Two related drawings, in the same sense, are in the Kunsthalle, Hamburg (Schnackenburg, op.cit., nos. 211-2); another, signed with monogram, in the same sense, is in the Musée Condé, Chantilly (Schnackenburg, op.cit., no. 213). A finished watercolour of this composition, also in the sense of the plate, is signed with monogram and dated 1684. It shows the addition of a child standing next to the woman winding wool, and is in the Fondation Custodia, Institut Néerlandais, Paris (Schnackenburg, op.cit., no. 24). A picture of the same composition in the same sense, also with a child near the woman, was sold at Lange, Berlin, 12 March 1941, lot 72 (Hofstede de Groot 313). Along with the picture in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (P.J.J. van Thiel and others, Alle Schilderijen van het Rijksmuseum te Amsterdam, Amsterdam/Haarlem, 1976, p. 431, no. C564, illustrated), it is probably a copy. Schnackenburg dates this plate to after 1670, Slatkes specifies that to circa 1671.
The geometrical fragment on the reverse of the plate shows the right half of a plate originally used to print the illustration of a rectangle in Juan Alfonso de Molina Cano's Descubrimientos Geométricos, Antwerp, 1598. Ostade used the other half of this plate for his etching B.12 (see lot 10 in this sale), which is dated to after 1670 by both Schnackenburg and Slatkes. Ostade's etchings B.36 and B.39 are also done on a plate used for de Molina Cano's book (see lots 33 and 36 in this sale). For further information see p. . in this catalogue.