Boy in a Cape and Turban (Portrait ofPrince Rupert of the Palatinate)
Jan Lievens(Leiden 1607 – 1674 Amsterdam)ca. 1631
oil on panel
66.7 x 51.8 cm
JL-104© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Boy in a Cape and Turban (Portrait of Prince Rupert of thePalatinate)
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How to cite
DeWitt, Lloyd. “Boy in a Cape and Turban (Portrait of Prince Rupert of the Palatinate)” (2017). In The Leiden
Collection

Catalogue,

2nd

ed.

EditedbyArthurK.

Wheelock

Jr.

New

York,

2017–20.

https://theleidencollection.com/artwork/a-boy-in-a-cape-and-turban/ (archived May 2020).
A PDF of every version of this entry is available in this Online Catalogue's Archive, and the Archive ismanaged by a permanent URL. New versions are added only when a substantive change to the narrative
occurs.

In this beautiful and compelling image, Jan Lievens has depicted a smooth-Comparative Figures

faced boy exotically dressed in a golden cape attached with a chain clasp
and a blue and gold turban festooned with the soaring plume of a bird ofparadise.[1] Light falling from the left illuminates the brilliant, shimmeringfabrics of his wardrobe, a symphony of yellows, golds, and blues thatbespeaks wealth and privilege. As exquisitely as Lievens has rendered thefabrics, even more remarkable is the sensitivity with which he has
characterized the sitter’s expression. As the youth stands with one handclasping his richly decorated cloth belt, he stares out to left with wide openeyes with a serious demeanor that conveys both dignity and inner resolve.[2]The sitter looks like a Turkish or Persian character or a figure from a biblicalstory, but he is actually Prince Rupert of the Palatinate (1619–90), theyoungest son of Frederick V (1596–1632), elector Palatinate, and Elizabeth
Stuart (1596–1661). Lievens painted this portrait while Frederick, the nephew

Fig 1. Rembrandt and studio,
Prince Rupert with His Tutor as
Samuel and Eli, ca. 1631, oil oncanvas, 102.9 x 88.3 cm, J. Paul
Getty Museum, Los Angeles,
84.PA.570

of Frederik Hendrik, stadholder of the United Provinces, and Elizabeth,daughter of James I, king of England, were living in exile in The Hague afterlosing their realm in 1619. Frederick had been named king of Bohemia in
November 1619, but his Protestant forces were soon routed by those ofEmperor Ferdinand II at the Battle of White Mountain, a key battle of theThirty Years War. Since their reign only lasted one winter they were often
referred to derisively as the Winter King and Winter Queen; nevertheless,they were warmly welcomed in The Hague and they maintained close
relationships with Frederick Hendrick and his consort, Amalia van Solms.[3]© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Boy in a Cape and Turban (Portrait of Prince Rupert of thePalatinate)
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Lievens presumably received this commission through the recommendationof Constantijn Huygens (1596–1687), secretary to Frederick Hendrick, theprince of Orange and a scholar and connoisseur passionately interested inscience, art, and music. In the late 1620s and early 1630s Huygens was
instrumental in helping Lievens and Rembrandt van Rijn (1606–69) becomecourt painters, not only for Frederick Hendrick and Amalia van Solms but
also for Frederick and Elizabeth.[4] Huygens was a great admirer ofLievens’s portraits, about which he wrote: “In painting the humancountenance,he[Lievens]

wreaksmiracles,”

and

his

artistic

recommendations would have been eagerly followed by these courtly
patrons.[5] Portrait commissions from the Bohemian court were also
appealing for Lievens because of his aspirations to become a court painterfor Elizabeth’s brother, King Charles of England.

Fig 2. Jan Lievens, Man in
Oriental Costume (“Sultan
Soliman”), 1629–30, oil on canvas,
135 x 100.5 cm, Neues Gallerie,
Potsdam, GK 1, 884

In the early 1630s Lievens and Rembrandt each painted portraits of thechildren of Frederick and Elizabeth. Rembrandt, with workshop participation,
painted a portrait historié of Rupert and his tutor, possibly in the guise of thebiblical figures Samuel and Eli (fig 1). In that painting Rupert wears an
Oriental costume similar to that in the Leiden Collection painting.[6] In 1631
Lievens painted a portrait historié of Rupert’s older brother, Charles Louis(1617–80), also in Oriental costume, and his tutor (J. Paul Getty Museum,
Los

Angeles).

