Portrait of a Young Married Couple

In 1880 a panel that appears to be this one was lent by the Earl of Sydney to an exhibition of old masters at the Royal Academy in London, catalogued simply as A Lady and a Gentleman, by Rubens. When it came to the Museum of Fine Arts in 1917, with the collection of Robert Dawson Evans and his wife, it was still entered as a Rubens. It is now given to Jacob Jordaens and dated around 1621 to 1622. The woman takes the lead in it. She is seated and richly dressed, looking straight out with complete assurance, while her husband stands at her side. Behind them are grand architecture and a far-off landscape. Above their heads hangs a thick growth of ivy, a plant that clings to what holds it up and was read as a sign of love and fidelity, which is why the museum thinks the portrait was painted to mark their wedding. Their names have not come down with it. It is painted on a wooden panel, which Flemish painters preferred for pictures of this size because of the glossy surface it gave.