CIRCA 1490-1510, TOURNAI OR BRUSSELS

This enchanting tapestry is a fascinating and informative testament to late mediaeval courtly representation and political allegory. In its regal subject matter and careful interpretation of 15th century fashion, it bears resemblance to a corpus of tapestries woven in the Southern Netherlands in the late Gothic period, circa 1480-1520.

THE DESIGN

The bold and vibrant interpretation of rich damask depicted in our tapestry as well as the painterly composition and subject matter of King Solomon is typical of the production of the Southern Netherlandish region. Like many Flemish tapestries of this period, it is difficult to ascertain the precise place of manufacture but this tapestry is likely to have been produced in the towns of Tournai or Brussels. While Tournai enjoyed its heyday as the centre of Flemish tapestry production in the mid-15th century, by 1500 Brussels was quick becoming the hub of this manufacture.

The scene depicted is the meeting between King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, known in biblical and Hebraic texts as the Riddle of the Queen of Sheba. Enthroned under a dais of heavy fabric, Solomon is dressed in a garment of red damask embellished with whimsical pineapple patterns and covered by a golden cloak trimmed with ermine. Sheba, similarly enrobed, wears a headdress placed high on the back of the head, typical of Burgundian and French fashion of the 1490s. The modish courtiers surrounding the throne also reflect the development of contemporary dress with the female attendant on the far left wearing a low-cut neckline filled-in with a newly fashionable gorget of a dark material. She sports, like the companion to her right, an early version of the French hood that would become so popular in the later 16th century.

Solomon receiving the Queen of Sheba was a popular subject for tapestry designers at this time and our tapestry closely follows the composition of a design conceived circa 1480 by Adrian Vandenhoute (c.1459-1521) of Mechelen. Vandenhoute was a designer and painter of glass roundels who also provided designs for the weavers of Brussels and Tournai. The dais, architectural columns, necklace and ermine collar of Solomon in Vandenhoute’s design are reproduced in our tapestry as are the male and female attendants flanking the throne left and right respectively. Notably, the positioning of Sheba and the children is reversed in the tapestry.

Rich with symbolism for the rulers of Europe anxious to project their power, episodes from the life of King Solomon were a typical subject for royal and ecclesiastical commissions in the late 15th and early 16th centuries. In an early form of public image control, the features of Solomon in our tapestry are likely based on those of Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor (1459-1519). A closely related tapestry, illustrated here and currently preserved in the Museum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte in Dortmund depicts Solomon sitting in a garden and is thought to have furnished the town halls of Imperial Cities. With similar hair, face and clothing to our own Solomon, they both recall contemporary depictions of Maximilian, an Emperor who carefully crafted and propagated his public image. Indeed when our tapestry left the collection of the Von Aufsess family in the early 20th century it was sold with the moniker Maximiliansteppich. Maximilian I's daughter's betrothed, Charles VIII of France also made use of tapestries for political representation, as demonstrated in the Coronation of the Virgin in the treasury of the Cathedral of Sens and Christ the Judge on the Throne of Majesty and Other Subjects in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (acc. no. 53.81) which depicts Charles VIII, Maximilian and members of their families in the guise of biblical figures.

This tapestry would have belonged to a wider series of tapestries depicting scenes from the life of King Solomon or as part of a series depicting biblical scenes. A closely related tapestry of the same height as ours illustrating Esther before Ahasuerus is currently preserved in the Museo Poldi Pezzoli, Milan. Another tapestry most likely from the same workshop depicting the story of Esther is illustrated Göbel, Tapestries of the Lowlands, New York, 1924, no. 371. The stories of Esther and Solomon often appeared together in large panel tapestries and series.

THE PROVENANCE

The quality and appeal of this tapestry is demonstrated by its early reputed provenance and its ownership by the most discerning collectors of mediaeval art in Europe, the Fuggers of Augsburg and the Von Aufsess family of Franconia.

On its acquisition by the Salomonsohn family in the early 20th century this tapestry was reputed to have belonged first to the Fugger family in Vienna. After their elevation to the rank of Imperial Princes in 1803 under Anselm Maria Fugger von Babenhausen, various figures of the Fugger-Babenhausen branch resided in Vienna and undertook military and political roles at the Imperial Court. The Fugger family were among the richest bankers in Europe in the 15th and 16th centuries and were major patrons of renaissance art and architecture. As financiers of the Habsburg dynasty and linchpins in the economy of Europe, the Fugger castles around Augsburg in Southern Germany contained treasures and portraits by the most famous artists of the day including Albrecht Durer and Giovanni Bellini.

Originating in Upper Franconia, Hans von und zu Aufseß (1801-1872) moved to Nuremberg in 1848 and in 1852 he founded the Germanisches Nationalmuseum, a museum of German antiquity and today the largest museum of German cultural history. A devotee of mediaeval Europe, Aufseß’s acquisition of this tapestry and its presence in his collection indicates its importance as a cultural survival of the late gothic period. The tapestry was acquired from the Munich dealer A. S. Drey by Arthur (1859-1930) and Alma Salomonsohn (later Solmssen) (1872-1961), a German-Jewish couple resident in Berlin. Arthur Salomonsohn was a successful banker who sat on the board of Deutsche Bank and the couple had a magnificent art collection which included a number of Dutch and Italian old master paintings. The collection was dispersed after Alma was forced to flee Germany for the United States in 1939.