PETER VISCHER 
that revival as reflected with a sudden and mo- 
mentary brilliancy by the productions of German 
artists who had travelled in Italy and studied with 
profit Italian works. 
On the expiration of his apprenticeship Peter 
Vischer would naturally,like other German youths, 
start on a period of travel—his Wanderjaiire. 
Whither he went we know not, but it is most 
probable that he turned his steps towards the 
Netherlands, where he could study the marvels of 
the new style of Flemish realism which had begun 
to exercise a potent influence upon the Nuremberg 
painters of his day. 
But whether he reached the Netherlands or not 
of one thing we may be certain. Neither now 
nor at any subsequent period did he go to Italy. 
It was indeed at one time thought and affirmed 
that he sojourned there once at least and perhaps 
twice. (Sandrart, Teutscher Academie, 1675.) But 
there is not one jot or tittle of evidence to support 
this theory, which was intended to supply us with 
the source whence he drew the inspiration for the 
second and third periods of his art. 
After his Wanderjahre he returned to Nurem- 
berg, and living in his father’s house, in friendship 
with Adam Krafft, and in an atmosphere of late 
Gothic tradition permeated by Flemish realism, 
he entered upon the first period of his work, which 
ended, we may say, with the year 1507, and of 
which the Magdeburg Monument was the highest 
expression and achievement. Vischer was by 
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