The Sword of Damocles

Together with seven sheets at the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (inv. RP-T-1889-A-1909 to RP-T-1889-A-1915; see K.G. Boon, Netherlandish Drawings of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries, The Hague, 1978, I, nos. 96-102, II, ill., as previously attributed to Crispijn van den Broeck) and two in the British Museum (inv. 1854,0628.40, 1854,0628.41), this drawing, previously given to Joos van Winghe, served as the model for engraved illustrations in an emblem book by Laurens van Haecht, Mikrokosmos/ Parvus mundus, published in Antwerp by Snellinck’s father-in-law, Gerard de Jode, in 1579. The attribution of the designs to Snellinck was first suggested by Hans Mielke on the basis of signed works (‘Antwerpener Graphik in der 2. Hälfte des 16. Jahrhunderts. Der Thesaurus veteris et novi Testamenti des Gerard de Jode (1585) und seine Künstler’, Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, XXXVIII, 1975, pp. 33-43; see also Mielke’s review of Boon, op. cit., in Simiolus, XI, 1980, no. 1, p. 44; and M.C. Plomp, ‘Acht muzen van Jan Snellinck’, in Liber Amicorum Dorine van Sasse van Ysselt. Collegiale bijdragen over teken- en prentkunst, The Hague, 2011, p. 37-42). In Van Haecht's book, the story of the courtier Damocles who switches places for one day with King Dionysius of Syracuse, illustrates the fear of death (‘Formido mortis’) and is accompanied by a verse from the book of Psalms (54:5).