BRUEGEL (or BRUEGHEL), PIETER, Flemish painter (1525?-1569), the son of a peasant of Bruegel, near Breda, was taught by Koek, whose daughter he married. He spent some time in France and Italy, and then went to Antwerp, where he was elected into the Academy in 1551. He finally settled at Brussels and died there on Sept. 5, 1569. The subjects of his pictures are chiefly humorous figures, like those of D. Teniers ; and if he lacks the delicate touch and silvery clearness of that master, he has abundant spirit and comic power.
The best collection of Bruegel's work is in the Vienna gallery, but there is an excellent example, "The Adoration of the Kings," in the National Gallery, London. Sir Charles Holmes (National Gallery, vol. ii.) observes that Bruegel pointed the way to a more rapid and fluent brushwork, and is the connecting link between the early Netherlandish painters and the epoch of Rubens, Van Dyck and Jordaens.
His son PIETER, the younger (1564-1637), known as "Hell" Bruegel, was born in Brussels and died at Antwerp, where his "Christ bearing the Cross" is in the museum.
Another son, JAN (1568-1625), known as "Velvet" Bruegel, born at Brussels, first painted flowers and fruits, and afterwards landscapes and sea-pieces. Rubens made use of him in the land scape part of several of his small pictures—such as his "Ver tumnus and Pomona," the "Satyr viewing the Sleeping Nymph," and the "Terrestrial Paradise." See Van Bastelaer and de Loo, Pieter Brueghel l'ancien, sa vie et son oeuvre (19o5—o7).