Lot 1582
CIRCLE OF MARCUS GHEERAERTS THE YOUNGER (c.1561-1636) PORTRAIT OF A LADY, FORMERLY IDENTIFIED AS QUEEN ELIZABETH 1, THOUGHT TO BE ELIZABETH `BESS` of HARDWICK, COUNTESS OF SHREWSBURY (c.1527-1608) Half length, wearing a black dress decorated with jewelled roundels, lace collar and cuffs and a triple rope of pearls, oil on canvas 96 x 73cm. * The traditional identification of the sitter is misleading but the suggestion of it being `Bess` of Hardwick is more plausible. Portraits of this distinguished sitter are scarce. Four marriages (to Robert Barlow, Sir William Cavendish, Sir William St Loe and George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury) raised Bess from humble birth into the aristocracy. Bess oversaw the building of Chatsworth and Hardwick Hall and, within the latter, a portrait of the Queen (commissioned by Bess) may still be seen. The format of this portrait is a deliberate companion piece and the globe attests to her loyalty to the monarch. The `ropes of great perle` were recorded in the inventory of Bess's jewels in 1593 and may be seen in another portrait of her at Hardwick. Provenance: (?) Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon; possibly by descent to his son, Henry Hyde, 2nd Earl of Clarendon (1638-1709), Cornbury Park, Oxfordshire; possibly by descent to his nephew, Henry Hyde, 2nd Earl of Rochester, later 4th Earl of Clarendon (1672-1753); possibly transferred to his son, Henry Hyde, 5th Baron Hyde and Viscount Cornbury (1710-1753), c.1749; by descent to his niece, Charlotte (d.1790), daughter of William Capel, 3rd Earl of Essex (1697-1743), who married Thomas Villiers (1709-1786), Ist Earl of Clarendon (2nd creation); thence by descent to a family member until sold, December 2010 Exhibited: Plymouth, City Museum and Art Gallery, Paintings in the Clarendon Collection, 1954, p.10, no.6; Plymouth, Buckland Abbey, on long loan until 2010 Literature: G. P. Harding, List of Portraits in Various Mansions in the United Kingdom (unpublished MS, 1804, vol.II, p.29); Lady T. Lewis, Lives of the Friends and Contemporaries of Lord Chancellor Clarendon, London 1852, vol.III, pp.271-272, no.6; P. Toynbee, Horace Walpole's Journal of Visits to Country Seats etc, Walpole Society, vol.XVI, 1927, p.38 (The Grove, Sept.1761); R. Gibson, Catalogue of Portraits in the Collection of the Earl of Clarendon, Wallop 1977, no.133, pp.119-120
