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59-477: Gabriel Metsu was the son of Jacques Metsu ( c. 1588 – March 1629), a tapestry worker and painter originally from Hainault , who lived most of his days at Leiden , and Jacquemijntje Garniers ( c. 1590 – 8 September 1651), the widow of a painter with three children of her own. It is not known when and where Gabriel was baptized; most likely in a Catholic hidden church but the baptismal records did not survive. Gabriel grew up on Lange Mare and his stepfather,

118-517: A Bolognese dog . Hung in the reception room of Hinlopen's home, the Visit to the Nursery thus alluded to his powerful role in local politics. County of Hainaut The County of Hainaut ( French : Comté de Hainaut ; Dutch : Graafschap Henegouwen ; Latin : comitatus hanoniensis ), sometimes spelled Hainault , was a territorial lordship within the medieval Holy Roman Empire that straddled

177-487: A Frisian ruler named Radbod, at some point in late 9th or early 10th century. The late 14th century Annales Hannoniae , which give legendary origins of the Counts of Hainaut, describes this Reginar I as a count of Mons – a title held by his descendants. [1] The first recorded count who was associated as a count with any part of Hainaut in a contemporary record was Count Sigehard . Leon Vanderkindere proposed that this Sigehard

236-410: A brewery and near his relatives, the children of the sugar refiner Philips Metsu. In 1657 he got into an argument with a neighbor. (It was alleged that Metsu left a brothel at six in the morning.) Gabriel moved to a house on the canal side, where a daily vegetable market was held. In 1658 he married Isabella de Wolff, whose father was a potter and mother the painter Maria de Grebber . At the onset of

295-560: A defense of Cambrai in 979, and appear in other records. They are believed to be the same as Count Godfrey "the captive" , and Arnulf of Valenciennes . In 998 the Reginar IV regained control over the County of Mons , in Hainaut, from Godfrey according to Alberic of Trois-Fontaines . Historian Michel de Waha believes this late report can not be trusted, and that we can only say they took control in

354-578: A fashionable surrounding. There is still some confusion about two paintings by Metsu — the Portrait of the family Hinlopen , now in the Gemäldegalerie , which for a few decades was referred to as The Family of burgomaster Gillis Valckenier , and Visit to the Nursery — in the Metropolitan Museum . There is some general resemblance. The latter belonged to Jan J. Hinlopen . In 1662 Jan Vos published

413-530: A habit in use with Dutch Catholics at that time. His widow left for Enkhuizen , to live with her mother. Isabella was buried in the Zuiderkerk in 1718. According to Arnold Houbraken , Metsu was taught by Gerard Dou , though prior to about 1653 his influence is not apparent. One of his earliest pictures is The Rich Man and Lazarus at the Strasbourg Museum , painted under the influence of Jan Steen . Under

472-466: A poem about this painting. It might depict the Hinlopen family, but as the sitters have not been identified this painting it is more a genre work than a portrait . In 1721 Arnold Houbraken recalled the latter painting as the largest and finest work by Metsu he had ever seen. Franits calls it one of his most intriguing images. What makes this painting especially interesting is its provenance. The provenance

531-486: A religious and administrative centre. In the early Middle Ages, records sometimes refer to places within the pagus of Hainaut as being within the pagus Fanomartenis , indicating that either Hainaut had an alternative name, or that Fanum Martis was base to a sub- pagus . According to the 10th-century monk Folcuin , Hainaut was simply a new name for the old Roman name, which had been connected to pre-Christian superstition . The geographical definition of Hainaut as found in

590-502: A skipper, must have supported his education, because his mother was a poor midwife. In 1648 Metsu was registered among the first members of the painters' guild at Leiden, but in 1650 he ceased to subscribe. Metsu was possibly trained in Utrecht by the Catholic painters Nicolaus Knüpfer and Jan Weenix . Around 1655 Metsu moved to Amsterdam; he lived in an alley on Prinsengracht , next to

