Roelant Roghman

Mountainous, Italianate Landscape with a Rotunda Church

c. 1660 - c. 1670

Inscriptions

  • signed: lower right, in brown ink, Roelant. Roghman.

  • inscribed on verso: centre, in an eighteenth- or nineteenth-century hand, with pencil, fl 90–

  • stamped on verso: lower left, with the mark of Pitcairn Knowles (L. 2643); lower centre, with the mark of the museum (L. 2228)

Technical notes

Watermark: Countermark with letters, LR

Provenance

…; ? sale, Jan Jansz. Gildemeester (1744-99, Amsterdam), Amsterdam (P. van der Schley et al.), 24 November 1800 sqq., Album I, no. 12 (‘Een buitengezicht by de Vestmuuren van een oude Stad, gestoffeerd met een Pleisterplaats, en Landlieden met Vee, in alles als de voorige geteekend; door R. Roghman’), with one other drawing, fl. 17:10:-, to the dealer P. van der Schley, Amsterdam;1Copy RKD. …; collection William Pitcairn Knowles (1820-94), Rotterdam and Wiesbaden (L. 2643); his sale, Amsterdam (F. Muller), 25 June 1895 sqq., probably no. 543, with one other drawing, fl. 14, to the dealer F. Muller, for the Vereniging Rembrandt,2Copy RKD. from whom, fl. 12, to the museum (L. 2228), 1901

ObjectNumber: RP-T-1901-A-4534

The artist

Biography

Roelant Roghman (Amsterdam 1627 - Amsterdam 1692)

He was the son of Hendrick Lambertsz Roghman (1602-1647/57) and Maria Saverij and was baptized on 25 March 1627 in Amsterdam’s Nieuwe Kerk. His father worked as an engraver,3F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), pp. 61-64, nos. 1-3. as did two of his five siblings: his sisters Geertruyt (1625-c. 1651/57) and Magdalena (16324Amsterdam, Stadsarchief, DTB 41, p. 174 (13 January 1632); erroneously given as 13 January 1637 in W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 9 and subsequent literature.-after 1669).5F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), pp. 53-60, nos. 1-23; pp. 65-66, nos. 1-2; E. Kloek et al. (eds.), Vrouwen en kunst in de Republiek: Een overzicht, Hilversum 1998 (Utrechtse historische cahiers, vol. 19), pp. 160-61. Through his mother, Roelant was a grandson of Jacob Savery I (1566-1603) and a great-nephew of Roelant Savery (1576-1639), after whom he was named. It is not known under whom he trained, but it is likely that he was influenced by the example of his grandfather and great-uncle. Although sometimes grouped with the pupils of Rembrandt (1606-1669), Roghman never actually studied with him. They were friends, however, and according to Houbraken, Rembrandt refused to accept Jan Griffier (1645/52-1718) as an apprentice because he was already studying with his friend Roghman.

Roghman was a prolific draughtsman, whose earliest dated works are two drawn views of tollhouses on the River IJ, both dated 1645, in the Van Eeghen collection, Stadsarchief, Amsterdam (inv. nos. 10055/28) and 10055/29).6B. Bakker (ed.), De verzameling Van Eeghen: Amsterdamse tekeningen, 1600-1950, Zwolle 1988 (Publikaties van het Gemeentearchief Amsterdam uitgegeven door de Stichting H.J. Duyvisfonds, vol. 16), 1988, nos. 28-29. Among the works possibly made even earlier is a pen-and-wash drawing in the Kupferstich-Kabinett, Dresden (inv. nos. C 1798), clearly influenced by Roelant Savery.7W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, figs. 15-16.

