“Sidonia von Bork 1560”
“Sidonia von Bork 1560” is an 1860 watercolor and gouache on paper painting by the Welsh English Pre-Raphaelite artist, Edward Burne-Jones.
This painting was inspired by the book, Sidonia the Sorceress, by Wilhelm Meinhold. It was translated into English and published in 1849 by Jane Francesca Elgee, Oscar Wilde’s mother, and again in 1894 through Burne-Jones’s friend, William Morris and his publishing company.
This is one of Burne-Jones’s earliest watercolors. He had only recently begun to pursue art as a career. Fanny Cornforth served as the model. She was a favorite among the Pre-Raphaelites and was a mistress to Dante Gabriel Rossetti.
Sidonia von Bork was a Pomeranian (Polish) noblewoman who lived from 1548 to 1620. History remembers her for being tried and subsequently executed for witchcraft. She became a femme fatale character and achieved something of a cult status after her death.
Von Bork was an unmarried noblewoman who lived with her sister in Strzmiele. After her sister died, she moved into a convent for unmarried women. She soon became involved in a series of political disputes with other roommates of the convent. Her last dispute began in 1619 during Mass when she got into an altercation with a convent roommate, Dorothea von Stettin. Both were arrested and von Stettin accused von Bork of witchcraft. During the trial, the deaths of several dukes were blamed on von Bork.
Simultaneously, another woman was being held for witchcraft and through heavy interrogation, mainly torture, the other supposed witch also named von Bork as a witch. Von Bork tried to escape and commit suicide after being accused of witchcraft a second time. After being held for about a year, von Bork was found guilty of several counts of murder, sexual contacts with the devil, magical practices, and other witchy things. Von Bork was found guilty of 72 counts in all. In 1620, at 72 years old, von Bork was decapitated, and her body burned.
The story of von Bork was written about in Germany and England. She achieved cult status in Victorian England through the publications of several novels that depicted her as a femme fatale type of character. She was particularly inspirational for the Pre-Raphaelite artists.
“Sidonia von Bork 1560” is currently in the collections of the Tate Gallery in London, England.
For more on Edward Burne-Jones, please visit his short biography here.
You can find more artists to learn about here.
