Nuremberg Shrovetide Carnival
(1449-1539). Schembartsbuch.
No. 2. Wild Man (Man of the Woods) in fur costume with bare patches, carrying a whole tree; a small figure clinging to its trunk.
FROM Bodleian Image Library

Though Dürer never mentions the Schembartlauf in his writings, he expresses an interest in the carnivalesque. For example, in a journal entry made while visiting the Netherlands in 1520, the artist gives a detailed description of a religious procession in which “very many delightful things were shown, most splendidly got up. Waggons [sic] were drawn along with masques upon ships and other structures… At the end came a great Dragon which St Margaret and her maidens led by a girdle.” This parade, with its emphasis on costumed participants and moveable floats with fantastic scenes, bears many similarities with the Nuremberg Schembartlauf. Shortly before Carnival in Antwerp in 1521, Dürer reports making a drawing of costumes and “two sheets-full of very fine little masks” for his hosts. Later he attended a banquet on Shrove-Tuesday where he observed “many strange masquers,” some of whom may have been attired in costumes he designed.^[5]

Dürer’s frequent portrayal of Wildmen is an indication of the impact of Carnival on his art. Although Wildmen were not unique to the Schembart parade, they played an important role in Nuremberg’s Carnival and could not have escaped the artist’s notice. They were among the worst offenders during Carnival, as evidenced by the fact that many of the City Council’s ordinances were aimed at controlling their behavior. As a young boy, Dürer may have been frightened by the Wildmen as they ran through the streets, screaming and occasionally demanding money,^[6] dressed in skins, hair, leaves, moss, and other natural materials. In the Schembart manuscripts, Wildmen are sometimes seen holding an uprooted sapling to which a young man or boy has been tied,^[6] apparently signifying their penchant for abduction. They provided a stark contrast to the elegantly-attired Schembartläufer, and probably represented the vestiges of medieval folkloric traditions that aimed to clear away the “spirit of dead vegetation,”^[7] celebrate the rebirth of nature, and remind viewers of the irrational forces in nature. Humanists interpreted the Wildman as a Bacchanalian figure, while advocates of the Reformation viewed him as a symbol of the excesses and potentially demonic aspects of Carnival.^[8]

Portrait of Oswolt Krel, 1499
(Oil on panel, 49.6 × 39 cm)
BY Albrecht Dürer
Alte Pinakothek

One of the most notable appearances of this carnivalesque figure in Dürer’s oeuvre can be found in his 1499 Portrait of Oswolt Krel, where wings depicting Wildmen with clubs and escutcheons were made to close over the portrait.^[9] Interestingly, Oswolt Krel’s name appears in a list of about 500 Schembartläufer.^[10] It is possible that Krel’s connection with the Schembartlauf led Dürer to include the Wildmen, one of the most distinctive symbols of Carnival, in his portrait. Perhaps Krel even performed as a Wildman as well as a runner, although we do not have a comparable list of people who dressed as grotesques. Krel was probably proud of his participation in the Schembartlauf, as it was a sign of wealth and elite status in Nuremberg. Although Wildmen had been used as supporters of escutcheons since the fourteenth-century, the shield-bearers in this portrait appear to be dressed as Wildmen. Their heads, hands and feet are perfectly human and stand out from their leaf and fur-covered bodies, suggesting that they are wearing costumes similar to those used during Carnival.

Knight, Death, and the Devil, 1513–14
(Engraving, 24.4 x 19.1 cm)
BY Albrecht Dürer
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1943 (43.106.2)

Dürer may have used the Carnival grotesque as inspiration for images of devils and monsters in several of his other works. Some Schembart parades included maskers dressed as fanciful hybridized creatures such as a “goat-horned, bird-beaked, human-handed figure in furry clothing;” a “goat-headed, human-handed figure,” sometimes accompanied by a child dressed in an identical costume; a “stork-headed figure” with female breasts; and a “pig-headed figure in furry clothing.”^[11] Kinser notes that scholarship has almost completely overlooked the relationship between these carnivalesque “fantasmatic” characters and Dürer’s weird, conglomerate creatures such as the merman in the Meerwunder of 1498 and the theriomorphic devil of 1513’s Knight, Death and the Devil — the latter of which looks remarkably like the goat-headed creature, and which carries a similar pitchfork-like instrument. It is also distinctly possible that Dürer’s works influenced the Nuremberg Carnival, and that his imaginative characters were the inspiration for some of the Schembartlauf’s outlandish costumes.

Nuremberg Shrovetide Carnival (1449-1539). Schembartsbuch. No. 6. Man in costume of the fur of a bear, mask of head of a pig, and carrying small figure of a fool. FROM Bodleian Image Library

Grotesques from the Schembart Parade LEFT: Fig. 22 Knell-ringer. RIGHT: Fig. 21 Father and Son. FROM Sumberg's The Nuremberg Schembart Carnival (New York: Columbia University Press, 1941)