From "misery" to "disaster" : perceptions of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century warfare in the etchings of Jacques Callot and Francisco Goya

Abstract

This article deals in the main with Jacques Callot's early life in Italy and with his later life in Lorraine where he produced his famous series of eighteen etchings which narrate his perception of seventeenth-century warfare known as "Les Miseres et les Malheurs de la Guerre" (1633). In contrast to Callot's point of view, the article closes with a brief account of Goya's "Los desastres de la guerra", a series of eighty-odd etchings produced in the early nineteenth-century, which can be used to explain a shift in the meaning and experience of warfare between these two centuries: from "misery" to "disaster".

Hierdie artikel handel hoofsaaklik oor die vroee lewe van Jacques Callot in Italie en sy latere lewe in Lorraine waar hy sy beroemde reeks van agtien etse gemaak het bekend as "Les Miseres et les Malheurs de la Guerre" (1633), wat sy indruk van sewentiende-eeuse oorlogvoering vertel. In teenstelling met Callot se sienswyse, sluit die artikel af met 'n kort beskrywing van Goya se "Los desastres de la guerra", 'n reeks van ongeveer tagtig etse wat in die vroee negentiende eeu gemaak is, wat gebruik kan word om 'n klemverskuiwing te verduidelik in die betekenis en ondervinding van oorlogvoering oor twee eeue heen: van "ellende " tot "rampspoedigheid".