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1 of 253523 objects
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1516/17-1547) c. 1535-6
Black and coloured chalks with black ink on pink prepared paper | 29.0 x 21.0 cm (sheet of paper) | RCIN 912216
Hans Holbein the Younger (1497/8-1543)
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1516/17-1547) c. 1535-6
Hans Holbein the Younger (1497/8-1543)
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1516/17-1547) c. 1535-6
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A portrait drawing of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1516/17-47) on pink prepared paper. He is shown bust length, facing to the left and wearing a hat. Only the face is worked up to any degree, and the drawing seems to have been abandoned by the artist, who redrew the earl in the same pose, but facing the front (RCIN 912215). On the present sheet, Holbein has roughly coloured in the sitter's hair in brown chalk, but has not added further definition to the strands as he did in the later drawing.
An eighteenth-century inscription (a copy of a mid-sixteenth-century original) at top left identifies the sitter as 'Tho: Earle of Surry.'. 'Tho(mas)' is a mistake, either in the eighteenth-century transcription or the sixteenth-century original, for 'Henry', since the sitter is clearly Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey and heir to the dukedom of Norfolk.
Henry Howard was the oldest son and heir of Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk. He was educated alongside Henry Fitzroy, Henry VIII's illegitimate son. A soldier and poet, Surrey dedicated verses to Thomas Wyatt, among others. In 1546, partly on the testimony of Richard Southwell, Surrey and his father were arrested on plotting to take control of the country while the king was ill at Windsor. Henry Howard was executed on 19 January 1547.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 on pink prepared paper
Measurements
29.0 x 21.0 cm (sheet of paper)
Markings
watermark: close to Briquet 12863: crowned vase without flower [same as 12219]
Object type(s)
Other number(s)
RL 12216
