The Four Naked Women (Dürer)

The Four Naked Women, or The Four Witches (German: Die Vier Hexen), or The Four Sorceresses or Scene in a Brothel, are titles given to a 1497 engraving by the German Renaissance artist Albrecht Dürer. It is one of his earliest signed engravings and shows four exuberant nude women gathered conspiratorially in a circle in a confined interior setting, perhaps a bathhouse, which appears to have entrances from either side. Although the image is clearly erotic, a small horned demon in the left-hand portal, perhaps representing temptation, looks out and holds what may be a hunting object, engulfed in flames.

The engraving has been subject to prolonged and significant scholarly analysis it remains enigmatic, and there is nothing in his writings to indicate his intent. There is no consensus as to its subject matter or its intended meaning, with art historians associating it with either witch hunting or figures from classical mythology. The women stand underneath a suspended globe or sphere and before an open stone window, which, given the human skull and thigh bone placed across from it, maybe a gateway to death, and that the women are engaged in some type of nefarious scheme, perhaps linked to the 1487 inquisition treatise Malleus Maleficarum. The alternative view is that the women represent Greek or Roman goddesses, perhaps Hecate, patroness of evil magic, poisonous plants, and ghosts, or her earthly counterpart Diana.

Dürer's monogram "AD" appears on the centre of the floor. Numerous original prints exist, held at a number of major museums.