Bold, theatrical and highly emotive, this painting shows ships tossed on the rocks, in a high sea, during a storm. Violent waves crash against the steep and rocky coast. The coat of arms of the City of Amsterdam, identified by three silver crosses known as the ‘triple-X’ motif and two golden lions on either side of the shield, can be seen on the stern of the ship in the foreground on the right. This emblem suggests that the ship may be called the Amsterdam. The proximity of the coat of arms to the surging water underlines the ship’s precarious position as do the claw-like waves which threaten to engulf the vessel. She is in danger of sinking in the heavy sea and is shown with her sails tightly furled. Several sailors can be seen clinging to her rigging.

On the left, another ship, whose stern is decorated with an image of the Virgin Mary, founders beneath the surface. Her plight may exemplify the potential fate awaiting the Amsterdam. The coat of arms on her stern indicates that the ship may bear a name relating to the Virgin Mary. Her masts have broken off and her sailors are shown struggling in the water or clinging to the rigging. Some of the submerged parts of the ship are, also, visible and one figure is shown head down in the water, already dead. Several figures are climbing up the side of the cliff, their efforts witnessed by a goat positioned on the rocks. A figure, at top left, is shown praying for the souls of the sailors perishing in the storm. Other shipping is lightly sketched on the horizon and assumes a ghostly pallor. The surrounding clouds are very dark and a shaft of light breaking through highlights the ship dashed on the rocks, lower left. The sky, rendered in alternating strips of lucid white and dark blue, is dominated by a mass of murky clouds moving into the composition from the right. Accompanying the clouds are flashes of jagged red lightning, which not only threaten the flailing Amsterdam but, on the far right, menacingly illuminate the outline of another ship in distress with a diabolic glow.

The artist has employed a range of dramatic effects to portray the plight of the foundering ships and the related human suffering, with high swirling waves, jagged rocks and flashes of brilliant colour contrasting with dark clouds. The purpose of the painting remains unclear. One interpretation could regard it as a parable of the precariousness of human life. The oppressive clouds which seem to surround the vessels from all angles may, as Heninger has pointed out, act as a literary metaphor for death: ‘Dark cloudy death o’ershades his beams of life’ (Shakespeare, 3 Henry IV, II.vi.62). However, while death is inevitable for the figures flailing in the water on the left, the fate of the men aboard the Amsterdam remains undecided. More specifically, the work may be interpreted as an allegorical rendition of a historical event: the wreck of the explorer Cornelis de Houtman’s 'Amsterdam', on its return from the East Indies in 1597. Although the ‘Amsterdam’ was in fact abandoned and burnt. Yet it may equally be understood as an allegory referring to the political state of the Netherlands, the triumph of the Protestant religion over Catholicism, and the position of Amsterdam, in particular, during the Eighty Years War against Spain, 1568-1648. The ship on the left, bearing the image of the Virgin, may allude to the Catholic party in the Eighty Years War. This vessel is almost entirely destroyed and its visibly broken mast protrudes above the water. This image of sinking may refer to the demise or defeat of Catholic Spain. The city of Amsterdam was the last Dutch city to align itself with the Protestant uprising against Spanish rule during the Eighty Years War and was, consequently, heavily criticized. Contemporary plays and literature indicate the sense that Amsterdam had been too long on the wrong side. Thus, the painting may allude to the city of Amsterdam’s attempt to steer a virtuous path between the rocks of Idolatry on the left and the storm of Hell on the right. The shaft of light, in the distance, offers a safe path to salvation. The capsizing Amsterdam may, also, be interpreted as the unhappy consequence of poor leadership. Although the ship is still – just about – afloat.

Lack of documentary information relating to the painting has meant that the intended subject, as well as the identity of the artist, remains elusive. The painting was procured by Palmer before 1950 as a work by the Flemish artist Cornelis Claesz van Wieringen (circa 1580-1633). However that attribution has since been invalidated on stylistic grounds. Moreover, while the painting appears palpably Dutch in terms of its spatial rendering and subject matter, its flamboyant colours and the inclusion of a tiny hermit figure on the left are both characteristically Flemish. It is certainly by a Flemish painter and Hans Savery the Elder (1564/5 - after 1626) has been suggested. He was born in Flanders but moved to the north in 1585. The work has been cautiously dated to 1630.