Charles V
by GOSSART, Jan, Etching from iron plate, 253 x 176 mm
This work dated 1520 is Gossart’s earliest print and also one of the earliest etchings produced in the Low Countries. According to the final line of the inscription at the bottom of the etching, Charles V was twenty years and three months old when he was portrayed by Gossart. It is likely that Gossart used an earlier image of Charles as a model and updated the regalia to reflect Charles’s new positions. (Charles was crowned emperor in 1520.)
The etching was hand-coloured by Dirck Jansz van Santen.