Animals in Eden: The Fall of Man in the Early Modern Art and Literature of Germany and the Low-Countries

This book looks at early modern representations, both pictorial and literary, of the animals surrounding Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden at the dramatic moment of the Fall. Beginning with Albrecht Dürer’s engraving Adam and Eve (1504) and ending with Rembrandt’s etching Adam and Eve (1637), it explores the many manifestations of this theme at the intersection of painting, literature, and natural history. Artists such as Lucas Cranach and Jan Brueghel, and poets such as Guillaume Du Bartas and Joost van den Vondel, as well as many others, mainly from Germany and the Netherlands, are discussed.