Holbein’s work at Whitehall—His residence in the parish of St. Andrew Undershaft—In high favour at court—Payments of his salary—Possible visit to Basel—Portraits and miniatures of Catherine Howard—Portraits of the Duke of Norfolk—The Earl of Surrey—Unknown men at Berlin and Vienna—Unknown Englishman at the Hague—Earl of Southampton—Unknown man, aged 54, at Berlin—Unknown English lady at Vienna—Simon George—Dr. John Chamber—Sir William and Lady Butts—Unknown Englishman at Basel—Young English lady in the collection of Count Lanckoronski—Lady Rich—Holbein’s self-portraits—A newly-discovered one at Basel—Portraits, now lost, etched by Hollar—The Duke of Buckingham’s Collection.

Though there is no actual evidence in support of the statement of the older writers that Holbein, after he entered the royal service, had the use of a permanent studio in Whitehall Palace, granted to him by the King, there is every possibility that such was the case. “One of the earliest of the famous non-royal residents in Whitehall Palace,” says Dr. Edgar Sheppard, “was the artist Holbein. He had been presented to Henry VIII by Sir Thomas More, and the King assigned him a permanent suite of apartments in Whitehall, and commissioned him to paint the interior of the new Palace, for which work he received two hundred florins per annum.”[396] While the great wall-painting in the Privy Chamber was in progress, it would be necessary for him to have a room for his own use within the building, for the storage of the materials required for the work, and it is not impossible that he was permitted to retain the room as his own, perhaps one of those over the so-called “Holbein’s Gate,” for the short remainder of his life, more particularly as his practice was almost entirely confined to the court, so that a studio in Whitehall would best suit the convenience both of the painter and his sitters.[397] That he had a “permanent suite of apartments” there, as Dr. Sheppard states, is much less probable. This would indicate residence, whereas it is known that during his last years he occupied a house in the east of London.

It is doubtful, too, whether Holbein carried out any important decorative work in the Palace beyond the famous wall-painting already described.[398] According to a curious entry in Pepys’ Diary, under the date August 28, 1668, which is not easy to understand, the room known as the Matted Gallery had a painted ceiling of Holbein’s handiwork. The passage runs as follows: “With much difficulty, by candle-light, walked over the matted gallery, as it is now with the mats and boards all taken up, so that we walked over the rafters. But strange to see how hard matter the plaister of Paris is, that is there taken up, as hard as stone! And pity to see Holben’s work in the ceiling blotted on, and only whited over!” The exact sense of the concluding words is not very clear, but Pepys appears to mean that the ceiling had been formerly painted by Holbein, and that, having become damaged in course of time, it had recently been given a coat of whitewash. The ceiling was probably decorated with coloured plaster-work in relief, and though Holbein may have supplied the design, and may even have been responsible for the painting, it is much more likely that the plaster-work itself was done by some Italian, such as Nicolas Beilin of Modena, who had carried out similar undertakings at Fontainebleau.

The legend that Holbein also painted a “Dance of Death,” composed of life-size figures, upon the walls of one of the rooms in Whitehall, is probably pure fiction, or, at least, there is much less to be said in its favour than for Pepys’ attribution of the ceiling in the Matted Gallery to the painter. The writer who first gave currency to the story was Francis Douce, in his “Dance of Death,” published in 1833. According to his statement, “very soon after the calamitous fire at Whitehall in 1697,[399] which consumed nearly the whole of that palace, a person, calling himself T. Nieuhoff Piccard, probably belonging to the household of William III, and a man who appears to have been an amateur artist,”[400] made etchings after nineteen of the cuts in the Lyon “Dance of Death.” Impressions of these etchings, accompanied with manuscript dedications, are said to have been presented by this Piccard to his friends and patrons, and among others to a Mynheer Heymans, and to the “high, noble, and well-born Lord William Denting, Lord of Rhoon, Pendreght,” &c. In these addresses Piccard speaks of a “wall-painting” of the “Dance” by Holbein which he himself had seen in Whitehall. In the dedication to Heymans he says:

“Sir,—The costly palace of Whitehall, erected by Cardinal Wolsey, and the residence of King Henry VIII, contains, among other performances of art, a Dance of Death, painted by Holbein in its galleries, which, through an unfortunate conflagration, has been reduced to ashes.”

