»Bedenke das Ende«

Contrary to received opinion, the Thirty Years' War was not widely perceived by contemporaries as a political phenomenon. In the series of prints by Hans Ulrich Franck and the monographer CR (Christian Richter) on which the present study concentrates, the major concern is a moral evaluation of war and warfare. The central thesis of the study is that we are confronted here with a pictorial version of 'edifying' literature designed as an instrument of deterrence. As the biblical motto "Be mindful of thine end" used by Franck suggests, these series stand in a late medieval memento mori tradition to which not only the ars moriendi sub-genre but also the "Dance of Death" motif and the extensive literature on death, dying and consolation may be reckoned.