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The Circumcision 1969 Washington: no. 20. by 1669.2 Probably Isaak van den Blooken, the Netherlands, 1974 Hasselgren: in, 127, 131, 195, 198, no. G 53, by 1707; (sale, Amsterdam, 11 May 1707, no. 1). Duke of repro. Ancaster, by 1724;3 (sale, London, March 1724, no. 18); 1975 NGA: 284, 285, no. 77, repro. Andrew Hay; (sale, Cock, London, 14 February 1745, no. 1978 Bolten and Bolten-Rempt: 202, no. 549, repro. 47); John Spencer, 1st Earl of Spencer [1734-1783], Althorp 1984/1985 Schwartz: 339, no. 396, repro. (also 1985 House; inherited through family members to John Poyntz, English ed.). 5th Earl of Spencer [1835-1910]; (Arthur J. Sulley & Co., 1985 NGA: 330, repro. London); Peter A. B. Widener, Lynnewood Hall, Elkins 1986 Sutton: 314. Park, Pennsylvania, by 1912; inheritance from Estate of 1986 Tumpel: 413, no. 217, repro. Peter A. B. Widener by gift through power of appointment 1986 Guillaud and Guillaud: 362, no. 416, repro. of Joseph E. Widener, Elkins Park. 1990 The Hague: no. 53. Exhibited: Exhibition of Paintings, Leeds Art Gallery, Leeds, 1868, no. 735. Rembrandt: Schilderijen Bijeengebracht ter Ge- lengenheid van de Inhuidiging van Hare Majesteit Koningin Wil- 1942.9.60 (656) helmina, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, 1898, no. 115. Winter Exhibition of Works by Rembrandt, Royal Academy, Lon­ don, 1899, no. 5. Washington 1969, no. 22. Rembrandt and the Rembrandt van Rijn Bible, Fukuoka Art Museum, Fukuoka; National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, 1987, no. 11. The Circumcision 1661 THE ONLY MENTION of the Circumcision of Christ Oil on canvas, 56.5 x 75 (22/4 x 29/2) occurs in the Gospel of Luke, 2:15-22: "...the Widener Collection shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even Inscriptions unto Bethlehem And they came with haste, and At lower right: Rembrandt, f 1661 found Mary and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger— And when eight days were accomplished Technical Notes: The original support, a medium-weight, for the circumcising of the child, his name was called loosely woven, plain-weave fabric, has been lined with the tacking margins unevenly trimmed. The absence of cusping Jesus." This cursory reference to this most signifi­ and the presence of old, off-center, stretcher bar creases cant event in the early childhood of Christ allowed suggest the dimensions may have been substantially reduced. artists throughout history a wide latitude in the way The double ground consists of a dark brown lower layer and they represented the Circumcision.4 1 a lighter brown upper layer. The upper layer is translucent The predominant Dutch pictorial tradition was and has a rough texture to give it "tooth." A nearly pure black imprimatura or underpainting lies under the main figural to depict the scene as though it occurred within the groups and the left side of the design. The extreme solubility Temple, as, for example, in Hendrick Goltzius' in­ of this imprimatura may have contributed to the overall de­ fluential engraving of the Circumcision of Christ, gree of damage. 1594 (fig. i).5 In the Goltzius print, the mohel circum­ The paint is applied in richly mixed and swirled layers, cises the Christ Child, held by the high priest, as blended both wet into wet and wet over dry as glazes and scumbles. A number of cross-sections have been made to Mary and Joseph stand reverently to the side. Rem­ identify and locate the many complicated paint layers. The brandt largely followed this tradition in his two early x-radiograph shows changes in the upper paint layers to etchings of the subject and in his now lost 1646 enlarge the circumcisor's robe at the left, to expand the tent painting of the Circumcision for Prince Frederik canopy horizontally, to alter the highlighting and positioning Hendrik.6 of the heads at the left, and to shade a once bright background area at the left. The iconographic tradition of the Circumcision The paint layers are quite damaged and areas of extensive occurring in the Temple, which was almost certainly repainting have been applied at various intervals. Old re­ apocryphal, developed in the twelfth century to paint, which was not possible to remove during the painting's allow for a typological comparison between the restoration in the early 1990s, is found over the circumcisor's Jewish rite of circumcision and the Christian rite of robe, the tent canopy, the heads and adjacent background of figures in the middle distance at left, Mary's headdress, and cleansing, or baptism. Integral to this tradition was other areas of abrasion. The abraded portions include the the assumption that shortly after the Circumcision, shadows to the right of Mary and the Infant Jesus, much of Christ was presented in the Temple. A close reading the right side, the dark figures and shadows in the lower left, of Saint Luke, however, reveals that