649-678: Is an oil on canvas genre painting by the Dutch artist Gabriël Metsu , created c. 1660. It has been held by the Rijksmuseum , in Amsterdam , since it was bought in 1928, with assistance from the Vereniging Rembrandt at a sale of works from the collection of Oscar Huldschinsky in Berlin . Metsu painted in a variety of styles and genres through his artistic career. He painted The Sick Child towards

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708-576: Is buried. Her estates were incorporated into the Burgundian Netherlands . Philip was already Duke of Burgundy , Count of Flanders, Artois , Namur and Franche-Comte , and would later become Duke of Brabant , Limbourg , and Luxembourg . His family, the House of Valois-Burgundy , a branch of the French royal family, created a powerful state between France and Germany and Hainaut was part of it. Charles

767-409: Is in compliance with other painting, The Doctor's Visit, where there is emotional involvement in the painting of a tragic event involving the ill woman. One of the finest collection of Metsu paintings was owned by Gerrit Braamcamp in the 18th century; he owned eight of them, including "man writing" and "woman reading a letter". At least thirteen of his paintings show carpets and he probably used

826-441: Is probably the count of 953 mentioned above, with his seat in or near Valenciennes. According to Hlawitchka, Richizo is probably Richwin, a brother of Count Richer who died in 972. The Regnarid brothers apparently did not succeed in gaining Hainaut, or even Mons for some decades. The Gesta of the bishops of Cambrai records that two counts named Godefrid and Arnulf succeeded Richizo and Amelric, and these two counts were involved in

885-472: Is thought to be Germanic . The first part is the river name (the modern Haine, probably based on Germanic) and the second component was originally based upon Germanic *awja , which appears in several old Frankish gau names, such as Masau , the oldest name of the pagus on the Meuse river north of Maastricht. The related word " gau ", used in the modern Dutch and German names of Hainaut, Hennegouwen and Hennegau ,

944-517: Is vercocht" "waer?" "aen een waerdinne clear, die ick vogel tgeheele Jaer." The Sick Child in Rijksmuseum from c.  1664 "prompts the thought that Metsu strongly admired Vermeer 's work. [The latter's Woman with a Water Jug was sold as a Metsu in 1877.] It also provides us with a hint about what he thought was lacking in Vermeer's paintings: emotional involvement of the viewer". This

1003-448: Is well-known, except for between the years 1666 and 1706. In 1680, after the burial of his brother and guardian Jacob J. Hinlopen the paintings were divided in lots and given to his daughters but none of the paintings or painters is mentioned. The scene is set in an imaginary room of unrealistically large proportions. The father gestures deferentially while a maid dutifully fetches a chair for this esteemed visitor. The chimney resembles

1062-484: The pagus of Oosterbant to the east, but they did not form part of the old pagus of Hainaut. In modern terms, the original core of Hainaut consisted of the central part of the Belgian province of Hainaut , and the eastern part of the French département of Nord (the arrondissements of Avesnes-sur-Helpe and Valenciennes ). Hainaut appears in 8th-century records as a Frankish gau or pagus which included

1121-601: The Habsburg Netherlands . Like much of that state, the northern part of Hainaut was absorbed into the First French Republic in 1797 after the end of the Ancien Régime ; it later became part of newly-formed Belgium in 1830. The river Haine, for which the original pagus (country or territory) is named, flows from east to west. It originates in the once forested area between Binche and modern Charleroi , near

1180-658: The High Middle Ages . Though a part of the Holy Roman Empire , ruled from present-day Germany, it was culturally and linguistically French and ecclesiastically part of the Catholic Archdiocese of Reims . Like its neighbours such as the counties of Brabant and Flanders , it frequently became entangled in the politics of France. The counts of Hainaut were often rulers of other counties, including Flanders and Holland . Examples of such personal unions include

1239-502: The Holy Roman Empire as her dowry. The revived County of Hainaut, therefore, emerged from the refeudalisation of three immediate counties: The unification of the County of Hainaut as an Imperial fief was accomplished after Arnulf's defeat in 1071, when Richilde and her son Baldwin II tried to sell their fiefs to Emperor Henry IV . Henry IV ordered the Prince-Bishop of Liège to purchase

