A bed first made famous by Vincent van Gogh's 1888 painting The Bedroom, may today still be lurking in a home or attic in a small Dutch town, an art historian claimed on Sunday.

Britain-based Van Gogh expert Martin Bailey says the bed on which Van Gogh slept while living in the scenic southern French city of Arles may have ended up in a home in Boxmeer in the Netherlands after World War II.

Bailey based his belief on his discovery of a letter written in 1937 by Van Gogh's cousin, Vincent Willem, in which he said he still possessed the bed of his famous uncle, who committed suicide in 1890.