Lievens’s

painting[7]

Rembrandt’s portrait historié.

waspresumablyapendant

toAround 1631 Lievens also executed a formal[8]

portrait of Rupert.

Meredith Hale proposed that the sitter of the Leiden Collection painting wasCharles Louis, but because of the sitter’s young age and his close
resemblance to the figure in Rembrandt’s portrait historié, a stronger
argument can be made that he is Rupert.[9] Rupert, who was twelve years oldin 1631, had a straighter nose and narrower face than did Charles Louis,
who was his elder by two years. These slight differences in the appearancesof the princes became more prominent over time if one judges by double
portrait Anthony van Dyck (1599–1640) painted of the two young men in
1637 (Musée du Louvre, Paris).[10] There, the prominent jaw and sloping
eyelids of the older but shorter Charles Louis have become quite distinctive
features.
Rupert’s Oriental dress was part of a vogue for such costume in the
Netherlands and England at the time, and Elizabeth must have specified thisattire when she commissioned the portrait. Perhaps her interest wasprovoked by the physical appearance and manners of the members of the© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Boy in a Cape and Turban (Portrait of Prince Rupert of thePalatinate)
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Persian embassy, notably Musa Beg, who fascinated the Dutch when hevisited The Hague in 1626 on behalf of Shah Abbas to secure a trade pactwith the Dutch.[11] Lievens seems also to have been inspired by the figure of
one of the Magi in a painting of the Adoration of the Magi by Peter Paul
Rubens (1577–1640), a composition that would have been known to him
through an engraving, dated 1621, by Lucas Vorstermans (1595–1675).
Lievens had also used Rubens’s magus as the basis for Man in Oriental
Costume (“Sultan Soliman”), 1629–30 (fig 2). This imposing painting was in
the collection of Frederik Hendrik and therefore probably known to
Elizabeth, which may explain why Lievens’s portrait of Rupert in Oriental
costume follows very closely the pose and costume of the “sultan.”- Lloyd DeWitt, 2017

© 2020 The Leiden Collection

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Endnotes

1. In February 2019, the feather adorning the turban was correctly identified as that of a bird ofparadise. It was originally published as an ostrich plume.
2. Rupert’s averted glance is seen in many of Lievens’s portraits, including his Self-Portrait ofca. 1631–32 (JL-105). Lievens, with few exceptions, tended to make his sitters and figures
seem aloof, detached, or reflective, and in this portrait he used the sideways glance to givethe prince an air of thoughtful authority. See Lloyd DeWitt, “Evolution and Ambition in the
Career of Jan Lievens (1607–1674)” (PhD diss., University of Maryland, 2006), 76.
3. Marika Keblusek, “The Bohemian Court at The Hague,” in Princely Display: The Court ofFrederik Hendrik of Orange and Amalia van Solms, ed. Marika Keblusek and Jori Zijlmans(Exh cat. The Hague, Historical Museum) (Zwolle, 1997), 47–49.
4. See Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., “Bringing New Light to an Old Master,” Jan Lievens: A Dutch
Master Rediscovered, ed. Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. (Exh. cat. Washington D.C., National
Gallery of Art; Milwaukee, Milwaukee Art Museum; Amsterdam, Museum Het Rembrandthuis)(New Haven, 2008), 9–10.
5. Constantijn Huygens wrote these words in his autobiography. This quotation is taken fromJan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered, ed. Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. (Exh. cat. Washington
D.C., National Gallery of Art; Milwaukee, Milwaukee Art Museum; Amsterdam, Museum Het
Rembrandthuis) (New Haven, 2008), 287.
6. Christopher Brown identified the boy in the Rembrandt workshop portrait as Prince Rupert
based on an eighteenth-century description and the provenance. Ernst van de Wetering inBernhard Schnackenburg and Ernst van de Wetering, eds., The Mystery of the Young
Rembrandt (Exh. cat. Kassel, Museum Schloss Wilhelmshöhe, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister;
Amsterdam, Museum Het Rembrandthuis) (Wolfratshausen, 2001), 326–31.
7. Lloyd DeWitt, “Prince Charles Louis with His Tutor, as the Young Alexander Instructed by
Aristotle,” in Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered, ed. Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. (Exh. cat.
Washington D.C., National Gallery of Art; Milwaukee, Milwaukee Art Museum; Amsterdam,
Museum Het Rembrandthuis) (New Haven, 2008), 138, no. 29.
8. Jan Lievens, Portrait of Prince Rupert of the Palatinate, ca. 1631, oil on canvas, 66. 2 x 51.6
cm, formerly Richard Green Ltd., London.
9. Meredith Hale, “Boy in a Cape and Turban,” in Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered,ed. Arthur K. Wheelock Jr. (Exh. cat. Washington D.C., National Gallery of Art; Milwaukee,
Milwaukee Art Museum; Amsterdam, Museum Het Rembrandthuis) (New Haven, 2008), 141,
no. 30.
10. Susan J. Barnes et al., Van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings (New Haven,© 2020 The Leiden Collection

