A Renaissance Allegorical Tapestry, from the series depicting the Planets, Flemish, and depicting Sun (Leo), after woodcuts by the German artist Georg Pencz, mid-16th century

woven with detailed architectural background, the balcony with onlookers including a King and Queen, the terraces and fields below with various groups of `striving’ figures, athletic and fighting, playing a form of bowls, wrestling and fencing, with larger figures in the foreground, the top left and right corners incorporating fleur-de-lys coats-of-arms of Condé family, within a blue shield and lozenge respectively, both surmounted with a crown, a horse drawn chariot, with wheel enclosing the Leo sign of the zodiac, the chariot with seated figure of a King with sceptre, cross the centre sky within clouds, within a four-sided border with exuberant fruit and flowers, incorporating birds, on a leaf stem support, the centre top border with blue ground entablature inscribed with `Sol’, flanked by small kneeling putti, the lower border centred with wider blue cartouche with golden strapwork, against a saffron ground, with further narrow banded red and blue outer selvedge

Panels of Mercury and Sun were sold at the Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 10^th December 1926 (nos.139, 140, both illustrated); both after the Pencz woodcuts, Mercury tapestry dated 1547, both woven with the arms of the Condé family 

Colours in catalogue are tonally a fairly good colour match with the tapestry. This tapestry is not lined, and it is recommended that it should be for hanging in the future. It would benefit from a clean. Colours evenly faded. Balanced colours with variety of shades across the tapestry. There are small repairs and areas of reweaving in areas, commensurate with age. For example visible as terracotta coloured areas, and defining lines to edges, and eyes. Some repairs visible on close inspection as small grey/blue areas of repair. Repairs to the light areas of highlight in places. There are a few horizontal splits, which can easily be repaired. Balanced composition, with attention to detail across the tapestry. Very attractive striking allegorical tapestry.
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The original sets of Planet tapestries, depicting their influence on mankind, included seven panels attributed to the planets, Sol, Jupiter, Mars, Saturn, Luna, Venus, Mercury, and two additional subjects, Time and Fortuna, were added to the series. The influence of the planets was a popular theme in the late Middle Ages, and depictions extend back to 15^th century Italy with Baccio Baldini’s engravings which distinctively included the gods travelling through the sky on chariots drawn by lesser beasts and birds, with humanity undertaking various pursuits, labours and leisure pursuits, under the ruling influence of the relevant planet. The influence of the Sun is strife. The theme of the Gods in their chariots overlooking their `children’ under their influence was taken up in the Northern countries, (incorporating gods from their mythology) and proliferated in the 16^th and 17^th centuries, and was woven to great effect by the Flemish weavers. Remaining sets in existence include a rare set of seven pieces woven with metal-thread highlights, with the Brussel’s mark, last third of 16^th century (Nationalmuseum, Munich), a set in Vienna, and panels at Hardwick House (Derbyshire), Château Chaumont-sur-Loire (woven by Reymbouts, Brussels), and two panels at Holyrood House (Edinburgh). The Holyrood panels, originally from Hampton Court, depict Venus and Mars, are a late 16^th century set and athough the main composition is of large foreground figures and very small chariot in the sky, they are within the same border type as the present border, and bear the Brussels mark, and unidentified weaver’s mark (Margaret Swain, Tapestries and Textiles: Palace of Holyroodhouse, HMSO for the Royal Collection, 1988, No. 7, The Planets, pp.29-32, figs. a-c). 

Records show that two tapestries from the Planet series, depicting Mercury and Sun were sold at the Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 10^th December 1926 (nos.139, 140, both illustrated), both after the Pencz woodcuts, woven within a Brussels floral and fruiting border, with the respective names of planets in the top borders, Mercury dated 1547, and with the arms of the Condé family. 

The present tapestry is taken directly from the compositional designs of vertical woodcuts of the planets by the German Georg Pencz (b.1500-d.1550).  Pencz worked with Barthel Beham and Hans Sebald Beham, and they all became part of a group of printers called the `Little Masters’, due to their intricate and influential prints. The composition depicts the chariot at the top, the architecturally detailed background with fighting figures, and the same figures in the foreground, albeit on a different scale to the present panel. For reference to the Pencz woodcuts of the seven subjects, including `Soll’, 1531, from the Kunstsammlungen der Veste Coburg (I, 122,499), see Katja Schmitz-von Ledebur, Die Planeten und ihre Kinder, 2009, pp.31-32, figs.18-24. 

In indentical set of German woven tapestries after Pencz, include narrative panels with German verse and dates across the top, and the comparable tapestry is clearly marked `Soll’, and is dated 1548, and all are woven with the composition in the same direction as the respective woodcut, see Schmitz-von Ledebur, opcit, pg.118, fig.73. The set of seven small tapestries were in the Baronne B.. sale, Galerie Charpentier,  Paris, 2<sup>nd</sup> December 1958 (nos. 133A-G, all illustrated), exhibited in `Spiegel der Welt’, Dresden 2001, now in the Bibliotheca Bodmeriana, Geneva.

The additional compositional sources which were of influence to the tapestries of the subject, were engravings of the `Seven Planets’, by Herman Muller, after designs by Marten van Heemskerck, dated 1568 and a set by Jan Saenredam, after Hendrick Goltzius, dated 1569. The later influencing the tapestry designs only with regard to the figures of humanity, as the Gods were shown on pedestals not in chariots.    

Planet Tapestries  

For comprehensive discussion of tapestries from the distinctive tapestry series from the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Munich, see Katja Schmitz-von Ledebur, Die Planeten und ihre Kinder, Eine Brüsseler Tapisserienserie des 16.Jahrhunderts aus der Sammlung Herzon Albrechts V. in München, Brepols, Belgium, 2009, Chp.III, Planetentapisserien im Bayerischen Nationalmuseum, No.9, `Soll’, pp.60-67, figs.37-42. This panel is within a more elaborate and allegorical border type, and the elements of the chariot within the cloud, and the architectural colonnade and small fighting figural groups on the left hand side are the only comparable similaraties, as the larger foreground figures are a different composition.

For a Planets series panel of `Luna’, mid 16^th century, within a very similar Flemish border type to that of the present tapestry,  and a composition based on the respective Pencz, 1531 print, interpreted by a French designer,  see Edith Appleton Standen, European Post-Medieval Tapestries and Related Hangings in the Metropolitan Museum, 1985, Vol. I, No.27, The Moon and her Children, pp.187-190.

For a complete set of nine Planet Flemish tapestries, Oudenaarde, including woven dates 1591, 1601, bearing Oudenaarde weaver’s mark, see G.F. Wingfield Digby, The Tapestry Collection – Medieval and Renaissance, Victoria and Albert Museum, London 1980, Nos.60-61, pp.61-63, pl. 81-89., including a panel of Sol, which are all woven within an architectural setting flanked by Corinthian columns, within a four-sided border of strapwork.