The Holy Family with the Infant John the Baptist

1593

Hendrik Goltzius

Associated Names
Hendrick Goltzius

Artist, Dutch, 1558 - 1617

The image shows a seated woman with a man and a child. The woman sits on the ground holding a child on her lap. She has delicate facial features and braided hair, wearing a long gown with a sash. Next to her are a pitcher and another container on the ground. The man stands behind her, leaning on a staff, with wavy hair and a beard, wearing a robe. The child besides the woman plays with another child, holding a cross. A cat is seen on a window ledge to the left. The setting is outdoors, with a tree trunk in the middle and hills and buildings in the background.

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    engraving

  • Credit Line

    Andrew W. Mellon Fund

  • Accession Number

    1978.2.2

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    New Hollstein 1996, no. 13, State iii/iii

Artwork history & notes

Exhibition History

1988

  • Graphic Survey Show, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., June 1988.

Bibliography

1921

  • Hirschmann, Otto. Verzeichnis des graphischen Werks von Hendrick Goltzius (1558-1617) mit Benutzung der durch E.W. Moest hinterlassenen Notizen zusammengestellt. Leipzig: Verlag von Klinkhardt und Biermann, 1921. Reprint. Braunschweig: Klinkhardt &Bie

1993

  • The New Hollstein Dutch & Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, 1450-1700. Rotterdam: Sound & Vision Interactive, 1996- : no.13, iii/iii.

Inscriptions

lower left, in image, in plate: HG / 1593; lower left, numbered in image, in plate: 6; below image, in plate: Praecursor Domini lactantis ab ubere matris / Blanditur puero puer, et colludit amice, / Quem praecognovit aliens utero abditus, hunc et / Indice monstravit digito crescentibus annis. (The herald of the Lord, who is suckled at his mother's breast, like a child, strokes the child and plays sweetly with him; the baby whom he recognized, leaping up, while he was still in his mother's womb, he also pointed to with his finger when they were a little older.)
[Latin translation from Leeflang, Huigen, and Ger Luijten. Hendrick Goltzius (1558-1617): Drawings, Prints and Paintings. Amsterdam: Rijksmuseum, 2003, p. 211.]

Wikidata ID

Q65569194

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