Aby Warburg: His Aims and Methods: An Anniversary Lecture
E.H. Gombrich
Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vol. 62. (1999), pp. 268-282.
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Fei Apr 28 09:31:50 2006ABY WARBURG: HIS AIMS AND METHODS
An Anniversary Lecture
EH. Gombrich
by Warburg died seventy years ago, on 26 October 1929 in his sixty-fourth year.
Twas at that time in my second year at Vienna University, studying the history of
art, but! do not think that the news of his death reached me, or that | knew much about
him, though my teacher, Julius von Schlosser, had a high regard for his erudition. It was
only when I came to England, almastsixty-three years ago, that I was assigned the task to
assist Gertrud Bing in publishing the vast array of his drafts and notes. [ was to use these
after her death in writing Warburg's Inécllectual Biography, and his oeuvre has never
been far from my mind. Do not expect a solemn address for the occasion! As indicated
in my title, I feel the best tribute I can pay him is to explain to the best of my power, sine
ira et studio, how he saw the purpose of art history and the methods it should employ, for
[find that people tend to have the weirdest ideas abouc these aims and methods,
There is no better way of finding out what a writer meant than to attempt to state
his meaning in different words, preferably in another language. Now, at last, seventy
‘years after Warburg's death, his collected works have been made available to English
readers who have no German? In my Intetlectuat Biography, { have wrestled myself
with what Warburg once jokingly called his “Aalsuppenstil’, “eebsoup style’, and so
‘can appreciate the work of David Britt, author of this excellent translation. I only wish
the publishers had also had an elementary consideration for readers, for the texts are
enshrined in such a heavy tome that it needs elephantine strength even to put it an
the table. I very much regret that obstacle
Yet on this occasion [ cannot regret the form the volume has taken. It can serve me
as a demonstratio ad ocules that | cannot possibly deal with Warburg's oeuvre in one hour.
Thave co select a derail, Warburg, after all, has often been quoted that ‘der liebe Gott
steckt im Detail’, “God dwells in the details”
The detail I have chosen for my presentation is the peroration from his mast
famous paper, which he delivered at the height of his career in October 1912, at the
tenth ArtHistorical Congress in Rome: his interpretation of the astrological fresco cycle
of the Palazzo Schifanoia in Ferrara, painted around 1470 (Fig. 89). He explained
his discovery that the theee figures marking each month are known to astrologers as
the decans, or the ten-day divinities, and chat the classical gods above, ruling the
1 BH. Gambrick, Aly Hlarurg am Inuglictuot —q. Aly Warburg, Walienische Kunst und [avert
Bugraphy, London 1g70s and edition, Oxford ig88. _conale Aswologe im Palazao Schifanoja au Ferrara!
> Aby Warburg, The Renawas of Papen Aniguity — Gatanneie Sehefeon, ML, Leipeig #932. PP 459-81.
Contributes fo the Cultural Misery of the Eueapean — Gambrich, op-eit, PP 97-5
Fonesssanc, intron, K. W. Fotster, 1. D, Bet, Las
angeler 1909ABY WARBURG