Portrait of Engelbert II, Count of Nassau

In the 1480s the Burgundian Netherlands came close to civil war, as Flemish towns rose against Maximilian of Austria, and Engelbert II of Nassau, lord of Breda, stayed on Maximilian's side. It paid. In 1496 Maximilian's son, Philip the Handsome, made him regent of all the Netherlands. Here he wears the collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece, and on his gloved left hand sits a hooded hawk whose tail feathers spill over the lower edge of the frame. Hunting with a bird of prey was a pastime largely reserved for the high nobility. The frame names him, Engelbert Conte de Nassau, and carries the date 1487 at the top, though the Rijksmuseum thinks these inscriptions may have been added later. He died in Brussels in 1504 without a son to succeed him, and Breda passed to his nephew Henry.