Jan Saenredam03

Engraving of a beached Sperm Whale at Beverwijk on 19 December 1601. Curious crowds stream to view it. The artist Jan Saenredam is in the left foreground sketching the whale. Various people are measuring it. The Latin text notes that it was 60 ft long and 14 ft high, a circumference of 36 ft, a tail of 14 ft and a lower jaw of 12 ft. The main figure in the group of onlookers, and holding a handkerchief to his nose, is Ernst Casimir, count of Nassau and hero of the Spanish War.