Schilder-boeck

Het Schilder-boeck

Author	Karel van Mander
Original title	Het Schilder-Boeck Waer in haer ghestalt, aerdt ende wesen, de leer-lustighe Jeught in verscheyden Deelen in Rijm-dicht wort voor ghedraghen; Daer nae in dry delen 't leven der vermaerde doorluchtighe Schilders des ouden, en nieuwen tyd: Eyntlyck d'wtlegghinhe op den METAMORPHOSEON Pub. Ouidij Nasonis; Oock daer beneffens wtbeeldinghe der figuren. Alles dienstich en nut den schilders Const beminders en dichters. Oock alle staten van menschen.
Translator	Hessel Miedema (to modern Dutch and to English)
Illustrator	Original edition had only a few plates
Country	Dutch Republic
Language	Dutch
Subject	Artist biographies
Genre	Art history, Biography, Art theory, Art education
Publisher	First edition: Passchier Wesbusch, Haarlem Second edition: Jacob Pietersz Wachter, Amsterdam
Publication date	First edition: 1604 Second edition: 1618
Published in English	1994-1997 (translation)
Media type	Print (Hardcover), Online version of original text available from the DBNL
ISBN	, , , , ,

Het Schilder-Boeck

First edition: Passchier Wesbusch, Haarlem

First edition: 1604

Het Schilder-Boeck or Schilderboek is a book written by the Flemish writer and painter Karel van Mander first published in 1604 in Haarlem in the Dutch Republic, where van Mander resided. The book is written in 17th century Dutch and its title is commonly translated into English as 'The Book of Painters' or 'The Book of (or on) Painting' and sometimes as 'The Book on Picturing'. Het Schilder-Boeck consists of six parts and is considered one of the principal sources on the history of art and art theory in the 15th and 16th century Low Countries. The book was very well received and sold well. Karel van Mander died two years after its publication. A second posthumous edition, which included a brief, anonymous biography of van Mander was published in 1618. This second edition was translated by Hessel Miedema into English and published in 1994-1997 together with a facsimile of the original and 5 volumes of notes on the text.

Het Schilder-Boeck is divided into six parts that have separate title pages and are indexed. The parts are:

The history of early Netherlandish painting was first described by the Italian Lodovico Guicciardini in his Descrittione di Lodovico Guicciardini patritio fiorentino di tutti i Paesi Bassi altrimenti detti Germania inferiore (1567; The Description of the Low Countries). This book formed a source for Giorgio Vasari's famous biographical accounts of painters in his book Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, often referred to as the "Vite". That tradition took little account of the geographic topology of the Low countries and the van Eyck brothers were considered the fathers of Netherlandish painting concentrated in Bruges. Karel van Mander intended to correct this misconception by listing all the famous early Netherlandish painters. He encountered many difficulties in obtaining accurate information, due to the political and religious unrest at the time.