Hunting near Hartenfels Castle (1540): Art, History and Details

Hunting near Hartenfels Castle (1540) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Lucas Cranach (German, 1472–1553).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The Protestant rulers of Saxony commissioned this animated hunt scene, set near their residence seen in the background, Hartenfels Castle (in eastern Germany). John Frederick the Magnanimous, in the bottom left corner, wears dark green hunting attire; he spans his crossbow and waits for his courtiers and dogs to chase a stag across the river. His wife, the Electress Sibylle, stands at right, poised to take the first ceremonial shot. The prince electors of Saxony were passionate practitioners of hunting with dogs—elaborate, highly rehearsed occasions, coordinated by the use of signals from hunting horns. Cranach dated this work and his signature is the winged snake at lower right. 1577 in the right corner is an inventory number.

Object facts

• Title: Hunting near Hartenfels Castle
• Date: 1540
• Creator attribution: Lucas Cranach (German, 1472–1553)
• Culture: Germany
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil, originally on wood, transferred to masonite
• Dimensions: Framed: 133 x 185.5 x 7.3 cm (52 3/8 x 73 1/16 x 2 7/8 in.); Unframed: 116.8 x 170.2 cm (46 x 67 in.)
• Collection: P - German before 1800
• Department: European Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1958.425

A detail from the museum

Humans, dogs, and deer make up most of the creatures in this busy scene—but not all of them! Look closely at the background to spot a bear and three boars.

Collection credit

John L. Severance Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Margaret H. Drey, letter to Henry Sayles Francis, April 9, 1959, in CMA curatorial file.
• Margaret H. Drey, letter to Henry Sayles Francis, March 18, 1959, in CMA curatorial file.
• Margaret H. Drey, letter to Henry Sayles Francis, March 18, 1959, in CMA curatorial file.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.