# Portrait of Erasmus of Rotterdam [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [HOLBEIN, Hans the Younger]() - Date: 1501-1550 - Technique: Wood, 76 x 51 cm ## Commentary Of Holbein's portraits of Erasmus, this is the most ostentatious, and not just because it is much larger. The background of the interior is furnished with a splendidly decorated pilaster and a shelf with books and a glass carafe, all of which help to ennoble the sitter. On the edge of the book reclining on the shelf is a Latin couplet composed by Erasmus, which asserts that Holbein would sooner have a slanderer than an imitator. That seems to mean that his outstanding art could scarcely be imitated and therefore criticism from the envious is more likely than imitation. The painting is on loan from Longford Castle collection. In the Web Gallery of Art you can view <A onclick="return OpenOther\('/cgi-bin/search.cgi?author=&title=erasmus&comment=&time=any&school=any&form=any&type=portrait&location='\)" HREF="/cgi-bin/search.cgi?author=&title=erasmus&comment=&time=any&school=any&form=any&type=portrait&location=">several portraits of Erasmus</A> by Renaissance painters, such as Hans Holbein the Younger, Albrecht Dürer and Quentin Massys. ## Related artworks - [Adam and Eve]() - [Apollo and the Muses on Parnassus]() - [Charitas]() - [Charles Brandon]() - [Christ as the True Light]() - [Christina of Denmark, Ducchess of Milan \(detail\)]() - [Christina of Denmark, Ducchess of Milan]() - [Courtier of Henry VIII and his Wife]() - [Darmstadt Madonna \(detail\)]() - [Darmstadt Madonna \(detail\)]() - [Darmstadt Madonna \(detail\)]() - [Darmstadt Madonna \(detail\)]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()