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1298-833: The Roman Empire . As the Roman empire lost centralized control of this region, which lay in the Roman province of Belgica II , it came under the administration of Childeric I , who had been the military ruler of the Frankish army who previously fought under Romans in Gaul , north of the Loire . The Merovingian dynasty , and later the Carolingians, kept many of the Roman districts, and established counts to administer pagi . As explained by Nonn, there are very few, if any, clear records of counts of all Hainaut in

1357-476: The 10th century. The region is associated by many historians such as Leon Vanderkindere with the so-called Reginarid dynasty who were a powerful and rebellious Lotharingian family, known for their frequent use of the name Reginar. This is because later in the 10th century a branch of this family succeeded to take the county by force, after returning from exile. However, while the later family clearly claimed to have once had important rights throughout Lotharingia,

1416-475: The 1660s Metsu turned for inspiration to the art of the " fijnschilders " from his native Leiden. Metsu was responding to the market of Dou's paintings, who sold his paintings all over for exorbitant prices. Metsu may have also influenced Pieter de Hooch . For a while Metsu trained Michiel van Musscher and Joost van Geel . Metsu died at the age of 38 and was buried in the Nieuwe Kerk . Three bells were tolled;

1475-714: The Bold of Burgundy, the son of Philip, was however killed at the Battle of Nancy in 1477, and the male line of the Burgundian dukes became extinct. In the same year, Charles' daughter Mary of Burgundy married Archduke Maximilian I of Habsburg , the son of Emperor Frederick III , and Hainaut passed to the Habsburg dynasty , who were emperors of the Holy Roman Empire and kings of Spain. King Louis XI of France had hoped to take advantage of

1534-656: The French revolution it formed the basis of the newly named French département of Nord . Today the area is still referred to as French Hainaut . The northern part of Hainaut, around Mons, remained part of the Spanish Netherlands, which became the Austrian Netherlands after the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht – moving possession from one branch of the Habsburgs to another. In 1797, during the French Revolution ,

1593-549: The Great , so he was deposed from all offices, exiled and banned in 958. The Vita of Gerard of Brogne also names him as a count of Hainaut. Ulrich Nonn considers it likely that he held Mons because it aligns with other evidence. A Count named Amelric who was "from" the pagus of Hainaut (Latin: ex pago Hainou ) is named in or after 953 in the Deeds of the bishops of Cambrai . This is generally taken to mean that Hainaut already included

1652-427: The Roman towns of Famars and Bavay . In the 9th century, if not earlier, it was also described as a county , which implies that it had a single count governing it. As with many counties of the region, there was apparently a 10th-century fragmentation of territories among different counts, which is difficult to reconstruct. In 1071 a single large territorial county was given its more-or-less final form that lasted for

1711-866: The Sambre. It empties into the Scheldt . From the earliest records, Hainaut also extended south of the Haine to the upper Sambre , the Helpe Majeure , Helpe Mineure and the Avesnois region in the Arrondissement of Avesnes-sur-Helpe . Hainaut's pagus also extended southwest along the Scheldt as far as the Selle river, where the most significant Roman city of the area was Famars (Roman Fanum Martis , literally 'shrine of Mars'), which had been

1770-527: The artist's signature "G. Metsue", and a drawing of Christ on the cross , echoing the suffering in the room. It is possible that Metsu's wife Isabella was the model for the mother in the painting: the woman wears the cap of a married woman and a wedding ring, and the earrings are seen in earlier portraits of Isabella (c.1658). The child may be theirs, although none is recorded, or possibly the child of Metsu's patron Jan Jacobszoon Hinlopen , whose family Metsu had painted in 1661 and 1663 (see Metsu's Portrait of

