  Adorno complains that “Hegel and Kant [ … ] were able to write major aesthetics without understanding anything about art” (Adorno, 334). This may or may not be true of Kant, but it is clearly quite untrue of Hegel: he had an extensive knowledge and a good understanding of many of the great works of art in the Western tradition. Nor was Hegel’s knowledge and interest restricted to Western art: he read (in translation) works of Indian and Persian poetry, and he saw at first hand works of Egyptian art in Berlin (Pöggeler 1981, 206–8). Hegel’s philosophy of art is thus an a priori derivation of the various forms of beauty that, pace Adorno, is informed and mediated by a thorough knowledge and understanding of individual works of art from around the world.