Engraving
Inscribed IH.W., attributed to Johannes Wierix, 1572. 

Transcription of Inscription [Lampsonius]:

QUINTINUS MESIUS. ANVER:PIANUS PICTOR.
Ante faber fueram Cyclopeus ; ast ubi mecum
     Ex aequo pictor coepit amare¹ procus :
Seque graves tuditum tonitrus postferre silenti
     Peniculo obiecit cauta puella mihi : 
Pictorem me fecit amor.  tudes innuit illud
     Exiguus, tabulis quae nota certa meis,
Sic ubi Vulcanum nato Venus arma rogarat 
     Pictorem e fabro summe Poeta facis.

Translation of Inscription [Lampsonius]:

To Quentin Matsys, painter of Antwerp.
Before I used to be a Cyclopean smith,² but when a wooing painter began to love³ on an equal footing with me, and the cautious girl objected to me that she liked the heavy thundering of hammers less than the silent paintbrush, love made me a painter.  A tiny hammer, which is the sure note of my paintings, alludes to this.  Thus, when Venus had asked Vulcan for arms for her son, you, greatest of poets, made a painter out of a smith.⁴

1. In the 1610 Pictorum, Lampsonius’ “amare” has been replaced with “amars”. See Quentin Matsys’s 1610 portrait.
2. Because the Cyclopes worked with hammers.
3. See note 1
4. The greatest of poets is Virgil, and the episode in question is Aeneid 8, 369-453 and 608-fin.  The author seems to think of the images on Aeneas’ shield as paintings (Virgil himself does not say clearly how Vulcan made the pictures).