Object data
oil on canvas
support: height 63 cm × width 85.7 cm
outersize: depth 7.8 cm (support incl. SK-L-1474)
Cornelis Saftleven
Satire on the Trial of Johan van Oldenbarnevelt
1663
Inscriptions
- signature and date, with ligated monogram, upper right, on the sheet of paper on the wall: CSL / 1663
- inscription, upper right, on the sheet of paper on the wall: TRUCIDATA INNOCENTIA
- inscription, beside most of the animals: numbers, some of them with traces of different, earlier ones
Technical notes
Support The plain-weave canvas has been wax-resin lined. All tacking edges have been preserved, though damaged. Shallow cusping is visible on the left and right. A former, probably original, round hole in the man’s left eye (approx. 0.3 cm) once served to attach a small portrait plate.
Preparatory layers The double ground extends up to the edges of the support. The first, beige-brown layer consists of fine white pigment particles with an addition of red earth and black pigments. The second, light grey ground contains mostly fine and some coarse white pigment particles with an addition of black pigment.
Underdrawing No underdrawing could be detected with the naked eye or infrared reflectography.
Paint layers The paint layer extends up to the tacking edges. A first lay-in of the composition was made with translucent brown paint. The painting was built up from the back to the front, leaving reserves for the seated old man and the animals, which were subsequently carefully closed. The winged devils of the Hell scene in the right background were sketchily applied on top of the background in brown with shades of grey, red and yellow. The eyes of several animals were accentuated with red. Overall the paint layer is smooth. Infrared reflectography showed a number of small compositional changes. The cuff around the old man’s left wrist was made narrower. The muzzle of the standing white goat was initially planned higher up, pointing more towards the man’s ear and the recumbent goat was enlarged somewhat along its back. In addition, several of the numbers near the animals were altered: that of the calf behind the figure (now 9) was originally 24, the white goat to the right of it (now 4) was 23, the goat in the centre (now 7) was 22, and the peacock (now 12) was either 4 or 14.
Anna Krekeler, 2023
Scientific examination and reports
- infrared reflectography: A. Krekeler, RMA, 11 June 2010
- paint samples: A. Krekeler, RMA, nos. SK-A-1588/1-2, 11 June 2010
- technical report: A. Krekeler, RMA, 11 June 2010
- X-radiography: RMA, no. 1911, 18 October 2010
Condition
Fair. A tear of approx. 26 cm runs along the right edge. The hole in the man’s left eye (see Technical notes) has been filled and retouched. Two old repaired and retouched areas of damage are visible in the centre: one in the left-hand side of the man’s face and another to the left of his right shoulder. The paint layer is somewhat abraded, especially in the cloak. The varnish has yellowed severely and saturates poorly.
Conservation
- H.H. Mertens, 1969: varnish rubbed off dry; varnish regenerated; retouched; revarnished
- L. Sozzani, 1991: scratch in varnish treated
Provenance
? from the painter to the Teding van Berkhout family;1 from whom to Jacob van Foreest (1640-1708), Hoorn, 1704;2 his descendants;3…; sale, Amsterdam (P. van der Schley et al.), 20 May 1799 sqq., no. 173 (‘Een ryke Ordonantie vol gewoel zinspeelende op de vier en twintig Rechters van J. van Oldenbarneveld, tegens de muur hangt een papier waarop Frucidata [sic] Innocentia […] op doek […] hoog 24 breed 33 duim [61.7 x 84.8 cm]. NB Den Koper zal eene nadere sleutel van deeze Ordonantie ter hand gesteld worden, benevens een op zilver geschilderd pourtrait van J. van Oldenbarneveld, ’t geen op de zittende man in ’t stuk past.’), fl. 231, to J. Spaan;4…; ? sale, Willem Frederick Taelman Kip et al.,5 Amsterdam (P. van der Schley et al.), 16 March 1801, no. 4 (‘een uitmuntend Stuk, zynde volgens de daar by zynde sleutel, een der twee Origineele stukken van de Historie van Johan van Oldenbarneveld, zittende voor zyn 24 gediligeerde Rechters, meesterlyk geschilderd, door C. Saftleven, benevens het Prentje van zyn Pourtret’), fl. 68-10, to Jan Yver;6…; Jonkheer Willem Pieter Adriaan Teding van Berkhout (1791-1874), Arnhem, 1851;7 his son, Jonkheer Rudolph Isaac Teding van Berkhout (1830-1892), Arnhem, 1891;8 sale, Baroness Taets van Amerongen van Natewisch, née Hodshon, et al., Amsterdam (F. Muller), 1 November 1892, no. 41, fl. 660, to Gijsbert de Clercq;9 by whom donated to the museum, with SK-A-1589, November 189210
