Young man in a cap and livery, possibly Willem Frederik Cupido or Guan Anthony Sideron, two African attendants in the service of the Dutch Stadtholder Willem V

Willem Frederik Cupido (c.1758-1806) and Guan Anthony Sideron (1756-1803) were two men of African descent, forced to travel to the Netherlands as children as a 'gift' to the future stadtholder William V in the 1760s, probably by the West India Company. Cupido came from Guinea on the African west coast, Sideron from Curacao. They both worked for more than forty years in the court household of William V and his wife Wilhelmina of Prussia. They were both salaried, and rose through the court ranks to the position of personal chamberlain in 1782. Both appear in various representations - mainly paintings - from the life of William V. Several of Cupido's descendants can be traced in the Netherlands today. The lives of the two livery servants have been described extensively in the book 'Cupido en Sideron. Twee Moren aan het hof van Oranje' by Esther Schreuder (2017). Another drawing of a Black boy in livery by Pothoven, also on blue paper, was acquired by the Rijksmuseum in 2022. It is not clear whether the two drawings show the same sitter, but both figures wear the livery of the court of William V. It was not unusual for an artist like Pothoven to make multiple drawings of the same figure in different poses, perhaps in preparation for a painting.