Triumph of Bacchus (c. 1539): Art, History and Details

Triumph of Bacchus (c. 1539) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Georg Pencz (German, c. 1500–1550).

The work and its context

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

A triumph was a civic ceremony and procession from antiquity, when military commanders were celebrated upon their return to Rome with the spoils of war. The grandeur and magnificence of such events, revived during the Renaissance, makes the diminutive size of these whimsical images of Bacchus’s triumphs even more amusing. The orderly parade depicted by Georg Pencz contrasts with the chaotic scene taking place in Johann Theodor de Bry’s engraving. Such small prints were meant to be enjoyed up close, perhaps with a magnifying glass, a socially acceptable examination of humorous or erotic content performed by a cast of scantily clad mythological characters.

Object facts

• Title: Triumph of Bacchus
• Date: c. 1539
• Creator attribution: Georg Pencz (German, c. 1500–1550)
• Culture: Germany
• Type: Print
• Technique: engraving
• Dimensions: Sheet: 4.8 x 28.4 cm (1 7/8 x 11 3/16 in.)
• Collection: PR - Engraving
• Department: Prints
• Accession number: 1922.151

A detail from the museum

Georg Pencz is among a group of engravers known today as the "Little Masters" for the many small prints they created, such as this one, which often required the use of a magnifying glass.

Collection credit

Gift of Mrs. Henry R. Hatch

Further reading listed by the museum

• Parsse, Leona. "Engravings by Georg Pencz in the Museum Collection." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 23, no. 4 (April 1936): 50-53.

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.