Man Seen from Behind: A Former Bosch Attribution

A broad hat hides the face of a standing man. His left arm bends outwards, while a long mantle hangs from the opposite shoulder and falls towards his legs. A few short strokes suggest shadow beneath the cloth. The figure has no elaborate setting, yet its uneven arrangement of arm, shoulder and drapery makes the posture feel particular rather than generic.

Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen identifies this small drawing as Man with a Hat and a Mantle Seen on the Back, N 174 verso (PK). Its current attribution is anonymous, in the circle of Pieter Bruegel the Elder.^[1] The older association with Hieronymus Bosch belongs to the sheet's attribution history. It should not be confused with the museum's present classification.

At a Glance

• Illustrated subjectMan with a Hat and a Mantle Seen on the Back
• Current attributionAnonymous, circle of Pieter Bruegel the Elder
• Museum date for the manAbout 1550–1569
• Medium on the illustrated sideTraces of black chalk, pen and brush in light brown ink
• Sheet dimensions130 × 84 mm
• Illustrated faceVerso, N 174 verso (PK)
• Opposite faceWoman Carrying a Pail of Water, N 174 recto (PK)
• Museum date for the womanAbout 1565–1570
• CollectionMuseum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam
• CreditLoan from Stichting Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, former Koenigs collection, 1940

Annotated Details from Two Figures Seen from Behind: Rotterdam N 174

The man in the article occupies the verso of Rotterdam N 174. A woman carrying a pail is drawn on the other face. The museum places the sheet in the circle of Pieter Bruegel the Elder.

Verso: Man with Hat and Mantle

Recto: Woman Carrying a Pail

Details from TWO FIGURES SEEN FROM BEHIND: ROTTERDAM N 174

Compare the different outlines and areas of hatching. The man’s source photograph has an uploader’s historical contrast adjustment; no further line or colour changes were made here.

Verso: Man with Hat and Mantle

1

The hat and bent arm

The broad hat conceals the face. A bent arm projects from the left side, creating an angular shape against the large hanging mantle.

2

The long falling folds

Several overlapping edges descend towards the feet. Short parallel marks suggest shadow while leaving large areas of cloth unshaded.

Recto: Woman Carrying a Pail

3

The pail and supporting hand

One hand grips the handle of a large pail. The rounded vessel, bare feet and low hem give this figure a different balance from the cloaked man on the reverse.

Image and detail crops: Wikimedia Commons source 1; Wikimedia Commons source 2 (public domain reproductions).

A Hat That Withholds the Face

The hat occupies the top of the drawing and meets the edge of the surviving sheet. Its rounded crown is surrounded by an uneven brim, which projects farther towards the left. The outline is simple, but its changes of direction make the soft material feel different from a rigid, geometrically regular form.

Below the brim are a few curling and pointed passages around the back of the head. The neck and collar are partly obscured. We can follow the direction of the head without recovering an expression. Unlike a conventional portrait, the drawing gives the viewer little access to the features by which a person might be recognised.

That concealment makes the rest of the body more important. The man's attention seems directed away from us, but no visible companion or activity explains it. His posture has to carry the encounter. The absence of a face does not make the figure impersonal; it shifts the evidence of character towards stance and clothing.

The Bent Arm and Hanging Mantle

At the left, the bent arm makes a broad angular projection from the upper body. Its outer contour moves sharply away from the shoulder before turning back towards the waist. The pale space inside the sleeve contains only a little modelling. Much of its volume is established by the enclosing line.

The opposite side is dominated by the mantle. A large fold crosses the shoulder, then widens into a hanging section with an irregular lower edge. Beneath it, another passage falls almost vertically towards the legs. The long central line helps organise a figure whose remaining contours are often broken or hesitant.

The two sides do not balance neatly. The bent arm is compact and emphatic, while the mantle is extended and loose. Their different shapes give the standing body a slight twist. The figure remains upright, but the clothing prevents it from becoming a static column.

The cloth is also more complicated than a single outer silhouette. Small turns of line suggest overlapping edges and folds. Near the lower body, the passages are difficult to separate with complete confidence. The drawing supplies enough information for a convincing draped figure without making every layer of clothing equally explicit.

Short Lines and Open Paper

Groups of short parallel strokes appear along the mantle and around the lower body. Some bend or finish with a slight hook. They do not cover the figure evenly. Instead, small concentrations of hatching interrupt comparatively empty areas of paper.

This economy is particularly apparent across the broad back. Large pale passages are bounded by contour, with only occasional marks to suggest a change of surface. Darker accents gather where cloth overlaps or where a fold turns away. The viewer completes the volume between those selected indications.

The lower edge of the mantle is less continuous than the hat's outline. Lines meet imperfectly or stop before the form is fully closed. These interruptions become significant when considering whether the artist was observing a figure directly or repeating an existing design. They can be seen clearly without assuming that every gap is deliberate or that every faint passage has the same cause.

One Sheet, Two Figures

The opposite side shows a woman from behind carrying a pail in her left hand. Her other arm bends away from her waist. A close-fitting upper garment gives way to a longer lower section, while the large bucket hangs low beside her legs. The pose is more obviously connected with a physical task than the mantled man's stance.

