The Tribulations of Saint Anthony

Martin Schongauer

National Gallery of Art

Printed with fine black lines, crosshatching, and flicks of stippling, a bearded man wearing a long robe is being held up in the sky by nine nightmarish, extremely imaginative creatures in this vertical print. The man is balding and wrinkles line his high forehead. His body faces us, and his arms are pulled down by his sides. He looks down and off to our right with hooded eyes under a furrowed brow. A book hangs from a belt wrapped around his waist, and drapery flutters behind his right arm, to our left. The critters pull on his clothing, arms, legs, and hair. Three raise clubs, ready to strike. Each creature is unique, and they are made of intricate blends of feathers and fur, spikes and scales, snotus and beaks, blunt and sharp teeth, horns, wings, whiskers, flicking tongues, and fins. A bit of a rocky cliff edges into the lower right corner, and the top half of the sky has a loose pattern of horizontal dashes. The artist signed the lower center with his initials, “M + S.”