What little we know of him was written in passing by Karel van Mander, who included a biography of his son, Dirck Barendsz.

[1] According to Van Mander who was writing in 1604, Dirck Barendsz's father was known as dooven or deaf Barent and he painted a piece dated 1535 which was then still hanging in the Amsterdam City Hall and which depicted a mob of members of a strange sect who wished to take over the city.

The painting Van Mander referred to was a depiction of what is known today as the Anabaptist riot and was later destroyed in the fire which burned the city hall down in 1652.

The surviving Anabaptists were executed in a particularly gruesome manner: their hearts were cut out of their breasts while still alive, their bodies were drawn and quartered, and their heads were stuck on pikes and posted at the city gates.

The painting in storyboard form was probably commissioned by the Amsterdam council to both depict the dead militiamen in scenes of heroic bravery, while serving as a warning to any future insurgents.