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Secondary sourcePainting1901

Plate Pesta11 from Svartedauen

Theodor Kittelsen · 1901

An illustration by Theodor Kittelsen from his 1901 book Svartedauen, showing a dark church scene associated with the Black Death.

A later artistic depiction imagining death in a church during the Black Death, created long after the pandemic.

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Dark etching-style print of an altar or table draped with a cloth in a dim church interior. Columns and a carved figure are faintly visible in the background. A large black, rounded mass, possibly a pile of hooded or cloaked forms, sits in the foreground below the table.
Theodor Kittelsen, Plate Pesta11 from Svartedauen, 1901. National Library of Norway.

About this source

What it is

This print by Norwegian artist Theodor Kittelsen, made in 1901 for his book Svartedauen, shows a dim church interior with a draped altar and a large dark mass in the foreground.

Why it matters

Kittelsen's work was created long after the Black Death struck Europe and Norway, drawing on folklore and imagination to depict the disease's devastation. The dark shape in the foreground may suggest bodies, reflecting how the plague was remembered as a time of mass death, especially in sacred spaces like churches.

Look closer

  • What does the setting of a church suggest about how people responded to the plague?
  • Why might the artist leave the dark mass ambiguous rather than showing it clearly?
  • How does this image shape our emotional understanding of the plague compared to a historical record?

This painting is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of The Black Death on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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