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View of Nijenrode Castle on the River Vecht
Jan Baptist Weenix, after 1647
- Artwork typedrawing
- Object numberRP-T-1889-A-2122
- Dimensionsheight 199 mm x width 329 mm
- Physical characteristicsbrush and grey ink, over black chalk; framing line in black ink
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Identification
Title(s)
View of Nijenrode Castle on the River Vecht
Object type
Object number
RP-T-1889-A-2122
Inscriptions / marks
- signature: ‘Gio Batta Weenix7’
- inscription: ‘No 116 (?) [...] I N (?)’
- inscription: ‘Nyenrode / J.B. Weenix’
- inscription: ‘N 3608’
Part of catalogue
Creation
Creation
draftsman (artist): Jan Baptist Weenix, Kasteel Nijenrode
Dating
after 1647
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Material and technique
Physical description
brush and grey ink, over black chalk; framing line in black ink
Dimensions
height 199 mm x width 329 mm
This work is about
Subject
Place
Acquisition and rights
Credit line
Purchased with the support of the Vereniging Rembrandt
Acquisition
purchase 1889-07-24
Copyright
Provenance
…; collection Johann Edler Goll von Franckenstein (1722-85), Amsterdam and Velsen (L. 2987); his son, Jonkheer Johan Goll van Franckenstein (1756-1821), Amsterdam and Velsen; his son, Jonkheer Pieter Hendrik Goll van Franckenstein (1787-1832), Amsterdam and Velsen; his sale, Amsterdam (J. de Vries et al.), 1 July 1833 _sqq_., Album D, no. 24, fl. 41, to the dealer J.N. Hulswit (1796-1844), Amsterdam;{Copy RKD} …; collection Jacob de Vos Jbzn (1803-78), Amsterdam (L. 1450); his widow, Abrahamina Henrietta de Vos-Wurfbain (1808-83), Amsterdam; sale, Jacob de Vos Jbzn, Amsterdam (C.F. Roos et al.), 22 May 1883 _sqq_., no. 617, fl. 62, to the dealer R.W.P. de Vries for the Vereniging Rembrandt (L. 2135);{Copy RKD; note RMA.} from whom acquired by the museum (L. 2228), 1889
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Jan Baptist Weenix
View of Nijenrode Castle on the River Vecht
after 1647
Inscriptions
signed: upper right, in black chalk, Gio Batta Weenix7
inscribed on verso: centre left, in an eighteenth-century hand, in blueish graphite or pencil, 96; lower left, by Goll van Franckenstein, in brown ink, N 3608; next to that, in graphite (barely legible, covered by tape), N° 116 (?) […] I N (?); lower centre, in a nineteenth-century hand, in pencil, Nyenrode; below that, in a nineteenth-century hand, in pencil, J. B. Weenix
Technical notes
watermark: Strasbourg lily, above letters WR; cf. Laurentius 2007, I, no. 415 (The Hague: 1642)
Provenance
…; collection Johann Edler Goll von Franckenstein (1722-85), Amsterdam and Velsen (L. 2987); his son, Jonkheer Johan Goll van Franckenstein (1756-1821), Amsterdam and Velsen; his son, Jonkheer Pieter Hendrik Goll van Franckenstein (1787-1832), Amsterdam and Velsen; his sale, Amsterdam (J. de Vries et al.), 1 July 1833 sqq., Album D, no. 24, fl. 41, to the dealer J.N. Hulswit (1796-1844), Amsterdam;1Copy RKD …; collection Jacob de Vos Jbzn (1803-78), Amsterdam (L. 1450); his widow, Abrahamina Henrietta de Vos-Wurfbain (1808-83), Amsterdam; sale, Jacob de Vos Jbzn, Amsterdam (C.F. Roos et al.), 22 May 1883 sqq., no. 617, fl. 62, to the dealer R.W.P. de Vries for the Vereniging Rembrandt (L. 2135);2Copy RKD; note RMA. from whom acquired by the museum (L. 2228), 1889
