Pendant portraits of Maerten Soolmans and Oopjen Coppit by Eugène Fromentin in 1877 with the remark that they were examples of Rembrandt at his best and were painted in the same period that Rembrandt painted his "Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp", traditionally marking the beginning of his career in Amsterdam. Clearly, the flamboyance of these young newlyweds did more to launch Rembrandt's career as a portrait painter for the Amsterdam upper class than his sober depiction of a class of serious students in Leiden. The entire Van Loon collection was sold to Rothschild for 40,000 pounds, which at the time was over a million francs. Wilhelm von
The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp scientist such as Dr. Tulp would not be involved in menial and bloody work like dissection, and such tasks would be left to others. It is for this reason that the picture shows no cutting instruments. Instead we see in the lower right corner an enormous open textbook on anatomy, possibly the 1543 "De humani corporis fabrica" ("Fabric of the Human Body") by Andreas Vesalius. The corpse is that of the criminal Aris Kindt (alias of Adriaan Adriaanszoon), who was convicted for armed robbery and sentenced to death by hanging. He was executed earlier on the same day of the