Dagger Sheath with a Young Couple Above

The Westphalian painter and printmaker Heinrich Aldegrever styled his nested AG monogram after the famed Albrecht Dürer, and often adopted the compact scale of the Little Masters of Nuremberg. Aldegrever produced some 100 of his 300 prints in similarly elaborate detail. His Dagger Sheath is one of the rarest and most classicizing Renaissance ornament prints, with its acanthus-leaf foliage and comparatively large figures. The specific dagger shape implies the print’s intended use as a pattern to decorate a leather cover for a blade.