Object number: RP-T-1889-A-2122
Credit line: Purchased with the support of the Vereniging Rembrandt
The artist
Biography
Jan Baptist Weenix (Amsterdam 1621 – c. 1659 De Haar)
He was the son of the Enkhuizen (house) painter Jan Jansz Weines (?-?). According to Houbraken, who was quite accurately informed by Weenix’s son, Jan Weenix (1641-1719), he trained successively with Jan Micker (1599-1664) in Amsterdam, Abraham Bloemaert (1566-1651) in Utrecht and finally with Claes Moeyaert (1591-1655) in Amsterdam. In 1639 he married Josina (1619-1662), a daughter of the painter Gillis d’Hondecoeter (1575-1638). Despite the fairly recent birth of his son Jan, he decided in March 1643 to go to Rome (via Rouen) ‘to put his art to the test’, as he himself put it. In Rome he joined the Bentvueghels (Northern artists’ society) and was given the nickname ‘Rattle’ (‘Ratel’), because he ‘was hasty in his speech and spoke somewhat jerkily’. Houbraken noted that he worked for Camillo Pamphili (1622-1666), who was made a cardinal in 1644. Invoices in the Pamphili archive also show that he supplied several paintings to Camillo’s uncle, Pope Innocent X (reg. 1644-55), in 1645-46. After his return from Italy, the connection with the pope gave him the idea of signing his works ‘Gio[vanni] Batt[ist]a Weenix’, those being Innocent’s original given names (Cardinal Giovanni Battista Pamphilj). Weenix was back in Amsterdam in 1647, and that is where Bartholomeus van der Helst (1613-1670) painted his portrait (now lost). Two years later he settled in Utrecht, where he became a warden of the Guild of St Luke in 1649 and remained until 1656. He spent the last years of his life in the Kasteel Ter Meij, a country house near De Haar, near Utrecht, which he rented from the nobleman Hendrik Valckenaer (d. 1669). His belongings were auctioned there on 25 April 1659, so that is very probably where he died earlier that year.
Jan Baptist Weenix was a versatile artist. He owes his fame mainly to his Italianate landscapes and harbour views, but he also painted still-lives, portraits and history pieces. Just over a dozen of the surviving paintings are dated, the earliest is the Blinding of Tobit of 1642 in Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam (inv. no. 1204 (OK)),3W. Stechow, ‘Jan Baptist Weenix’, The Art Quarterly 11 (1948), Stechow 1948, p. 184. and the last is the Italian Landscape with Inn and Ruins, from October 1658, in the Mauritshuis, The Hague (inv. no. 901).4Q. Buvelot and C. Vermeeren, Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis: A Summary Catalogue, coll. cat. The Hague 2004, pp. 332-33. He collaborated on several works with other artists, including Nicolaes Berchem (1621-1683) for the Calling of St Matthew, also in the Mauritshuis (inv. no. 1058).5E. Runia and Q. Buvelot, Mauritshuis, Koninklijk Kabinet der Schilderijen. Hoogtepunten uit de collective, coll. cat. The Hague 2014, pp. 120-21. Weenix’s pupils were his son Jan and nephew Melchior d’Hondecoeter (1635-1695).
