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 THE HAGUE — The painting was sliced down the middle and straight through its center in the 19th century, probably to be sold as two Rembrandt portraits. At some point in the next 40 years, it was sutured back together with pieces of an entirely different canvas, and layered with paint to cover up its scars. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 In 1898, the director of the Mauritshuis Royal Picture Gallery here proudly displayed it in the museum as “Saul and David,” one of Rembrandt’s most important biblical works. Then in 1969, a top Rembrandt authority discredited the painting, and for years it hung next to a label that read, “Rembrandt and/or Studio,” a serious demotion. 
 
 Now, after eight years of examination and restoration by the museum’s own conservators — with support from researchers from various outside institutions, like the Delft University of Technology, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, the Netherlands Institute for Art History and Cornell University — the Mauritshuis has reclaimed the painting as an authentic Rembrandt, saying it was painted in two stages by the master’s own hand, one of hundreds of surviving Rembrandt paintings. 
 
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 The museum is to reveal its findings on Tuesday two days before it opens an exhibition, “Rembrandt? The Case of Saul and David.” The show is devoted entirely to this single work, which depicts the young hero David playing a harp for an elderly King Saul, who is moved by the music and uses a curtain to wipe away his tears. 
 
 “It’s a very special occasion,” said Ernst van de Wetering, a Dutch art historian, a leading authority on Rembrandt and one of eight members on the museum’s independent advisory committee. “They must feel lucky. They have another addition to their fantastic collection of Rembrandt.” 
 
 Mr. van de Wetering, speaking in a telephone interview, added that the work was “a rare history painting from Rembrandt’s middle period.” 
 
 Other Rembrandt scholars who were not on the panel but who learned about the conclusions from a reporter, responded largely with approbation. 
 
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 “It seems to me a reasonable proposition,” said Christopher White, a Dutch art specialist in London who is the former director of the Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology in Oxford, England. “I’ve looked at it over the course of many years, and to me it really looks like a Rembrandt. It fits the style of Rembrandt and also his kind of handling. If I compare it with other Rembrandts it fits in perfectly well.” 
 
 Gary Schwartz, an American Rembrandt scholar and founder of Codart, an online resource for Dutch and Flemish paintings, said in an email: “The outcome of the new research does not surprise me. What is new is not the attribution itself but the minute attention to all the physical details of this complex canvas.” 
 
 If the attribution to Rembrandt seems largely uncontested now, why was it in limbo for almost 50 years? And what led the researchers to conclude that it was painted by the master, and not by one of his pupils or followers? The answer lies in evidence gathered using new technologies combined with a reinterpretation of the original painting by leading scholars. Determining a painting’s authorship is always a matter of art and science, though, and some Rembrandt researchers were tentative about weighing in before they had read all the new data. 
 
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 “This painting is in a very bad state and that makes it harder to analyze,” said Stephanie Dickey, a professor in Northern Baroque art at Queen’s University in Canada and the author of three scholarly books about Rembrandt. “No matter how much scientific research you do there is always a subjective element. The most trustworthy aspect of this is the part that’s based on careful scientific analysis and the other is individual subjective analysis by select connoisseurs.” 
 
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 Emilie Gordenker, the director of the Mauritshuis, said new scientific data gleaned from paint sample analysis and a new X-ray technique allowed restorers to look beneath the overpainted surface and gain fresh perspective on aspects of the painting that had been obscured by damage and previous restorations. 
 
 Attribution problems for the painting began in 1969 when the German-Dutch art historian Horst Gerson questioned its authorship in his reference book, “Rembrandt. The Complete Edition of the Paintings.” He suggested that it was the work of one of the master’s pupils, because “the painterly execution is superficial and inconsistent” and he didn’t “recognize Rembrandt’s touch in it.” 
 
 Mr. White, the Dutch art specialist in London, said the pronouncement “caused a storm at the time” and “then other people took it up,” though some scholars, like Mr. Schwartz, who was Mr. Gerson’s editor at the time, still had their doubts. The Mauritshuis nevertheless accepted Mr. Gerson’s decision, and changed the wall label next to the work to “Rembrandt and/or Studio” — as it has remained until now. 
 
