The First of These Two Essays on Pieter Bruegel the Elder is a critical study of the well-known painting Triumph of Death. Gibson's analysis of the visual traditions that inspired Bruegel's highly original and terrifying evocation of humanity's last hour on earth sheds new light on this familiar work. The second essay considers three of Bruegel's peasant scenes within a far-ranging discussion of the peasant in sixteenth-century thought. Gibson offers his own conclusions to the ongoing debate over what Bruegel intended to convey in his peasant scenes.

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