Jan (Pietersz.) Saenredam (1565-1607),

• Was a Dutch Northern Mannerist painter, printmaker in engraving.
• He was father of the painter of church interiors, Pieter Jansz Saenredam.
• Saenredam was born in Zaandam.
• As an orphan Jan lived with his uncle, Pieter de Jongh, in Assendelft who first sent him to learn basket weaving as a profession.
• He was visited by a lawyer called Spoorwater tot Assendelft, who convinced his guardian to let him apply his gift, and thus young Saenredam was sent to learn drawing from Hendrick Goltzius in Haarlem.
• He became a master at the age of 24 (in 1589).
• His first engraving was of the 12 apostles after a drawing by Karel van Mander.
• He produced prints after Goltzius, Abraham Bloemaert, Cornelis van Haarlem, Polidoro da Caravaggio, and his own invention.
• He made over 170 plates of which the last one was a history of Diana and Callisto by Paulus Moreelse in 1606.
• According to the Rijksmuseum, he returned in 1595 from Amsterdam to Assendelft, where he married Anna Pauwelsdochter.
• Jan left his wife a sizeable estate as a result of lucrative investments in the Dutch East India Company.
• He died of typhus on April 6, 1607 aged about 41.
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