Adam and Eve
Medium
engraving
Dimensions
image: 25 × 19.2 cm · sheet: 25.2 × 19.4 cm
Classification
Department
Prints
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Dudley P. Allen Fund
Accession Number
1944.473
Tags
male
About this artwork
Albrecht Dürer’s iconic engraving was hugely impactful to the spread of natural symbolism in Europe. Drawing upon Classical sculptural models, he represented Adam and Eve in perfect, uncorrupted beauty moments before tasting the forbidden fruit. The tree of knowledge, with its writhing serpent, is a fig tree, and the tree of life, which Adam clasps, a mountain ash, native to Northern Europe. The elk, rabbit, cat, and ox are symbols of the four human temperaments—melancholic (gloomy), sanguine (s...