North Netherlandish School, circa 1525

In, and probably commissioned with other panels as a retable for, the Crozier's Priory of Sint Pietersdael, Hoorn, Noord-Holland, The Netherlands;

Probably transferred with the other panels to the Cologne Croziers when the Sint Pietersdael Priory was given up in 1572;

Probably dispersed and sold during the secularization when Cologne fell under the rule of the despot Napoleon;

Ferdinand Franz Wallraf, Cologne;

From whom acquired circa 1801–2 by Kanonikus Franz Pick, Cologne and from 1805, Bonn;

His sale, Bonn, 18 August 1819 (as Jan van Eyck), for 900 francs, to

Eduard Weber, Bonn;

Johann Jakob Merlo (1810–1890), Cologne;

Meijer, Berlin;

Hirzel, Leipzig (possibly Salomon Hirzel 1804–1877);

Thence presumably by descent to Frau Hildegard Hirzel, Birkenwaldstrasse 185, Stuttgart;

From whom acquired privately by Julius Böhler on 27 April 1957;

By whom sold in late 1958 to Hans Wetzlar, Amsterdam (by exchange for a Cuyp);

By whom sold by exchange to Xaver Scheidwimmer, Munich, 1965;

From whom acquired by Willy Kaus in 1967 (as by The Master of Alkmaar or The Master of the Seven Acts of Mercy);

Thence by inheritance.

E. Firmenich-Richartz, Die Brüder Boisserée: Sulpiz und Melchior Boisserée als Kunstsammler, ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Romantik, Jena 1916, pp. 35–36;

R. van Luttervelt, Middeleeuwse Kunst der Noordelijke Nederlanden, exhibition catalogue, Amsterdam 1958, no. 90, reproduced fig. 51 (as The Master of Alkmaar);

J. Bruyn, ‘De Abdij van Egmond als opdrachtgeefster van kunstwerken in het begin van de zestiende eeuw (II)’, in Oud Holland, 1966, pp. 203–4, 217, reproduced p. 212, fig. 17 (as attributed to Cornelis Willemsz.);

A.G. Spiller, Kanonikus Franz Pick. Ein Leben für die Kunst, die Vaterstadt und die Seinen, Diss., Bonn 1967, pp. 97–99, 186, n. 635, reproduced fig. 8 (as the Master of Alkmaar);

H. Vey, Katalog der deutschen und niederändischen Gemälde bis 1550 im Wallraf-Richartz-Museum..., Cologne 1969, pp. 73–74 (as the Master of Alkmaar);

J.D. Bangs, ‘The Masters of Alkmaar and Hand X. The Haarlem Painters of the Van Waterland Family’, in Wallraf-Richartz-Jahrbuch, vol. 60, 1999, pp. 100–1, reproduced fig. 53 (as Claes van Waterlant);

K.P. Boeye and M. van Zanten, ‘The Hoorn Altarpiece. An Early Sixteenth-Century Altarpiece for the Order of the Holy Cross’, in Wallraf-Richartz-Jahrbuch, vol. 71, 2010, pp. 95–96 and 122, reproduced p. 98, fig. 5 and with possible reconstructions pp. 99 and 101, figs 6 and 8 (as ‘artist unknown’);

R. Krischel, ‘Antwerpen in Köln. Das Altarbild der Kreuzbrüder’, in Ein vergessenes Meisterwerk. Das Antwerpener Altarbild der Kölner Kreuzbrüder, exh. cat., Cologne 2016, pp. 8–87, esp. p. 10.