Death on display

Abstract

Isabel Casteels examines the response of contemporary viewers – both intended and actual – to Frans Hogenberg’s execution prints dating from the first decades of the Dutch Revolt. Hogenberg characterised these executions, like those of the counts of Egmond and Horn in Brussels in 1566, as religious ceremonies, thus implicitly criticising them. The prints highlight the public, ritual, and indeed purely theatrical elements of these events, which, from the perspective of the Catholic Church and the secular authorities, may have legitimised them, but for Protestants and supporters of the Revolt generally did exactly the opposite – that is, de-legitimised them, exposed them for what they really were: cruel bloodshed. Eyewitness accounts confirm this, as did the prosecution of printers who issued copies of the prints. The depiction of the audience in many of the prints made their viewers aware of their role in these judicial rituals.