The Triumph of Time over Fame

Unknown

ca. 1500–1530 · Wool warp; wool and silk wefts · Medieval Art

An old man representing Time commands a chariot that crushes Fame beneath its wheels. Four famous long-lived men accompany him on foot: the biblical figures of Adam, Methusalah, and Noah as well as Nestor, from Greek mythology. The humbling theme that fame ultimately is lost to the passage of time derives from I Trionfi (The Triumphs), by the fourteenth-century Italian poet Petrarch. By about 1500, it had been translated into French for Louis XII and pictured in royal tapestries. This tapestry is one of a series from the château de Septmonts, the residence of the bishops of Soissons. Bishop Symphorien de Bullioud, who was familar with Italian culture because of his diplomatic missions to Rome and Milan for Louis XII, likely commissioned the work.

Artist

Unknown

Date

ca. 1500–1530

Medium

Wool warp; wool and silk wefts

Culture

South Netherlandish

Department

Medieval Art

Credit line

Bequest of George D. Pratt, 1935