Portret van Kenau Simonsdr Hasselaer (1526-1588)

Entry

This modest pair of relief-carved portrait medallions commemorates for all time Kenau Hasselaer (shown here), a brave and masculine woman whom Dutch historians have accorded a heroic role in the Spanish siege of Haarlem in 1572-73, and her spouse, Nanning Borst (BK-KOG-1654). The identification is provided by inscriptions on the reverse of each relief, added in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century. Kenau’s portrait alone can be confirmed via comparisons with other known painted portraits of the heroine. The dimensions of the two medallions differ, a detail belying the fact that the two portraits indeed form a pair. Both bear the monogram of the Amsterdam mother-of-pearl carver and medallist Dirck van Rijswijck (c. 1596-1679), who executed the portraits in a light-brown stone, most likely the ivory-coloured Solnhofen limestone from southern Germany. This very fine stone is exceptionally well-suited for producing relief carvings. Both portraits are set against a background of black limestone (Noir de Mazy), as its name implies, a deep-black stone type from the Ardennes Mountains. Noir de Mazy is seldom encountered in art cabinet sculpture, yet Van Rijswijck is certain to have been very familiar with this material, as a sculptor who built his reputation on producing black limestone tabletops and plaquettes inlaid with engraved mother-of-pearl, as exemplified by a large tabletop in the Rijksmuseum (BK-NM-1916), on which the poet Joost van den Vondel (1587-1679) wrote a laudatory ode.¹ As a medallist, he also produced silver portrait medallions. The present portrait medallions of Kenau Hasselaer and her husband, carved from Solnhofener stone, can essentially be seen as a combination of these two activities, as they may very well have served as models for silver medallions (even with no known surviving examples). In addition to pear and boxwood, models for silver and gold medallions were often executed in this stone. Nevertheless, this material was also appreciated in its own right. Besides the two medallions discussed here, the collection of the Haarlem physician and amateur historian Adriaan van der Willigen (1810-1876),² included a third stone relief bearing Van Rijswijck’s monogram: a portrait medallion (85 x 70 mm) of John Calvin (1509-1564), depicted half-figure and turned to the left. Since the sale of the collection in 1874, its whereabouts are unknown.³

Kenau Hasselaer’s renown as the legendary leader of the women’s resistance in Haarlem is based on an eyewitness account from the year 1573, attributed to Arcerius, entitled the Historie ende waerachtich verhael van al die dinghen die gheschiet sijn, van dach tot dach, in die lofweerdichste ende vermaerste stadt van Hollandt, Haerlem ghenoemt, in dien tijt als die van den Hertoghe van Alba beleghert was (History of a True Story of all those Things that Occurred, from day to day, in the most praiseworthy and esteemed city of Holland, called Haarlem, at that time when besieged by the Duke of Alva). Described in this work are the valiant deeds of one ‘Kenau’, who oversaw the repair of the city ramparts, which had been destroyed by the Spanish bombardments during the siege of Haarlem (December 1572 to July 1573). The same work also relates how the soldiers of the besieging army were attacked with burning straw and boiling tar poured from the rampart walls. The first published accounts of Kenau’s courageous acts during the siege of the city date from as early as the end of the sixteenth century, among them Emanuel van Meteren’s narrative: ‘Those from within Haarlem also had a brave woman and an honourable widow, about XLVI years old, called Kennau, who led the other women in all urgency and with several others, carried out many manly deeds beyond women’s nature against the enemy, with lances, muskets and sword, as if a man were assisting them in women’s attire.’⁴ It was thanks to this account and others that Kenau’s role began to assume mythical portions. By the end of the nineteenth century, she was even said to have led an army of 300 women against the Spanish. Presumably, such adulation was chiefly cultivated by her descendants – specifically, members of the regent’s family Hasselaer – who commissioned posthumous portraits and collected memorabilia surrounding her name.⁵ The patron(s) of the Van Rijswijck portrait medallions must therefore likely be sought in such family circles.

Frits Scholten, 2025