Although this miniature has been linked to the unfinished sketch of Barbara Villiers, Countess of Castlemaine in the Royal Collection (420109), differences between the tilt of the head and the type of hairstyle shown in each make it likely that they derive from separate sittings given to Samuel Cooper. Samuel Pepys, a keen admirer, later recorded how 'I glutted myself with looking at her' when he chanced to see her in the street at Whitehall and her beauty was so striking that Sir Peter Lely declared 'it was beyond the compass of art to give this lady her due, as to her sweetness and exquisite beauty'. Barbara Villiers, daughter of William Villiers, 2nd Viscount Grandison, met Charles II during his exile in The Hague and by May 1660 she had become his mistress. She bore him six children, and was created Duchess of Cleveland (1670). Signed in black on the left: 'SC' (monogram) and dated '166i'