Der Selbstmord der Dido / The Suicide of Dido.

Article description

Original copper engraving A small and intensely dramatic engraving depicting Dido, Queen of Carthage, at the moment of her self-immolation. Standing barefoot on a stone plinth, partially draped in windswept robes, she plunges a sword into her breast with her right hand while her left clutches flowing drapery. Behind her, flames and billowing smoke fill the entire background — the funeral pyre upon which, according to Virgil's Aeneid, she chose death over life after the abandonment by Aeneas. Her expression is one of tragic composure, her hair loose and wild in the heat. The swirling, turbulent background and the expressive, twisting figure are hallmarks of Altdorfer's graphic style and of the broader Danube School — a sensibility in which landscape, atmosphere, and emotional intensity merge into a unified dramatic whole. The artist's monogram and the title inscription DIDO appear together in a small cartouche at the lower right. A fine impression with good margins. The image is sharp and well-contrasted, with characteristic richness in the hatching of the flame-filled background.

Winzinger 159c; The New Hollstein German engravers 48; Bartsch 1802-1821, VIII, 42