Description:

inscribed (upper right): Auf und Grund Riss / von einer 611 digen Feld Affüte / mit zugehörigem Protz-Gestelle; dated (lower right): Copenhagen den 30de Martü 1765; signed (lower right): PC Beuvius / EG Mechlenburg; wax seal of the General War Commissar (lower right)
pen and black ink, grey wash
485 x 700 mm

Provenance:

Provenance:
Private collection, Copenhagen

Note:

This meticulously rendered depiction of an artillery carriage is the result of a collaboration between two Danish Artillery officers, Ezechias Gustav von Mechlenburg and Polycarpus Chrysostomus von Beuvius. Signed by both men in the lower right-hand corner, the sheet also bears the stamped wax seal of the General War Commissar. The inscription to the lower left-hand corner dates the drawing to the 30th of March 1765, when the two men were stationed in Copenhagen.

The upper portion of the drawing depicts the carriage from side-on, and the lower portion from birds-eye, The limber (a two-wheeled cart) is shown to the right of the design, attached to the central gun carriage. The extended cheeks form the body of the carriage linking the limber to the larger wheels to the left. The ammunition chest is mounted to the right of centre on a transom held between the cheeks of the carriage. Military drawings of this kind are characteristic biproducts of the Enlightenment, where mathematical theories of war propounded. Philosophical rationalism, balance, and symmetry resulted in designs of great aesthetic appeal. For Beuvius and Mechlenburg artillery design appears to have been both a science and an art.