Cavaliers and Ladies

To a Dutch viewer in 1633 this room was full of jokes. Two men have come back from hunting, one hands a hare to a woman, and his companion carries a brace of partridges. In the Dutch of the day, hunting the hare and going birding were ordinary slang for making love, and the bed at the back, its curtains drawn open, leaves little doubt about where the evening is heading. The rest of the room piles on the pleasures. A woman plays the lute, another fingers her jewellery before a small mirror on the table, a cello leans against the bed and rich cloths are heaped up beside the women. Such luxuries also carried the old warning of vanitas, that earthly delights do not last. Codde signed with his monogram on that little mirror, and painted the date above the doorway.