Table of Contents - 6 Acknowledgments - 10 Preface: The Scope of the Study - 14 1 Book Culture - 18 The Image of the Reader in Rembrandt’s Art - 20 Rembrandt as Rag-picker and Book-hunter? - 25 The Ubiquitous Book - 26 The Humanist Library and its Organization - 30 The Process of Reading - 35 Reading to Illustrate: Rembrandt's Ship of Fortune and Medea - 37 Observations on Literary Theory and Painting - 43 Rembrandt’s Judas - 47 2 Rembrandt’s Training - 50 Academic Studies - 52 Rembrandt’s Apprenticeship to Jacob van Swanenburgh - 60 Pieter Lastman: Pedantic Literacy - 65 Rembrandt’s Scholarly Acquaintances - 73 3 Rembrandt‘s Bookshelf - Part I - 76 The 1656 Inventory and its 22 Books in the Breestraat House - 78 Callot’s Gants Jerusalem - 82 Dürer’s proportie boeck - 89 4 Rembrandt’s Bookshelf - Part II - 106 Rembrandt’s Proserpina: Visual Rhetoric from Claudian and Scaliger - 108 Amorous Myths from Ovid - 114 Reading Homer: Vulcan’s Net - 123 The Historical Homer: Poet and Teacher - 131 Artemisia: Devotion in Body and Soul - 138 5 Rembrandt’s Bookshelf - Part III - 144 A Confrontation: Popilius Laenas and Antiochus - 147 Livy as a Studio Resource: Lucretia, Scipio, Dido - 156 Stimmer’s Josephus - 173 6 Rembrandt’s Later Imagery - 190 The Amsterdam Town Hall - 193 The Oath of Civilis - 196 A Case of Kindness: Pyrrhus - 200 Defying Mortality: Zeuxis Laughing - 208 7 Artists’ Libraries - 216 Avoiding Error: Advice to the Artist - 227 An Essential Reading List - 239 Rembrandt’s Library Concluded - 246 Notes - 252 Bibliography - 271 Illustration Acknowledgments - 284 Index - 287