DOI Heft:
No. 2-3
DOI Artikel:Żygulski, Zdzisław; Rembrandt; Rembrandt [Ill.]: Rembrandt's "Lisowczyk": a study of costume and weapons
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.17160#0068
24. Fragment of a Polish „net" sash, XVII c, in the National Museum in Kraków
thousands of „kutchmas" produced in this country not a single actual specimen has survived
till our times but there are ample iconographic examples, especially in paintings and engravings22.
Such a cap was useful in the cold climate and at the same time it made a good protection against
the blows of cold steel. It should be added that besides „kutchmas" the Polish horsemen also
wore caps of Hungarian style introduced by King Stephen Batory. They were of two varieties:
one had a stand up brim without fur, deeorated with a plume in a gold or silver holder, the
other, faced with fur, had the crown extended into a hanging pouch. The „kutchma" was not
popular in Hungary, however, and it is hardly to bc found in the Hungarian iconography of
costume in the XVII century.
The Lisowczyk cap was probably of cloth, red in colour with the brim faced with fox fur. The
early interpreters of the picture were puzzled or misled by the dark semicircular strip in the front
of the cap, looking like a portion of diffcrent fur. This was difficult to explain as no evidence
of such a „kutchma" with bicolourcd fur was to be found. The solution of the problem was found
by Held and Mr W. Suhr whomade a precise examination of the picture in the Frick Collection:
the whole area in traestion is much rubbed and the dark colour is part of a lower layer of
pigment. The regular, semicircular shape is due either to accident or design on the part of a
22. Good examples of sucli caps are to be found in tlic mcntioned engravings by Eimmart (sec: note 10), also in tbe series
of gouache miniatures by P.P. Sevin represcnting ihe Polish cmbassy to Turkey in 1678 (The National Musenm in Kra-
ków, Czartoryski Collection). It is worth mentioning that similar caps were uscd at the end of the century in tbe Western
World with a man's lounging robe (see: C. Piton, Le Costttme Ciuile en France du XIII-e en XTX-ieme siec/e, Paris, 1913,
p. 215).
58
thousands of „kutchmas" produced in this country not a single actual specimen has survived
till our times but there are ample iconographic examples, especially in paintings and engravings22.
Such a cap was useful in the cold climate and at the same time it made a good protection against
the blows of cold steel. It should be added that besides „kutchmas" the Polish horsemen also
wore caps of Hungarian style introduced by King Stephen Batory. They were of two varieties:
one had a stand up brim without fur, deeorated with a plume in a gold or silver holder, the
other, faced with fur, had the crown extended into a hanging pouch. The „kutchma" was not
popular in Hungary, however, and it is hardly to bc found in the Hungarian iconography of
costume in the XVII century.
The Lisowczyk cap was probably of cloth, red in colour with the brim faced with fox fur. The
early interpreters of the picture were puzzled or misled by the dark semicircular strip in the front
of the cap, looking like a portion of diffcrent fur. This was difficult to explain as no evidence
of such a „kutchma" with bicolourcd fur was to be found. The solution of the problem was found
by Held and Mr W. Suhr whomade a precise examination of the picture in the Frick Collection:
the whole area in traestion is much rubbed and the dark colour is part of a lower layer of
pigment. The regular, semicircular shape is due either to accident or design on the part of a
22. Good examples of sucli caps are to be found in tlic mcntioned engravings by Eimmart (sec: note 10), also in tbe series
of gouache miniatures by P.P. Sevin represcnting ihe Polish cmbassy to Turkey in 1678 (The National Musenm in Kra-
ków, Czartoryski Collection). It is worth mentioning that similar caps were uscd at the end of the century in tbe Western
World with a man's lounging robe (see: C. Piton, Le Costttme Ciuile en France du XIII-e en XTX-ieme siec/e, Paris, 1913,
p. 215).
58