsakes her. When his father Anchises dies, Aeneas travels to the underworld guided by the Sibyl of Cumae. There he learns that his journey will eventually lead to found a glorious city, Rome. He and the Trojans then travel to Latium where Aeneas is betrothed to the daughter of King Latinus, Lavinia. A rivalry develops with another suitor and battle between the Trojans and Latins ensues, with Aeneas the eventual victor.
The present plaque and the following lots represent scenes from Books II, III, IV and VIII in which Aeneas and his fellow Trojans travel from their home city of Troy to the Bay of Naples. This set of four enamels herald from the same collection but have different but equally distinguished earlier provenances. They are the most important grouping of Aeneid enamels to have been sold at auction since those from the collection of the Dukes of Northumberland in these rooms in 2015.
The present plaque represents an episode from Book II of the Aeneid, in which Cassandra, daughter of Priam, is dragged by her hair by Greek soldiers from the temple of Minerva, its dome in the background filling the right corner of the panel. To the top left a group of Trojan soldiers led by Aeneas and Achates arrive in an attempt to rescue her, whilst Coroebus charges his spear into the ranks of soldiers, frenzied in grief. In the foreground are combat scenes with Menelaus fighting Iphitus, and Ajax and Agamemnon attack a Trojan soldier. The composition of the scene is taken from folio 171 (verso) of the Publii Virgilii Maronis opera cum quinque vulgatis commentarii, published by Johann Grüninger in 1502.
RELATED LITERATURE
E. Bonnaffé, Inventaire des meubles de Catherine de Médices en 1589: Mobilier, tableaux, objets d'art, manuscrits, Paris, 1874; P. Verdier, Catalogue of the painted enamels of the Renaissance, cat. The Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore, 1967, pp. 75-89; R. Pinkham, “Attributions to the Aeneid Master”, Apollo 95, May 1972, pp. 370-375; E. Langmuir, “Arma Virumque… Nicolò dell’Abate’s Aeneid Gabinetto for Scandiano”, Journal of the Warburg and Courtald Institutes, 1976, pp.151-170; M. Fagiolo, “Virgilio nell’arte e nella cultura europea”, Roma-Biblioteca nazionale centrale, Rome, 1981, pp. 119–193; S. L. Caroselli, The painted enamels of Limoges. A catalogue of the collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, 1993, pp. 73-79; A. Wlosok, “Illustrated Vergil manuscripts: Reception and exegesis”, The Classical Journal 93, no.4, 1998, pp. 355-382; S. Baratte, Les émaux peints de Limoges, cat. Musée du Louvre, Paris, 2000, pp. 56-62; S. Baratte, “La série de plaques du Maître de L’Énéide”, A. Erlande-Brandenburg, J-M. Leniaud and X. Dectot (eds.), Études d'histoire de l'art offertes à Jacques Thirion. Des premiers temps chrétiens au XXe siècle, Paris, 2001, pp. 133-148; P. J. Usher, 'The Aeneid in the 1530’s: Reading with the Limoges enamels', P. J. Usher and I. Fernbach (eds.), Virgilian identities in the French Renaissance, Martlesham, 2012