In the dedication to “Lord William Benting” Piccard is more precise:

“Sir,—In the course of my constant love and pursuit of works of art, it has been my good fortune to meet with that scarce little work of Hans Holbein neatly engraved on wood, and which he himself had painted as large as life in fresco on the walls of Whitehall.”

As far as can be ascertained, there is not the slightest truth in this legend. Nothing is known as to the identity of Heymans, but Lord William Benting was evidently William Bentinck (1704-1774), of Rhoon and Pendrecht in Holland, and Terrington St. Clements, Norfolk, third son of Hans William Bentinck, first Earl of Portland, and a Count of the Holy Roman Empire. Douce, who gave undeserved authority to this story, made no attempt to trace the history of the manuscript “addresses” which accompanied the etchings, and though he saw them, does not say to whom they then belonged, or even in what language they were written. They may be safely set down as forgeries, as far as any wall-paintings of the “Dance of Death” by Holbein are concerned. Piccard, whoever he may have been, is the sole authority for the existence of these mythical works, which are not mentioned by Van Mander or Sandrart, or by any of the foreign travellers who visited this country in their descriptions of Whitehall, though the wall-painting of Henry VIII with his wife and parents in the same palace is more than once spoken of in such records in terms of high praise. Both Pepys and Evelyn are equally silent on the subject, though the latter mentions the “Dance of Death” woodcuts, and ascribes them to Holbein by name. “We have seen,” he says, “some few things cut in wood by the incomparable Hans Holbein the Dane, but they are rare and exceedingly difficult to come by; as his Licentiousnesse of the Friers and Nuns; Erasmus; Moriae Encomium; the Trial and Crucifixion of Christ; The Daunce Macchabree; the Mortis Imago, which he painted in great in the Church at Basil, and afterwards graved with no lesse art.”[401] What he says is by no means free from mistakes, but as, in speaking of a visit paid to Whitehall in 1656, he describes the condition of the large wall-painting of the two kings Henry VII and Henry VIII, and their consorts, it is not probable that he would have failed to mention any other important wall-paintings in the palace had they existed. Douce thought he had discovered a corroboration of Piccard’s story in an entry in Van der Doort’s catalogue of Charles I’s collection, which runs: “A little piece, where Death with a green garland about his head, stretching both his arms to apprehend a Pilate in the habit of one of the spiritual Prince-Electors of Germany. Copied by Isaac Oliver from Holbein”; but this, no doubt, was painted from the woodcut of the Elector in the Lyon “Dance of Death,” and not from a large wall-painting.

As already stated, though Holbein may have had a workroom within the precincts of Whitehall, his permanent home in London was elsewhere. The public records show that in 1541 he was living in the parish of St. Andrew Undershaft, in Aldgate Ward. How long he had been there is not known, but possibly for the greater part of his second sojourn in England. This information is contained in a subsidy roll for the City of London, dated 24th October, 33 Hen. VIII (1541). Among the “straungers” taxed were:

Why Holbein was obliged to pay twice the amount charged to Buttessey on an equal assessment of £30 a year is explained by the fact that in these subsidies it was usual to tax “lands, fees, and annuities,” at double the rate of goods. “In the royal accounts,” says Sir Augustus W. Franks, “the payments to Holbein are sometimes noticed as wages, sometimes as an annuity; while other payments of a similar kind, although fees or annuities, are included under the general term “wages,” and evidently looked upon as synonymous terms for the salaries paid by the King to various members of his household. In any case, the salary of Holbein, the painter, rendered him liable to be rated, as a foreigner, at the high amount above-mentioned.”[402] There can be no doubt that this Holbein of the subsidy roll was the artist. The amount of his fee, £30, corresponds with the salary he received from the royal purse, while Holbein’s will gives his place of residence as the parish of St. Andrew Undershaft.