Boy in a Cape and Turban (Portrait of Prince Rupert of thePalatinate)
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11. Hermann Goetz, “Persians and Persian Costumes in Dutch Paintings of the SeventeenthCentury,” Art Bulletin 20 (1938): 287.

ProvenanceJules Porgès, Paris, by 1921 (sale, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 17 June 1924, no. 105, as
by studio of Rembrandt [Galerie van Diemen, Berlin, 1925; to Guttman]).
S. Guttman, Berlin and London; by descent to the Bett family (sale, Bonhams, London, 13
December 1990, no. 102 [£584,500 to Emmanuel Moatti, Paris; to a private collection, Brazil,
around 1994]).
Private collection, Brazil (sale, Christie’s, New York, 17 June 2004, no. 72 [to Johnny van
Haeften, Ltd., London]).
From whom acquired by the present owner in 2004.

Exhibition History
Berlin, Akademie der Künste, “Gemälde alter Meister aus Berliner Besitz,” July–August 1925,
no. 218 [lent by Galerie van Diemen, Berlin].
London, Matthiesen Gallery, “Rembrandt’s Influence in the Seventeenth Century,” 20
February–2 April 1953, no. 46 [lent by S. Guttman or his descendants].
Paris, Grand Palais, “16e Biennale Internationale,” 18 September–4 October 1992 [displayedby Emanuel Moatti, Paris].
Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, on loan with the permanent collection, 24 August
2004–31 October 2005 [lent by the present owner].
Washington, National Gallery of Art, “Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered,” 26
October 2008–11 January 2009; Milwaukee, Milwaukee Art Museum, 7 February–26 April
2009; Amsterdam, Museum Het Rembrandthuis, 17 May–9 August 2009, no. 30 [lent by thepresent owner].
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, on loan with the permanent collection, January 2010–February
2012 [lent by the present owner].
Istanbul, Sakip Sabanci Museum, “Rembrandt and His Contemporaries: The Golden Age ofDutch Art,” 21 February–10 June 2012, no. 68 [lent by the present owner].
© 2020 The Leiden Collection

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New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, on loan with the permanent collection, September
2012–September 2013 [lent by the present owner].
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, on loan with the permanent collection, April 2013–April 2016
[lent by the present owner].
Paris, Museé du Louvre, “Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection: The Age of Rembrandt,” 22
February–22 May 2017 [lent by the present owner].
Beijing, National Museum of China, “Rembrandt and His Time: Masterpieces from The
Leiden Collection,” 17 June–3 September 2017 [lent by the present owner].
Shanghai, Long Museum, West Bund, “Rembrandt, Vermeer and Hals in the Dutch Golden
Age: Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection,” 23 September 2017–25 February 2018 [lentby the present owner].
Moscow, The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, “The Age of Rembrandt and Vermeer:
Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection,” 28 March 2018–22 July 2018 [lent by the present
owner].
St. Petersburg, The State Hermitage Museum, “The Age of Rembrandt and Vermeer:
Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection,” 5 September 2018–13 January 2019 [lent by thepresent owner].
Abu Dhabi, Louvre Abu Dhabi, “Rembrandt, Vermeer and the Dutch Golden Age.
Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection and the Musée du Louvre,” 14 February–18 May
2019 [lent by the present owner].

