The little Chabo cock
in "the Poultry Yard" by Jan Steen
    
          
 
     
 
    
     

The Dutch artist and poultry scholar Cornelis S. Th. van Gink, especially known for his many beautiful pictures of poultry, drew in the beginning of the last century also the little cock as seen on the painting "The Poultry Yard" from 1660 by Jan Steen. Apparently he has not hesitated  to exercise fully his artistic freedom in doing so. The differences are very obvious. The saddle of the sketched little cock is more feathered, the legs are shorter -perhaps to near the ideal appearance of the Chabo or Japanese bantam better- and also the length of the neck, the position of the head and the head-decorations differ remarkably. The list of differences may perhaps be easily extended, but now already is clear, with or without any doubts about the truthfulness of perception in the drawn representation, that by Jan Steen phenotypically another cock has been depicted in that yard. Unquestionable Steen's little cock shows many features of the Chabo, especially the typical form of the body, the way the tail is worn and the little legs and eo ipso has been undoubtedly demonstrated by this that by their unmistakably influence on their non pure bred offspring, at least in this painting, these Japanese bantams can have been present in the Netherlands already in the seventeenth century. 

However, Steen's little cock -again- is not a pure bred Chabo, and most certainly not according today's standards.  More knowledge about the possible nature of its descent can be acquired as well by closer reflections on the whole painting itself, as especially from the breeding experiences with Japanese bantams and crested poultry.

  

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