The Betrayal of Christ: a fragment

The most important northern Netherlandish master of his generation, and the master of Lucas van Leyden, Cornelis Engebrechtsz. was probably apprenticed in Leiden, where several as yet unidentified masters were active at the time; claims that he studied with Colijn de Coter in Brussels are based on questionable stylistic evidence. The first record of him as a master dates from 1482, when he received payment from the monastery of Hieronymusdal, near Leiden, although few works remain from this early period. The attributional basis for his oeuvre is provided by two winged altarpieces in the Stedelijk Museum "de Lakenhal", Leiden, which were mentioned in 1604 by Carel van Mander.

The depiction of the figures in this previously unpublished work is strikingly similar to those of Christ and his disciples in the Calling of Saint Matthew by Engebrechtsz. in the Gemäldegalerie, Berlin, dated to 1520-5.