was already known but thought to be a copy by another hand – commented on the markedly different lighting used for this version, claiming that it "marks a significant step toward the more dramatically lit, highly focused style of Caravaggio's maturity" – i.e., towards the heightened contrast between shadows and light (tenebrism) that would mark paintings such as The Martyrdom of Saint Matthew. Nevertheless, critic Jason Kaufman felt that the rendition of the boy in the Wildenstein version was aesthetically inferior to the Hermitage, "...the face...hard and the expression less sweet than bovine...[t]he features...more sharply defined, the eyebrows severely geometrized, and the complexion pink, rather than fleshtone, " and David Van Edwards, noting apparent mistakes in the depiction of the lute in the Wildenstein version, the secondary light source and the inconsistent perspectives of table and sitter, concluded that the painting is not by Caravaggio. The Hermitage version is from the collection of the artist's other important patron of the period, Del Monte's friend and neighbour, Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani. It was purchased in 1808 at the Paris auction by Russian emperor Alexander I through his personal art adviser Valily Rudanovsky. Purchasing was supported by Dominique Vivant Denon. Badminton House version The Badminton House painting came to light at auction in Sotheby's, New York (January 25, 2001, lot 179); the painting was sold attributed to the circle of Caravaggio, possibly by Carlo Magnone. Clovis Whitfield, an art-dealer based in London, has questioned the attribution and suggested the Badminton House painting may actually be by Caravaggio. Originally covered in a thick yellow varnish, it corresponds in all details with the description made by Baglione of the work he saw at Cardinal Del Monte's palace. The flowers are scattered with dewdrops as Baglione remarks, and the carafe of water reflects the window and other features of the room. These elements, and the considerable number of pentimenti (incisions made in the paint with the brush-handle, a common working method seen also in Leonardo's Salvator Mundi), set the Badminton House painting apart from the Hermitage version. It is slightly larger than the Hermitage work, whose original edge cuts the flowers on the left and the scroll of the violin, and painted with denser brushwork. This painting would seem to be the one described in the 1627 inventory of Del Monte's collection. It was not the painting described in 1628 by the heirs as ‘Un giovane