The Nativity, ca. 1470

About the Work

he stable in Bethlehem is depicted as the ruin of a once-splendid structure, probably the old Temple of Solomon as a reference to the Old Testament. The remains of a wall frame the scene of Christ’s birth and assign the beholder a place like that of the shepherds who have come to worship the newborn child. Here Schongauer recounts the episode with a spectrum of different materials quite opulent for an engraving, along with stones, vegetation, and space-creating light.