Carte-de-visite head and shoulders photograph of Elizabeth, Princess of Anhalt Dessau, in a vignette format. The subject is shown in three quarter view, facing towards the right of the image with her face in profile. Her hair is arranged in braids and a chignon and she is wearing a large oval locket on a chain around her neck. She is wearing a pale coloured pinstripe gown with a square neckline trimmed with lace, tassles and a bow.

Elizabeth was the third child of Duke Friedrich I of Anhalt and Princess Antoinette of Saxe-Altenburg. In 1877 she became the Hereditary Grand Duchess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz when she married the then Hereditary Grand Duke, Adolf Friedrich V. The couple had four children.