Lot Essay
The last of Rembrandt’s etched sheets of studies and the rarest, this plate features a self-portrait in the centre, surrounded by two vignettes, of a beggar with his hands cupped asking for alms at the left and, at a 90 degree turn to the right, a beggar woman accompanied by a child in the lower half of the plate. The self-portrait bears a strong resemblance to Self-portrait etching by a Window, 1648 (NH 240), with the artist’s fuller, middle-aged features and determined expression, though less formal and lacking the hat. The figures of the beggar woman and child, and to a lesser extent that of the man, are reminiscent of the family group in A blind Hurdy-Gurdy Player and Family receiving Alms, 1648 (NH 243). The plate is signed and dated 'RL 1651' below these figures, however, as Rembrandt replaced his monogram with his full signature in the 1630’s, some early scholars suggested that the date actually read 1631, and that it was in fact a portrait of Rembrandt’s father or brother. More recent watermark research, however, supports the dating of the plate to circa 1648, which is consistent with the stylistic parallels to Self-portrait etching by a Window and A blind Hurdy-Gurdy Player and Family receiving Alms. This leaves the anachronistic monogram and date of 1651 something of a mystery.