Genre, Masterprint, Winter, Winter Scene, Hendrik de Hondt
"Hac Hiemis facies. Aqua nunc constricta: Voluptas Hic aliqua est. Melius nil habet orbis Aqua"
Original antique print
Copper etching by Hendrik de Hondt, the older (1573-1649) - Engraver, artist and publisher
Lower left corner monograms: S.C.M pictor and PS invent
Lower right corner: Cum privill. Ord. ten. fodder. Inf. germ. prov.
Translation: Here we see the face of winter. The water is now frozen. Da gibt es Vergnügen. Gut, sass es Wasser gibt. (Very superficially translated)
Latanized the Hondius family was an important engraver family in the Netherlands.
This print (winter) is most likely one of a set of four seasons. It shows the pleasures of skating on the frozen over rivers and the gathering of fire wood during a severe winter in the Netherlands. We were unable to decipher the monograms of the artists .
In upper right, within the plate, there is the printing date engraved: 1600.
The print is clean, but has a light general age patina from the window of a matting. All four margins are sufficient in width. There is a vertical centerfold, indicating that the print was bound in a book. Holding it up against a source of light we see the watermark in the hand-made paper and two thin spots of no avail to the print.
21 x 32,9 cm (ca. 8.3 x 13")
The Hague (Den Haag), 1600
