REMBRANDT Harmenszoon van Rijn
(b. 1606, Leiden, d. 1669, Amsterdam)

The Anatomy Lesson of Joan Deyman

1656
Oil on canvas, 100 x 134 cm
Historisch Museum, Amsterdam

Catalogue number: Bredius 414.

After the Anatomy Lecture of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp in 1632, Rembrandt came back to the surgeons' guild for another anatomy lesson in 1656. The lecturer now was Dr. Joan Deyman. In three days starting on 29 January 1656, he demonstrated the anatomy of the body on the criminal Jores Fonteijn van Dienst, hung on the 28th. The lectures were a public spectacle for which admission was charged. The body parts exposed by Rembrandt in the painting are the abdominal cavity and the brain.

The main source of the painting, which in the present state is only a fragment, is obviously Mantegna's Lamentation over the Dead Christ.