 The art historian Hendrik Frederik Wijnman disproved the myth that Ruisdael died a poor man, supposedly in the old men's almshouse in Haarlem. Wijnman showed that the person who died there was in fact Ruisdael's cousin, Jacob Salomonszoon. Although there is no record of Ruisdael owning land or shares, he appears to have lived comfortably, even after the economic downturn of the disaster year 1672. His paintings were valued fairly highly. In a large sample of inventories between 1650 and 1679 the average price for a Ruisdael was 40 guilders, compared to an average of 19 guilders for all attributed paintings. In a ranking of contemporary Dutch painters based on price-weighted frequency in these inventories, Ruisdael ranks seventh; Rembrandt ranks first.
