| Belshazzar's Feast | |
|---|---|
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| Artist | Rembrandt |
| Year | c. 1635-1638 |
| Medium | Oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 167.6 cm× 209.2 cm(66.0 in× 82.4 in) |
| Location | National Gallery, London |
Belshazzar's Feast is a major painting by Rembrandt now in the National Gallery, London. [1] The painting is Rembrandt's attempt to establish himself as a painter of large, baroque history paintings. [2] [3] The date of the painting is unknown, but most sources give a date between 1635 and 1638. [4] [1]
The story of Belshazzar and the writing on the wall originates in the Old Testament Book of Daniel. [1] The Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar looted the Temple in Jerusalem and has stolen the sacred artefacts such as golden cups. [5] His son Belshazzar used these cups for a great feast where the hand of God appeared and wrote the inscription on the wall prophesying the downfall of Belshazzar's reign. [5] The text on the wall says "mene, mene, tekel, upharsin". Biblical scholars interpret this to mean "God has numbered the days of your kingdom and brought it to an end; you have been weighed in the balances and found wanting; your kingdom is given to the Medes and Persians". [1]
The inscription on the wall is an interesting element in this painting. Rembrandt lived in the Jewish Quarter of Amsterdam and "derived the form of Hebrew inscription from a book by his friend, the learned Rabbi and printer, Menasseh ben Israel, yet mistranscribed one of the characters [6] and arranged them in columns, rather than right to left, as Hebrew is written." [2] [7] This last detail is essential as it relates to the question of why Belshazzar and his advisers were not able to decipher the inscription and had to send for Daniel to help them with it. [8] The biblical story does not identify the language of the cryptic message, but it is generally assumed to be Aramaic, which, like Hebrew, is written in right-to-left rows, and not in right-to-left columns as in the painting. Although there is no accepted explanation why the Babylonian priests were unable to decipher the writing, [9] the point of this unconventional arrangement – reading the text in the painting in the conventional row-wise left-to-right order results in a garbled message – may be to suggest why the text proved incomprehensible to the Babylonian wise men; [10] This explanation is in accordance with the opinion of the amora Shmuel, which is mentioned in the Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Sanhedrin, 22a, among various dissenting views.
The painting was in possession of the Earl of Derby at Knowsley Hall since 1736. The picture, however, was barely known beyond England, and it was not considered a masterpiece. [11] As it was exhibited at the Art Treasures Exhibition in Manchester in 1857, the curator George Scharf wrote: "The whole picture, notwithstanding the boldness of the attitudes, is tame, and inadequate in execution." [12] This lack of admiration can be explained in comparison to contemporary depictions of the biblical story, especially Belshazzar's Feast by John Martin (c. 1821), that earned much more reputation by its size and grandeur of its composition. This assessment changed in the second half of the 20th century together with the revaluation of Rembrandt's historical paintings. After Belshazzar's Feast was acquired by the National Gallery in 1964, it became very popular and was used many times as an illustration for commercial products like album covers. In 2014, it was the third most licensed image of the National Gallery. [11]
Rembrandt's handling of painting materials and his painting technique in Belshazzar's Feast are both exceptional and do not compare to any of his other works. [13] The palette of this painting is unusually rich encompassing such pigments as vermilion, smalt, lead-tin-yellow, yellow and red lakes, ochres and azurite. [14]
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Belshazzar was the son and crown prince of Nabonidus, the last king of the Neo-Babylonian Empire. Through his mother, he might have been a grandson of Nebuchadnezzar II, though this is not certain and the claims to kinship with Nebuchadnezzar may have originated from royal propaganda.
Shekel or sheqel is an ancient Mesopotamian coin, usually of silver. A shekel was first a unit of weight—very roughly 11 grams —and became currency in ancient Tyre and Carthage and then in Hasmonean Judea.
Peres is a Portuguese, Galician, and Judaeo-Spanish surname. Its Spanish variant is Pérez. It is common in both forms Peres, Perez, and Peretz among descendants of Sephardic Jews in Puerto Rico.
Belshazzar's Feast is a cantata by the English composer William Walton. It was first performed at the Leeds Festival on 8 October 1931, with the baritone Dennis Noble, the London Symphony Orchestra and the Leeds Festival Chorus, conducted by Malcolm Sargent. The work has remained one of Walton's most celebrated compositions. Osbert Sitwell selected the text from the Bible, primarily the Book of Daniel and Psalm 137. The work is dedicated to Walton's friend and benefactor Lord Berners.
