A great wave of enthusiasm for Southern ideals swept over the entire North about the third decade of the sixteenth century. It established the supremacy of Italian standards of artistic merit, which--as we know--were not such as to give new life to the graphic arts. This wave of Italian influence was felt in the immediate following of Dürer, in that group of painter-engravers, known to us as the “little masters,” though _little_ only in the size of their plates. A high standard of technique is common to them all, with variations in their perfection. Variations there are also in the measure in which they yielded to Italian influence. Their graver was devoted to the rendering of a great variety of subjects; Northern characteristics are still evident in their portraits, in their Biblical scenes with German types of figures. Northern customs are depicted with Northern minuteness; on the other hand, the study of Southern models has developed in these Northern engravers an appreciation of the beauty of the nude, which is freely introduced in mythological, allegorical, Biblical, and other subjects, and very skillfully handled. We are apt not to appreciate the gravity of this Italian invasion, of this Southern supremacy in Northern art. Ideal perfection of form was a new language to the Germanic artists, accustomed to the realistic, faithful rendering of nature as they saw it, with all its facts, perfections, and imperfections alike. The change often meant that the artist forgot his native tongue, if the expression may be used--a harsh tongue, if you will, but sincere and expressive; in return he acquired, often but imperfectly, a new language in which his expression needs must be imitative, not original. [Illustration: TOURNAMENT Woodcut. Lucas Cranach] The true Northern spirit still greets us in the woodcut productions of that period. Woodcut was used for subjects of wide popular interest, for Passion series, portraits, religious subjects, and all manner of illustration. Dürer had used the relief process extensively for such purposes, likewise Burgkmair, who was, with Dürer, one of the foremost designers for the extensive publications of Emperor Maximilian. Lucas Cranach elected the strong, emphatic woodcut for much of his graphic work, prominently employed in the service of the Reformation. An example of his work, this tournament scene, is a reminder of the times in which he dwelt, and an illustration of his vivid power of presentation, typically Northern with its crowded figures.