References
Akademie der Künste. Gemälde alter Meister aus Berliner Besitz. Ausstellung in der
Akademie der Künste. Exh. cat. Berlin, Akademie der Künste. Berlin, 1925, 38, no. 218.
Schneider, Hans. Jan Lievens, sein Leben und seine Werke. Haarlem, 1932, 29–30
Reprinted with supplement by Rudolf E. O. Ekkart, Amsterdam, 1973, 131, 329, no. 153.
Goetz, Herman. “Persians and Persian Costumes in Dutch Painting of the SeventeenthCentury.” Art Bulletin 20 (1938): 287.
Gerson, Horst. Rembrandt’s Influence in the Seventeenth Century: Catalogue of a Loan
Exhibition. Exh. cat. London, Matthiesen Gallery. London, 1953, no. 46.
Bauch, Kurt. “Zum Werk des Jan Lievens (II).” Pantheon 25 (1967): 264–66, fig. 22.
Sumowski, Werner. Gemälde der Rembrandt-Schüler. 6 vols. Landau and Pfalz, 1983– 94,
3:1802, 1904, no. 1265.
Moatti, Emmanuel. Moatti: Tableaux Anciens. Sale cat. Paris, Grand Palais, 16e Biennale desAntiquaires. Paris, 1992, no. 5.
© 2020 The Leiden Collection

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Scott, Barbara. “Letter from Paris: The Biennale at the Grand Palais.” Apollo 136 (September
1992): 184.
Huys Janssen, Paul, and Werner Sumowski. The Hoogsteder Exhibition of Rembrandt’s
Academy. Exh. cat. The Hague, Hoogsteder & Hoogsteder. Waanders, 1992, 26, fig. 3.
Gudbrod, Helga. Lievens und Rembrandt: Studien zum Verhältnis ihrer Kunst. Frankfurt am
Main, 1996, 286, 312, 316.
Hale, Meredith. “Boy in a Cape and Turban.” In Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered.
Edited by Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr., 140–41, no. 30. Exh. cat. Washington, D.C., National
Gallery of Art; Milwaukee, Milwaukee Art Museum; Amsterdam, Museum Het Rembrandthuis.
New Haven, 2008.
Gifford, E. Melanie. “Lievens’ Technique: Wonders in Smeared Paint, Varnishes, and Oils.”
In Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master Rediscovered. Edited by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., 47, 52. Exh.
cat. Washington, National Gallery of Art; Milwaukee, Milwaukee Art Museum; Amsterdam,
Museum Het Rembrandthuis. New Haven, 2008.
DeWitt, Lloyd. “Young Man in Yellow (Self-Portrait?).” In Jan Lievens: A Dutch Master
Rediscovered. Edited by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., 146. Exh. cat. Washington, D.C., National
Gallery of Art; Milwaukee, Milwaukee Art Museum; Amsterdam, Museum Het Rembrandthuis.
New Haven, 2008.
Van der Goes, Bernadette. “De herontdekking van Jan Lievens.” Collect: Kunst & Antiek
Journal 14, no. 4 (April 2009): 36.
Wuestman, Gerdien, ed. Rembrandt and His Contemporaries: The Golden Age of Dutch Art.
Exh. cat. Istanbul, Sakip Sabanci Museum. Istanbul, 2012, 148–49, no. 68.
Schnackenburg, Bernhard. Jan Lievens: Friend and Rival of the Young Rembrandt.
Petersberg, 2016, 431–32, no. 241.
Yeager-Crasselt, Lara. “Boy in a Cape and Turban (Portrait of Prince Rupert of thePalatinate.” In Rembrandt and His Time: Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection. Edited by
Lara Yeager-Crasselt, 40; 174, no. 10. Translated by Li Ying. Exh. cat. Beijing, National
Museum of China. Beijing, 2017.
Long Museum, West Bund. Rembrandt, Vermeer and Hals in the Dutch Golden Age:
Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection. Exh. cat. Shanghai, Long Museum, West Bund.
Shanghai, 2017, 58–59.
Yeager-Crasselt, Lara. “The Leiden Collection and the Dutch Golden Age.” In The Age of
Rembrandt and Vermeer: Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection. Edited by Polina
Lyubimova, 18, 19; 29, 30. Translated by Daria Babich and Daria Kuzina. Exh. cat. Moscow,
The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts; St. Petersburg, The State Hermitage Museum.
Moscow, 2018.
Yeager-Crasselt, Lara. “Boy in a Cape and Turban (Portrait of Prince Rupert of the© 2020 The Leiden Collection

