Dirty Bride

This drawing represents a group of street performers putting on a comic folk play, The Dirty Bride (De Vuile Bruid) on the occasion of Shrovetide, the three days before Ash Wednesday. The coarse, bedraggled bride being led from a shabby nuptial tent is Nisa, while the prancing groom who leads her out is Mopsus. The account of their marriage derives from the Eighth Eclogue of the Roman poet Virgil, but also appeared in several contemporary books of proverbs, in which it was used to indicate a world turned upside down. (http://www.metmuseum.org )