Don Adrián Pulido Pareja

When the National Gallery bought this picture in 1890, it was taken for a Velázquez. His name and the date 1639 are written at the centre left, and his biographer Palomino had described a life-size likeness of this sitter, signed and dated in just that way. The inscription has since been shown not to be original, and the painting itself argues against 1639. Don Adrián Pulido Pareja, a captain in the Spanish royal navy who fought the French fleet between 1638 and 1641, wears the gold badge of the Order of Santiago on his sash, and he joined the order only in 1647. The Gallery now says the portrait is possibly by Juan Bautista Martínez del Mazo, the master's son-in-law and chief assistant, perhaps copying the lost original. The head and the silk sleeves seem to lack the quick, economical touch of the master himself.