The medical enigma of Rembrandt's Bathsheba

Abstract

The model of Rembrandt's Bathsheba, a celebrated painting of the Louvre Museum in Paris, was his lover Hendrickje Stoffels. The picture has periodically caught the attention of the medical community because Hendrickje appears to have a condition affecting her left breast. Generally breast cancer has been proposed. The past diagnoses have been reviewed and has been proposed a new one - Mondor's disease - based on colour, a critique of past diagnoses, and the depth of the disease to be perceivable by the painters' eye. Finally, the article shows a convincing comparison between Bathsheba disease and a case of Mondor's thrombophebites recently observed.

Keywords: Mondor disease; breast cancer; mastitis; pigmentation; skin; thrombophlebitis.