According to a story told by Walpole, Holbein once resided in a house on London Bridge. He says: “The father of Lord Treasurer Oxford passing over London Bridge, was caught in a shower, and stepping into a goldsmith’s shop for shelter, he found there a picture of Holbein (who had lived in that house) and his family. He offered the goldsmith 100l. for it, who consented to let him have it, but desired first to show it to some persons. Immediately after happened the fire of London, and the picture was destroyed.”[403] This story is apparently a mere legend, and there is no evidence to support it; nor is it very probable that an important painting by Holbein would have remained in the same small house for more than one hundred and twenty years. Dallaway, in his notes to Walpole, includes in a supplementary list of works by Holbein in England a small picture of Holbein, his wife, four boys, and a girl, at Mereworth Castle, Kent, which he suggests may be either a repetition or the original picture of the London Bridge story; but in the first place, Holbein never had a family of four sons, and, secondly, the picture bears no traces of Holbein’s manner. He quotes Gilpin’s description of it: “As a whole, it has no effect; but the heads are excellent. They are not painted in the common flat style of Holbein, but with a round, firm, glowing pencil, and yet exact imitation of nature is preserved—the boys are very innocent, beautiful characters.” If some such “family” picture existed in London at that time, it is much more likely to have been a copy or a replica of the genuine family group in the Basel Gallery.

The favour with which Holbein was now regarded at court is shown by the frequency with which he received a year’s or half a year’s salary in advance, a mark of royal condescension which was most unusual. Thus under “September Ao xxxi” (1539) is the following entry: “Item paide by the Kingis highnesse commaundement certefied by my lorde privyseales lettres to Hans Holbenne, paynter, in the advauncement of his hole yeres wagis beforehande, aftre the rate of xxx li. by yere, which yeres advauncement is to be accompted from this present Michaelmas, and shall ende ultimo Septembris next commynge, the somme of xxx li.”[404] Notwithstanding this payment in advance, it appears, as already pointed out,[405] from the four following quarterly entries in the accounts having reference to Holbein, from Michaelmas 1539 to Midsummer 1540, that he continued to receive his salary of £7, 10s. each quarter as usual.[406] If these entries are to be depended upon, he clearly received his money twice over, either by accident, owing to carelessness in the keeping of the King’s accounts, or of set purpose as a further reward for his services.

In September 1540 he received an advance of half a year: “September, Ao xxxii—Item paide to Hans Holbyn, the Kingis paynter, in advauncement of his wagis for one half yere beforehande, the same half yere accompted and reconned fromme Michaelmas last paste, the somme of xv li.” This time, however, he did not receive his salary twice over, for in the two following entries, at Michaelmas and Christmas, 1540, the accounts merely state: “Item, for Hans Holbyn, paynter, wages, nihil, quia prius per warrantum.” In the following March 1541 he again obtained a half-year’s advance: “March, Ao xxxii: Item paied to Hans Holben, the Kingis painter, in advauncement of his half yeres wages before hande, after the rate of xxx li. by yere, which half yere is accompted to beginne primo Aprilis Ao xxxij. domini Regis nunc, and shall ende ultimo Septembris then next ensuynge, the somme of xv li.” The two remaining entries of which we have record, at Lady Day and Midsummer following, are as follows: “Item for Hans Holben, paynter, wages, nil, quia praemanibus”; and “Item for Hans Holbyn, paynter, nihil, quia prius.” The volume of accounts closes with the payments for this quarter, and no details of the royal expenditure during the next two years and a half exist, so that there is no record of the salary Holbein received for the remaining years of his life. In a later volume of Tuke’s accounts, as treasurer of the household, extending from October, 35 Hen. VIII (1543) to November, 36 Hen. VIII (1544), the first quarterly payments are for Christmas 1543, and Holbein’s name does not occur in them, as he had then been dead for about two months. It is rather strange, however, that it does not appear among the Christmas payments with “Nihil quia mortuus” after it, as this was the usual procedure in case of death. This omission, however, may have been due to the fact that he had once again received his salary beforehand.

