Carrying the Cross, Pieter Brueghel the Younger

In a long procession, Christ is led to Golgotha before his execution. A group of curious people is already waiting at the execution site when the first horsemen of the escort arrive. Behind these soldiers follows an open cart in which the good and the bad murderer are carried along, each with his confessor beside him. Behind them follows another group of lancers. Next comes Christ, who, with the help of Simon the Cyrener, drags on his cross and is surrounded by a spiteful gang of pulling and dragging executioners. Before Him, Veronica kneels to bite His face with a sudarium. Behind Christ follow, seated high on their horses, Pilate and the high priest, who must attend the execution. From a rock near the bottom right corner, Our Lady, John Evangelista and the Holy Women look down on the passing procession, weeping. According to Van Bastelaer and Hulin de Loo (1907), the present composition goes back to a lost original of the Old Breugel. However, Glück (1932) and Tolnay (1935) rightly consider this Carrying of the Cross to be an original composition by Pieter de Jonge, although very much inspired by his father's work of the same name in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Numerous iterations, including in the Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, the Statens Museum for Konst, Copenhagen, the Szepmüveszeti Muzeum, Budapest, Pieter Brueghel the Younger (Brussels, 1564 or 1565 - Antwerp, 1638) was a Southern