264 - Anthony Van Dyck, Paulus Pontius - Nicholas Rockox, mair of Antwerp

Anthony Van Dyck, Paulus Pontius - Nicholas Rockox, mair of Antwerp Description: Portrait of Nicholas Rockox, bust-length, turned to right; wearing a doublet and white ruff; within a lettered oval with a coat of arms in a cartouche between a broken arch pediment above the portrait, and with a lettered tablet below; after Anthony van Dyck Engraving. Lettered around the portrait, in a single line of Latin: "Nicolavs Rockox Eqves Et Consvlaris Antv. Aet. Anno LXXIX / Stet OvicVno Volet Potens Aviæ Cvlmine Librico. Me Dvlcis Satvret Qvies". Lettered in tablet below, in six lines of Latin by Gevaerts: "Qui nouies patria moderatus in Urbe secures,/ Qui summos spreuit, quos dabat Aula gradus;/ Sic vultus sic docta gerit Roccoxius ora,/ Octonas bis dum vixit Olympiadas/ Ambitione procul. Magnum delata Potestas,/ Maiorem sedenim spreta, Quiesq?, probant." "C. Geuartius Pos.". Lettered with production details in lower corners, on the platform: "Ant. van Dyck pinxit" Paul. Pontius sculpsit" After Anthony van Dyck Print made by: Paulus Pontius After: Peter Paul Rubens (formerly attributed) Dimensions: 26,20 x 18,20 cm Condition: Excellent impression on a full sheet of watermarked laid paper (fools head with bells). Condition is excellent. Literature: New Hollstein (Dutch & Flemish) 104. (Van Dyck) Mauquoy-Hendrickx 1991 115.IX Hollstein 117 (Pontius) Schneevoogt 1873 186.273 (wrongly attributed to Rubens) The portrait is probably based on Van Dyck's drawing, now kept in the Royal Collection, Windsor Castle, inv.no.906421, (Vey 193; C. White and C. Crawley, 'The Dutch and Flemish Drawings of the XV to XIX Centuries in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen at Windsor Castle', Cambridge 1994, cat. 354). A tondo grisaille is in a private collection and another grisaille in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Strasbourg. No fully worked up portraits of the sitter relating to this print are described in S. Barnes, N. de Poorter, O. Millar and H. Vey, 'Van Dyck: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings', Yale & London, 2004. The format of the print differs from others in the Iconography. The plate was nevertheless published by Gillis Hendricx and it is plausible that it was used as a tailpiece Medium: Engraving Date: 1640