In the context of Susanna and the Elders (Artemisia Gentileschi, Pommersfelden), discuss the Date of the History.
The questioning of the date of the painting started in 1845, in Joseph Heller's guidebook for the Pommersfelden collection. Art historian Rave said that the last digit looked like a 6 or a 9, so the date could be 1616 or 1619. On the other hand, art historians such as Rose-Marie Hagen said that it was a zero, and the date of 1610 was correct. The painting was x-rayed in 1970 by Susanna P. Sack, which confirmed that the date is written as 1610. That revelation was published by Mary D. Garrard in 1982 and most scholars have accepted it. The date of the painting is important because a date of 1616 or 1619 it would put the painting into the Florentine period. However, since the work was completed in 1610, it was completed during the Roman period. Even Gentileschi's birth year was questioned by art historians Roberto Longhi and Andrea Emiliani, because there was an incorrect identification of her birth date. That was corrected by Bissell in 1968, after she found a public record of Gentileschi's birth year.
Gentileschi Susanna Mary D. Garrard Pommersfelden