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Adam Willaerts (1577-1664)
The departure of Frederick V, elector of the Palatinate, from England to Vlissingen, 1613(?). Signed and dated A. Willaerts 1619. Canvas, 88 × 142 cm.

The Netherlands Office for Fine Arts, inv.nr.NK 2368 (on loan to Nederlands Scheepvaartmuseum, Amsterdam).

1619 was a great year in the life of Frederick V. Elected king of Bohemia by the Protestant nobility in August, he entered Prague in October and was crowned in November.

His only better year was 1613, when he sailed to England from Holland to marry the daughter of King James I, Elizabeth Stuart, in a magnificent celebration for which Shakespeare wrote King Henry VIII.

Frederick was the nephew of the Dutch stadholder Maurits and his brother Frederik Hendrik, who came over for the occasion. His connection with the house of Orange and his popularity among the Dutch were a great good fortune to him when, in 1620, he lost his throne, and had to flee to Holland. There, as the 'Winter King,' he kept a rich court in exile for the rest of his life.

Adam Willaerts, who had lived in England himself for some time before his marriage in 1605, was one of the Dutch painters to be patronized by the Winter King. Above the mantlepiece in one of the rooms of Frederick's country home in Rhenen hung a painting by Willaerts – perhaps this one, for all we know. The representation is a bit puzzling, and may be a composite of more than one occurrence in the life of its hero. It has been suggested that the castle in the background is the Hradschin in Prague, which became Frederick's in 1619. The late date in itself cannot be an objection to the identification of the subject. In 1623 the town of Haarlem commissioned a painting of the arrival of Frederick v in Vlissingen from Hendrick Vroom.

Van Luttervelt 1947. Bol 1973. Bok 1984, pp. 102-104.