Netherlandish or German School, circa 1620

Art market, Munich, before 1930;

Walter Rickards, M.D. (1839–1897), London, by the 1930s;

By descent in the Rickards family;

From whom acquired by the present owner circa 2000.

L. Baldass, 'Bildnisse des Niederländischen Romanismus', in Städel-Jahrbuch, G. Swarzenski and A. Wolters (eds), vol. 6, Berlin and Frankfurt am Main 1930, p. 89, reproduced pl. XX, fig. d (as Jan van Hemessen);

Y. Hackenbrock, Enseignes: Renaissance Hat Jewels, Florence 1996, pp. 135–36 and 138, reproduced fig. 140 (as 'Portrait, possibly of Pietro Aretino. 1525–30. Whereabouts unknown').

Although this portrait has been identified previously as a likeness of Pietro Aretino on account of the loose similarities with an engraving by Marcantonio Raimondi (c. 1480–before 1534), of which there is an impression in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York,¹ this sitter bears no resemblance to Aretino in his numerous extant portraits by Titian (c. 1485/90–1576). Regardless, this gentleman was evidently of significant social standing, as attested by the elaborate cameo on his hat, which depicts Bacchus and Ariadne.

¹ Object no. 17.50.40; engraving; second state of two, 21.3 x 15 cm.; https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/342704.