 Israhel van Meckenem probably trained initially as a goldsmith and engraver with his father, before travelling to work with Master E. S., the leading Northern European engraver of the day.His earliest dated print comes from 1465, and indicates that he created it in Cleves, modern Kleve, on the Dutch border and then Dutch-speaking, where the family had moved.In 1470 he is documented as working in Bamberg in Bavaria; he returned to Bocholt by about 1480, where he remained for the rest of his life.