'Better late than never'.
'Don't judge a book by its cover'.
'If the boot fits'.
The English language is full of these little pearls of wisdom, packaged in clever,
quippy, or comical catchphrases.
Actually, every language has these socially-relevant metaphors with a moral lesson.
We call them proverbs and hey, if you want to give good advice, well,
they're a good way to 'put your best foot forward'.
But, 'don't count your chickens before they hatch', because 'talk is cheap'.
After all, 'a picture's worth a thousand words'.
And that's where art comes in handy.
We love our proverbs, but we're far from the only culture to appreciate them.
In the 16th century, proverbs were also an important part of life.
Now, European societies had their own proverbs, but people of this time period had been
really looking back to the Classical societies of ancient Greece and Rome for knowledge and guidance.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?
Well, that devotion to Classical knowledge is called Humanism.
Humanist scholars wrote their own philosophies but also spent a lot of time translating
the works of ancient Rome and Greece to make that knowledge more available to people of the 16th century.
One of the most important of the Humanist scholars was a Dutch priest
and intellectual: Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, most often just called Erasmus.
Historians call Erasmus 'the Prince of Humanism' because his writings alone accounted for
up to 20% of all book sales in Europe.
He translated tons of ancient texts, but he didn't put all of his eggs into one basket.
As he was translating, he began keeping a list of all the ancient proverbs he came across.
Remember, his goal was to make Classical knowledge and wisdom available to people in the 16th century.
In 1500, he published this collection of translated Classical proverbs in a book called the Adagia.
The first addition contained 800 proverbs, with such gems as 'One step at a time',
'Call a spade a spade', and 'Caught between a rock and a hard place.' By 1508,
the Adagia included over 3,000 proverbs.
Think he bit off more than he could chew?
Nope.
By the time of his death in 1536, Erasmus had translated a total of 4,151 proverbs.
Most of these we still use today, indicating just how important they became to European society.
But Erasmus was just the tip of the iceberg.
Now Erasmus was a major figure in documenting and spreading the proverbs of the 16th century.
But, 'it takes two to tango'.
Remember, this lesson is really about art.
I just didn't want to 'cross that bridge before we came to it'.
The proverbs of the ancient Romans and Greeks mixed with the local proverbs of people in
the 16th century to create a culture that was full of catchy metaphors.
This was especially true up in Northern Europe, and the intricacies of daily society
caught the attention of many artists.
One of the first to begin really focusing on the lives of common people was Pieter
Bruegel the Elder, a Netherlandish painter of the 16th century.
Bruegel specialized in genre paintings, scenes of daily peasant life,
and turned this into a true art form, painting images of northern society
that both documented trends of the time and hid a layer of intricate symbolism
that criticized social problems.
By far the best example of this is his 1559 masterpiece Netherlandish Proverbs.
Think this is just a busy scene of daily peasant life?
'Close, but no cigar'.
With a closer look, you'll notice that all of these people are engaged in very specific activities.
Actually, some very strange activities.
In fact, they are literally acting out popular 16th-century proverbs.
Bruegel managed to capture no less than 112 Netherlandish proverbs in this painting,
all depicted in a literal sense.
Some are familiar to us, like 'swimming against the tide'.
Others, like 'his roof is tiled with tarts', were a little more specific to the 16th century.
As a side note, that one about tarts means to be very wealthy.
So, this painting manages to capture not only the proverbs themselves,
but also shows how important these were to Northern European society.
And below all that is a veiled social commentary.
Bruegel was known for often criticizing the inherent foolishness of people,
seen here through the use of 112 different phrases all created to basically reinforce
the same message: don't be stupid.
You might accuse Pieter Bruegel the Elder of crying over spilled milk but hey,
it's the squeaky wheel that gets the grease.
Proverbs are catchy, easy-to-remember, socially-relevant metaphors and are used by every society.
We love them, but the people of 16th century Europe were absolutely obsessed with these
delightful pearls of wisdom.
Part of this came from a devotion to the Classical knowledge of ancient Greece
and Rome that led to a philosophy of education and art called Humanism.
The Prince of Humanism was Erasmus, a Dutch priest and intellectual who spent his
lifetime translating books from ancient Greek and Latin.
Over time, he compiled a list of Classical proverbs, catchy and useful bits of ancient
knowledge, and published them in the Adagia.
European society was filled to the brim with proverbs, leading the Netherlandish artist
Pieter Bruegel the Elder to find inspiration in the complexities of daily life.
Bruegel captured images of daily peasant life in genre paintings, which often used common
proverbs to both document and critique 16th-century society.
He may have intended for some of his criticisms to be hidden below symbolism, but what can I say?
'The cat's out of the bag'.