Still Life with Passglas

A passglas is a tall, straight-sided beer glass with rings of glass laid round it at even intervals. In Dutch drinking custom it was passed round the company, and each drinker had to empty it exactly down to the next ring. If he overshot, he had to go on to the one after.

Jan van de Velde painted one here in 1660. He signed on the edge of the tabletop, spelling out his whole name in capitals, IANVANDEVELDE, with the letters joined, the way his father, a printmaker, sometimes signed. After it come Ano. 1660 and Fecit, Latin for 'made it'.

The Mauritshuis bought the canvas in 1885 from P. Verloren van Themaat in Amsterdam. It belongs to the museum and hangs in the Gallery Prince Willem V in The Hague.