Learned Fable, Living World: Artistry, Knowledge and Attention to Nature in Two Aesopic Paintings by Joannes Fyt

Abstract

Now better known as a hunting painter, the Antwerp animal specialist Joannes Fyt (1611–1661) also produced several depictions of Aesopic fables. A notable feature of Fyt’s fables is their attentiveness to the appearances and behaviors of animals and how they inhabit their environment. Focusing on two paintings by Fyt featuring poultry birds, this essay uses period fable books, a key discussion of fable by Erasmus, and zoopoetic theory to explore how these works address both the allegorical realm of fable and a tangible living world that was increasingly coming under investigation from natural history and related modes of inquiry.