A triumphal procession against the backdrop of an ideal town, with knights of the Orders of Malta and of Santiago de Compostela in ceremonial armour and music-making boys,
oil on canvas, 73 x 192 cm, framed

Provenance:
Dowager Duchess of Bedford, Woburn Abbey, Bedfordshire;
sale, Sotheby’s, London, 9 December 2003, lot 9

The present, highly interesting painting has so far eluded a convincing attribution. The painting’s iconography has equally posed a puzzle. It shows one of the triumphal processions of the Baroque held to celebrate the entrance of a regent, a coronation, or an important festival. The picture’s dimensions and the confidently yet almost sketchily rendered architectural setting is unusual. The elegantly dressed princes, who can readily be identified as knights of the Orders of Malta and of Santiago de Compostela respectively, show portrait-like features. The composition was probably used as a tapestry design.

Triumphal processions have a long tradition in European art; knights adorned with similarly elaborate plumes can be found in paintings until well into the eighteenth century. Due to the colours used for the plumes and other similar compositions it can be assumed that the present painting depicts a procession held on the occasion of a wedding in the House of Habsburg. Closely related compositions showing such fantastic feather decorations can be found in the Wedding Codex of Archduke Ferdinand II, which was embellished with coloured and gilded copper engravings by Sigmund Elsässer and Johannes Agricola. The illustrated codex contains the parades held before tournaments organised on the occasion of Archduke Ferdinand II’s wedding to his second wife, Anna Caterina Gonzaga, in Innsbruck in 1582. Similar plumes were also used for the procession celebrating the wedding of Maria Josephine of Austria and Prince Frederick August of Saxony (1719) or in the costume of Emperor Leopold I in his '̍Ballet Portrait' by Jan Thomas van Yperen.

A possible interpretation as one of the Processions held during the festivities on the occasion of the Marriage of Cosimo II with Maria Magdalene of Austria in 1608 in Florence has also been suggested.