Otto van Veen was one of Antwerp's leading figure painters and he was the teacher of Peter Paul Rubens. His work "Miles Christianus", which impressively depicts the dramatic battle of the Christian knight against the seven deadly sins and death itself, was considered lost for a long period of time. In 2007 Hans Ost praised the work extensively in his piece "Unbekannte Werke von Otto van Veen" (unknown works by Otto van Veen) in the Wallraf-Richartz yearbook. Presumably it was created between 1609 and 1629 for a Cologne cleric and in the 19th century it came to the collection of Johann Jakob Merlo who is known for his fundamental article "Nachrichten von dem Leben und den Werken Kölnischer Künstler" (ne...