1877, Duke of Berwick and Alba, Palacio de Liria, Madrid; April 7-20, 1877, Berwick and Alba sale, Hotel Drouot, Paris, lot 13 [see note 1], possibly to Baron Frederic Emile d'Erlanger (b. 1832 - d. 1911), Paris [see note 2]. 1922, Duveen Brothers, New York; 1922, sold by Duveen to William Randolph Hearst (b. 1863 - d. 1951), New York; to the Hearst Foundation, New York; 1954, gift of the Hearst Foundation to the MFA. (Accession Date: December 9, 1954)
NOTES:
[1] This was one of six tapestries sold at the time, from a series called Allegorical Subjects from the New Testament. [2] Baron d'Erlanger purchased a number of other tapestries at the Berwick and Alba sale. That the series of which this particular tapestry formed a part was in his collection is according to D. T. B. Wood, "Tapestries of the Seven Deadly Sins--I," Burlington Magazine 20, no. 106 (January, 1912), 215-216, 221. They may be the tapestries mentioned as being in the Erlanger collection by Gaston Le Breton, "Les tapisseries et les broderies anciennes," Gazette des Beaux-Arts 1882, p. 444 (called "moralités évangéliques"). / Gift of the Hearst Foundation in memory of William Randolph Hearst