1829-508: The basis of the modern Province of Hainaut in Belgium. In modern Hainaut the traditional county's heritage can still for example be seen in the dialect differences. The western part of Hainaut is a transitional area between Picard and Walloon dialects. 50°27′N 3°57′E  /  50.450°N 3.950°E  / 50.450; 3.950 The Sick Child (Metsu) The Sick Child (Dutch: Het zieke kind ) or The Sick Girl

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1888-678: The death of his cousin, Charles and sent an army to invade the Netherlands. However, the French were defeated at the Battle of Guinegate in 1479, and Hainaut was consolidated in the Habsburg Netherlands by the Treaty of Arras in 1482. Hainaut became part of the Burgundian Circle in the Holy Roman empire in 1512. It was ruled by the Spanish branch of the Habsburgs from 1555 to 1714. In 1579 Hainaut

1947-461: The end of his life, when his style resembled Pieter de Hooch or Johannes Vermeer , with bright light, weak shadows, and fresh even colours, but with thicker paint and coarser brushstrokes so a less refined style than Vermeer. The painting was probably made after an outbreak of the bubonic plague in Amsterdam from 1663 to 1666: this last epidemic in Amsterdam  [ nl ] killed a tenth of

2006-507: The exact nature of most of these is unclear, and their possession of a county in Hainaut before Reginar III can not be proven. The only medieval record which claims that Reginar I had direct lordship over Hainaut was the much later Dudo of Saint-Quentin , who is considered to be unreliable for this period. He names Reginar as "Duke" (Latin dux ) of both Hesbaye and Hainaut, and discusses his march against Rollo in Walcheren , together with

2065-736: The fiefs and then return them as a unified county to the countess Richilde and, through the chain of feudal authority, to the Dukes of Lower Lorraine . Although Baldwin II did not inherit the County of Flanders, he and his descendants, Baldwin III , Baldwin IV , and Baldwin V , were in the male line of the Counts of Flanders, and the two lines joined again. Baldwin V married the heiress of Flanders, Margaret in 1169, becoming "Baldwin VIII" of Flanders, and during his lifetime Flanders, Hainaut and Namur were united under one lord. In

2124-571: The following: In 1432, Hainaut, Holland and Zeeland joined Flanders, Artois , Namur , Brabant, Limbourg , and later Luxembourg , within the large agglomeration of territories in the Low Countries belonging to the French House of Valois-Burgundy . This new state, the Burgundian Netherlands , was inherited by the Habsburg dynasty in the 1470s. In 1659 and 1678 southern Hainaut was acquired by France. The northern part continued as part of

2183-1072: The influence of Rembrandt he produced the Woman taken in Adultery, (1653) a large picture in the Louvre . To the same period belong the Dismissal of Hagar, in the Museum De Lakenhal , Leiden, and the Widow's Mite at the Schwerin Gallery . Around 1653–1654, Metsu began placing his figures in domestic interiors and specialized in genre scenes on small panels. Old people were among Metsu's favorite thematic borrowings from Dou during his first years in Amsterdam. Metsu often painted young (single) women who either fed pets, sold goods at market (fruit, vegetables, fish, poultry, or meat), or were grocery-shopping themselves for these provisions. Another significant painting from this period

2242-531: The jurisdictions of more than one count. Apart from the one associated with Mons, Amulric perhaps held a county based in Valenciennes. The second or third count of Hainaut to be named in a contemporary record was however called Godefrid, starting in 958, the year of Reginar III's exile. He is generally considered to be Godfrey I, Duke of Lower Lorraine who died in 964 in Italy. After the death of Godfrey in Italy, he

2301-757: The next generation, Namur was given to a different son than Flanders and Hainaut, which remained together under Baldwin VI/IX , who became the first emperor of the Latin Empire of Constantinople . Baldwin's brother, Philip I of Namur was regent in Hainaut but also had to fight Luxembourg for control of Namur. Baldwin himself was killed in Bulgaria, leaving two heiresses, Joan who ruled but died childless in 1244, and Margaret who ruled from 1244 and married twice. The lines of her two husbands divided Flanders and Hainaut between them: From 1299, Hainaut's count Jean II, d'Avesnes ,

