The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein the Younger

The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein the Younger

Two men and their things

On the left stands Jean de Dinteville, French ambassador to the court of Henry VIII, in a fur-lined coat over pink satin; on the right, in a long dark gown, is his friend Georges de Selve, Bishop of Lavaur. Between them is a two-tier stand. The upper shelf holds a celestial globe, sundials and other instruments for measuring the heavens; the lower one holds a terrestrial globe, a lute with a broken string, a case of flutes and a Lutheran hymnbook, open at Luther’s German versions of Veni Sancte Spiritus and the Ten Commandments. The floor copies the Cosmati pavement before the high altar of Westminster Abbey.

The skull and the crucifix

The long grey shape slanting across the floor is a skull painted in anamorphic perspective. From the front it is a smear; seen at a sharp angle from the side, it snaps into shape. It is a memento mori on a grand scale, a reminder beside all this learning and finery that both men will die. The picture holds a second, easily missed detail: at the very top left, half hidden by the edge of the green curtain, hangs a small crucifix. The lute’s broken string is usually read as a sign of discord, perhaps the religious strife of the Reformation.

Where it hangs

The painting is in the National Gallery in London, which bought it in 1890. The oak panel measures about 207 by 209 centimetres.

About this print

Made from a 9,000-pixel photograph of the original, enough to print sharply at up to about 60 inches on its longest side.

Sources: National Gallery, London · Wikidata Q1212937 · Wikimedia Commons