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Not only Peasants
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Bruegel had no inhibitions in this respect. Two figures
in his Peasant Wedding Banquet in the barn have their spoons
in their mouths, one guest has set the jug to his lips, and
the child in the foreground is licking his fingers. The same
may be encountered in The Corn Harvest, where the
midday break during work in the field means spoon in mouth,
jug and dish set to lips.
One might gain the impression that Bruegel was confirming
the prejudice against the peasant as a being at the mercy of
basic needs, one at whom the man of education might laugh. A
closer examination of his figures reveals this to be
incorrect, however. Furthermore, executing a large-format
painting merely in order to poke fun at someone would
contradict the custom of the times: mockery was the realm of
cheap prints. Finally, Bruegel has indicated in his picture
The Land of Cockaigne (1567) that he was
thinking not only of peasants in connection with a
dependence upon nourishment. It is not just a peasant we see
lying there, but also a noble warrior and a scholar. Bruegel
has bedded them down in different ways, the aristocrat
sleeping on a cushion, the scholar on a fur cloak, the
peasant on the flail with which he threshes the corn. All
three have eaten their way through the mountain of porridge;
all three have crammed themselves with eggs, meat and
poultry before sinking into sleep, their bellies full.
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The Land of Cockaigne
1567
A peasant, a knight and a scholar are lying with full
bellies under a tree around the trunk of which a
tabletop has been fixed. The squire, wearing some pieces
of the knight's armour, is keeping watch, hoping that
something will fly into his mouth. Behind the fairytale
fantasy of the land in which there is nourishment in
abundance lies the experience of ever-recurring famine.
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The Land of Cockaigne (detail)
1567
You must eat your way through a mountain of porridge to
reach the land of Cockaigne, the proverbial "land of
milk and honey". There, the fences are made of sausages,
the geese lie ready-grilled on the plates, the pigs
bring knives with them, and what one might take to be
cacti are in fact made of oatcakes.
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Attributed to Pieter van der Heyden after Pieter
Bruegel the Elder
Land of Cockaigne
after 1570
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 The Gloomy Day
1565 |
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Bruegel portrayed the significance of eating over
and over again; in doing so, however, he did not
draw a veil over the excretion of what had been
digested. In several of his paintings, a man may be
seen standing against a wall, his back to the
observer (e.g. The Massacre of the Innocents,
The Gloomy Day, The Census at Bethlehem,
or even in a squatting position, presenting the
observer with bared buttocks (The Fair at Hoboken,
The Magpie on the Gallows).
The Fair at Hoboken, 1559
Yet the artist remains discreet, leaving women out of such actions, giving
no undue prominence to this emptying of the bowels.
Nevertheless, the fact that he should consider such
a thing at all worthy of depiction distinguishes him
from almost all his contemporaries, particularly
from the Italians and the so-called "Romanists" who
were their pupils.
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The Massacre of the Innocents
1566 |
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 The Census at Bethlehem
1566 |
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The Italians and Romanists emphasized what distinguished
man from the animal and plant world. Bruegel, in contrast,
emphasized their similarities, the natural, "begotten, not
made" element in man. In the words of the Creation story,
"the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and
breathed into his nostrils the breath of life" (Genesis 2:7)
- Bruegel sees not just the divine breath but also the
material, the dust of the ground.
This may be observed in many of his pictures, in widely
differing motifs. The Wedding Dance in the Open Air
(1566) and The Peasant Dance (1568), for instance,
convey an impression of vitality, through a whole host of
people, movement, and vivid colours. It is not from the head
that vitality comes, however, but from the body, from the
belly. Bruegel has emphasized the codpieces among the
wedding guests; contemporary fashion demanded that one dress
up the male sex organs, but the painter has set them off to
even greater advantage. Fertility and reproduction are
vigorously celebrated in his Wedding Dance in the Open Air.
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The Wedding Dance in the Open Air
1566
A picture of bright colours and brilliant colour contrasts,
with people in boisterous motion almost to the very edges.
Bruegel has painted a company full of scarcely controlled
vitality, adding many realistic details: the bridal crown
has been affixed to a cloth in the background, in front of
which money is being collected on a table, while ditches
have been dug out further to the left, on the edges of which
the company will sit to eat.
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The Wedding Dance in the Open Air (detail)
1566
The bagpipes were considered to exert an especially erotic
effect. This portrait of a boisterous dance is a celebration
of vitality and fertility. Bruegel has particularly
emphasized the codpieces worn by some of the men.
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Pieter Bruegel the Younger
Peasant Wedding Dance
1607
The son has produced a variation upon a theme of
his father's, and a comparison of the two works
sheds light upon the particular vision of the older
Bruegel. The father's work reveals a turbulent crowd
of people, vitality, potential violence, with the
figures seemingly bursting out of the frame. That of
the son displays idealized faces and clear
groupings, while the rather harmless festivities are
held in check by the absence of figures in the areas
along the border.
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