Portrait of Francesco di Cosimo II de' Medici

In 1631 the fourth son of the Tuscan grand-ducal house travelled north with his mother and his brother Mattias to present himself to their uncle the Emperor Ferdinand the Second, and to take up a soldier's career in the war then burning through Germany. Sustermans painted Francesco at about that moment, full length in black damascened armour with a salmon sash and a plumed hat, a young Black attendant at the lower left holding his helmet. The canvas is over two metres tall and the museum describes the figure as larger than life, the scale Florence kept for a prince of the house. The career it announces lasted three years. Francesco was at Lützen in 1632 and left the field, which earned him a letter of reproach from his elder brother the grand duke, and in July 1634 he died of plague during the siege of Regensburg, aged 19.