The remaining years of Holbein’s life must have been busy ones, judging from the number of preliminary studies for portraits of the men and women of Henry’s court which exist in the Windsor Collection and in many of the great European museums. These drawings are all undated, and cover the whole period of his English career, but there are so many of them that his time must have been always fully occupied. It is strange, therefore, that so few of his finished portraits can be ascribed with any certainty to the year 1540. Although it was by no means his invariable custom to put the date on his paintings, yet this was his more usual practice, and there is no known picture by him which is inscribed 1540, though there are a few dated 1541 and 1542. Several portraits of the Howard family can be given with some certainty to the earlier year, but beyond this nothing has been so far discovered. It may be suggested, as some explanation of this, that Holbein paid another visit to Basel during the last quarter of 1540, as the two years’ leave of absence granted him by the Town Council came to an end in the middle of October. The Council, who had been paying his wife the promised yearly pension of forty gulden, expected him to make Basel his permanent residence on the completion of this further extension of leave. The terms of their agreement with him were fairly generous, and it is not to be supposed that the painter would risk losing his rights of citizenship and the stoppage of the pension to his wife through a total disregard of the Council’s wish. It seems possible, therefore, that he went over to Switzerland in order to make personal application for a further and longer leave of absence in England than the agreement of 1538 permitted. Unlike many of the foreign artists and artificers then resident in this country, he never became a naturalised British subject, and this, no doubt, was due to the fact that he was determined to end his days as a citizen of Basel, and regarded his residence here as merely a temporary one, and England as a profitable field which, as time passed, would become worked out. He could not, of course, foresee that he was to be suddenly cut down when a comparatively young man and still in the full maturity of his powers. At Michaelmas in the year in question he received half a year’s salary in advance, so that it was impossible for him to leave England permanently for some time to come.

In the summer of 1540 Holbein lost another of his English patrons. Henry formally divorced Anne of Cleves on the 12th of July, and on the 28th of the same month Thomas Cromwell, then Earl of Essex, who had been a good friend to the painter, was beheaded for high treason, after a period of eight years during which his influence with both King and Parliament had been paramount. During the same month Henry privately married Catherine, daughter of Lord Edmund Howard, a cousin of Anne Boleyn, and niece of Thomas, third Duke of Norfolk. By this marriage the Howards, and through them the Catholic party, regained that ascendancy in the councils of the King which had received a severe check at the fall of Anne Boleyn; and at least three members of this family were painted by Holbein. The new Queen was publicly acknowledged on August 8 at Hampton Court Palace.

Although it was to be supposed that Henry would employ Holbein to paint the portrait of his new queen, until quite recently the only known likeness of her from his brush was the miniature portrait in the royal collection at Windsor Castle, and the replica of it belonging to the Duke of Buccleuch. In 1909, however, the discovery was made by Mr. Lionel Cust of a genuine and very beautiful portrait of this Queen. In the Windsor miniature (Pl. 31 (4)),[407] which shows her in a similar position to the one in the newly-discovered picture, she is represented nearly to the waist, turned to the left, her hands folded in front of her, the left over the right. Her hair and eyes are brown, and she wears a circular hood of the then fashionable French pattern, with a fall of black velvet. Her square-cut bodice is of dark cloth of gold, with sleeves of grey-green silk embroidered with gold, and white ruffles with black embroidery. Round her neck, over the white cambric filling of the dress, falls an elaborate necklace of pearls, rubies, and sapphires. The background, which is bright blue, has no inscription. It is painted on the back of a playing card, the eight of diamonds, and is 2⅓ inches in diameter. The hands, and the lower part of the arms, are badly painted, and appear to be a later addition.

