Historical Art Index, A.D. 400-1650. People, Places, and Events Depicted

When searching for historical illustrations, what does one do without a starting point — without even knowing whether a person or event has ever been represented at all? Indexes of artwork seem almost always to be listed alphabetically by the artist’s name; this does little good if the artist is unknown. Often, while doing research, I found myself spending as much or more time searching for illustrations as I spent researching an article in the first place.
My solution was to find as many works as I could that relate to a person, place, or event in history, then group them under alphabetically arranged subject headings. To be as complete as possible, I have included statues, funeral effigies, and even allegorical representations along with paintings, sketches, woodcuts, and engravings. I have omitted seals and coins from this index for fear that they would make the index too cumbersome; these portraits tended to be stylized anyway.
Since many people have the same or similar names, I have tended to follow the more common usage in listing them (e.g. “Edward, the Black Prince,” rather than “Plantagenet, Edward of Woodstock, Prince of Wales”); however, alternate usages and titles are cross-referenced. Persons whose names are generally associated with countries are listed under their given names —thus “Anne of Bohemia” may be found under A.
Works under each boldface subject heading are listed chronologically by date of creation (as far as such date could be determined), starting with contemporaneous art and continuing through the Romantic movement. Information given for each work follows this pattern: title of the place (or a description); date of event where known; artist’s name where known; date of work where known. Unless otherwise stated, one can assume the work is a painting. I have noted where a sketch or woodcut is in color; engravings are in black-and-white.