The Master of the Egmont Albums derives his conventional name from these drawings, which came to the Gallery in a series of albums assembled by the first Earl of Egmont. A brilliantly original draftsman, the artist appears to have been trained in the Netherlands and then to have traveled across Europe, for his works display a knowledge of Venetian and Roman art as well as of Albrecht Dürer’s works. These two drawings show all of his characteristic mannerisms. He worked out compositions of dizzying complexity in black chalk, over which he then applied strong pen lines, often in two different shades of brown ink, juxtaposing dark, hatched shadows alongside areas of untouched white paper. Many other battle scenes by the artist have been identified. Their density would have made them poor models for engraving, and the drawings are perhaps better understood as complete—if mysterious—works in their own right.