Sebald Beham

Sebald Beham (1500–1550) was a German painter and printmaker, especially noted for his engravings. Born in Nuremberg, he spent the later part of his career in Frankfurt. He was one of the most important of the "Little Masters", the group of German artists making prints in the generation after Dürer.

His name is often given as Hans Sebald Beham, although there is no documentary evidence that he ever used this additional forename.

Beham was born in Nuremberg. Nothing is known of his parents. His brother Bartel Beham, two years his junior, was also an artist. His training is undocumented. In 1521 he is recorded as a Malergeselle ("journeyman painter"), and by 1525 he was master of his own workshop in Nuremberg.

In January 1525, along with his brother and Georg Pencz, he was banished from Nuremberg, accused of heresy, blasphemy and not recognising the authority of the City council. The three thus became known as "godless painters". The accusations against Beham were connected with his Lutheran beliefs, the city authorities then being Catholic, although they adopted Lutheranism as the city's official religion only two months later. The three artists were soon allowed to return to Nuremberg, but in 1528 Beham hurriedly left the city once more, following the threat of legal action over his treatise on the proportions of the horse which was regarded as having been plagiarised from an unpublished manuscript by Albrecht Dürer, who had recently died. He then spent time working in various German cities; his woodcuts were published at Ingolstadt between 1527 and 1530, and in the latter year he was in Munich, where he recorded the triumphal entry of Emperor Charles V in a woodcut entitled The Military Display, 10 June 1530. He lived mostly in Frankfurt from 1532, becoming a citizen there in 1540, and remaining until his death ten years later.

Until about 1532 his prints were monogrammed 'HSP', reflecting the Nuremberg pronunciation of his surname: Peham. After this date, by which time he had established himself in Frankfurt, his monogram became "HSB". This monogram has often led to his name being given as "Hans Sebald Beham", but there is no documentary evidence for this additional forename, the "H" in the monogram probably representing the second syllable of his surname.

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