Elector John Frederick the Magnanimous with Book and Crucifix
A woodcut containing a portrait of John Frederick (Johann Friedrich) reading a book and praying before a crucifix. Frederick was a leader of the Schmalkaldic League and fought for Luther's cause against the Imperial troops. The league was defeated in the Battle of Muehlberg in April of 1547. Frederick was wounded by a slash across his left cheek, captured, condemned to death, but ultimately pardoned and reinstated as duke in Weimar. After 1547, however, the Electoral power had fallen to the rivalling Albertininian line of the dynasty residing in Dresden. The print depicts Frederick with the scar on his cheek. The book contains the words, "Hilf Got[t]" (help me God). Cranach marked the woodcut plate with his device and dated it to 1552, but the broadsheet in its current manifestation was printed in 1557.
Cranach, Lucas, 1515-1586
Wittenberg (Saxony-Anhalt, Germany)
Bruno, Gregor
Latin
Early works to 1800
Woodcuts (prints)
Crucifixion
Jesus Christ
Johann Friedrich I, Kurfürst von Schsen, 1503-1554
Sixteenth century
Still image
woodcuts (prints)
Reformation-era Woodcut collection, 1506-1576
Heller, Lucas Cranach's Leben und Werke, p. 239 n. 612.
Box 1, Folder 5
MSS 400
The online edition of this work in the public domain, i.e. not protected by copyright, has been produced by Pitts Theology Library.
Emory University
Pitts Theology Library