Two Beggars Fighting
Medium
etching
Classification
Department
Prints
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Fortieth Anniversary Gift of The Print Club of Cleveland in honor of William Mathewson Milliken
Accession Number
1960.20
Tags
male
About this artwork
Since antiquity, music was considered to inspire two different effects: it could elevate the soul to spiritual thoughts, or arouse passions both violent and sensual. In this genre scene, two transients engage in an epic struggle. The hurdy-gurdy, slung across the body of one of the vagabonds, was considered a "base" instrument whose melodies heated the senses without uplifiting the spirit. In his Syntagma Musicum of 1618, the musical theorist Michael Praetorius dubbed the hurdy-gurdy a "fiddle f...