Nothing is known of its history, or as to the date of its acquisition, but it did not belong to the Crown in Tudor or Stuart days. Dr. Ganz describes it as badly over-painted, and possibly only a copy. Doubts have been thrown from time to time on its right to be called a portrait of Catherine Howard. Mr. Ernest Law considers the attribution to be “very problematical indeed,” and states that it “does not at all accord with the Holbein drawing inscribed as ‘Queen Katherine Howard.’”[408] In this he follows earlier writers. Nichols says that though the position and head-dress of the drawing agree with the miniature, “the features do not appear to correspond.”[409] It is difficult, however, to agree with them in this, for a careful comparison of the two makes it quite evident that they represent the same lady. The version belonging to the Duke of Buccleuch is almost identical with the Windsor miniature, but is a better work and slightly smaller, being only two inches in diameter. It was last publicly exhibited at the Burlington Fine Arts Club, in 1909.[410] It was formerly in the collection of the Earl of Arundel, and when there was etched by Hollar in 1646. It was afterwards owned by Jonathan Richardson the younger (1694-1771), and subsequently by Horace Walpole. Walpole describes it as: “Catherine Howard, a miniature, damaged, it was Richardson’s, who bought it out of the Arundelian collection. It is engraved among the Illustrious Heads [of Houbraken]; and by Hollar, who called it Mary, Queen of France, wife of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk.”[411] In this he is wrong, for no name is attached to it in Hollar’s etching, and it was first identified as Catherine Howard by Mr. Cust. In his Description of Strawberry Hill, however, Walpole calls it merely “a lady painted by Holbein,” and says that it is “probably Mary Tudor, Queen of France, sister of Henry VIII, but among the Illustrious Heads called Catherine Howard.” According to Granger, it was Vertue who first named it Mary, Queen of France. The Duke of Buccleuch also possesses a small oil painting on panel, 5⅜ in. × 4½ in., which was likewise at the Burlington Fine Arts Club (Case C, 24). It is inscribed, by a hand later than that of the painter of the portrait, “Catherine Howard Henry VIII.” According to Scharf, this is “apparently a French work, and, indeed, thoroughly so in personal characteristics.”[412] It is in the style of Clouet, and the compilers of the Burlington Fine Arts Club catalogue suggest that it may represent Anne de Pisseleu, Duchesse d’Estampes.

The Windsor drawing[413] bears no inscription, and the sitter is turned to the right, as in Hollar’s engraving, instead of to the left, but otherwise it shows the same type of features, smooth auburn hair, and French cap or hood, as in the miniature. The dress, however, in Holbein’s usual fashion, is merely indicated with a few lines, showing a plain bodice cut square, filled in with white cambric, with a diamond-shaped opening revealing neck and bosom. It agrees in the same way with the newly-discovered portrait, of which, though reversed, it is evidently one of the preliminary studies. The identity with Catherine Howard is further proved, as Mr. Lionel Cust points out, by the family resemblance, plainly visible, in certain of the features, such as the over-accentuated lower jaw, to the portraits of her uncle, the Duke of Norfolk, and of his son, the ill-fated Earl of Surrey.

In 1898 the Trustees of the National Portrait Gallery acquired a portrait of Catherine Howard[414] at the sale of the Cholmondeley pictures at Condover Hall, Shropshire, which closely follows the Windsor drawing, although in the reverse position. The excellence of the painting of the hands, and of the details of the dress and jewels, led at first to the supposition that it might be a genuine work by Holbein which had undergone some damage and restoration, but closer examination proved that it was merely a careful contemporary school copy, or repetition of some lost original. It is inscribed “Etatis svæ 21,” which corresponds with the known facts of Catherine Howard’s life. In the summer of 1909 the original picture of which it is a copy was submitted to Mr. Cust, who recognised it at once as not only a portrait of Catherine Howard, but as most possibly a genuine work of the great master, which proved to be the case on the removal of much dirty varnish and some repaints.[415] It came from a private collection in the west of England, where it had formed part of a series of historical portraits which had been in the possession of the same family for several generations, and had been regarded at one time as a portrait of Eleanor Brandon, Countess of Cumberland, and at another as Princess Mary Tudor. It is now in Canada, in the collection of Mr. James H. Dunn.

