The seventeenth century was the Golden Age of Dutch painting, during which political independence and increasing prosperity created a newpatrons of the arts among merchants and statesmen. Rembrandt, Hals and Vermeer, and a host of lesser-known talents, produced a dazzling variety of work, from intimate portraits to virtuoso still lifes, dramatic seascapes to coolly observed domestic interiors. This survey of the period presents a careful selection of paintings which marvellously evoke the spirit of a great age of creativity. Christopher Brown's lucid account includes an introduction, extensive commentaries to each of the 48 full-page colour plates, and the numerous black-and-white illustrations by way of comparison.