Portrait of Rogier Le Witer

In 1623 the Antwerp merchant Rogier Le Witer became the city's grand almoner, one of the men responsible for collecting charitable gifts. When he commissioned Jordaens to paint him in 1635, he made sure the office came into the picture. Look at the lower left, where a collection plate rests on a table covered with a patterned carpet. Its rim carries an abbreviated word for alms and the date 1623, the year he took up the post. The little red figure standing on the plate is fettered, a sign that these gifts were meant for prisoners. The rest shows a prosperous citizen in black silk and a lace ruff, a hat in one hand, a red curtain pulled back on a patch of blue sky. Beside him rises a gilded male herm, and the inscription at its base gives his age as 44.