Venationes ferarum, avium, piscium (Hunts of wild animals, birds and fish). Plate 12. Fight between a lion, bull, bear and two wolves.

This print is the work of three major Flemish figures of the late 16th century: the original artist Jan Van der Straet (a.k.a. Stradanus), the engraver Jan Collaert II; and the publisher Philips Galle. The success of Van der Straet's cartoons for a hunting series to decorate the Medici villa at Poggio a Caiano, near Florence (1566-77), led to the leading Flemish publishers Heronymus Cock, and subsequently Galle, to commission related engravings in the 1570s and 1580s. (Galle also engraved/published other works by Van der Straet, including his Crucifixion, in Te Papa's collection).

These proved so popular that in 1596 Galle published the ambitious, 105 plate volume Venationes, ferarum, avium, piscium (Hunts of wild animals, birds and fish), engaging several engravers including Collaert, all based on original drawings by the prolific Van der Straet.  Bird hunts form an important sub-theme. The volume was republished by Philips Galle's son, Johannes, in 1634.

This print depicts a horrifying scene in an a circus pit, and is described in the Renaissance Latin inscription below the image, kindly translated by Tim Smith, Victoria University of Wellington: 'Noblemen watch the spectacle before them in the circus. A ferocious lion tears apart wild animals with tooth and claw, and casts down the wolves  [who are lying dead]. After a struggle, it overcomes a bull. All the while, a terrified bear trembles in fear.' 

See: Chris Michaelides, http://blogs.bl.uk/european/2015/09/joannes-stradanus-and-his-hunting-scenes.html

Dr Mark Stocker     Curator, Historical International Art      March 2017