The bucket's curved handle, broad rim and upright sides make it a substantial object within a very small drawing. Its weight seems to pull down at the woman's left hand. Her body inclines towards the other side, producing a counterweight through the shoulder and hip. The gesture can be followed through the whole figure rather than read only at the wrist.

The woman is more heavily shaded than the man. Long diagonal strokes cross her upper back, and darker hatching follows the side of the lower garment. Near the feet, lines extend into a small passage of ground shadow. These additions make the figure feel more firmly placed, while the man remains comparatively light and open.

Judith Niessen attributes both sides to one hand, distinguishing the woman's ink drawing from the man's additional black-chalk preparation.^[4] The drawings belong to one physical sheet, but their different density should remain visible when comparing them.

Why the Drawing Was Linked with Bosch

Niessen recounts De Tolnay's largely unsuccessful Bosch attribution, based on comparisons with beggar studies and figure drawings subsequently reassigned to Roelandt Savery. She instead connects the short, hooked hatching with Bruegel's circle, following Karel Boon's 1967 proposal.^[4]

That account describes a change in the comparison material as well as a change of artist name. A resemblance judged against one group of drawings may look different when that group itself is reassigned. The man's anonymous present status is therefore not simply an absence of information. It is the outcome of considering the sheet within a different network of figures and drawing practices.

The two museum records also retain different date ranges: about 1550–1569 for the man and about 1565–1570 for the woman.^[1][4] These should be recognised as catalogue estimates for the respective faces, rather than converted into two documented occasions on which the sheet was used.

A Comparison in the Louvre

Niessen compares the Rotterdam man with Four Men Standing in Conversation in the Louvre, inventory 19740 recto.^[4] The Louvre currently attributes that drawing to Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Its own commentary calls it a rapid, unfinished study not found in a known composition by Bruegel, while noting a resemblance to groups in Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery.^[5]

The Louvre sheet gives a useful contrast in arrangement. A large figure seen from behind stands within a small group, his broad cloak occupying much of the foreground. Faces and hats appear around his shoulders, so the back-view figure helps structure a social encounter. In Rotterdam, the corresponding interest in draped posture is isolated from such a gathering.

The comparison need not mean that one drawing directly copies the other. Both make the back of a clothed body visually important, but the Louvre figure belongs to a group and the Rotterdam man stands alone. Those differences matter alongside any resemblance in the handling of cloth.

Observation or Repetition?

Niessen proposes dependence on a model, perhaps a lost Bruegel sheet, citing hesitant and incomplete contours. Her footnote records Martin Royalton-Kisch's contrasting preference for an independent study.^[4]

The disagreement changes how the gaps might be understood. In a study from observation, broken contours could belong to a selective response to a moving or complicated figure. In a copy, they might reflect uncertainty about how lines in an earlier design connect. The visible drawing permits discussion of these alternatives without proving either history on its own.

Likewise, the woman's bucket does not establish that an actual worker posed in front of the artist. It gives the figure a recognisable action, but a convincing action can be drawn from observation, memory or another image. The sheet preserves decisions about bodily weight more securely than it preserves the circumstances of making them.

Names, Marks and Collecting History

The woman's side bears BRVEGEL at the lower left, but the museum records no signature and retains anonymous authorship.^[4] The inscription should therefore be distinguished from a securely accepted autograph signature. A name on a drawing can participate in its attribution history without resolving the identity of its maker.

On the man's side, an oval mark containing interlaced letters sits below and to the left of the figure. The museum identifies Franz Koenigs's collector's mark, Lugt 1023a.^[1] The mark belongs to the history of ownership, rather than to the clothing or ground on which the man stands.

The museum traces the sheet through nineteenth- and early twentieth-century collections, including Joseph Daniël Böhm and Edwin Czeczowiczka in Vienna. It was acquired for Koenigs in 1930, entered the Koenigs collection loan at the museum in 1935 and became part of the foundation loan following the collection's purchase and presentation in 1940.^[1][4] Those events concern the surviving object, distinct from its changing artist names.

Small as it is, the sheet rewards comparison at several levels: one side against the other, the pale mantle against the heavily shaded working figure, and the isolated man against the Louvre's conversation group. Its interest lies in the precise arrangement of cloth, contour and bodily weight that survives beyond the former attribution to Bosch.

References

1. Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen: Man with a Hat and a Mantle Seen on the Back, N 174 verso (PK), current record View source.
2. BRCP Catalogue Raisonné (2016), object dates in catalogues 1, 2, 8, 15 and 20; catalogue 20 object metadata only for the Haywain comparison. View source
3. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 2016 exhibition wall texts, p. 3: approximate date of KdZ 549. View source
4. Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen: Woman Carrying a Pail of Water, N 174 recto (PK), including Judith Niessen's catalogue essay and six footnotes View source.
5. Musée du Louvre: Four Men Standing in Conversation, INV 19740 recto, current collection record View source.
6. Splash image, Anonymous, circle of Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Man with a Hat and a Mantle Seen on the Back, about 1550–1569, traces of black chalk, pen and brush in light brown ink, 130 × 84 mm. Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, N 174 verso (PK), loan Stichting Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, former Koenigs collection, 1940. View source.