Pensverkoper 1660

Giuseppe Maria Mitelli made this etching of a pen seller in seventeenth-century Italy. Mitelli was one of the most prolific printmakers in Bologna, a city that was then part of the Papal States. While he produced many religious images, he was equally interested in the lives of ordinary people, such as this street vendor. We see him trudging along, bent under the weight of his wares, which include writing quills and what appear to be small birds, perhaps for food. Though he is rendered with a degree of sympathy, the figure is also caricatured. His expression suggests a kind of cunning, and his clothes are tattered. The text beneath the image also hints at the hardships of his trade. What does this image tell us about the social and economic conditions of seventeenth-century Italy? Was Mitelli making a political statement about the plight of the poor, or simply creating a genre scene for the entertainment of his wealthier patrons? Answering such questions requires that we look not only at the image itself, but also at the historical context in which it was made, using sources such as period literature, economic data, and social histories.