In 1646/47, Roghman embarked on his most ambitious project, the series of some 250 castle drawings, of which the Rijksmuseum owns 49 individual sheets. Besides travelling through the Dutch provinces to make castle drawings and topographical views, he also visited Brussels and the region around Cleves.8Cf. drawings such as The Pond at Boschvoorde near Brussels, Brussels, Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België (inv. no. 4060/3065; S. Hautekeete, Tekeningen van Rembrandt en zijn leerlingen in de verzameling van Jean de Grez, exh. cat. Brussels (Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België) 2005, no. 32.); and a View of Cleves, which appeared in the Valkema Blouw sale, Amsterdam (F. Muller), 2 March 1954, no. 389. A number of alpine landscapes – including one in the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam (inv. no. MB 221), dated 16549W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 29 (fig. 41). For more drawings with identifiable locations in the Swiss Alps, cf. W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), p. 5066. – suggest that he must have travelled to the Alps that year,10Cf. different views of the natural passageway in the Pierre Pertuis near Tavannes in the Jura (e.g. Dresden, Kupferstich-Kabinett, inv. no. C 1770; W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), no. 2243, with further examples). presumably passing through France. A trip further south may be documented by a View of San Giacomo a Rialto in the Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin (KdZ 2617), traditionally attributed to the artist,11W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, fig. 7. That drawing has alternatively associated with Willem Schellinks (1623-1678; by Frits Lugt, cf. W. Schulz, Die holländische Landschaftszeichnung, 1600-1740: Hauptwerke aus dem Berliner Kupferstichkabinett, exh. cat. Berlin (Kupferstichkabinett) 1974, p. 72) and Jan Baptist Weenix (1621-1659; by Stijn Alsteens, cf. note on that drawing’s mount). Stylistically, however, its broad style relates with drawings by Roghman of circa 1650, for instance, inv. no. RP-T-1887-A-1385, whereas Weenix and Schellinks both worked with more delicate lines. and a signed drawing in the Klassik Stiftung Weimar, Sailing Boat at a Moorage, could have well been made in Venice.12Inv. no. KK 5329; B. van den Boogert, Goethe & Rembrandt: Tekeningen uit Weimar uit de grafische bestanden van de Kunstsammlungen zu Weimar, aangevuld met werken uit het Goethe-Nationalmuseum, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Museum Het Rembrandthuis) 1999, pp. 94-95. In 1657, Roghman stayed in Augsburg, where he had a set of six etched alpine landscapes published by Melchior Küsel (1626-1684)13F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), pp. 78-81, nos. 25-32; cf. W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 4, n. 18. and contributed a drawing to an album amicorum (inv. no. RP-T-1898-A-3991). No later than 1658, he was back in Amsterdam, where he is documented during the 1660s. In 1672, his opinion was sought on the authenticity of a group of Italian paintings in a legal dispute between Gerrit Uylenburgh (c. 1625-1679) and Friedrich Wilhelm, Elector of Brandenburg (1620-1688).

Roghman’s rare paintings feature mostly mountain scenes and were probably done after his trip to the Alps. Of his circa fifty etchings, mostly landscapes, one depicts the Breach of the St Anthony’s Dike,14F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), p. 90, no. 39. a famous incident in 1651 that was also recorded by Jan Asselijn (c. 1610-1652), for example in his painting in the Rijksmuseum (inv. no. SK-A-5030), Willem Schellinks (1627-1678) and Jacob Esselens (1626-1687).

Roghman apparently never married and from 1686 lived in Amsterdam’s Oudemannenhuis (Old Men’s Home). His last dated drawing is from 1657, but according to Houbraken, he continued to produce art well into his old age. He died on 3 January 1692 and was buried in the St Anthonis Kerkhof, Amsterdam.

Annemarie Stefes, 2018

References
A. Houbraken, De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen, 3 vols., Amsterdam 1718-21, I (1718), pp. 173-74; III (1721), p. 358; A. von Wurzbach, Niederländisches Künstlerlexikon, 3 vols., Vienna/Leipzig 1906-11, II (1910), p. 464; R. Juynboll, ‘Roelant Roghman’, in U. Thieme and F. Becker, Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler: Von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, 37 vols., Leipzig 1907-50, XXVIII (1934), p. 518, with earlier literature; W.T. Kloek, ‘Een berglandschap door Roelant Roghman’, Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum 23 (1975), no. 2, pp. 100-01; F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), pp. 67-93; H. Gerson and B.W. Meijer (eds.), Ausbreitung und Nachwirkung der Holländischen Malerei des 17. Jahrhunderts, Amsterdam 1983 (rev. ed.; orig. ed. 1942), pp. 27, 49, 130, 186, 293, 307, 356, 403; W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, pp. 1-14; W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), pp. 4989-5174; P. Groenendijk, Beknopt biografisch lexicon van Zuid- en Noord-Nederlandse schilders, graveurs, glasschilders, tapijtwevers et cetera van ca. 1350 tot ca. 1720, Utrecht 2008, p. 642

