A pilgrim wearing the badge of Santiago de Campostella

Cornelis Schut III was born in Flanders but travelled to Spain with his father who was a military engineer in the service of King Philip IV of Spain. He was probably trained by his uncle Cornelis Schut I in their native Antwerp, but his draughtsmanship betrays the strong influence of Spanish artists such as Murillo, with whom he is often confused. On arriving in Seville he set about becoming a central member of the artistic community, as on the founding members of the Academy of Seville in 1660 and serving as its president from 1670-74.

Comparable drawings by Schut are in the Prado (A.E. Perez Sanchez, Museo del Prado, Dibujos Espanoles, Siglos XV-XVII, I, Madrid, 1972, pp. 131-132, nos. F.A. 93 and F.A. 94) and in the Louvre (A.E. Perez Sanchez and L. Boubli, Dessins Espagnols, Maîtres des XVIe et XVIIe siècles, Paris, 1991, no. 98).