Two Churches and a Town Wall

The view shown here is not a real landscape, but an invention of the artist, although the church resembles that of Saint Francesca Romana in Rome. It is thought that the figures were painted by Adriane van de Velde, another artist – van der Hayden often had other painters do these for him, since he was better at depicting perspective and architecture than people.

Van der Hayden later turned his talent in other directions, inventing an improved fire engine, introducing the first lamp post to the Netherlands, and writing a manual of fire-fighting.