Theodoor van Thulden

Collection Freiherr von Brabeck, Schloss Söder, Hildesheim, by 1792;
Anonymous sale, Hannover, 31 November 1859, lot 259;
Collection Prince Stolberg, Schloss Wernigerode;
Thence by descent.

Halle, Staatliche Galerie Moritzburg, by 1960, inv. no. I/1373 (according to a label on the reverse).

A. Roy, Theodoor van Thulden. Een Zuidnederlandse barokschilder, exhibition catalogue, Zwolle 1992, pp. 155-6, cat. no. 16, reproduced.

The actual painting has a little less contrast in the colours, but the illustration is representative for the actual painting. The canvas is relined. Stretcher marks are slightly visible to the front. Thinness occurs in the darker hues of the paint, but overall the paint surface is in good and stable condition. A few filled and retouched damages are visible to the naked eye in the darker areas of the background, especially in the upper right side. Along all edges strips of retouching are visible, probably due to frame abrasion. Scattered pinpoint spots of paint loss are visible, especially along the edges and a spot lower right corner. A repaired dent is visible lower left by the king's throne. The paint surface is under a dense and fine craquelure pattern, the varnish layer is somewhat discoloured and matt. Inspection under UV-light confirms the abovementioned retouchings and reveals additional ones scattered throughout the painting, but mostly in the dark areas of the background, the lower right (area of the table and shield) and in the group of the seated king. Overall the main figures are very well preserved, however the following retouchings can be mentioned: a spot in the hand of the old doctor, a vertical one in the face of Antiochus and a few in his yellow blanket, a few spots in the white dress, small spots in the faces of the young girls next to Stratonice, in the face of the king, his foot, in the red drapery and in his throne. Offered in a gilt wood frame, with several damages and chips. (JD)
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The love story of Antiochus and Stratonice was very well known in the 17th and 18th Century, as at least five written operas from the period 1658-1792 are left to us. Valerius Maximus tells this story in his Facta et dicta memorabilia (V,7), and this may be the source that Van Thulden followed. The young prince Antiochus lies stretched on his bed with the expression of a dying man. This is a result of his secret passion for his stepmother, the fair Stratonice, standing on his right side. His father, Seleukos I Nicator, seated to the far left, holds his royal sceptre with a gaze that reveals the hopelessness of his son's condition. His doctor Erasistratos, standing to the right of Antiochus, intelligently observed the cause of sickness when his pulse increased when Stratonice entered the room. When Erasistratos revealed the cause of Antiochus' illness, Seleukos magnanimously ceded Stratonice so the two lovers could be united. An inscription and emblem on the table rug to the far right reinforces the moral: Prudentia relevant amorem (wisdom helps love), with the figure of Prudentia looking over a sleeping Cupid.

According to Alain Roy, the painting can be dated to circa 1640 as the style, composition, the architectural elements and the figure of Stratonice are find parallels in another work by Van Thulden, The Continence of Scipio, a version of which is dated 1638.¹    

It is possible that the present painting was that seen by Sir Joshua Reynolds, when he visited Mr. Dasch in Antwerp in 1781, which was then believed to be by the hand of Rubens:

'At Mr. Dasch's there is a great picture of Rubens; the story of Seleukos and Stratonice. The miserable attitude of the lying son on the bed is of unseen beauty; the composition of the ensemble is good.'

No known work of Rubens treats this subject, but as Stechow pointed out, for this to be the same picture Van Thulden's painting would have to have been seen by Reynolds in Antwerp only eleven years prior to when it was catalogued in the Söder collection.²

1. Private Collection. Reproduced by Roy under Literature, pp. 153-4, fig. 85.
2. W. Stechow, 'The Love of Antiochus with fair Stratonice in Art', in Art Bulletin, 27, 1945, pp. 221-37.