Jan Jacobszoon Hinlopen

Who was Jan Jacobszoon Hinlopen?

Jan Jacobszoon Hinlopen was a rich Dutch cloth merchant, an officer in the civic guard, a real estate developer in the Jordaan, alderman in the city council and a keen art collector. He would have been elected as a burgomaster, if he had not died at the age of forty, an age considered acceptable to be eligible. He was a prominent patron of the arts in his time, and there is some speculation on being an influential protector of Rembrandt and it is likely that he had good connections with Gabriel Metsu. Hinlopen, like his father-in-law, Joan Huydecoper I, is known in art history because of the poems by Jan Vos reciting the paintings in his house and members of the family. These paintings are spread all over the world, the poems nearly forgotten.