Title-plate, from Waffenhandlung von den Rören Musquetten undt Spiessen / Wapenhandelinghe van Roers Musquetten ende Spiessen (The Exercise of Arms)
after Jacques de Gheyn II Netherlandish
Workshop of Jacques de Gheyn II Netherlandish
possibly by Robert Willemsz de Baudous Netherlandish
Not on view
From a series of 117 numbered plates from the drill manual for foot soldiers, "Wapenhandelinghe van Roers Musquetten ende Speissen" (The Exercise of Arms). The series is divided into three sets: Marksmen (42 plates), Musketeers (43 plates), and Lansquenets (32 plates), with individual figures in drill posture on each plate. The Exercise of Arms was first published as a complete volume in 1608, and several more editions followed shortly after, with Dutch, French, German, English, and Danish versions produced. This version (49.95.1110-1227) belongs to the German translation of the third edition (titled "Waffenhandlung von den Rören Musquetten undt Spiessen"), which was published in The Hague in 1608. This plate seems to belong to Version b of the title-plates described in New Hollstein, but it lacks an inscription below the privilege, in contrast to the address inscriptions New Hollstein describes on both the first state of Version b (Amsterdam bei Robbert de Baudous Kupferstecher zu finden), as well as the second state (Ambsterdam bei Hendrick Laurenss Buchführer zu finden).
