One of a set of four small portraits on copper of two of the sons of George, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg-Calenburg and Anne Eleonore of Hesse-Darmstadt and their wives (RCINs 401390-3). They are first recorded in the Privy Chamber at Kensington Palace in 1818, without attribution or identification, with ‘curious’ added as a remark.

Benedicta Henrietta was the youngest daughter of Edward of Simmern, a brother of the Electress Sophia of Hanover (the mother of George I). She married, in 1668, John Frederick, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, thus becoming Sophia's sister-in-law as well as her niece. Although she was closer than Sophia in succession to the English Crown, her father and her husband were Catholics and she bore no sons. A more flattering depiction of the sitter by an anonymous German 17th century artist is in the Royal Collection (RCIN 420461).

The set are attributed to Jean Michelin, whose miniatures form part of a group of portraits of the ancestors of the Hanoverian monarchs in the Royal Collection. The artist is said to have been born in Langres, France, and died in Jersey. He became a member of the Académie Royale in 1668 and worked for the Hanoverian court from 1668 until 1686.