Princess Marie (1875-1938) was Queen Victoria’s granddaughter, the second child of her fourth child, Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, and his wife Marie, daughter of Alexander II of Russia.

When Queen Victoria commissioned the portrait she informed Millais that she left the whole arrangement and attitude and dress entirely to the artist, as she wanted ‘not merely a portrait, but a characteristic picture of your own composition’. Millais wanted to show that Princesses, like other little girls, enjoyed ordinary activities, such as knitting. The children’s author, Beatrix Potter, noted that she saw the Princess coming out of Millais’ house after a sitting, but the artist also used photographs, which gave ‘a very good idea of the gracefulness of the little Princess’. The painting was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1882. At the Academy banquet that year the Duke of Edinburgh thanked Millais for ‘the charming manner in which he has drawn the features of my little girl’.

Signed and dated: JEM [in monogram] 1882.