Massacre of the Innocents

This unfinished engraving presents the violent biblical narrative through several isolated, highly muscular figure groups. In the foreground, a bearded King Herod stands upon a stone pedestal with a scepter, observing the chaos while mothers desperately shield their children from daggers. The print is a famous example of an unfinished work, leaving large portions of the composition as blank paper or simple outlines.

Hendrick Goltzius was the leading figure of the Haarlem Mannerists, a circle of artists and intellectuals who emphasized anatomical virtuosity and complex 'disegno'. This work demonstrates the technical mastery and intellectualized approach to art favored in late 16th-century Haarlem, where the creative process was often as valued as the finished religious subject.