The Virgin with a Starry Crown (1508): Art, History and Details

The Virgin with a Starry Crown (1508) 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:

Dürer made four engravings of the Virgin and Child standing on a crescent moon. These devotional images link the Madonna with the pregnant woman of the apocalypse from chapter 12 of the Book of Revelation. The verse says that "a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars . . . " appeared in heaven, delivering a son to conquer Satan—a prefiguration of Christ. In direct contrast with the crowned Virgin here, whose double aureole shines extravagantly around her figure, Dürer conceived the Madonna (1958.116) with simplicity and humility. In each he presents the dual roles of the Virgin as the Queen of Heaven and as the humble mother of Jesus.

Object facts

• Title: The Virgin with a Starry Crown
• Date: 1508
• Creator attribution: Albrecht Dürer (German, 1471–1528)
• Culture: Germany
• Type: Print
• Technique: engraving
• Collection: PR - Engraving
• Department: Prints
• Accession number: 1934.334

Collection credit

Gift of Leonard C. Hanna Jr.

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.