his altarpiece for the high altar of St. Peter in Geneva is
signed and dated 1444. In 1446 he is recorded as dead,
leaving his widow and fi ve young children.
The Heilsspiegel Altar, dated circa 1435 and partially
destroyed and dismembered in the iconoclasm of 1529,
was painted for the choir of the church of St. Leonhard
in Basle. Based on the Speculum humanae salvationis
(Mirror of Human Salvation), which places Old Testa-
ment an other prefi gurations next to their fulfi llment in
the New Testament and Last Judgment, it is the earliest
and largest altar in this tradition in the fi fteenth century.
The center and predella (lower alter panel) are lost, but
seven of the eight scenes from the inner wings survive.
Five are in the Kunstmuseum in Basle and the other
two in the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin and the Musée des
Beaux Arts in Dijon. Since they show Old Testament
or historical scenes with two fi gures standing before a
gold background, the missing center must have shown
their fulfi llment: an Adoration of the Magi or a Christus
Salvator (Christ as Savior) are most often suggested. The
outside panels seen on the closed altar showed single
fi gures standing in narrow rooms. Five of the original
eight survive: four in Basle and one in Dijon.
The St. Peter Altarpiece (Geneva, Musée d’Art et
d’Histoire) also lacks its center and predella, probably
destroyed by iconoclasts in 1535, when the remaining
panels were separated. Today the inner wings show the
Adoration of the Magi on the left and the donor pre-
sented to the Virgin by St. Peter on the right. The left
outside wing represents the Miracle of Fishes and Call-
ing of St. Peter, and the right outside wing the Freeing
of St. Peter from Prison. The landscape of the Miracle
of Fishes gives an accurate view of the shores of Lake
Geneva with the Savoy Alps and Mont Blanc and is con-
sidered to be the fi rst topographical landscape portrayed
in northern European art. New research considers the
connection of this panel to the politics of Savoy. Other
undated paintings attributed to Wirz are the Annuncia-
tion (Nuremberg, Germanis ches Nationalmuseum), the
Meeting at the Golden Gate (Basel, Kunstmuseum),
and Saints Catherine and Mary Magdalene in a Church
(Strasbourg, Musée de l’Oeuvre Notre-Dame).
The physical presence of fi gures and materials is
more important in Witz’s paintings than depiction of
rich costumes or detailed settings. His tempera tech-
nique and strong, simple colors increase the immobility
that characterizes his fi gures, and strong shadows help
to defi ne his space. The forms on the outside wings in
their narrow rooms resemble those in some miniatures
of the Utrecht school circa 1430.
Further Reading
Deuchler, Florens. “Konrad Witz, la Savoie et l’Italie: Nouvelles
hypothèses à propos du retable de Genève.” Revue de l’art
71 (1986): 7–16.
Gantner, Joseph. Konrad Witz. Vienna: A. Schroll, 1942.
Rott, Hans. Quellen und Forschungen zur südwestdeutschen und
schweizerischen Kunstgeschichte im XV. und XVI. Jahrhundert
3 : Der Oberrhein 2. Stuttgart: Strecker und Schröder, 1936,
pp. 20–25.
Schauder, M. “Konrad Witz und die Utrechter Buchmalerei,”
in Masters and Miniatures: Proceedings of the Congress on
Medieval Manuscript Illumination in the Northern Nether-
lands (Utrecht, 10–13 December 1989), ed. K. van der Horst
and Johann-Christian Klamt. Doornspijk: Davaco, 1991, pp.
137–147.
Marta O. RengerWOLFRAM VON ESCHENBACH
(fl. fi rst half of the 13th c.)
The greatest German epic poet of the High Middle
Ages, Wolfram wrote Parzival, Willehalm, Titurel, and
nine lyric poems. Internal evidence in his works makes
it likely that he composed Parzival between 1200 and
1210, worked on Willehalm after 1212, and left it unfi n-
ished sometime after 1217, possibly as late as the 1220s.
Wolfram’s few lyric poems, most of them amorous
exchanges between two lovers (“dawn songs”), were
probably completed early in his career, and the two frag-
ments that make up Titurel were composed either during
or after his work on Willehalm. Wolfram must have lived
from about 1170 to the 1220s. He names himself in both
Parzival and Willehalm and characteristically interjects
remarks about his personal life and circumstances, so
that we seem to have ample biographical information
about Wolfram. Yet it is diffi cult to know how much of
it is true or how much is only a pose.
If we take Wolfram at his word, he was a poor man,
probably not a ranked administrator (ministeralis, min-
isterial), dependent on wealthy patrons for support. He
must have been at the court of Landgrave Hermann of
Thuringia, who, he says, provided the French source
for Willehalm, and he claims to have been a military
man with a wife and young daughter. Wolfram was
probably born in the Middle Franconian town of Ober-
Eschenbach, today renamed Wolframs-Eschenbach.
His grave was seen there in the fi fteenth century and
again in the early seventeenth century, but there is no
sign of it today. He was well acquainted with the works
of the leading poets of his day: Heinrich von Veldeke,
Hartmann von Aue, Gottfried von Straßburg, Walther
von der Vogelweide, and Neidhart von Reuental. He
surely knew Eilhart von Oberge’s Tristant, the German
Alexanderlied, Rolandslied, Kaiserchronik, Nibelun-
genlied, and other heroic sagas. Yet Wolfram claims
not to be able to read or write (see Parzival strophe
115, ll. 27–30; Willehalm 2,16–22). Such remarks may
well have been made in reaction to poets like Hartmann
and Gottfried, who boasted of their learning and their
literary abilities.WITZ, KONRAD