Portrait of George Frederik (1606-74), Prince of Nassau-Siegen

The Katzenelnbogen Series

These eight small bust-length portraits show Jan the Elder, Count of Nassau (shown here), two of his sons and five of his grandsons. Until now they have been incorrectly grouped together with the so-called Honselaarsdijk Series, called the Leeuwarden Series in the present catalogue. Whereas the portraits that make up the Leeuwarden Series were already listed in Cornelis Sebille Roos’s 1801 manuscript catalogue of the paintings in the Nationale Konst-Gallery in Huis ten Bosch, the eight paintings in the present series were only recorded for the first time in the 1809 catalogue of the museum in its new home in Amsterdam.² In the 1809 catalogue, moreover, they appear together after the works in the Leeuwarden Series. These portraits also differ in a number of ways from those in that series, with which there is some overlap. They are slightly larger, and instead of having inscriptions on the front they are inscribed on the reverse, all in similar block letters and in German. As the name Katzenelnbogen is used in these inscriptions, it has been decided here to call these eight paintings ‘The Katzenelnbogen Series’.

Unfortunately, it has not been possible to discover any information about the provenance of the series. Nor does the name Katzenelnbogen provide a clue to the provenance, as this name could be used by all members of the houses of Orange and Nassau. In an accord that was reached in Frankfurt on 30 June 1557, the small seigniory of Katzenelnbogen, which lies east of the Rhine river between Cologne and Mainz, was given to the House of Hesse, while the name and coat of arms were made the property of William the Silent and Jan the Elder’s father, Willem the Rich and his descendants.³ The original owner of the series was presumably a descendant of Jan the Elder, possibly one of those portrayed. Three portraits in Paleis Soestdijk since 1950 probably belong to the same series. They are of Jan the Elder’s sons Willem Lodewijk (1560-1620) and Ernst Casimir (1573-1632), and his grandson Albert (1596-1626).⁴ The sitters have been given the same very ruddy complexions as Jan the Elder, Jan the Middle, Philips and Jan the Younger in the Rijksmuseum portraits. The panels, moreover, are similar in size, and also bear inscriptions in black paint on the reverse, including the name Katzenelnbogen, with the exception of the Portrait of Ernst Casimir.

In the 1976 Rijksmuseum catalogue, the portraits of Jan the Middle (SK-A-540), Jan the Younger (SK-A-539), Adolf⁵ and Willem (SK-A-543) are attributed to Van Ravesteyn himself. The quality, however, is not high enough to warrant such an attribution. Rather, they and those of Jan the Elder and Philips (SK-A-542) were probably executed by Van Ravesteyn’s studio. The portraits of Jan the Elder (SK-A-538), Jan the Middle, Philips, Jan the Younger and Adolf seem to be the work of one assistant. Going by the ruffs and collars in these portraits, most of the prototypes were probably executed between 1605 and 1615; a date of about 1610 to 1620 has therefore been given to these works. The prototype for the Portrait of Willem was probably executed between 1620 and 1630. The remaining two in the series are mediocre works to which it has not been possible to attach a name or a studio (SK-A-541 and SK-A-537). The Portrait of George Frederik is dated 1636.

Jonathan Bikker, 2007

The Katzenelnbogen Series, missing work

Portrait of Adolf (1586-1608), Count of Nassau-Siegen, c. 1610-20 (SK-A-562)
Workshop of Jan Anthonisz van Ravesteyn

This portrait is missing, but is known from black-and-white photographs. For the sitter’s biography see the entry on the Portrait of Adolf, Count of Nassau-Siegen (SK-A-535) in the Leeuwarden Series. Both portraits probably follow the same lost prototype, which can be dated to around 1606-08.

This entry was published in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, I: Artists Born between 1570 and 1600, coll. cat. Amsterdam 2007, no. 400, with information on its inscription, literature, collection catalogues and provenance.