The Licentious Kitchen Maid

The grinning man refills the kitchen maid’s glass. His intentions are plain: he is seducing her. His efforts will undoubtedly be successful, because the maid has already placed one foot on his knee and loosened her shift, so that her breasts are partly exposed. The scene is watched by an old man, who leans over the half-door and raises a warning finger – because this, of course, is an example of what not to do.
The shameless behaviour of the two is further emphasized by the monkey, which – chained to a block – unashamedly looks up the girl’s skirt. The monkey symbolizes man, chained to the block of his own sins.
The humorous pillorying of reprehensible behaviour on the part of kitchen maids and domestic servants in general was an almost classic subject in the seventeenth century, in both art and literature.