Object number: SK-A-1588
Credit line: Gift of G. de Clercq, Amsterdam
Copyright: Public domain
The artist
Cornelis Saftleven (Gorinchem 1607 - Rotterdam 1681)
Cornelis Saftleven was born in Gorinchem in 1607. He and his younger brothers Herman and Abraham followed in the footsteps of their father, the painter Herman Saftleven, who probably dealt in art as well. Cornelis and Herman Jr are the only ones with an extant oeuvre. Shortly after their eldest son’s birth the family moved to Rotterdam, where Herman Sr is documented before he married. Cornelis, who was still living in his parents’ house in 1629, trained with him. His earliest pictures are two small panels with grotesque figures dated 1628.11
It is thought that he spent some time in Antwerp around 1632-34, mainly because of similarities in his output to that by Flemish artists like Adriaen Brouwer and David Teniers II from about 1634, the existence of a portrait of him drawn by Anthony van Dyck, and above all the fact that Rubens added the staffage in his works before 1637. The latter’s probate inventory lists no fewer than eight paintings by Saftleven, four of them with figures by his own hand. Another hypothesis, although it does not rule out a period in Antwerp, is that Teniers shared a studio with Cornelis and his brother Herman in Rotterdam around 1634, because there are striking parallels in the repertoire of all three at that time. Cornelis was in Utrecht in the mid-1630s, where he and Herman, who was living there, collaborated on a family portrait at nearby De Haar Castle. From 1637 on he was documented back in Rotterdam, where he married Catharina van der Heyden in 1648. The inventory drawn up after her death in 1654 lists several dozen paintings. The following year Elisabeth van den Avondt became his wife. She was a Catholic, unlike Saftleven, who was a member of the Reformed Church. In 1663 the city’s firemen paid him for 18 panels they had commissioned and in 1672 for 2 ‘watch pennants’. On 18 October 1667 Saftleven was elected dean of the Rotterdam Guild of St Luke. He died on 1 June 1681 and was buried four days later in the Franse Kerk.
Saftleven is mainly spoken of in contemporary sources as an artist of ‘apparitions’ and satanic monsters, but that type was just a small part of his output. He mastered a wide range of disciplines: genre and history pieces, stable interiors, landscapes and animal pictures. He collaborated with his fellow townsman Willem Viruly, who is said to have painted the sceneries in some of his works. Saftleven also left a large drawn oeuvre. According to the 1654 inventory he had several young pupils, one of whom, according to Houbraken, was Ludolf de Jongh (1616-1679).
Gerdien Wuestman, 2023
References
C. de Bie, Het gulden cabinet van de edel vrij schilder const, inhoudende den lof vande vermarste schilders, architecte, beldthowers ende plaetsnijders van deze eeuw, Antwerp 1662, p. 412; S. van Hoogstraten, Inleyding tot de hooge schoole der schilderkonst: Anders de zichtbaere werelt: Verdeelt in negen leerwinkels, Rotterdam 1678, p. 184; G. van Spaan, Beschrijvinge der stad Rotterdam en eenige omleggende dorpen, Rotterdam 1698, p. 421; A. Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen, I, Amsterdam 1718, pp. 342-43; ibid., II, 1719, p. 33; C. Kramm, De levens en werken der Hollandsche en Vlaamsche kunstschilders, beeldhouwers, graveurs en bouwmeesters: Van den vroegsten tot op onzen tijd, V, Amsterdam 1861, p. 1435; J.H. Scheffer and F.D.O. Obreen, Rotterdamsche Historiebladen, III, Rotterdam 1880, pp. 670-74; F.D.O. Obreen, Archief voor Nederlandsche kunstgeschiedenis: Verzameling van meerendeels onuitgegeven berichten en mededeelingen betreffende Nederlandsche schilders, plaatsnijders, beeldhouwers, bouwmeesters, juweliers, goud- en zilverdrijvers [enz.], V, Rotterdam 1882-83, pp. 115-28; A. Bredius, ‘Het schildersregister van Jan Sysmus, Stads-Doctor van Amsterdam’, Oud Holland 8 (1890), pp. 1-17, 217-34, 297-313, esp. p. 4; C. Hofstede de Groot, ‘Een spotteekening van Cornelis Saftleven op de Dordtsche Synode’, Oud Holland 15 (1897), pp. 121-23; P. Haverkorn van Rijsewijk, ‘De geboorteplaats van Cornelis Saftleven’, Oud Holland 17 (1899), pp. 239-40; N. Alting Mees, ‘Aanteekeningen over Oud-Rotterdamsche kunstenaars, III’, Oud Holland 31 (1913), pp. 241-68, esp. pp. 255-58; J. Denucé, Kunstuitvoer in de 17e eeuw te Antwerpen: De firma Forchoudt, Antwerp 1931, p. 25; E. Wiersum, ‘Cornelis Saftleven, geboren te Gorcum in 1607, overleden te Rotterdam in 1681’, Rotterdams Jaarboekje, series III, 9 (1931), pp. 88-90; J. Denucé, De Antwerpsche ‘Konstkamers’: Inventarissen van kunstverzamelingen te Antwerpen in de 16e en 17e eeuwen, The Hague 1932, p. 69; Stechow in U. Thieme and F. Becker (eds.), Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, XXIX, Leipzig 1935, pp. 309-10; B.J.A. Renckens, ‘Enkele notities bij vroege werken van Cornelis Saftleven’, Bulletin Museum Boymans-van Beuningen 13 (1962), pp. 59-74; M.-L. Hairs, Dans le sillage de Rubens: Les peintres d’histoire anversois au XVIIe siècle, Liège 1977, pp. 20-21; W. Schulz, Cornelis Saftleven, 1607-1681: Leben und Werke: Mit einem kritischen Katalog der Gemälde und Zeichnungen, Berlin 1978, pp. 1-5; Van der Zeeuw in N.I. Schadee (ed.), Rotterdamse meesters uit de Gouden Eeuw, exh. cat. Rotterdam (Historisch Museum) 1994, pp. 295-96; R. van Dijk, Nieuwsbrief Stichting Gouden Eeuw Gorinchem, no. 3 (Spring 2009); Veldman in Saur Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon: Die Bildenden Künstler aller Zeiten und Völker, C, Munich/Leipzig 2018, pp. 344-45; Bredius notes, RKD
Entry
Cornelis Saftleven is known for his allegories in which animals play the part of people. The earliest examples, now in Rotterdam and Prague, are dated 1629.12 The present painting, which is from 1663, is devoted to a crucial event in Dutch history: the trial of Johan van Oldenbarnevelt. The Grand Pensionary of the province of Holland was a prominent statesman during the Eighty Years’ War (1568-1648).13 In the course of the Twelve Years’ Truce of 1609-21 he clashed with Stadholder Prince Maurits on religious and political issues. When Van Oldenbarnevelt decided to give the towns the freedom to appoint their own civic guards, the prince staged a coup and had the nearly 71-year-old arrested on 29 August 1618 on a charge of high treason. On 12 May 1619 he was sentenced to death by a 24-member court headed by Reijnier Pauw, and was executed the following day. Saftleven depicted Van Oldenbarnevelt as an old man seated in a chair, surrounded by animals playing his judges. On the far right is a view of Hell. Hanging on the wall is a map of the Dutch Republic and next to it a large sheet of paper with the words ‘TRUCIDATA INNOCENTIA’ (Murdered innocence), as well as the artist’s signature ‘SCL’ and ‘1663’.
Each of the 24 animals is accompanied by a number added in light-coloured paint.14 The Rijksmuseum has a copy of what is probably an eighteenth-century manuscript clarifying who these opponents of Van Oldenbarnevelt are.15 The peacock (pauw in Dutch), is very fittingly playing the part of Reijnier Pauw, the elephant is Nicolaes Cromhout, counsellor of the provincial Court of Holland, while the ass playing the violin is Pieter Jansz Schagen, town councillor of Alkmaar.16 It is not certain that this is the original identification, because the numbers on the picture were altered at an unknown date. For instance, there are different, older versions beneath the ones for the calf and the sheep behind Van Oldenbarnevelt, and for the monster in the bottom right corner.
