A selection of 41 portraits (plus the engraved allegorical title-page, and the two other prints) from the first edition of Hendrick Hondius's series of portraits of artists from the Low Countries. The complete set, which contained 70 portraits, appeared in or soon after 1610 (the portrait of Jacobus de Geyn is dated 1610). Johannes Janssonius in Amsterdam published a second edition in 1618 with the title Theatrum honoris in quo nostri apelles ... imagines. The prints were also sold separately and have no fixed order, so the number of portraits and the additional prints included varies from copy to copy. Although there was no fixed order, the STCN calls for three parts.
The portraits in the complete series fall into three categories: 22 copy Domenicus Lampsonius's series of portraits of artists working before ca. 1500; 26 portray artists active in the sixteenth century, and 20 portray contemporary artists.
The present selection contains after (1) the engraved title-page (H 80), (2) the plate with the three putti with banderols (23 x 15 cm; H 81), (3) a leaf with the mounted extra added portrait of Hendrik Hondius by Fredericus Boultats after the drawing by Hondius himself with a biographical note in French below, (4) the leaf with the dedicatory poem by Hendrick Hondius, "Picturae amatoribus, admiratoribusque", 41 portraits, and the allegorical print (21.5 x 13.5 cm), with in the foot margin the motto "Post Funera, Vita" (Life after death), by Hondius (H 115), suggesting that the deceased subjects will live on.
The present selection appears to deliberately cover artists after ca. 1500, including only one of the portraits after Lampsonius (Cornelis Engelbrechtsz by Hondius, a borderline case chronologically). It includes 23 of the 26 16th-century artists and 17 of the 20 contemporary artists. It therefore gives a good overview of artists in the Low Countries from ca. 1500 to ca. 1610.
In total there are 10 portraits by the famous engraver, etcher and publisher Hendrick Hondius (1573-1650), 23 by Simon Wynouts Frisius (ca. 1580-1629), 5 by the pupil of Jacques de Geyn II, Andries Stock (ca. 1580-1648) and 4 by Robert de Baudous (ca. 1574-ca. 1660), although many of the portraits are however signed by Hondius.
Some marginal stains the top corner of several leaves damaged and the spine and boards somewhat rubbed, but still in good condition. New Hollstein, Hendrick Hondius, 80-115 (pp. 90-105); Hollstein VII, Frisius, p. 32; Von Szwykowski 1856, p. 1; Kramm III, p. 718; Van Someren 1, 211a; Burchard 15.