The Girl with a Pearl Earring (Dutch: Meisje met de parel) is an oil painting by Dutch Golden Age painter Johannes Vermeer, dated c. 1665. It got this name in the late 20th century. It shows a girl wearing a turban and a pearl earing.
The painting is a tronie, the Dutch 17th-century description of a "head" that was not meant to be a portrait. It shows a European girl wearing a fancy dress, a head wrap, and what looks to be a very big pearl as an earring. The girl in the painting is unknown. She may be a model, or Vermeer's own ideal creation. Not many art historians believe the story that she is the artist's oldest daughter, Maria.