There is a long iconographic tradition of using animals to ape people.17 Raupp argued persuasively in 1984 that Saftleven’s scene was inspired by Joost van den Vondel’s stage play Palamedes oft Vermoorde onnooselheyd of 1625, in which the poet gave the controversy involving Van Oldenbarnevelt and Prince Maurits a mythological slant.18 Not only is the hero in the title page engraving by Salomon Savery being menaced by a horde of wild animals,19 as in Saftleven’s allegory, but moreover, the Trucidata innocentia legend given to the painting is the Latin translation of the Dutch subtitle (‘Vermoorde onnooselheyd’). Vondel’s Palamedes was originally banned due to its controversial subject and was not performed in Amsterdam until 1665. Raupp noted that it could be seen in Rotterdam in 1663, which makes a relationship between Vondel’s play and Saftleven’s picture very probable indeed.20
The allegory in the Rijksmuseum has a very unusual adjunct: a small rounded, convex silver plate with the painted likeness of Van Oldenbarnevelt, known from contemporary prints, that can be mounted on his head in the canvas (fig. a).21 The miniature must have been made especially for this purpose, and was probably ordered by the picture’s first owner. It is mentioned in the earliest record of the painting in a 1799 Amsterdam sale catalogue,22 so the roundel must date from the seventeenth or eighteenth century. In fact, it is very possible that it was produced by Saftleven himself, for the little portrait is in his manner.
There are two documented drawings which may be preliminary studies for the present work;23 the winged devils on the right were inspired by Jacques Callot’s 1635 print The Temptation of St Anthony.24 It is not clear on whose initiative the scene was made, but in view of the highly unusual subject it was presumably a commission.25 According to the Rijksmuseum’s aforementioned copy identifying the animals,26 Saftleven produced the picture for the Teding van Berkhout family because they were descendants of Johan van Oldenbarnevelt. As far as is known, the latter was not in fact a relative but a friend of Adriaen Tedingh Berckhout (1571-1620), justice at the Court of Holland, who warned the Grand Pensionary of his impending arrest. It is conceivable that Saftleven, having built up a reputation as a satirist, added the Trucidata innocentia text at the request of Adriaen’s next of kin.27 It is odd, though, that the picture was put up for auction several times around 1800 before eventually ending up mid-nineteenth century with a member of the family again,28 Jonkheer Willem Pieter Adriaan Teding van Berkhout, who was a direct descendant of Adriaen Tedingh Berckhout.29 In 1892 the Rijksmuseum was unable to buy this work, which was so important for the nation’s history, but it then received it as a gift from Gijsbert de Clercq.30 It is clear that Saftleven’s Satire on the Trial of Johan van Oldenbarnevelt appealed to the popular imagination from the existence of several variants. One is in a private collection, another is in Haarlem.31
Gerdien Wuestman, 2023
See Key to abbreviations, Rijksmuseum painting catalogues and Acknowledgements
Literature
W. Schulz, Cornelis Saftleven, 1607-1681: Leben und Werke: Mit einem kritischen Katalog der Gemälde und Zeichnungen, Berlin 1978, pp. 36, 192-93, no. 530; H.-J. Raupp, ‘“Trucidata Innocentia”: Die Verurteilung des Oldenbarnevelt bei Joost van den Vondel und Cornelis Saftleven’, in H. Vekeman and J. Müller Hofstede (eds.), Wort und Bild in der niederländischen Kunst und Literatur des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts, Erftstadt 1984, pp. 209-19; G. Wuestman, ‘Een portretminiatuur thuisgebracht’, in E. Buijsen, C. Dumas and V. Manuth (eds.), Face Book: Studies on Dutch and Flemish Portraiture of the 16th-18th Centuries: Liber Amicorum Presented to Rudolf E.O. Ekkart on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday, Leiden 2012, pp. 359-64
Collection catalogues
1903, p. 236, no. 2104; 1934, p. 254, no. 2104; 1960, p. 275, no. 2104; 1976, p. 493, no. A 1588
Citation
Gerdien Wuestman, 2023, 'Cornelis Saftleven, Satire on the Trial of Johan van Oldenbarnevelt, 1663', in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.5356
(accessed 23 November 2024 12:36:54).