 In 2007, the Mauritshuis began its own investigation, led by the head of conservation, Petria Noble, who is now chief conservator at the Rijksmuseum. 
 
 Ms. Gordenker, the Mauritshuis director, said: “The painting looked awful. The varnish had gotten very yellow, and it was very hard to read.” 
 
 There were two key questions that Ms. Gordenker said she hoped to answer. 
 
 “First, we knew that it had been cut apart, but we didn’t know what the original format was. How much was cut out?” she said. “And second had to do with iconography: The whole middle of the painting had been overpainted. Was it covering something up?” 
 
 To answer those questions, the Mauritshuis teamed up with Delft University of Technology and the University of Antwerp, which had developed a new mobile tool that allowed them to scan paintings using macro X-ray fluorescence analysis. This technique isolates individual elements in pigments used to make the paint, allowing researchers to identify a greater range of colors than was ever possible with previous technology, said the team’s leader, Joris Dik, a professor in Delft’s department of materials science. 
 
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 Once researchers could differentiate original pigments from those that were added later, the museum could more easily start to conceptualize the original work. Knowing which part had been overpainted, they began gently to remove the yellowed varnish and overpaint to reveal the original work. Rather than taking the step of stripping the painting back to its most raw state, they chose to make the work “presentable” but not to hide its complex history. 
 
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 The final assessment of attribution was made through the judgments of curators, restorers and members of the international advisory board of Rembrandt scholars. Ms. Gordenker, the Mauritshuis director, made the final call. 
 
 Examining the painting after the cleaning convinced Mr. van de Wetering that it was indeed a Rembrandt, but one that must have been painted earlier than thought. “For me, the clue was the dating,” said Mr. van de Wetering, who thinks that Rembrandt started the work in 1645 and completed it in 1652. 
 
 “Once you make that move to the earlier dating, suddenly you find other examples in his work of these lovely cloudy plays of light and flesh,” he said. “There’s so much color in this earlier phase of the painting, and there are certain things you find in the major parts of the turban of Saul and the brushwork and the type of detailing.” 
 
 He added, “These things together make it to me very convincing as a Rembrandt, and it’s not so much technical data but more re-dating and suddenly understanding the stylistic properties of the work.” 
 
 Ms. Dickey, the expert in Canada, said dating could often be very helpful in Rembrandt attribution issues. 
 
 “His style was not static and it was constantly evolving, so the way his art looks in 1640 is very different from how he was painting in 1650,” she said. 
 
 In the end, there is no single “smoking gun” that determined attribution, said Ms. Gordenker, who is also the curator of the exhibition. The new conclusions, she said, are only one aspect of an exhibition that showcases the museum’s conservatorial expertise. 
 
 Ms. Gordenker described the exhibition as a “‘CSI’-style forensic investigation” into the life, injury and revitalization of this work, and said she hoped that it would open up the matter to a broader discussion. It is quite possible that yet other experts, when they see the research for themselves, might draw different conclusions, she added. 
 
 “We really don’t want the ‘it is or it isn’t?’ question to dominate,” Ms. Gordenker said. “We take a point of view on it but we’re open to discoveries and new revelations.” ||||| THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — After a CSI-style investigation and restoration spanning eight years, the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague has declared that one of its star paintings really is by Dutch master Rembrandt van Rijn. 
 
 A Dutch television reporter strokes a 3D printed version of Rembrandt's "Saul and David" at a press preview of a new exhibition at the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague, Tuesday, June 9, 2015. After a CSI-style... (Associated Press) 
 
 This photo provided Tuesday, June 9, 2015 by Mauritshuis shows Rembrandt's "Saul and David" after restororation. After a CSI-style investigation, the Mauritshuis museum has declared on Tuesday that one... (Associated Press) 
 
 This photo provided Tuesday, June 9, 2015 by Mauritshuis shows Rembrandt's "Saul and David" after restororation. After a CSI-style investigation, the Mauritshuis museum has declared on Tuesday that one... (Associated Press) 
 
 The announcement should end years of is-it-or-isn't-it debate about whether "Saul and David" was a real Rembrandt. 
 
