Pieter van der Heyden (1525–1569) (after Pieter Bruegel the Elder), ‘
Battle of the Money Bags and the Strong Boxes’, after 1570
“The unprecedented, and somewhat enigmatic, iconography of this image derives from the fertile imagination of Pieter Bruegel the Elder, who executed the original drawing after which this was engraved. Strongboxes, piggy banks, money bags, barrels of coins, and treasure chests—most of them heavily armed with swords, knives, and lances—attack each other in a ferocious display of chaotic, all-out warfare. The Dutch verses inscribed in the lower margin inform us that “It’s all for money and goods, this fighting and quarreling.” According to the Latin portion of the inscription, the banner with the “savage grappling hook” in the right background exemplifies greed, the vice at the root of all this trouble. The image seems to suggest that humanity’s lust for money is responsible for armed conflict. The concerns for the dangers of acquisitiveness and avarice expressed here had deep resonance in Antwerp, the bustling mercantile capital of Northern Europe where Bruegel was active for most of his career.”
Giuseppe Maria Mitelli (1634-1718),
‘Machina del Mondo, ogn'un cerca di star sopra il compagno’, 1675-1710.
“A pyramid of ten persons climbing on top of each other, the poor at the bottom, the king at the top; Death appears to take them all.”
Bernard Picart
The Chaos (engraving, 1731)
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