Robert Angus
Massacre Of The Innocents (Bruegel 1566)
(Midwinter)
Josephus has failed to notice the massacre.
(The persons are few & the result negligible.)
But here - somewhere lost in the scene - Bruegel
is present.
[Snow covers the tiles covers the ground deadens
the cries absorbs the blood.]
The prophet Jeremy observes:
‘Voices everywhere are heard: lamentation & mourning:
Rachel bitterly weeping for her children…’
High in his tree a crow peers from his nest.
The blacksuited commander counts the bodies
(5 or 6 dead the rest struggling about to be dead).
Horses noticing nothing paw the ground
Dogs excitedly sniffing blood bark.
Silently the troop
patiently grouped in a block
wait for the end of the hunt the killing.
* * *
Herod no longer mocked
[another crow in another tree]
also hopes & waits.
Note. Small killings were frequent & likely to pass unnoticed; but the artist (looking apparently from a point above them) observes the details vividly. He sees (& hears with Jeremiah) the mothers begging for the lives of their children & he clearly illustrates the butchery. He blankets the village in snow, introduces some dogs & aristocratic huntsmen & hunt servants. He observes a nest in a tree to the right. Herod & the crow are absent, but one can imagine them counting & writing.
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