An engraving of William Shakespeare. Bust length with a lace collar and embroidered doublet. With To the Reader by Benjamin Jonson printed in letterpress below.  

The plate was originally engraved for the first complete publication of Shakespeare's plays, the First Folio (1623), and was subsequently reproduced in later editions for the next sixty years. This print dates from the Fourth Folio, published in 1685, and it is one of the impressions removed from the text.  

Alongside the Stratford Church Bust, this portrait is one of the two likenesses of Shakespeare executed within living memory of the playwright, and as such has one of the best claims to authenticity. Below the portrait is printed Ben Jonson's To the Reader, which endorses the print as a true likeness of Shakespeare. The accuracy of the print was vouched for by Shakespeare's friends and benefactors John Heminges and Henry Condell, actors in the company of the King's Men, who prepared the publication of the First Folio.