Dutch Golden Age painting Drapers' Guild" is a subtle treatment of a group round a table. Scientists often posed with instruments and objects of their study around them. Physicians sometimes posed together around a cadaver, a so-called 'Anatomical Lesson', the most famous one being Rembrandt's "Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp" (1632, Mauritshuis, The Hague). Boards of trustees in their "regentenstuk" portraits preferred an image of austerity and humility, posing in dark clothing (which by its refinement testified to their prominent standing in society), often seated around a table, with solemn expressions on their faces. Most militia group portraits were commissioned in Haarlem and
Nicolaes Tulp of his books, Tulp became Mayor of Amsterdam in 1654, a position he held for four terms. His son Dirck married Anna Burgh, the daughter of Albert Burgh, another Mayor of Amsterdam who had, like Tulp, studied medicine in Leiden in 1614. In 1655 Tulp's daughter Margaretha married Jan Six, whom he helped become a Magistrate of family affairs in Amsterdam. Years later, Six would also become Mayor of Amsterdam. Tulp, impressed by his behaviour, invited Paulus Potter to come to Amsterdam, after a quarrel in the Hague. In 1673 Tulp was admitted to the Governing Committee of the Republic