Entry

In Roghman’s drawn oeuvre, the second largest group after the castle series, numbering more than seventy examples, consists of what Kloek has christened his ‘monumental landscapes’, all boldly executed in pen and brown ink, with heavy grey and brown washes, and most of them signed.15W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 39 (n. 71); cf. W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X, pp. 5041-43. Of these imaginary landscapes, done on sheets of more or less uniform format of circa 160 x 230 mm, the Rijksprentenkabinet owns four other sheets: inv. nos. RP-T-1896-A-3165, RP-T-1901-A-4533, RP-T-1901-A-4535 and RP-T-1901-A-4537. Despite the fact that the five sheets are of only average format, the term ‘monumental’ seems appropriate given their impressive mountainous scenery, dramatically staged with strong contrasts of light and shade.

The scenery of the present view has a decidedly southern character.16W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 30. As noted in the 1895 Pitcairn Knowles sale catalogue, Roghman probably first recoded the scene as a ‘souvenir of his travels’, perhaps during or after his presumed journey to the south (1654-57), in other words, around the same time as a stylistically similar sheet, Mountain Landscape with Ruins and a Land Bridge, dated 1655, in the Museum der Bildenden Künste, Leipzig (inv. no. N.I. 471).17W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), Drawings, X, no. 2234. That does not necessarily mean that the present sheet was drawn in situ – in general, the ‘monumental landscapes’ are rightly considered to be imaginary views based on first-hand experience, perhaps made a decade or more later.18W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 34; M.C. Plomp, The Dutch Drawings in the Teyler Museum, II: Artists Born between 1575 and 1630, coll. cat. Haarlem 1997, p. 348, under no. 398; W.W. Robinson, Bruegel to Rembrandt: Dutch and Flemish Drawings from the Maida and George Abrams Collection, exh. cat. London (British Museum)/Paris (Institut Néerlandais)/Cambridge (MA) (Fogg Art Museum) 2002-03, p. 158, under no. 66; P. Schatborn, Rembrandt and his Circle: Drawings in the Frits Lugt Collection, 2 vols., coll. cat. Paris 2010, pp. 362, 364. This conclusion is supported by the watermarks in the supports of such drawings, which date from the 1660s.

A round or rotunda church building at the end of a bridge, though in a more urban setting, is found in a stylistically related drawing in the Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg (inv. no. 1916-493).19A. Stefes, Niederländische Zeichnungen 1450-1800, 3 vols., coll. cat. Hamburg 2011 (Die Sammlungen der Hamburger Kunsthalle, Kupferstichkabinett, vol. 2), no. 870. There are autograph replicas or copies of both that sheet and the present drawing in the British Museum, London (inv. nos. inv. no. 1836,0811.475 and 1836,0811.474).20A.M. Hind, Catalogue of Drawings by Dutch and Flemish Artists Preserved in the Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum, 5 vols., coll. cat. London 1915-32, IV (1931), nos. 4 and 3. The presumed copy after the present sheet features fewer goats and omits the dog drinking from the pond at left; the signature was replaced by little pen strokes indicating grass. A third drawing in the British Museum (inv. no. Oo,9.59)21Ibid., no. 1. was squared for transfer and apparently served as model for an autograph replica or copy in the Biblioteca Reale, Turin (inv. no. 16432).22G.C. Sciolla, I disegni di maestri stranieri della Biblioteca Reale di Torino, coll. cat. Turin 1974 (Manuele e saggi di bibliografia, vol. 8), no. 118; W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), no. 2236.

Annemarie Stefes, 2018

Literature

W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 39 (nn. 62, 77)

Citation

A. Stefes, 2018, 'Roelant Roghman, Mountainous, Italianate Landscape with a Rotunda Church, c. 1660 - c. 1670', in J. Turner (ed.), Dutch Drawings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.59912

(accessed 29 May 2025 02:41:29).

