1456AD.
1521AD.
The bottom image is Nuremberg Germany. The top one I do not recall the country of origin.
1456AD.
1521AD.
The bottom image is Nuremberg Germany. The top one I do not recall the country of origin.
What a startling image, that first color panel is. It’s interesting that the phenomenon was well known and widespread enough to have had a conventionalized representation, the six pointed star with emanating, directional “rays” in both the painting and the woodcut. It’s almost laserlike in the color panel, looking as if it’s zapping a tower or steeple. I wonder what it actually is intended to represent?
The architecture, landscape and color of the roofs (unless it’s meant to represent roofs on fire) should provide a clue as to geographic origin. The odd, almost Hieronymus Bosch-like imagery of very pale people fixes it to northern Europe, but the architecture and roof color shifts it somewhat south, imho. I’m going to go out on a limb and guess Aquitaine.
Is that a two-headed calf? Children outside of the walled city, abandoned? It would seem to also represent a breakdown of both the social and natural order. A combination of amusement and fear is playing out upon their faces.