(At)testing Virtue: Shine and the Materiality of Metals in the Construction of Habsburg Nobility (1477–1519)

This dissertation investigates the critical role that metallic matter and its transformations played in shaping narratives of Habsburg nobility, with particular focus on the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I (1459–1519). Beyond generic interpretations of metals as precious materialia, I show how metallic matter and its visual effects were sought out to materialise the position of Maximilian and his dynasty in a cosmological hierarchy of divine grace. At the core of this study stands the poetic and epistemic slippage between material and moral virtues (virtutes) as dynamic forces that could make conceivable the nobility of individuals as well as mineral matter. Turning to materiality and artistic process as well as finely crafted objects, I offer a more nuanced analysis of the meaning of metals between established technical narratives and artistic/technological advancement during the crucial decades either end of 1500. The first chapter focuses on Jacob Mennel’s monumental genealogical chronicle, the Fürstliche Chronik Kaiser Maximilians Geburtspiegel and the associated Zaiger (1518) and situates them within the artistic and intellectual milieu of Freiburg im Breisgau surrounding Gregor Reisch and Hans Baldung Grien. Beyond token references to literary traditions and honorary titles of royal splendour, Mennel and his illuminator(s) purposefully instrumentalise verbal, visual and material allegories of light-related phenomena and metallic materiality to evidence the particular grace claimed for their patron’s lineage. Motivated not least by the preceding chapter’s differentiated use of iron, the second chapter centres around a group of outstanding swords and hunting knives made by the Tyrolean swordsmith Hans Sumersperger von Hall for Maximilian (c. 1496). I show how their dazzling, iridescent and fire-gilded surfaces serve to underline their pictorial and textual evocations of the celestial sphere in support of Maximilian’s sovereign authority. Intimately linked to ideals of material perfecting and princely virtue, I expound their intricate visual effects in the context of contemporary metallurgical techniques and narratives of ingenious crafting. The third chapter hones in on Maximilian’s planned tomb monument and the way he sought to surround his mortal remains with a veritable flock of copper-alloy statues. If steeped in antique gravitas, here, cast copper alloy also represented a decidedly modern medium of material triumph through its intimate connection to the innovative field of artillery. If Maximilian’s illuminated arsenal inventories portrayed cannons as eloquent symbols of his dynastic ingenuity, I develop how the cast figures were to furnish the emperor’s tomb as a treasury of dynastic virtue. Known for his innovative patronage of the print medium, this project develops how Maximilian as well as the scholarly advisers and artists in his employ relied on material hierarchies, luminous matter and the articulation of artisanal ingenuity to materialise Habsburg sovereignty dei gratia. Conversely, negotiating their patron’s nobility and ‘super-virtuosity’ provided an attractive arena for artists and artisans, scholars and clerks to articulate their own identity and cunning. Placed at the intersection of art and nature, divine creation and inspired artifice, artisanal knowledge and material literacy crucially informed the negotiation of categories of preciousness, complex ontological states and individual distinction.

Name dc:type.qualificationname

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Level dc:type.qualificationlevel

Doctoral

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

University of Cambridge

Year dc:date.issued

2024

Author dc:creator

• Wisgrill, Stella

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Marr, Alexander

• Alchemy
• Art and Sovereignty
• Artillery
• Artisanal Collaboration
• Artisanal Knowledge
• Artistic Process and Materiality
• Augsburg
• Cast Copper-Alloy
• Casting Techniques
• Copper Trade
• Cultural History of Metals
• Dynasty
• Early Modern Patronage
• Epistemology
• Fire-Gilding
• Genealogy and Nobility in Art
• Gregor Reisch
• Habsburg
• Hans Baldung Grien
• Hans Sumersperger von Hall
• Hardening
• Heat-Bluing
• Holy Roman Empire
• Innsbruck
• Iridescent Surfaces
• Iron
• Late Gothic Weaponry
• Material Culture in Early Modern Europe
• Material Hierarchies
• Maximilian I
• Mercury-Gilding
• Metalwork and Metallurgy in Art
• Nuremberg
• Political Imagery in Art
• Recipe Collections
• Renaissance Art and Technology
• Renaissance Tomb Sculpture
• Steel
• Swords
• Tomb Monument
• Tyrol
• Upper Rhine
• Vischer Workshop

Licence

• https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/a60803f8-2c57-44ee-9fa5-35ed0474ec66/download
• http://purl.org/NET/rdflicense/allrightsreserved

DOI dc:identifier.doi

https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.118653

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.repository.cam.ac.uk:1810/384750