Footnotes

  • 1Copy RKD.
  • 2Copy RKD.
  • 3F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), pp. 61-64, nos. 1-3.
  • 4Amsterdam, Stadsarchief, DTB 41, p. 174 (13 January 1632); erroneously given as 13 January 1637 in W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 9 and subsequent literature.
  • 5F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), pp. 53-60, nos. 1-23; pp. 65-66, nos. 1-2; E. Kloek et al. (eds.), Vrouwen en kunst in de Republiek: Een overzicht, Hilversum 1998 (Utrechtse historische cahiers, vol. 19), pp. 160-61.
  • 6B. Bakker (ed.), De verzameling Van Eeghen: Amsterdamse tekeningen, 1600-1950, Zwolle 1988 (Publikaties van het Gemeentearchief Amsterdam uitgegeven door de Stichting H.J. Duyvisfonds, vol. 16), 1988, nos. 28-29.
  • 7W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, figs. 15-16.
  • 8Cf. drawings such as The Pond at Boschvoorde near Brussels, Brussels, Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België (inv. no. 4060/3065; S. Hautekeete, Tekeningen van Rembrandt en zijn leerlingen in de verzameling van Jean de Grez, exh. cat. Brussels (Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België) 2005, no. 32.); and a View of Cleves, which appeared in the Valkema Blouw sale, Amsterdam (F. Muller), 2 March 1954, no. 389.
  • 9W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 29 (fig. 41). For more drawings with identifiable locations in the Swiss Alps, cf. W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), p. 5066.
  • 10Cf. different views of the natural passageway in the Pierre Pertuis near Tavannes in the Jura (e.g. Dresden, Kupferstich-Kabinett, inv. no. C 1770; W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), no. 2243, with further examples).
  • 11W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, fig. 7. That drawing has alternatively associated with Willem Schellinks (1623-1678; by Frits Lugt, cf. W. Schulz, Die holländische Landschaftszeichnung, 1600-1740: Hauptwerke aus dem Berliner Kupferstichkabinett, exh. cat. Berlin (Kupferstichkabinett) 1974, p. 72) and Jan Baptist Weenix (1621-1659; by Stijn Alsteens, cf. note on that drawing’s mount). Stylistically, however, its broad style relates with drawings by Roghman of circa 1650, for instance, inv. no. RP-T-1887-A-1385, whereas Weenix and Schellinks both worked with more delicate lines.
  • 12Inv. no. KK 5329; B. van den Boogert, Goethe & Rembrandt: Tekeningen uit Weimar uit de grafische bestanden van de Kunstsammlungen zu Weimar, aangevuld met werken uit het Goethe-Nationalmuseum, exh. cat. Amsterdam (Museum Het Rembrandthuis) 1999, pp. 94-95.
  • 13F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), pp. 78-81, nos. 25-32; cf. W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 4, n. 18.
  • 14F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, c. 1450-1700, 72 vols, Amsterdam and elsewhere 1947-2010, XX (1978), p. 90, no. 39.
  • 15W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 39 (n. 71); cf. W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X, pp. 5041-43.
  • 16W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 30.
  • 17W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), Drawings, X, no. 2234.
  • 18W. Kloek and J.W. Niemeijer, De kasteeltekeningen van Roelant Roghman II, Alphen aan den Rijn 1990, p. 34; M.C. Plomp, The Dutch Drawings in the Teyler Museum, II: Artists Born between 1575 and 1630, coll. cat. Haarlem 1997, p. 348, under no. 398; W.W. Robinson, Bruegel to Rembrandt: Dutch and Flemish Drawings from the Maida and George Abrams Collection, exh. cat. London (British Museum)/Paris (Institut Néerlandais)/Cambridge (MA) (Fogg Art Museum) 2002-03, p. 158, under no. 66; P. Schatborn, Rembrandt and his Circle: Drawings in the Frits Lugt Collection, 2 vols., coll. cat. Paris 2010, pp. 362, 364.
  • 19A. Stefes, Niederländische Zeichnungen 1450-1800, 3 vols., coll. cat. Hamburg 2011 (Die Sammlungen der Hamburger Kunsthalle, Kupferstichkabinett, vol. 2), no. 870.
  • 20A.M. Hind, Catalogue of Drawings by Dutch and Flemish Artists Preserved in the Department of Prints and Drawings in the British Museum, 5 vols., coll. cat. London 1915-32, IV (1931), nos. 4 and 3.
  • 21Ibid., no. 1.
  • 22G.C. Sciolla, I disegni di maestri stranieri della Biblioteca Reale di Torino, coll. cat. Turin 1974 (Manuele e saggi di bibliografia, vol. 8), no. 118; W. Sumowski, Drawings of the Rembrandt School, 10 vols., New York 1979-92, X (1992), no. 2236.