The Martyrdom of Saint Barbara

Cranach painted this in Wittenberg around 1510, court artist to the Elector of Saxony and a fixture of a small German town that was about to become the center of the Reformation. Seven years later Martin Luther, who lived there, would nail up his theses, and Cranach, Luther's close friend, would become the great image-maker of the new faith. But that is still ahead. Here he is painting an old Catholic story: Barbara, a girl whose pagan father locked her in a tower and then, when she turned Christian, dragged her out to be killed. She kneels in a fine gown at the front, hands folded, while her own father lifts the sword behind her. Legend said he was struck dead by lightning the moment it was done. Cranach dresses the whole scene in the clothes and hills of his own Saxony.