SEBASTIAN DADLER COLOSSUS MERCURIO MEDAL

To celebrate the victory, Sebastian Dadler was engaged to create a medal. Its reverse programmatically repeats the inscription that can still be viewed at the portal of the Hamburg town hall: LIBERTATEM QVAM PEPERERE MAIORES STUDEAT SERVARE POSTERITAS (= The liberty the elders have achieved posterity may preserve.).

The obverse shows a motif that had been hitherto used in a similar form in emblems only: a colossus whose legs straddle the entrance to the Hamburg harbor. Until that day, that subject had been associated with the motto ‘only the great pleases’. Dadler, however, used the motif to illustrate the size of Hamburg which – and that was the comparison – matched up with ancient harbor city of Rhodes. While the Colossus of Rhodes was an image of the god Helios, Hamburg was given a Hanseatic variant: Mercury as embodiment of the trade, wearing a winged cap and winged shoes, a staff with entwined snakes and an olive branch as symbol of peace. To avoid any mistaken identity, the god carries a plate around his neck depicting the city’s coat of arms. Cornucopiae on both sides embody the affluence both of land and sea. Two women can be seen behind Mercury: one is standing on land, holding a spade, between bunches of goods and barrels; the other one is standing on a barge decorated with the globe of the earth, sailing the Elbe River. In the background a harbor is depicted, protected by a fortress, as well a ship under full sail.

The medal’s reverse is remarkable. For the subject Dadler drew on a map that was to be published a few years later, in 1644. Dadler most probably had seen early drafts of that marvel. He represents that map in such detail that Gerd Hatz was able to show in 1989 that an engraving by Arnt Pitersen, published in 1944, must have been the model. In 1636, Hamburg was sure on a rosy future. The Privilege of the Elbe had been granted and soon the revenues would flow. But more than a century was to pass until the struggle for Hamburg’s autonomy from Holstein was finally decided - a struggle that was rekindled again and again by the Elbe customs. Only with the Treaty of Gottorp from 1768, Denmark acknowledged the imperial immediacy of the Hanseatic city officially.

To read the complete article, see:
Colossus Mercurio – or: Hamburg and the Privilege of the Elbe (www.kuenker.de/en/information/presseinformationen/aktuelle-mitteilungen/92)

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