Portrait of a gentleman

A recent restoration in Dijon took a lot of other people's work off this canvas. Later hands had repainted the lace collar, added a knot of hair that changed the sitter's hairstyle, and covered over a ring on his left ring finger. The ring is the useful part. In the Dutch Republic of 1619 a man was commonly painted wearing one for a marriage, as one of a pair with a portrait of his wife, and hers, if it was ever made, has not been traced. The coat of arms in the upper corner has produced no name either. Hals was in his thirties, working in Haarlem three years after his first big civic guard group portrait, and taking the private commissions that paid the bills. The picture reached the museum in 1899 in the bequest of a Dijon collector, Joseph Chenot.