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1 of 253523 objects
Hans Holbein the Younger (1497/8-1543)
Margaret, Lady Elyot (d. 1560) c. 1535
Black and coloured chalks with black ink and white heightening on pink prepared paper | 27.8 x 20.8 cm (sheet of paper) | RCIN 912204
Pennethorne Gallery, The King's Gallery, Buckingham Palace
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A portrait drawing of Margaret, Lady Elyot, on pink prepared paper. She is shown bust length, facing three-quarters to the right. She wears a gable hood with one lappet raised; the rest of her dress is only lightly sketched. The drawing is largely in black and coloured chalks, with additions of black ink and white heightening in herface.
An eighteenth-century inscription (a copy of a mid-sixteenth-century original) at top right identifies the sitter as 'The Lady Eliot.'.
Margaret à Barrow married Thomas Elyot in 1520. With her husband, she was part of the learned circle around Thomas More in the 1520s. This is a companion to Holbein's portrait of Sir Thomas (RCIN 912203). The unusual orientation of the sitters, with Margaret on the left (traditionally the placement for the male of a pair), has been remarked on and Susan Foister has proposed (in Holbein and England, 2004, p. 227) that Lady Elyot's portrait was made first, before Sir Thomas's was added to form a pair.
The drawings of Sir Thomas and Lady Elyot probably date from around 1535 since that of Lady Elyot, and possibly also that of Sir Thomas, are on the same paper used by Holbein for his drawing of Sir Nicholas Poyntz (RCIN 912234). By this time, the couple were largely living in Cambridgeshire.Provenance
Henry VIII; Edward VI, 1547; Henry FitzAlan, 12th Earl of Arundel; by whom bequeathed to John, Lord Lumley, 1580; by whom probably bequeathed to Henry, Prince of Wales, 1609, and thus inherited by Prince Charles (later Charles I), 1612; by whom exchanged with Philip Herbert, 4th Earl of Pembroke, 1627/8; by whom given to Thomas Howard, 14th Earl of Arundel; acquired by Charles II by 1675
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Creator(s)
Acquirer(s)
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Medium and techniques
Black and coloured chalks with black ink and white heightening on pink prepared paper
Measurements
27.8 x 20.8 cm (sheet of paper)
Markings
watermark: Briquet 1050: fleurs de lys and other in a crowned shield [same as 12247]
Object type(s)
Other number(s)
RL 12204