E. de Groot
References
C. de Bie, Het gulden cabinet vande edele vry schilder-const, Antwerp 1661, p. 277; A. Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen, 3 vols., Amsterdam 1718-21, II (1719), pp. 77-83, 111, 113, 131, III (1721), pp. 70, 72; A. Bredius, ‘Een testament van Jan Baptist Weenicx’, Oud Holland 45 (1928), no. 1, pp. 177-78; W. Stechow, ‘Jan Baptist Weenix’, The Art Quarterly 11 (1948), pp. 181-98; R.J. Ginnings, The Art of Jan Baptist and Jan Weenix, Newark (DE) 1970 (PhD diss., University of Delaware); C. Schloss, ‘A Note on Jan Baptist Weenix's Patronage in Rome’, Essays in Northern European Art Presented to Egbert Haverkamp-Begemann on his 60th Birthday, CITY 1983, pp. 237-38; A.C. Steland, ‘Jan Baptist Weenix in Rom, 1643-1647: Zur Datierung des zeichnerischen Frühwerks anhand von Signaturveränderungen’, Niederdeutsche Beiträge zur Kunstgeschichte 33 (1994), pp. 87-112; J.A. Spicer et al., Masters of Light: Dutch Painters in Utrecht during the Golden Age, exh. cat. San Francisco (Fine Arts Museums)/Baltimore (Walters Art Gallery)/London (National Gallery) 1997-98, pp. 390-91 (text by M.J. Bok); A.C. Steland, ‘Drawings by Dutch Italianate Painters’, in L.B. Harwood (ed.), Inspired by Italy: Dutch Landscape Painting, 1600-1700, exh. cat. London (Dulwich Picture Gallery) 2002, pp. 42-63; A. van der Willigen and F.G. Meijer, A Dictionary of Dutch and Flemish Still-life Painters Working in Oils, 1525-1725, Leiden 2003, p. 215; A.A. van Wagenberg-Ter Hoeven, Jan Baptist en Jan Weenix: The Paintings, 2 vols., Zwolle 2018; RKD Artists https://rkd.nl/artists/83250
Entry
Weenix signed this drawing of Nijenrode Castle with the Italianized version of his name, a clear indication that it was done after his return from Italy in 1647. Such a large signature in a prominent place implies the sheet was made as an autonomous work or art. It may even have been commissioned by the owner of the castle.6E.P. Löffler, ‘Kastelen en landhuizen in de Nederlandse kunst’, Jaarboek Kastelenstichting Holland en Zeeland 4 (2005), pp. 15, 17 on this category of ‘castle portrait’. Moreover, Nijenrode was famous in its own right, being one of the four castles featured in a print series of the Four Seasons of c. 1600-10 by Hessel Gerritsz (1581-1632) after David Vinckboons (1576-c. 1632); cf. ibid., p. 11 and F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XXXVII (1991), no. 16. Nijenrode, its name alluding to the clearing of trees that was necessary to prepare the ground before building the castle, was erected in the mid-thirteenth century by Gerard Splinter van Ruwiel (1298-?) on the left bank of the river Vecht, near Breukelen, north of Utrecht.7B. Olde Meierink, Kastelen en ridderhofsteden in Utrecht, Utrecht 1995, pp. 341-46 (text by T. Hermans). In Weenix’s lifetime, it belonged to the Van den Bongard family.8After Bernard III van den Bongard (?-1641) died, the castle went to his sister Anna (?-1661/63), who died childless; cf. P.H. Bogaard, ‘Van den Bongard. Genealogie van een Nederlandse tak van het Nederrijnse geslacht Von dem Bongart’, Jaarboek Oud Utrecht 6 (1975), pp. 195-96. In 1673, it was demolished by French troops, and in 1675 it was sold to the Amsterdam merchant Johan I Ortt (1642-1701); cf. B. Olde Meierink, Kastelen en ridderhofsteden in Utrecht, Utrecht 1995, pp. 341-42 (text by T. Hermans). After 1632, the castle was modernized, for example by adding the classicist gateway visible in the present sheet.9Ibid., p. 343. A bridge was added after 1675.
Weenix chose a viewpoint employed in drawn and engraved renderings of the castle by such artists as Roelant Roghman (1627-c. 1691/92),10Zeist, Rijksdienst voor de Monumentenzorg, W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, no. 140. Theodor Matham (c. 1605/06-1676)11F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XI (1954), no. 56 (c. 1650). and Herman Saftleven (1609-1685).12Cf. his drawing in the museum’s collection, inv. no. RP-T-1905-95 and his dated print of 1653, inv. no. RP-P-1910-4043; ibid., XXIII (1980), no. 16. Comparison with these works reveals that Weenix took some liberties, for instance by making the windows smaller, by reducing the number of the dormers and by omitting a stepped gable in the internal courtyard that was apparently situated next to the right stair tower.
