Chicken coop

Philip IV kept a set of ground-floor rooms in the Alcázar of Madrid for the summer months, hung with Flemish pictures of animals and kitchens, and this canvas is recorded in the palace inventory of 1666 among them. The Prado dates it no more closely than the first half of the 17th century. Its title has moved about more than its date has. In the museum catalogue of 1857 it is number 1775, Riña de gallos, a cockfight, and the entry adds that the two birds are watching each other, waiting to go in. A handwritten label on the back of the frame, older still, calls it two cocks fighting. The museum now files it as the poultry yard.