Lebenstreppe

A Lebenstreppe or Stufenalter (German: "steps of life" or "stages of life") is a pictorial representation of the human life as a series of ascending and descending steps. The tradition began in fifteenth-century Europe and many hundreds of variations were produced until the early twentieth century, though the popularity of the tradition waned during the nineteenth century. The most common variation depicts ten steps each representing ten years, with the peak at fifty. Parodic versions have been created for satiric, moralistic, and advertising purposes.