Rubens, Peter Paul (Siegen 1577 – Antwerp 1640). Neptun and Amphitrite. Neptun with wife + suite as patron of the navigation under spread sail before mast. He with the trident in the right, she grasping jewels out of a horn of plenty held by a triton and both surrounded by rhinoceros, hippopotamus, lion + tiger and crocodile. Steel engraving by Eduard Schuler (Strasbourg 1806 – Lichtenthal/Baden-Baden 1882) after the oil formerly in Berlin. 3^rd quarter of the 19^th century. Inscribed: Galerie Schönborn / P. P. Rubens pinx^t. / E. Schuler sc., otherwise as before. 20 x 14.4 cm.

Rosenberg, 2^nd ed., 1906, p. 492 (about 1615/18) + ills. 112; Bernhard, (Lost Works of Painting), 1965, p. 20 + ills. 138. – The oblong format (230 x 305 cm) worked here as upright format whose both quoted illustrations are shortened differently. So at Bernhard the cloth ends under loss even of the trident already close above of Amphitrite’s head, at Rosenberg far higher, but per subject border, while the engraving here with the sail going noticeably beyond the mast including the lines reproduces quite obviously the original state and helps the composition optically only to its right. Considering such aggravating defects of reproduction in semi-official literature and the destruction of the original itself Schuler’s engraving here falls to additional worth of documentation. Only on the left with the rhinoceros looking into the picture only Schuler has minimally shortened compared with Bernhard. Otherwise already Nagler set off Schuler’s “especially fine steel engravings”.
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