a period of time Mary's and the circumcisor's draperies, and the heads of the lapsed between the two events. After Luke describes figures at center left. the naming of Jesus at the rite of Circumcision, he Provenance: Probably Lodewijck van Ludick (1607-1669), continues: "And when the [forty] days of [Mary's] Amsterdam, by 1662. Probably Ferdinand Bol (1616-1680) purification according to the law of Moses were 270 DUTCH PAINTINGS Rembrandt van Rijn, The Circumcision, 1942.9.60 REMBRANDT VAN RIJN 271 In this painting of 1661 Rembrandt added a new component to his scene by having Mary, rather than Joseph or another male, hold the Christ Child. In this way he suggested the fundamental association between the Circumcision and Christ's final shed­ ding of blood at his Crucifixion. Mary holds her son tenderly in her lap before the ladder of the stable, just as she will do some thirty-three years later near a ladder leaning against the cross. A canopy, placed over her head, reinforces the sacramental character of the scene and offers a further reminder of the significance of this, the first of Mary's Seven Sor­ rows.8 The Circumcision is performed by a priest, dressed in yellow ceremonial robes, who kneels be­ fore the Child in a gesture of serving and obeisance. Mary, who wears a red dress, tenderly holds the Child and gazes lovingly down at him. Visually, her body and that of the priest form a triangular shape that reinforces their shared sense of responsibility. While the bright colors of their clothing and cen­ trally placed forms draw the viewer's attention to this sacred rite, the onlookers in the painting peer not at the Christ Child but at the scribe who writes the name of the Child in a large book he holds in his Fig. i. Hendrick Goltzius, Circumcision of Christ, engraving, 1594, Rotterdam, Museum Boymans-van left hand. The excitement and anticipation of the Beuningen onlookers who crane forward to learn the name of the young Messiah, however, places the scene within a Christian context. Joseph is almost certainly the bareheaded, bearded man who stands nearest the accomplished, they brought him to Jerusalem, to Virgin and Child. Among the witnesses, on the far present him to the Lord." Rembrandt's beautifully left, appears to be Rembrandt himself.9 evocative painting, which places the scene before The innovative and subtle interpretation Rem­ the stable, thus reflects far more accurately the cir­ brandt has given to the scene has confused observers cumstances of Christ's Circumcision than do rep­ in the past. Hofstede de Groot, for example, be­ resentations of the event within the Temple. lieved that Rembrandt initially portrayed here the Rembrandt must have reassessed the iconography Adoration of the Magi. He argued that during the of the Circumcision sometime between 1646 and course of execution Rembrandt changed one of the 1654, the vear m which he made his intimate etching Magi into the priest performing the Circumcision. The Circumcision in the Stable as part of a series Hofe also suggested that Rembrandt changed the etchings of the life of the Christ Child (fig. 2; B. 47). priest's retinue into the observing crowd. Alterna­ Rembrandt's break from Dutch pictorial traditions tively, he argued, the scribe might have originally may have resulted from a closer reading of the text or been Zacharias and the scene initially the Circum­ from discussions with Jewish scholars. It may also cision of John the Baptist.10 While Hofstede de have been a conscious attempt to shift the theological Groot's theories did not receive widespread accep­ implications of the story itself. Representations of tance, a number of writers in ensuing years have the Circumcision in the Temple emphasized the im­ used his ideas as a point of departure for assessing portance of adherence to Jewish law. The circum­ Rembrandt's interpretation of the Circumcision in cision was the ritual act that cleansed the sins of the this painting.11 parents and was the moment that a name was given Hofstede de Groot might have been mistaken in to the child.7 By depicting the scene in the humble the types of changes he believed Rembrandt had surroundings of the stable, however, Rembrandt made in this work, but x-radiographs have revealed shifted the emphasis of the story to stress its implica­ a notable pentimento: the yellow cloak of the high tions for Christian beliefs. priest performing the Circumcision was enlarged 272 DUTCH PAINTINGS and given a bolder form at some point during the course of the work (fig. 3). This change, which en­ hances the prominence and stateliness of the figure, is compositionally significant. It is of even greater interest, however, historically; for it confirms that this painting is one of two works, the other a Nativity, acquired from Rembrandt for 600 guilders by the Amsterdam collector and art dealer Lodewijk van Ludick.
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