Henry’s fifth Queen is shown seated, at a little more than half length, turned to the left. The hands are in the same position as in the miniature, though the fingers are more closely interlaced. Her hair is auburn, parted in the middle, and the eyes are blue-grey. She wears, too, a costume of a similar fashion, though of different materials. The circular French hood, with its heavy band of gold ornament and black fall, appears to be the same, but the dress is of black satin, with a square black velvet yoke across the bosom, open at the neck and turned back to show the white lining. A band or piping of gold ornament elaborately pierced, with pairs of gold tags at intervals, runs along the outer seam of the sleeves from shoulder to wrist, and the white ruffles are embroidered all over with a floral design in black. The ornaments she wears are of exceptional interest, as they afford actual evidence that Holbein not only painted portraits of royal ladies, but also designed their jewellery. Round her neck is a small necklace, set with pearls and diamonds, less heavy and elaborate than the one represented in the miniatures, and of greater beauty and delicacy of design, to which a large pendant jewel is attached. At her breast is a brooch from which hangs a circular jewel or medallion of chased gold work, with a large oblong diamond in the centre, on which is represented the story of Lot’s wife and the flight from Sodom. This jewel was designed for Catherine by Holbein. It corresponds exactly, as Mr. Cust points out, with a most characteristic study, a small roundel placed within an octagon, among the wonderful series of Holbein’s original drawings for jewellery in the Print Room of the British Museum,[416] and thus gives particular interest to a portrait which in all ways forms a very important addition to the master’s work, both on account of the brilliance of its execution and of its value as an historical document. Suspended from a chain round her waist hangs a still larger circular jewel, only the upper part of which is seen. That portion of the subject which is visible represents two angels with hands raised in adoration on either side of a crowned and bearded figure, most possibly the Almighty. The background of the portrait is a plain one, of Holbein’s favourite blue, across which is inscribed, as in the National Portrait Gallery copy, “Etatis svæ 21,” on either side of the head. It is on an oak panel 29 inches high by 20 inches wide. It must have been painted between August 1540, the date of her marriage, and November 1541, when she was deprived of her dignity as Queen, and forbidden to wear jewels; most probably in the latter year, according to Mr. Cust, which would correspond with her accepted age at the time of her marriage. Its importance and its genuineness have been accepted by such leading authorities as Dr. Bode, Dr. Friedländer, Dr. Paul Ganz, and Sir Sidney Colvin.

Catherine Howard’s reign as Queen of England was a short one. There is no need to describe her tragic fate in detail. Before the close of the year 1541 it was discovered that not only had she had two lovers, one of them her cousin Francis Dereham, before her marriage, but that she had also been unfaithful to the King almost from the beginning of her married life, her paramour being one of her gentlemen, Thomas Culpeper. The Queen and her accomplice, Lady Rochford, were confined in Syon House, pending a parliamentary inquiry. Dereham and Culpeper were tried at Guildhall in December, pleaded guilty, and were hanged at Tyburn twelve days afterwards; and in February 1542, Catherine and Lady Rochford were condemned to death, and were beheaded on the 13th of the month, on the same spot on which the Queen’s cousin, Anne Boleyn, had suffered the same penalty for the same crime.

This fresh tragedy in his life greatly aged the King, as can be seen in the portraits of him painted about this period, usually attributed to Lucas Hornebolt. A month after the execution, Marillac wrote to Francis I, on March 17, 1542, that Henry was “already very stout and daily growing heavier, much resembling his maternal grandfather, King Edward, being about his age, in loving rest and fleeing trouble. He seems very old and grey since the mishap (malheur) of this last queen, and will not yet hear of taking another, although he is ordinarily in company of ladies, and his ministers beg and urge him to marry again.”[417]

