The Virgin and Child with a Monkey (c. 1498): Art, History and Details

The Virgin and Child with a Monkey (c. 1498) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Albrecht Dürer (German, 1471–1528).

The work and its context

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

Catholic theology during the Renaissance taught the Virgin Mary as a woman born without original sin, an idea manifested in botanical and zoological symbols. Albrecht Dürer portrayed the Virgin and Christ child within a garden enclosed by a low wood gate. Mary gazes down at her son, who holds a bird with his left hand, a symbol of the souls he will save through his Crucifixion. The tamed monkey, chained to the fence, is an accurate zoological study (probably a Barbary macaque) with a theological role: associated with bodily pleasure, it shows the power of Mary’s virtue over Eve’s sin.

Object facts

• Title: The Virgin and Child with a Monkey
• Date: c. 1498
• Creator attribution: Albrecht Dürer (German, 1471–1528)
• Culture: Germany, late 15th Century-early 16th Century
• Type: Print
• Technique: engraving
• Dimensions: Image: 19 x 7.9 cm (7 1/2 x 3 1/8 in.)
• Collection: PR - Engraving
• Department: Prints
• Accession number: 1964.29

A detail from the museum

The monkey portrayed here can be identified as a Barbary macaque, which the artist may have seen as part of a zoological collection in Germany.

Collection credit

Dudley P. Allen Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978.

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.