Boy Sleeping on a Grave

Boy Sleeping on a Grave (German: Knabe auf einem Grab schlafend[1] ) is a c. 1803 print designed by the German Romantic painter Caspar David Friedrich, and printed on paper as a woodcut, the block cut by his brother Christian Friedrich, who was a carpenter and furniture maker.

[2] The wood blocks for three of the prints - Boy sleeping on a grave, Woman with the Spider's Web and Woman with a Raven at an Abyss - are held by the Hamburger Kunsthalle.

[2] It was suggested by the German art historian Helmut Börsch-Supan [de] that they were made as illustrations for a book - perhaps a volume of Friedrich's poetry.

Although the pages are now separated, eleven are held by the Kunsthalle Mannheim, but a pen and ink drawing of a sleeping boy (German: Schlafender Knabe) dated to 1802 is held by the Kunsthalle Bremen.

[2] The fourth woodcut is a profile self-portrait of Friedrich, perhaps intended as a frontispiece for the same volume of poetry.