The scene on this copper plate is sometimes thought to represent Aristotle being ridden by Phyllis, but it is more accurately identified as a comic depiction of woman’s tyrannical rule.
Its humor relies in part on the longstanding association between women and spinning. The object at the left of the plate represents a fixed distaff, which was used to spin wool by hand. Once spun onto a spindle, the yarn would be wound off with a cross-reel such as that held by the man. The fact that a man could be reduced to hank winding would alone have been quite amusing to medieval viewers, but that he has been reduced to a most embarrassing position and is in the process of being beaten - possibly for not correctly performing even this simplest of tasks - can only be viewed as a domestic satire.
A plate of this size and depth could have served either as a charge on which to carry large portions of food to the table, or as a basin into which water could be poured.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Plate with Wife Beating Husband
Date:ca. 1480
Geography:Made in Dinant or Malines, Netherlands
Culture:Netherlandish
Medium:Copper alloy, wrought
Dimensions:Overall: 3 7/8 x 20 1/4 in. (9.8 x 51.5 cm)
Classification:Metalwork-Copper alloy
Credit Line:Gift of Irwin Untermyer, 1964
Accession Number:64.101.1499
Dr. Albert Figdor, Vienna (until d. 1927); [his posthumous sale, Paul Cassirerat Hotel Esplanade, Berlin (Sept. 29-30, 1930, vol. V, no. 496)]; Irwin Untermyer, New York (until 1964)
New York. The Cloisters, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Medieval Art from Private Collections," October 30, 1968–March 30, 1969.
New York. The Cloisters Museum & Gardens. "The Secular Spirit: Life and Art at the End of the Middle Ages," March 28–June 15, 1975.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Highlights of the Untermyer Collection of English and Continental Decorative Arts," September 29, 1977–May 21, 1978.
Braunschweig, Germany. Braunschweigisches Landesmuseum. "Stadt im Wandel. Kunst und Kultur des Bürgertums in Norddeutschland," August 25, 1985–November 24, 1985.
State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts. "Dekorativno-Prikladnoe Iskusstvo ot Pozdnei Antichnosti do Pozdnei Gotiki," June–December 1989.
State Hermitage Museum, Leningrad. "Dekorativno-Prikladnoe Iskusstvo ot Pozdnei Antichnosti do Pozdnei Gotiki," February–July 1990.
New York. Bard Graduate Center: Decorative Arts, Design History, Material Culture. "Lions, Dragons, and Other Beasts: Aquamanilia of the Middle Ages. Vessels for Church and Table," July 12, 2006–October 15, 2006.
New York. The Cloisters, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Rich Man, Poor Man: Art, Class, and Commerce in a Late Medieval Town," March 6, 2023–February 4, 2024.
Walcher-Molthein, Alfred von. "Geschlagene Messingbecken." Altes Kunsthandwerk 1 (1927). p. 4, pl. 1, fig. 2.
Falke, Otto von, and Max J. Friedländer, ed. Die Sammlung Dr. Albert Figdor, Wien. Vol. 5. Berlin: Paul Cassirer Verlag, 1930. no. 496, pl. CLXXX.
Hackenbroch, Yvonne. Bronzes Other Metalwork and Sculpture in the Irwin Untermyer Collection. Irwin Untermyer Collection, Vol. 5. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1962. pp. xliv, 26, fig. 102, pl. 99.
Gómez-Moreno, Carmen. Medieval Art from Private Collections: A Special Exhibition at The Cloisters, October 30, 1968 through January 5, 1969. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1968. no. 122.
Husband, Timothy B., and Jane Hayward, ed. The Secular Spirit: Life and Art at the End of the Middle Ages. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1975. no. 73, p. 65.
Draper, James David, ed. Highlights of the Untermyer Collection of English and continental decorative arts. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1977. p. 152, no. 289.
Lockner, Hermann P. Messing: ein Handbuch über Messinggerät des 15.-17. Jahrhunderts. Munich: Klinkhardt & Biermann, 1982. pp. 31, 33, fig. 7.
Meckseper, Cord, ed. Stadt im Wandel: Kunst und Kultur des Bürgertums in Norddeutschland, 1150–1650. Ausstellungskatalog. Vol. 1. Braunschweig: Braunschweigisches Landesmuseum, 1985. no. 374, p. 454.
Pushkin Museum and State Hermitage Museum. Dekorativno-Prikladnoe Iskusstvo ot Pozdnei Antichnosti do Pozdnei Gotiki: Kratkii Katalog Vystavki. Moscow: Pushkin Museum, 1990. no. 76, p. 13.
State Hermitage Museum. Dekorativno-Prikladnoe Iskusstvo ot Pozdnei Antichnosti do Pozdnei Gotiki. St. Petersburg: State Hermitage Museum, 1990. no. 76, pp. 158–59.
Barnet, Peter, and Pete Dandridge, ed. Lions, Dragons, & Other Beasts: Aquamanilia of the Middle Ages, Vessels for Church and Table. New York: Bard Graduate Center for Studies in the Decorative Arts, Design, and Culture, 2006. no. 56, p. 190.
Lyon, Christopher. Couples in Art: Artworks from The Metropolitan Museum of Art selected by Colin Eisler in collaboration with Caroline Kelly. Munich, London, New York: Prestel, 2011. pp. 22–23.
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