The portrait of Thomas Howard, third Duke of Norfolk, uncle by marriage to Henry VIII, was painted at about the same time as that of Catherine Howard. The inscriptions on the fine original version by Holbein in Windsor Castle (Pl. 25),[418] and the excellent contemporary copy in Arundel Castle, both state that it was taken in his sixty-sixth year, and as he is said to have been born in 1473, this gives the date of the picture as 1539 or early in 1540. He is shown standing, at half-length, slightly turned to the left. He is wearing a doublet of dusky red silk, edged with brown fur, and a white collar embroidered with black silk. His outer robe of dark velvet has a deep collar and border of ermine, and on his head is a plain, flat black hat, without a badge, over a black skull-cap which covers the ears. In his left hand he holds the long white wand of his office of Lord High Treasurer, and in his right the shorter gold baton, tipped with black, which he carried as hereditary Earl Marshal of England. Across the shoulders hangs the magnificent and richly-jewelled collar of the Order of the Garter with the pendant George, which is painted with all Holbein’s wonderful mastery in the clear rendering of minute ornament. The face, clean-shaven, and of a brown complexion, displays remarkable subtlety in the delineation of a proud and cruel nature. The cold, unflinching eyes, the thin, compressed lips with their faint, ironic smile, and the bony hands clasping the staves, reveal the sitter’s true character as it has come down to us in the pages of history, pride of race, cruelty almost remorseless in its pursuit of power, and inflexibility of purpose both in personal aggrandisement and in the service of his royal master.

The background is green, and across the top of the panel runs the inscription: “Thomas · Dvke · off · Norfolk · Marshall · and Tresvrer off · Inglonde the · lxvi yere · of · his · age.” It is now almost illegible, through the passage of time and over-painting, but can be deciphered by the aid of the exactly similar inscription on the Arundel picture. This, as already stated, gives the date of the portrait as about 1540. The inscription, however, is not contemporary, but was probably added some hundred years later, in the reign of Charles I, when the picture was in the collection of the Earl of Arundel. It was finely etched by Vorsterman when in the Earl’s possession, in 1630, though without the inscription, but beneath the plate is engraved: “Hans Holbein pinxit. Visitur in Ædibus Arondelianis Londini.” This does not necessarily prove that the inscription on the panel did not exist at that date, as Vorsterman may have omitted it as disfiguring. That it was certainly there fifteen years later is proved by a coloured drawing on vellum by Philip Fruytiers, the Antwerp painter, dated 1645, a copy of a study by Van Dyck representing a large group of Thomas Howard, Earl of Arundel, his wife, and family. On the wall in the background Van Dyck had inserted, and Fruytiers has copied, on the one side, this very portrait of the Duke of Norfolk by Holbein, in which the inscription across the top of it in gold letters can be plainly seen, and on the other side the portrait of his son, the Earl of Surrey, also evidently a work by Holbein, though the original painting is now lost, which is inscribed: “Henry Howard Erle of Suhry anno ætatis svæ 25.” This water-colour drawing, which is signed “An. Vandyke inv. Ph. Fruytiers fecit 1645,” is in the collection of the Duke of Sutherland, and there is a small copy of it in oils on copper at Norfolk House, which also shows the inscription. It was engraved by Vertue in 1743. The original sketch or composition by Van Dyck has been lost.

It is supposed that the Windsor version is the one which was in the Arundel Collection, but its subsequent history is uncertain. That collection was divided in 1686, and the share which fell to the Duke of Norfolk may possibly have contained this portrait of his ancestor.[419] The Duke’s pictures were sold in 1692, and nothing further is to be heard of this portrait until it is mentioned by Walpole as being then (1762) in Leicester House, at that time the dower-house of the Dowager Princess of Wales, widow of Frederick, Prince of Wales.[420] “There can be no doubt,” says Mr. Ernest Law, “that the picture passed, on the death of the Princess in 1772, into the possession of the Crown with the rest of the collection which had been formed by Prince Frederick.”[421] It is not known from whom that Prince acquired it, but many of his pictures were purchased for him on the Continent by his agent, Bagnols, and it is not unlikely that Woltmann’s surmise is correct, and that it is to be identified with the portrait of the Duke which appeared in the catalogue of an anonymous sale of pictures at Amsterdam on April 23, 1732, as “Een zeer konstig uitmuntent stuk door Hans Holbeen, zynde de Hartog van Nortfolk nooit zoo goet gezien,” which must have been a fine work, as it fetched the relatively high price of 1120 florins.[422] It is quite possible, therefore, that the portrait was one of those sold by Lord Stafford in Amsterdam in 1654, immediately after the death of the Countess of Arundel, and that it was never in the possession of the Duke of Norfolk, but remained in that town until 1732.