Belshazzar's feast, or the story of the writing on the wall, tells how Belshazzar holds a great feast and drinks from the vessels that had been looted in the destruction of the First Temple. A hand appears and writes on the wall. The terrified Belshazzar calls for his wise men, but they are unable to read the writing. The queen advises him to send for Daniel, renowned for his wisdom. Daniel reminds Belshazzar that his father Nebuchadnezzar, when he became arrogant, was thrown down until he learned that God has sovereignty over the kingdom of men. Belshazzar had likewise blasphemed God, and so God sent this hand. Daniel then reads the message and interprets it: God has numbered Belshazzar's days, he has been weighed and found wanting, and his kingdom will be given to the Medes and the Persians.
That very night Belshazzar, the Chaldean [Babylonian] king, was killed. And Darius the Mede received the kingdom […]
The mina is an ancient Near Eastern unit of weight for silver or gold, equivalent to approximately 1.25 pounds (0.57 kg), which was divided into 60 shekels. The mina, like the shekel, eventually also became a unit of currency.
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn, usually simply known as Rembrandt, was a Dutch Golden Age painter, printmaker, and draughtsman. An innovative and prolific master in three media, he is generally considered one of the greatest visual artists in the history of art. It is estimated Rembrandt produced a total of about three hundred paintings, three hundred etchings, and two thousand drawings.
Belshazzar is an oratorio by George Frideric Handel. The libretto was by Charles Jennens, and Handel abridged it considerably. Jennens' libretto was based on the Biblical account of the fall of Babylon at the hands of Cyrus the Great and the subsequent freeing of the Jewish nation, as found in the Book of Daniel.
Music in the Tuileries is an 1862 oil-on-canvas painting by Édouard Manet. It is owned by the National Gallery, London and the Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin as part of the shared Lane Bequest.
The fall of Babylon was the decisive event that marked the total defeat of the Neo-Babylonian Empire to the Achaemenid Persian Empire in 539 BCE.
The Woman Taken in Adultery is a painting of 1644 by Rembrandt, bought by the National Gallery in London in 1824, as one of their foundation batch of paintings. It is in oil on oak, and 83.8 x 65.4 cm.
"Finger of God" is a phrase used in the Torah, translated into the Christian Bible. In Exodus 8:16–20 it is used during the plagues of Egypt by Pharaoh's magicians. In Exodus 31:18 and Deuteronomy 9:10 it refers to the method by which the Ten Commandments were written on tablets of stone that were brought down from Mount Sinai by Moses.
Belshazzar's Feast is an oil painting by British painter John Martin (1789–1854). It was first exhibited at the British Institution in February 1821 and won a prize of £200 for the best picture. It was so popular that it needed to be protected from the crowds by a railing, and established Martin's fame. In the words of Martin's biographer William Feaver, he "turned literary references to visual reality". Martin published mezzotint engravings in 1826 and 1832. The original painting is now held in a private collection; two smaller contemporaneous "sketches" are held by the Yale Center for British Art in New Haven, Connecticut and the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Connecticut.
Self-Portrait at the Age of 34 is a self-portrait by Rembrandt, dating to 1640 and now in the National Gallery in London. The painting is one of many self-portraits by Rembrandt, in both painting and etching, to show the artist in a fancy costume from the previous century. In this case specific influences in the pose have long been recognised from Raphael's Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione and Titian's A Man with a Quilted Sleeve in the National Gallery. Rembrandt saw both of these in Amsterdam, in his day the centre of Europe's art trade, and made a sketch of the Raphael, with its price.
Belshazzar is a historical novel by H. Rider Haggard set in Ancient Babylon. It was written in 1924, and was just finished at the time of his death.
Lead-tin yellow is a yellow pigment, of historical importance in oil painting, sometimes called the "Yellow of the Old Masters" because of the frequency with which it was used by those famous painters.
Judas Returning the Thirty Pieces of Silver is a painting by Rembrandt, now in Mulgrave Castle in Lythe, North Yorkshire. It depicts the story of Matthew 27:3: "Then Judas, which had betrayed him, when he saw that he was condemned, repented himself, and brought again the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders".
Belshazzar, son of the last king of the Neo-Babylonian empire, Nabonidus, has inspired many works of art and cultural allusions, often with a religious motif. While a historical figure, depictions and portrayals of him are most often based on his appearance in the biblical story of Belshazzar's feast in the Book of Daniel. This story is the origin of the idiomatic expression "the writing is on the wall".
Red pigments are materials, usually made from minerals, used to create the red colors in painting and other arts. The color of red and other pigments is determined by the way it absorbs certain parts of the spectrum of visible light and reflects the others. The brilliant opaque red of vermillion, for example, results because vermillion reflects the major part of red light, but absorbs the blue, green and yellow parts of white light.
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