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Dimensions: 53.3 by 63.8 cm.; 21 by 25 in.
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Provenance: Ambrose Hussey-Freke, Hannington Hall, near Salisbury, Wiltshire;
Anonymous sale (Hussey-Freke?), Salisbury, Wooley and Wallis, 5 May 1978;
With Agnews, London, 1980;
Anonymous sale, London, Sothebys, 2 July 1986, lot 152 (as by Berchem and Jan Both);
Anonymous sale, New York, Christie's, 31 May 1990, lot 67.
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Exhibited: London, Agnews, 1980, no. 6.
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Literature: J. Ingamells, The Wallace Collection. Catalogue of Pictures. IV Dutch and Flemish, London 1992, p. 31.
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Notes: The principal figures in this painting recur in another picture by Berchem which is signed and dated 1654 and now in the Wallace Collection in London. The landscape setting of the Wallace Collection version, is however, very different (see Ingamells, Literature, reproduced). The present painting most probably dates from the same year, and both pictures were therefore probably painted after Berchem's purported trip to Italy between 1651 and 1653. The evidence for this journey comes from Houbraken (who also records an earlier trip in 1642 with Jan Baptist Weenix), and although not conclusive, works such as this from after 1653 do betray a very marked and more Italianate lighting and a brighter palette. Another related version of this composition, also stated to be signed, is recorded in the Limpurg sale, Dordrecht 10-12 November 1953, and may be identifiable with the present work.
