The biblical painting resurfaced in 2014 when it was offered at a German auction, in which it was wrongfully listed as by a "Netherlandish School."

The canvas was bought for €1.5 million by Amsterdam-based art dealer and historian, Jan Six, who identified the young man above all the background characters as a self-portrait by Rembrandt.

Now properly attributed to the Dutch master, Let the Little Children Come to Me will be one of the 34 early paintings by Rembrandt featured in the presentation at the Ashmolean Museum.

Young Rembrandt will examine the first decade of the revered artist's career (spanning from 1624 to 1634), which have proven to be "central to any understanding of his work as a whole" according to Professor Christopher Brown.

"In his early paintings, prints and drawings we find a young artist exploring his own style, grappling with technical difficulties and making mistakes. But his progress is remarkable and the works in this exhibition demonstrate an amazing development from year to year," Brown, who co-curated the exhibition, added in a statement.

Also on view at the Ashmolean Museum will be History Painting, which is one of the first works in which the painter depicted himself among the main characters.

The canvas was followed two years later by Rembrandt Laughing, an experimental self-portrait painted on copper.

The exhibition will also include 90 drawings and prints by Rembrandt, including his first etching titled The Circumcision. They will be presented alongside 10 paintings by his most important contemporaries.

"The show offers a unique opportunity to follow Rembrandt step by step as he develops from an inventive and ambitious teenager to the supremely accomplished and successful artist he became over the first ten years of his career. It is not a straightforward trajectory but it is a thrillingly revealing one that allows us to see the making of one of the world's great artists," Dr Xa Sturgis, who is the director of the Ashmolean Museum, said in a statement.

Young Rembrandt will go on view from February 27 through June 7, 2020 at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.

See also: New York's Museum Of Modern Art Set To Reopen, Bigger And Better