Can the Military and Police Be Independent of the Government?
Today, let’s discuss Rembrandt’s paintings. You only need to remember one key idea: historically, many functions of the government were often carried out by spontaneously formed guilds.
Starting with Rembrandt’s Famous Painting
Many matters that we now consider governmental responsibilities were once handled by guilds. But surely, there must be some functions that only the government can take on—such as the police and the military, right?
Now, take a moment to step back and look at the decorative paintings on the walls of your home.
For users of “Dedao” (a Chinese knowledge-sharing platform), it is unlikely that you have decorations like “Harmony in the Family Brings Prosperity” or “The Ten Marshals Riding Ponies.” I have carefully observed the decorative painting market and found that even when selecting Western paintings, Chinese buyers tend to prefer themes with an Eastern aesthetic—such as floral, bird, and landscape paintings. In contrast, statistics from the European decorative art market indicate that the best-selling painting is a green-toned, slightly modern portrait of an unnamed woman. Unlike Europeans, Chinese people generally do not like hanging portrait paintings in their rooms, apart from their own artistic photos and wedding pictures.
Despite these differences, one universal truth remains—everyone enjoys their own “artistic photos.”
European painting excels far beyond Chinese painting in terms of realism, particularly after the invention of perspective, which gave portraits an almost photographic effect. For noble families, displaying a family lineage by hanging ancestral portraits in grand estates became a long-standing tradition. In society at large, the middle class naturally had an urge to imitate the aristocracy. Once they accumulated wealth, they too sought out painters to commission their own portraits.
Oil paintings were typically priced by size, and hiring a skilled artist could be costly. As a result, some clever clients came up with a solution: pooling money to commission group portraits. Rembrandt’s masterpiece The Night Watch is one such example of a collective-funded artwork.
Among Rembrandt’s later group portraits, the most famous is The Sampling Officials of the Drapers’ Guild.
Rembrandt’s The Syndics of the Drapers’ Guild (1662)
The painting features six individuals. If you view it on a phone screen, you might initially see them as equals. However, a keen observer—like Sherlock Holmes—would immediately notice that the fourth person from the left is somewhat different. He is positioned in the back row, partially hidden, and unlike the other five men in the front row, he is not wearing the same wide-brimmed black hat. If you zoom in on his head, you’ll notice that he is actually wearing a small, brimless black cap—standard attire for an assistant or attendant at the time.
The five men in the front row share the same status: they are all drapers in Amsterdam and, at the same time, members of the Drapers’ Guild board. These board members were elected for one-year terms and were responsible for inspecting textile samples from weavers three times a week. If the fabric met the quality standards, they would stamp it with a lead seal—on the front was the city’s emblem, and on the back, the guild’s mark. This system laid the foundation for what we now recognize as trademarks. The fabrics were classified into four quality grades: first-class fabrics received four lead seals, while fourth-class fabrics received only one—an early version of the star-rating system.
After its completion, Rembrandt’s group portrait was displayed in the guild hall of the Drapers’ Guild.
Many large guild halls in various cities were eventually repurposed as town halls.
A Comparison to Ip Man
Looking at a modern example, let’s compare this to the film Ip Man, which we discussed last week. The character played by Sammo Hung essentially serves as the head of a martial arts guild, while the other martial arts schoolmasters are guild council members. They assess Ip Man’s martial arts skills before granting him permission to open his own school—much like the Drapers’ Guild certifying high-quality fabrics with a lead seal, signaling to customers that Ip Man’s martial arts had been peer-reviewed and approved, ensuring authenticity. If Ip Man were injured or even killed in his fight against the British boxer, the guild would be responsible for supporting his wife and children. Without such a safety net, a hero would not only shed blood but also tears. In the film, the guild leader played by Sammo Hung dies in the ring, leaving the question: who will take care of his wife and young children? The movie does not provide an answer.
Rembrandt and the Market for Dutch Painters
Returning to 17th-century Holland, Rembrandt was one of the most financially successful painters of his time. However, Dutch painters, in general, earned less than their Italian counterparts. This discrepancy was not purely due to differences in artistic skill but rather in patronage. Italian painters had clients such as popes and aristocrats, whereas even a top-tier Dutch artist like Rembrandt primarily received commissions from the middle class. His most famous work, The Night Watch, is a prime example—funded by a civic militia. Though these militias were armed and responsible for maintaining public order, they were essentially guild-like civilian organizations rather than state-controlled military forces.
Rembrandt’s The Night Watch (1642)
The Story Behind The Night Watch: Dutch Civic Militias
The title The Night Watch was given to the painting later; the original work had nothing to do with a night patrol. It only appears to depict a nighttime scene because improper preservation caused the canvas to darken over time.
At the time, the Netherlands was a republic or a federation, with no king or pope. Every profession had its own guild, and these guilds handled various administrative responsibilities. Even the military had its own guild-like organizations.
Before the Netherlands gained independence, cities had already begun forming their own militias, known as civic guards. As the name suggests, these were not formal military forces but armed civilian groups organized for self-defense. During peacetime, the militias were at the forefront of fashion—their members took great pride in their appearance, carrying swords at their waists and muskets in hand, striking dashing poses that captivated many admirers. If smartphones had existed back then, militia members would have been the most enthusiastic about taking selfies and posting them online. In those days, the alternative was to hire a painter to immortalize their image.
We can see that the individuals who commissioned portrait paintings were typically wealthy citizens from various trades. But what happened if they refused to pay the artist?
Painters, like other professionals, could turn to their guilds for help—yes, artists had their own guilds too.
However, in this case, even though the civic militia failed to fully pay Rembrandt for The Night Watch, he had no recourse to his guild for justice. The reason? His artistic style was too avant-garde. He focused entirely on composition and dramatic lighting, neglecting the fundamental expectation of clearly portraying each individual’s face. Moreover, he failed to allocate equal space to those who had paid the same amount. In contrast, The Banquet of the Officers of the St. George Militia Company by Frans Hals exemplified the conventional militia group portrait of the time, adhering to the traditional standards that clients expected.
Frans Hals – The Officers of the St. Adrian Militia Company (1633)
David Teniers the Younger – Members of Antwerp Town Council and Masters of the Armaments Guild (1643)
If Rembrandt had prioritized user needs over artistic ambition, he could have sought assistance from the painters’ guild to negotiate with the civic militia over his unpaid commission. This wasn’t unique to the Netherlands—Italy had long-established traditions of artists organizing into guilds, which profoundly influenced the development of different artistic schools.
In Mutual Aid, Peter Kropotkin noted:
“Medieval Italian painters also organized into guilds, which later transformed into academies of art. Italian art at the time was so rich in individuality that even today, we can distinguish distinct styles from cities like Padua, Bassano, Treviso, and Verona. This was because each city’s painters belonged to their own guilds, which, while maintaining friendly relations with those in other cities, remained independent.”
Beyond its significance in art history, this passage highlights an important detail: these guilds eventually became art academies. Based on this clue, consider which of the following words originally carried the meaning of “guild”: brotherhood, college, company, corporation, and society.
Today, we’ve discussed Rembrandt’s paintings, but the key takeaway is this: throughout history, the functions of government were often carried out by spontaneously formed guilds.