The staffage in the right foreground, a man steering his boat through the reed, was possibly added by a later hand.
Annemarie Stefes, 2018
Literature
W. Stechow, ‘Jan Baptist Weenix’, The Art Quarterly 11 (1948), p. 196; R.J. Ginnings, The Art of Jan Baptist and Jan Weenix, Newark (DE) 1970 (PhD diss., University of Delaware), no. 48; J.B.J. Postma, Nijenrode in prent. Met een beknopt overzicht van zeven eeuwen historie, Breukelen 1972, pp. 26-27; P. Schatborn, with J. Verberne, Drawn to Warmth: 17th-century Dutch Artists in Italy, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Rijksmuseum) 2001, p. 115; A.A. van Wagenberg-ter Hoeven, Jan Baptist Weenix en Jan Weenix: The Paintings, 2 vols., Zwolle 2018 , I, p. 29 (fig. 10), p. 56 (n. 81)
Citation
A. Stefes, 2018, 'Jan Baptist Weenix, View of Nijenrode Castle on the River Vecht, Kasteel Nijenrode, after 1647 - ', in J. Turner (ed.), Dutch Drawings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200145589
(accessed 20 juli 2026 15:00:09 UTC+0).Footnotes
- 1Copy RKD
- 2Copy RKD; note RMA.
- 3W. Stechow, ‘Jan Baptist Weenix’, The Art Quarterly 11 (1948), Stechow 1948, p. 184.
- 4Q. Buvelot and C. Vermeeren, Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis: A Summary Catalogue, coll. cat. The Hague 2004, pp. 332-33.
- 5E. Runia and Q. Buvelot, Mauritshuis, Koninklijk Kabinet der Schilderijen. Hoogtepunten uit de collective, coll. cat. The Hague 2014, pp. 120-21.
- 6E.P. Löffler, ‘Kastelen en landhuizen in de Nederlandse kunst’, Jaarboek Kastelenstichting Holland en Zeeland 4 (2005), pp. 15, 17 on this category of ‘castle portrait’. Moreover, Nijenrode was famous in its own right, being one of the four castles featured in a print series of the Four Seasons of c. 1600-10 by Hessel Gerritsz (1581-1632) after David Vinckboons (1576-c. 1632); cf. ibid., p. 11 and F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XXXVII (1991), no. 16.
- 7B. Olde Meierink, Kastelen en ridderhofsteden in Utrecht, Utrecht 1995, pp. 341-46 (text by T. Hermans).
- 8After Bernard III van den Bongard (?-1641) died, the castle went to his sister Anna (?-1661/63), who died childless; cf. P.H. Bogaard, ‘Van den Bongard. Genealogie van een Nederlandse tak van het Nederrijnse geslacht Von dem Bongart’, Jaarboek Oud Utrecht 6 (1975), pp. 195-96. In 1673, it was demolished by French troops, and in 1675 it was sold to the Amsterdam merchant Johan I Ortt (1642-1701); cf. B. Olde Meierink, Kastelen en ridderhofsteden in Utrecht, Utrecht 1995, pp. 341-42 (text by T. Hermans).
- 9Ibid., p. 343. A bridge was added after 1675.
- 10Zeist, Rijksdienst voor de Monumentenzorg, W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, no. 140.
- 11F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XI (1954), no. 56 (c. 1650).
- 12Cf. his drawing in the museum’s collection, inv. no. RP-T-1905-95 and his dated print of 1653, inv. no. RP-P-1910-4043; ibid., XXIII (1980), no. 16.