The Tower of Babel
The original, as its museum records it
Every line above is reproduced from the holding institution’s own catalogue entry, which is linked. Where their title, date or attribution differs from ours, theirs is the one printed here.
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View in the galleryAbout this painting
Nearly everything in it is work in progress. The Kunsthistorisches Museum describes Bruegel setting down, with meticulous and encyclopedic interest, a vast number of building and craft processes.
The scale comes from below. The harbor city at the tower's foot looks Flemish and is, beside the tower, strikingly tiny; the museum takes it as the measure of the whole. The stone shell mixes ancient and Romanesque architecture.
Genesis says the builders meant the top to reach heaven. Bruegel signed the picture low down, on one of the squared blocks, BRVEGEL. FE. M.CCCCC.LXIII: his name on their stone.
Sources: Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien, 'Turmbau zu Babel', GG 1026, read 2026-09-24 · Genesis 11:4, Douay-Rheims (Challoner), project corpus data/bible_drc.js, read 2026-09-24
And they said: Come, let us make a city and a tower, the top whereof may reach to heaven; and let us make our name famous before we be scattered abroad into all lands.
Genesis 11:4 · Douay-Rheims (Challoner)
Printed on demand. Public-domain masterwork, reproduced from a 38,076 px master of the original. The whole image is printed — never cropped to fit the sheet — so every sheet carries an archival margin, and the dimensions and resolution listed above are the ones you receive.