Apple CEO Tim Cook jokingly said that he saw the iPhone in a painting painted in the 17th century. CNBC, he spoke about this According to on Tuesday at the Start-up Fest event in Amsterdam.

Answering a question from former European Commissioner for Digital Policy Nelya Cruz about whether Cook knew where and when the iPhone was invented, the Apple CEO said that he saw an object similar to a smartphone in one of the paintings at the Rijksmuseum, which he visited the day before.

“You see, until last night I thought I knew. Last night Neli took me to see Rembrandt's work and I was shocked by what I saw in one of the paintings. One of the paintings had an iPhone in it,” Cook explained.

Cruz showed the audience a photo of the painting, but it was blurry. “It’s hard to see, but I swear he’s there,” Cook said. "I always thought I knew when the iPhone was invented, but now I'm not so sure," he added.

CNBC notes that in fact it was not a painting by Rembrandt, but a canvas by the Dutch painter Pieter de Hooch, painted in 1670. The painting is called “A Man Handing a Letter to a Woman in the Hallway.” The letter in the man's hand vaguely resembles an iPhone.

The first iPhone went on sale in 2007. In March 2015, at the presentation of the Apple Watch, Cook said that by that time 700 million iPhones had been sold .

Painting by Dutch painter Pieter de Hooch “A man gives a letter to a woman in the hallway” (Photo: www.rijksmuseum.nl)

Tim Cook spotted an iPhone in a 17th-century painting