2360-526: The northern part of the county was ceded to France by Emperor Francis II , who was also count of Hainaut. It became the French département of Jemappe . After the defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, the northern part, once again called Hainaut, went to the new Kingdom of the Netherlands , and then in 1830 to the Kingdom of Belgium which was created from the southern part of that kingdom. It forms

2419-522: The oldest medieval records, was relatively stable, as shown by Faider-Feytman, Deru, and other historians of the region. According to archaeological evidence, geographical Hainaut, including Avesnes, formed the oldest region of development in the civitas of the Belgic Nervii . They had their early capital in Bavay in Hainaut (Roman Bagacum ), which became a major Roman crossroads. The etymology of Hainaut

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2478-416: The one in the "schepenzaal" of former Amsterdam townhall , also painted by Pieter de Hooch . There is a seascape on the wall and Persian carpets on the table and the floor. The carpet on the table is divided into compartments, which are partly vermilion red and partly purple red, and shield-shaped. The dark blue color of the borders on the carpet are relatively unusual. The dog in the painting could be

2537-411: The period 985–1015, and probably after 1007. Reginar IV died 1013, and was succeeded by his son Reginar V. Reginar IV's brother Lambert, who made himself Count of Louvain, died in battle in Hainaut in 1015. The County of Valenciennes disappears from records after the death of Arnulf of Valenciennes in about 1011, with this part of Hainaut possibly being taken over by the County of Flanders. Reginar V ,

2596-487: The population. The painting measures 32.2 cm × 27.2 cm (12.7 in × 10.7 in). The composition resembles a Pietà : a mother is cradling her listless child, probably a girl, on her lap, recalling religious works depicting the Virgin Mary cradling the dead body of Jesus . The positions of the mother and the child create diagonals crossing near the mother's heart. The child gazes out vacantly past

2655-640: The present-day border of Belgium and France . Its most important towns included Mons ( Dutch : Bergen ), now in Belgium, and Valenciennes , now in France. The core of the county, named after the river Haine , stretched southeast to include the Avesnois region and southwest to the Selle (Scheldt tributary) . In the Middle Ages , its Counts also gained control of part of the original pagus of Brabant to its north and

2714-564: The rest of the Middle Ages . For much of its existence the County of Hainaut was a frontier territory, bordering upon the Kingdom of France . From 843 the County formed part of the "middle kingdom" of Lotharingia . After about 925 Lotharingia was definitively attached by King Henry the Fowler to his eastern Frankish realm that would become the Kingdom of Germany . Hainaut and its neighbourhood remained an important frontier area, or "march" , during

2773-450: The same model. He included several fine examples of minutely depicted floral and cloud band carpets in his works and even a silk oriental rug , as well as so-called " lotto " rugs which he for some reason, in contrast to his meticulous rendering of the floral carpets, depicted only in a very sketchy fashion. Around the year 1661, Metsu won the patronage of the Amsterdam cloth merchant Jan J. Hinlopen and painted his family more than once in

2832-763: The so-called Hook and Cod wars which were partly driven by factions in Holland. After the death of Duke William II of Bavaria-Straubing in 1417, Hainaut was inherited by his daughter Jacqueline , who had a powerful opponent in her cousin, Philip the Good. Already in 1428, effective control of Hainaut, Holland and Zeeland was acquired by Philip the Good . In 1432 Jacqueline had to cede the inheritance rights of Hainaut, Holland and Zeeland to Duke Philip. The last independent countess died early on 8 October 1436 (presumably of tuberculosis ) in Teylingen Castle , near The Hague , where she

2891-454: The son of Jean I, was also Count of Holland and Zeeland , through his mother. He was also an unsuccessful claimant to become Count of Flanders. After his grandson William died in 1347, these same lordships went to his sister, and were held by members of the Wittelsbach dynasty who also possessed the Dukedom of Bavaria-Straubing . This branch of the Wittelsbach family held Hainaut until 1436. The Wittelsbachs struggled against each other in

