3-016-461 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Traveller at a Cottage Door, 1649. A traveller or possibly an itinerant worker to judge from his clothes and the objects he carries (a satchel and sheepskin rucksack) at the entrance to a humble dwelling. Van Ostade used the façade of this poor cottage as the backdrop for the traveller and the three members of a peasant family. The traveller is seen standing, leaning on his staff while he speaks to the woman seated on the ground who has placed her spinning tools beside her. Their young son, with his hat on the ground, timidly hides his face in his mother’s lap. Meanwhile the father, inside the cottage, leans out of the door to look at the stranger and listens attentively to the conversation.