 Researchers used advanced X-ray techniques to peer through several coats of paint that had been applied during previous restorations and establish that the original pigments were the same as those Rembrandt used in the 17th century. Paint sampling showed that the primer used was typical of Rembrandt's studio in the 1650s and 1660s. 
 
 For decades, there was no question. A former director of the museum in The Hague, Abraham Bredius, bought the painting more than a century ago, but in the late 1960s Rembrandt expert Horst Gerson cast doubt on who actually painted the Biblical scene of King Saul using a curtain to dab a tear from his eye while David, kneeling below the king, plucks the strings of a harp. 
 
 Restorer Carol Pottasch said it was no surprise that Gerson questioned who painted the oil-on-canvas work, because previous restorations had added so much paint. 
 
 "I guess that was the biggest problem that he faced. He couldn't see a painting by Rembrandt because there was no painting to see," she said Tuesday. "And now we've taken off all these layers now you can actually see the original paint again and then there's no doubt." 
 
 Now newly re-attributed to Rembrandt, the painstakingly restored canvas is the centerpiece of an exhibition opening Thursday and running through Sept. 13 that goes into forensic detail on how the museum unraveled the mystery of who painted "Saul and David." 
 
 Part of the team that confirmed the attribution was renowned Rembrandt expert Ernst van de Wetering. 
 
 Like many crime-scene investigations, the Mauritshuis probe had to deal with a "victim" that had suffered much abuse. Cut up, painted over and faded over time, "Saul and David" even had part of another painting stuck into its top right-hand corner. 
 
 "Before the painting was treated, before it was cleaned, it became clear that the painting had been overpainted a number of times, that the painting had discolored, that its original dimensions had been changed in the past," said Joris Dik of Delft Technical University, whose high-tech scans helped establish the painting's authenticity and guide restorers. "It's been really treated brutally, this painting, in multiple past restoration campaigns." 
 
 Emilie Gordenker, the director of Mauritshuis, said the investigation turned up plenty of surprises. Peering through the paint, experts saw a canvas that almost resembled a jigsaw puzzle. 
 
 "The analysis helped us to determine that the painting is in fact made up of 15 different pieces of canvas; three main parts — the Saul, the David, and an insert of a copy of an old painting in the upper right corner plus strips all around the edges. So it's a real patchwork," she said. 
 
 It remains unclear why the painting was carved up in the past. 
 
 One result is that the painting now hanging in pride of place in the Mauritshuis exhibition — "Rembrandt? The case of Saul and David" — is smaller than Rembrandt's original. 
 
 But, in keeping with the high-tech nature of the investigation, the museum also commissioned a 3D printed version of the painting in its original size that visitors can touch to get a true feel for the Dutch master's brush strokes. 
 
 Director Gordenker said the museum did not set out to prove that the painting was indeed a Rembrandt. 
 
 "In fact, we only came to the conclusion about a month ago," Gordenker said. "We would have been happy to do this show and come to the conclusion it wasn't (a Rembrandt)."
– After centuries of mistreatment and nearly 50 years of mystery, a biblical painting in a Dutch museum has finally been declared an authentic Rembrandt. Experts say they needed "CSI-style" tools to authenticate Saul and David, which had been repeatedly over-painted in long-ago restorations and even cut in two at some point in the 19th century, possibly in an attempt to sell it as separate portraits of Saul and David, the New York Times reports. The Mauritshuis Royal Picture Gallery put the painting on display as a Rembrandt in 1898, but a leading expert cast doubt on its origin in 1969. A restoration expert tells the AP the skepticism now seems unsurprising because there had been so much paint added there was none of Rembrandt's left to see. Researcher used tools such as advanced X-ray techniques and paint sample analysis to determine that the Dutch master himself, not one of his followers, created the painting in two stages starting around 1645, the Times reports. Saul and David will now be the centerpiece of an exhibition focusing on the investigation's years of detective work. "The analysis helped us to determine that the painting is in fact made up of 15 different pieces of canvas; three main parts—the Saul, the David, and an insert of a copy of an old painting in the upper right corner plus strips all around the edges," the museum's director tells the AP. "So it's a real patchwork." (Another recent art find: Hitler's long-lost bronze horses.)