Adriaen Matham: Portrait of count Floris V of Holland and Zeeland (1620)

(Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands)

An engraving by the Dutch artist Adriaen Matham (1590-1660), based upon an earlier print by the Dutch artist Willem Thibaut (1524-1597). This engraving from part of a set of 36 prints, depicting the counts of Holland. this print depicts count Floris V of Holland (1254-1296) who ruled as Count of Holland and Zeeland from 1256 until his death in 1296. Floris became count at the age of 2 when his father, count William II of Holland, was killed in battle at Hoogwoud on 28 January 1256 against the West-Frisians. When Floris was an adult, he took revenge on the West-Frisians for the death of his father. He finally managed to defeat the Weft-Frisians by invading their territory from the sea and annexing West-Frisia, succeeding where his predecessors had failed - after the defeat of the West-Frisians, Floris managed to retrieve the body of his father. In the West, Floris V expanded the county of Holland at the expense of the bishop of Utrecht. In the south, Floris received Zeeland-bewester-Schelde (the land which controls the access of the Scheldt river) as a loan from the Holy Roman King Rudolf I of Germany in 1287. Unfortunately for Floris, the local nobility of Zeeland-bewester-Schelde sided with the count Guy of Dampierre of Flanders who promptly invaded. The conflict between Flanders and Holland soon received the attention of England and France. Floris V at first sided with king Edward I of England but when the support of England failed to materialize and England moved the wool trade away from Holland to Flanders, Floris switched sides and made and agreement with France. King Edward I of England was furious and prohibited all English trade with Holland and conspired with with several local lords to remove Floris. The original plan probably was to take Floris alive and force him into an alliance with England but the reality went different. Floris V was taken prisoner during a hunting party and moved to the nearby castle Muiderslot. When the local population heard that loris V was taken prisoner they moved to the castle to liberate their count. The captors panicked and tried to move Floris to a safer spot but the were stopped by an angry mob of local peasants. In the ensuing confusion, the captors murdered Floris and fled. The three main conspirators were captured - Gerard van Velzen was executed, Gijsbrecht van Amstel and Herman van Woerden lost all their possessions and were banished from Holland. Count Floris V was very popular and after his death, he was remembered by the peasants as "the god of the peasants"(in Dutch 'der keerlen God'). The engraving shows a fictional portrait of the count, his raised sword is a symbol that his death was violent. Engraving from 1620.