Cleveland Museum of Art
The Great Triumphal Car of Emperor Maximilian
Albrecht DürerLinkedCulture matchlcp-91cf98b472c5
- Date
- 1523
- Medium
- woodcut
- Culture
- Germany
- Department
- Prints
- Institution
- Cleveland Museum of Art
- Object ID
- 124271
From LinkedCulture
This woodcut took years to finish, even though the emperor it honors was already dead. Albrecht Dürer published The Great Triumphal Car at his own expense in 1523, four years after Maximilian I died, with Latin text written by his friend Willibald Pirckheimer. Every detail carries meaning, from the horses whose reins are labeled Nobility and Power, to wheels that stand for Magnificence and Glory. It is one of the most ambitious political images ever made in the woodcut medium.
Written by LinkedCulture for its video on this object. Machine-generated (claude-sonnet-4-6), not yet reviewed by a person. It is not part of the museum’s record.
What the image shows
A detailed engraving depicting a chariot race with two teams of horses pulling chariots, accompanied by figures labeled 'Paquinaria' and 'Oenotria'.
Generated by LinkedCulture from the photograph alone, without the museum’s catalogue text (Qwen/Qwen2.5-VL-7B-Instruct), and not yet reviewed by a person. It describes the picture, not the object’s history, and it is not part of the museum’s record.
From the Cleveland Museum of Art record
Dürer conceived this fantastical chariot as part of a larger commission to depict Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I (reigned 1486–1519) in a triumphal procession. The ruler sits enthroned in the lavish car, as Victory holds a laurel wreath above his imperial crown. Her feathered wings list Maximilian’s military campaigns. Nearly every component of the allegorical pageant—from the entourage of female attendants to the laurel garlands—has a Latin label describing honorable qualities of an ideal prince. The car rolls on wheels of Magnificence, Honor, Dignity, and Glory. Its driver is Reason, who guides a team of 12 horses with reins of Nobility and Power. Virtues of Justice, Strength, Wisdom, and Temperance, stand on pedestals arranged around the emperor. Maximilian died in 1519, before the ambitious commission could be completed. Dürer published The Great Triumphal Car at his own expense with text composed by his friend Willibald Pirckheimer (1470–1530).
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Provenance & credit
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- Credit line
- Dudley P. Allen Fund
- Provenance
- with Richard H. Zinser, New York | Purchased by the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
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