BOUTS, DIERICK (1400?-1475), painter of the Nether landish school, a follower of the Van Eycks. Before going to Lou vain about 1445 he may have worked at Brussels under the in fluence of Roger van der Weyden. He died at Louvain on May 6, 1475. Two authentic works of this master are known, both painted towards the end of his life. One was ordered by the Confraternity of the Holy Sacrament for the church of St. Peter at Louvain in 1464. The picture consisted of five panels. Its wings, formerly in the museums at Munich and Berlin, were returned to Belgium under the Treaty of Versailles, and are now reunited to the centrepiece in the church of St. Peter. The central panel represents the "Last Supper," and the artist seems to have introduced his own portrait and that of his sons in the background. On the wings are shown the "Feast of the Pass over," "Elijah in the Desert," the "Gathering of Manna," and "Abraham and Melchisedek." The other authentic work is a series of panels, which the artist undertook to paint for the town hall at Louvain. He only completed two of these, which are now in the Brussels gallery. They represent episodes in the life of the emperor Otto III.
These works reveal a master of rich and harmonious colour schemes, a landscape painter, one who placed his figures in three dimensional spaces, correctly constructed according to the rules of perspective. He observed nature closely and his drawing as a portraitist was precise and full of character. His rendering of human anatomy was primitive and his compositions are some what angular, lacking the grace which his contemporary Roger van der Weyden gave to his pictures. The following is a list of the most notable works, which are generally attributed to the master on stylistic evidence. Probably his earliest extant paint ing is the little triptych at Madrid representing the "Annuncia tion," the "Visitation," and the "Epiphany." Then comes the large triptych in the cathedral at Granada representing the "Descent from the Cross," the "Crucifixion," and the "Resurrec tion," a replica of which is in the Colegio del Patriarca at Va lencia. Other early works are: the "Entombment" in the National Gallery, London, the "Pieta" in the Louvre, Paris; the "Annunci ation" at Petrograd. A "Crucifixion" in Berlin is of special inter est because the skyline of Brussels is painted across the horizon in the background, making it probable that the artist worked there at the time. The following works were probably painted after the move to Louvain: "Moses and the Burning Bush" in the Johnson collection at Philadelphia; the "Virgin enthroned between St. Peter and St. Paul" in the National Gallery; the triptych in Mu nich, known by the name of "The Pearl of Brabant," representing the "Adoration of the Magi" ; "John the Baptist" and "St. Christo pher," a pair of panels, one at Lille and one at the Louvre, repre senting respectively Paradise and Hell; the triptych of the "Mar tyrdom of St. Erasmus" at St. Peter's, Louvain. Of several ver sions of the half-length figure of the "Madonna holding the Child," the one in the National Gallery (Salting collection) is among the finest. Of portraits the most notable is in the National Gallery, dated 1462, and believed by some to be a self-portrait. The Alt man collection in the Metropolitan Museum also contains a por trait and a third is in the Warneck collection. After his death his two sons, Albert and Dierick, carried on his tradition in Louvain. BIBLIOGRAPHY.—A. Wauters, Notre premiere Ecole de Peinture, T. Bouts et ses Fils (1863) ; Van Even, Thierry Bouts dit Thierry de Harlem (1865) ; L'Ancienne Ecole de Peinture de Louvain (187o) ; Arnold Goffin, Thierry Bouts (1907) ; Paul Heiland, Dirk Bouts and die Hauptwerke seiner Schule (1902) ; Sir Martin Conway, The Van Eycks and their Followers (1921) ; Max Friedlander, Dierick Bouts . (I. A. R.) literally "rhymed ends," the name given in all literatures to a kind of verse which Addison described as "lists of words that rhyme to one another, drawn up by another hand, and given to a poet, who was to make a poem to the rhymes in the same order that they were placed upon the list." The more odd the rhymes are, the more ingenuity is required to give a sem blance of common-sense to the production. For instance, the rhymes breeze, elephant, squeeze, pant, scant, please, hope, pope are submitted, and the following stanza is the result : Escaping from the Indian breeze, The vast, sententious elephant Through groves of sandal loves to squeeze And in their fragrant shade to pant; Although the shelter there be scant, The vivid odours soothe and please, And while he yields to dreams of hope, Adoring beasts surround their pope.
The invention of bouts-rimes is attributed to a minor French poet of the 17th century, Dulot, of whom little else is remembered. About the year 1648, Dulot was complaining one day that he had been robbed of a number of valuable papers, and, in particular, of 30o sonnets. Surprise being expressed at his having written so many, Dulot explained that they were all "blank sonnets," i.e., that he had put down the rhymes and nothing else. The idea struck every one as amusing, and what Dulot had done seriously was taken up as a jest. Bouts-rimes became the fashion. The most curious incident in their history is the fact that the elder Alexandre Dumas, in 1864, took them under his protection. He issued an invitation to all the poets of France to display their skill by com posing to sets of rhymes selected for the purpose by the poet, Joseph Mery. No fewer than 35o writers responded to the appeal, and Dumas published the result in 1865.
Dante Gabriel Rossetti and W. M. Rossetti constantly practised their pens in writing sonnets to bouts-rimes, Dante Gabriel writing off these exercises at the rate of a sonnet in five or eight minutes.