2950-436: The son of Reginar IV, married the granddaughter of his father's old rival, Godefrid the "captive". The bishop, Gerard of Florennes, accepted this diplomatic marriage despite the couple being within the degrees of relationship where this would normally not be allowed. When the last Reginarid Count of Hainaut, Herman, the son of Reginar V, died without issue in 1051, his widow Richilde married Baldwin VI, Count of Flanders , who

3009-401: The subject of a Metsu painting was based on a popular emblem from an emblem book . This can give the painting a double meaning, such as in The Poultry seller , 1662 , showing an old man offering a rooster to a young girl in a symbolic pose that is based on a lewd engraving by Gillis van Breen (1595–1622), with the same scene. The accompanying verse is: "Hoe duur dees vogel vogelaer?" "hy

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3068-414: The viewer and into the distance, with her mother leaning over her attentively. The mother's bright red skirt and blue apron, and the child's yellow and white clothes, contrast with the otherwise muted tones of the room. A pot with a spoon lies unheeded on a table to the left, with the child too lethargic to eat. To the right, some clothes lie on a chair. Hanging on the wall is a map of Europe, which bears

3127-423: Was The Vegetable Market in Amsterdam , in the Louvre, for which the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition praised ", the characteristic movement and action of the dramatis personae, the selection of faces, the expression and the gesture, and the texture of the things depicted". Houbraken ends his biography with the comment that he was "of impeccable reputation", but he may have meant this ironically. Often,

3186-401: Was a member of the Union of Arras which submitted to the rule of Habsburg Spain , while the northern Union of Utrecht rebelled and formed the Dutch Republic in 1581. The 1659 Treaty of the Pyrenees and the 1679 Treaties of Nijmegen cut Hainaut in two. The southern area, around the towns of Valenciennes , Le Quesnoy and Avesnes , was ceded to France under King Louis XIV . During

3245-410: Was a vassal of the French crown. On the death of his father in 1067, Baldwin VI became the ruler of both Hainaut and Flanders. He was succeeded by his son Arnulf III , who was killed at the Battle of Cassel in 1071 in an inheritance dispute with his uncle, Robert I the Frisian . The victorious Robert acquired Flanders, but his sister-in-law Richilde retained the adjacent Lower Lorraine territories in

3304-593: Was also used but never became popular in medieval documents concerning this particular area. The first surviving records indicating that Hainaut was a county are the records of the Carolingian dynasty being divided into parts in 831, 843 and 870. Most of the early medieval records mentioning Hainaut, starting in the 9th century, describe it as a pagus , a land or country, rather than a county. 8th- and 9th-century attestations, as listed by Ulrich Nonn, however, never name any specific counts who ruled it: Many such early medieval pagi in Europe have histories going back to

3363-446: Was given the county while Reginar I was out of favour. In fact no such connections can be proven. He was more clearly described as a count in the pagus Liugas , east of Liège . From 925, Lotharingia, including Hainaut, was continuously part of the eastern kingdom, "Germany". In 939, the Reginars led a rebellion against Germany which was defeated. Gilbert, Duke of Lorraine , the son of Reginar I who had been leader of this rebellion,

3422-422: Was killed. Reginar II (died before 943), the younger son of Reginar I, was named as a Count of Hainaut in the late 11th-century life story ( Vita ) of Gerard of Brogne (died 959), but this work is considered unreliable, and we can not be certain of this position. His son Count Reginar III Longneck , may also have been a count in Hainaut. What is more certain is that he unsuccessfully rebelled against Duke Bruno

3481-449: Was replaced in Hainaut by a Count Richer , who was perhaps the same Count Richer who held a county in the pagus of Liège. In 972 he died. In 973 two noble brothers, Werner and Reynold, were killed near Mons fighting the two sons of Reginar III, Reginar IV and Lambert , who had returned to claim their father's property. Also in 973, Counts named Amelric and Richizo appeared in a royal grant in favour of Crispin Abbey in Hainaut. Amelric

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