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Palatinate).” In The Age of Rembrandt and Vermeer: Masterpieces of The Leiden Collection.
Edited by Polina Lyubimova, 112–13; 236, no. 23. Translated by Daria Babich and Daria
Kuzina. Exh. cat. Moscow, The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts; St. Petersburg, The
State Hermitage Museum. Moscow, 2018.
Yeager-Crasselt, Lara. “The Leiden Collection and the Dutch Golden Age.” In Rembrandt,
Vermeer and the Dutch Golden Age. Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection and the
Musée du Louvre. Edited by Blaise Ducos and Lara Yeager-Crasselt, 26, 27. London, 2019.
[Exhibition catalogue also published in French and Arabic.]
Ducos, Blaise. “The Dutch Miracle.” In Rembrandt, Vermeer and the Dutch Golden Age.
Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection and the Musée du Louvre. Edited by Blaise Ducos
and Lara Yeager-Crasselt, 37. London, 2019. [Exhibition catalogue also published in Frenchand Arabic.]
Blanc, Jan. “Being Modern, Being Dutch: The Seventeenth-Century Invention of the GoldenAge.” In Rembrandt, Vermeer and the Dutch Golden Age. Masterpieces from The Leiden
Collection and the Musée du Louvre. Edited by Blaise Ducos and Lara Yeager-Crasselt,
40. Exh. cat. Abu Dhabi, Louvre Abu Dhabi. London, 2019. [Exhibition catalogue also
published in French and Arabic.]
Ducos, Blaise, and Lara Yeager-Crasselt, eds. Rembrandt, Vermeer and the Dutch Golden
Age. Masterpieces from The Leiden Collection and the Musée du Louvre. Exh. cat. Abu
Dhabi, Louvre Abu Dhabi. London, 2019, 54, 66–7, no. 9. [Exhibition catalogue also publishedin French and Arabic.]
Sevcik, Anja K., ed. Inside Rembrandt 1606-1669. Exh. cat. Cologne, Wallraf-RichartzMuseum & Fondation Corboud. Petersberg, 2019, 131–32, fig. 32.1.

Technical Summary
The support is a rectangular composite panel composed of two vertically grained Baltic oak
planks of similar but not identical widths.[1] The panel join runs right of center. There are bevels
along all four edges, and the panel is unthinned and uncradled. There are two paper labels, a
black stencil, and two handwritten inscriptions, but no wax collection seals, import stamps, panel
maker’s marks or machine toolmarks.
A light-colored ground is thinly and evenly applied followed by a light brown imprimatura.
The paint has been applied quickly with thin opaque scumbles, which allow the ground andimprimatura to show through in areas, and wet-into-wet where one stroke interrupts the other. The
cloak appears to have been underpainted with a deep crimson, which gives a warmth to theshadowed folds. The turban decoration and the feather have been scratched into wet paint with© 2020 The Leiden CollectionPowered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Boy in a Cape and Turban (Portrait of Prince Rupert of thePalatinate)
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the back of a brush.
The painting is unsigned and undated.
Infrared images captured at 780–1700 nanometers reveal a dark brushy sketch below the paintsurface used to establish the shadows along the figure’s proper left shoulder and left side of theneck and face. There is no additional finer underdrawing.
The painting has not undergone conservation treatment since its acquisition in 2004 and remains
in a good state of preservation.[2]Technical Summary Endnotes

1. The characterization of the wood is based on Peter Klein’s two dendrochronology reports.
One states a dating could not be obtained; the other suggests an earliest fell date of 1617, a
more plausible fell date of 1621…1623…1627 + x, and a plausible first use date from 1625
onward.
2. Entry based on a 2011 examination report by Kate Smith, Paintings Conservation
Department, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

© 2020 The Leiden Collection