…; the dealer P.C. Huybrechts, The Hague; from whom acquired by the museum as by David Teniers I, 1803¹¹E.W. Moes and E. van Biema, De Nationale Konst-Gallery en Het Koninklijk Museum, Amsterdam 1909, pp. 69 (for a list of 1804 where described as no. 49 't breeken van het twaalfjarig bestand door de spaanjaarden …'), 132, 217.

Object number: SK-A-619

Acquired as by David Teniers I (1582-1649) and then considered by Bredius to be by an anonymous Dutch artist, the present attribution to Nicolaas van Eyck II was suggested by a comparison with a reproduction of a comparable, signed work by this artist which appeared on the Viennese market in 1964.⁹⁹As noted on the Rijksmuseum inventory card; the painting was advertised in Weltkunst, 15 February 1964, p. 113, and offered in an anonymous sale, Vienna (Dorotheum), 17-20 March 1964, no. 34; later offered, in anonymous sale, Vienna (Wiener Kunst Auctionen), 2 December 1993, no. 7 (reproduction in the RKD). Other similar paintings by Van Eyck in the public domain are in the State Hermitage Museum (N. Gritsay and N. Babina, State Hermitage Museum Catalogue: Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century Flemish Painting, St Petersburg 2008, p. 103, no. 138) and in the Kunsthistorisches Museum (E. von Engerth, Kunsthistorische Sammlungen des Alterhöchsten Kaiserhauses, Gemälde, Beschreibendes Verzeichniss, 3 vols., Vienna 1884-86, pp. 139-40, no. 831) on loan to the Heeresgeschichtliches Museum (incorrectly said to be dated 1640 by Wikipedia). Information kindly provided by Gerlinde Gruber and Walter Kalina. Van Eyck’s small, extant oeuvre seems not to be homogeneous, for a more statuesque treatment of the figures is evident in the equestrian portrait at Lille¹⁰¹⁰A. Brejon de Lavergnée and Annie Scottez-De Wambrechies, Catalogue sommaire illustré des peintures, 2 vols., Lille (Musée des Beaux-Arts)1999, p. 70, no. P.98. and the Riding School which appeared on the Cologne market in 2006.¹¹¹¹Offered anonymous sale, Cologne (Lempertz), 22 June 2004, no. 1046 (reproduction in the RKD). The present painting shares characteristics with both types. Thus, granted uncertainty about the make-up of Van Eyck’s oeuvre and the poor condition of the museum picture, it seems best to retain the qualified ascription (unintentionally to Van Eyck I) of the 1976 museum catalogue. It is noteworthy that a full attribution has been accepted by Van Maarseveen¹²¹²Van Maarseveen in M.P. van Marseveen et al. (eds.), Beelden van een strijd. Oorlog en kunst vóór de Vrede van Munster, 1621-1648, exh. cat. Delft (Stedelijk Museum Het Prinsenhof) 1998, p. 108, fig. 107. and Beaujean.¹³¹³Beaujean in Saur Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon: Die Bildenden Künstler aller Zeiten und Völker, Munich/Leipzig 1983-, XXXV, p. 521.

The signed work with which the present work has been compared, has been identified as depicting the battle of Kallo which took place in 1638. This is improbable if only because the terrain is not shown as flat. Whether the skirmish depicted here can be identified is doubtful, although the point-blank engagement at a wooden footbridge over a narrow dike – an unusual but not unique battle-piece theme – may well not be imaginary. Visscher’s print of 1622 Skirmish near the Village of Ter Schilde provides a precedent.¹⁴¹⁴F.W.H. Hollstein et al., Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts 1450-1700, Amsterdam/Roosendaal 1948-, XXXVIII, part 1, p. 28, no. 42, part 2, p. 27, no. 47.

Of the infantry detachments involved, that on the left can be identified as Spanish as it fights under the Spanish army flag of the Burgundian red raguly saltire on a white field.¹⁵¹⁵W. Smith, Flags through the Ages and across the World, Maidenhead 1975, pp. 125, 156. The banner of the opposing troops is an unspecified red denoting perhaps no more than that an action is taking place.¹⁶¹⁶W. Smith, Flags through the Ages and across the World, Maidenhead 1975, p. 159. In a related painting, see below, the colour is yellow which may refer to the topmost colour of the ‘princes flag’,¹⁷¹⁷W. Smith, Flags through the Ages and across the World, Maidenhead 1975, p. 156. making the detachment part of the army of the United Provinces. Hostilities between the two armies continued in the campaigning seasons of the 1640s until two years prior to the treaty of Münster of 1648.¹⁸¹⁸J. Israel, The Dutch Republic and the Hispanic World (1606-1661), Oxford 1982, pp. 315ff. The costumes in the Rijksmuseum painting do indeed suggest a date circa 1645.¹⁹¹⁹Cf. those in the Louvre The Feast of the Prodigal Son by David Teniers II, of 1644, in J. Foucart (ed.), Catalogue des peintures flamands et hollandaises du musée du Louvre, Paris 2009. In these years the Spanish army of the Netherlands, however, also engaged with the French army.

In the comparable, signed battle-pieces referred to above, an infantry engagement at close range is depicted in the middle-ground, with the Spanish troops also deployed on the left. Seemingly the same engagement as takes place in the present work is shown in the middle-ground of a painting on the London market in 1985.²⁰²⁰Anonymous sale, London (Phillips), 21 May 1985, no. 20 as Lambert de Hondt, 56 x 82.5 cm (reproduction in the Witt Library). This, judging from the colour reproduction, is also probably by Nicolaas van Eyck II. Here in the foreground Spanish infantry, lined up before a dike, repel a cavalry charge.

Gregory Martin, 2022

1809, p. 69, no. 297 (Teniers (de Oude) Het verbreken van het twaalf jarig bestand); 1903, p. 12, no. 115 (Anon. Dutch, 17th century, second half); 1976, p. 223, no. A 619 (attributed to Nicolaas I van Eyck)

G. Martin, 2022, 'attributed to Nicolaas van (II) Eyck, Infantry Skirmish in the Eighty Years War, c. 1645', in Flemish Paintings in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/20027863