c. 1515

The Saturnalia (The Desperate Man)

German, 1471 - 1528

Dürer’s unusual subject in this etching eludes definitive interpretation. The print is sometimes called The Dismayed Husband, while another reading has speculated that the figures might represent different types of melancholy. Variations of the bearded man in profile and the slumbering nude woman appear in sketches that Dürer made in 1514, suggesting that this scene was pieced together from figure studies drawn around the time he began experimenting with etching. Dürer typically included his initials and the year of creation in his prints, but their absence here suggests that this etching may have been an experiment, and possibly his first.