The Tower of Babel

Get close, because the detail is astonishing. The tower is modelled on the Colosseum in Rome, which Bruegel had seen a decade earlier, but it also leans slightly and its floors are not level, as if the rock beneath it has shifted. Look at the treadmill crane on the ramp, the tiny washing hung out on the upper storeys where people have already moved in, and the ships in the harbour, painted with the accuracy of someone who had studied the Antwerp docks. Bruegel signed and dated the panel on a stone block near the king's feet. The painting can be read as a warning about pride, but it is also a celebration of engineering; Antwerp in 1563 was the richest and busiest port in Europe.

The panel belonged to Nicolaes Jonghelinck, who owned sixteen Bruegels, and it reached the imperial collection with the rest of them through Archduke Ernst and Rudolf the Second. A second, smaller Tower of Babel by Bruegel is in Rotterdam, darker and more menacing. This Vienna version is the one that everyone copies, from Renaissance engravers to film designers, and it hangs here beside eleven other Bruegels, more than anywhere else in the world.

Did You Know? Bruegel based the tower on the Colosseum, but slipped in a clumsy arch on the left that is already collapsing before the top is finished.