This engraving depicts a portrait of Nathanael Dilgerus at age seventy-five (with long white hair and beard), turned to the right and facing forward in an oval frame. Nathanael Dilger was the leading, senior Lutheran Minister for the city of Danzig
Leigh Hunt writes: “"Edelinck was one of the greatest masters of pure engraving. He never used etching or dry-point on his plates, and of the four hundred that he produced there is not one that is poor or second-rate. Edelinck's work was epoch making: he revolutionized engraving, abandoning lines that crossed to form squares for lozenge forms. Further, he massed his lines and changed their direction, thus avoiding the monotony that had marked all previous work in France. Edelinck had all the merits of his predecessors and, besides, rendered texture, colour, and light and shade as they never before had been rendered. His strokes were clear and bold, and the results beautifully finished, harmonious and silvery. His proofs were the first to possess the quality called technically by engravers 'colour'." *
Hunt, L. (1909). Edelinck. In The Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Retrieved August 5, 2021 from New Advent:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05281a.htm
