1.
Wenceslaus Hollar
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Václav Hollar, was a Czech etcher from Kingdom of Bohemia, known in England as Wenceslaus or Wenceslas and in Germany as Wenzel Hollar. He was born in Prague, and died in London, being buried at St Margarets Church, after his family was ruined by the Sack of Prague in the Thirty Years War, the young Hollar, who had been destined for the law, determined to become an artist. In 1627 he was in Frankfurt where he was apprenticed to the renowned engraver Matthäus Merian, in 1630 he lived in Strasbourg, Mainz and Koblenz, where Hollar portrayed the towns, castles, and landscapes of the Middle Rhine Valley. In 1633 he moved to Cologne and it was in 1636 that he attracted the notice of the famous nobleman and art collector Thomas Howard, 21st Earl of Arundel, then on an embassy to the imperial court of Emperor Ferdinand II. Employed as a draftsman he travelled with Arundel to Vienna and Prague, in Cologne in 1635, Hollar published his first book. In 1637 he returned him to England where he remained in the Earls household for many years. In around 1650, probably at the request of Hendrik van der Borcht, he etched a commemorative print done after a design by Cornelius Schut in Arundels honour and dedicated to his widow, Aletheia. Arundel is seated in melancholy mode on his tomb in front of an obelisk, in 1745, George Vertue paid homage to their association in the vignette he published on page one of his Description of the Works of the Ingenious Delineator and Engraver Wenceslaus Hollar. It featured a bust of Arundel in front of a pyramid, symbolizing immortality, surrounded by illustrated books, during his first year in England he created View of Greenwich, later issued by Peter Stent, the print-seller. Nearly 3 feet long, he received thirty shillings for the plate, afterwards he fixed the price of his work at fourpence an hour, and measured his time by a sand-glass. On July 4,1641 Hollar married a servant of the Countess of Norfolk and her name was Tracy, they had two children. Lord Arundel left England in 1642, and Hollar passed into the service of the Duke of York and he continued to produce works prolifically throughout the English Civil War, but it adversely affected his income. Hollar took his setting, presumably symbolizing longer term values, directly from an engraving published in George Sandys Relation of a Journey begun An, Hollar joined the Royalist Regiment and was captured by parliamentary forces in 1645 during the siege of Basing House. After a short time he managed to escape, in Antwerp in 1646, he again met with the Earl of Arundel. In 1652 he returned to London, and lived for a time with Faithorne the engraver near Temple Bar, during the following years many books were published which he illustrated, Ogilbys Virgil and Homer, Stapyltons Juvenal, and Dugdales Warwickshire, St Pauls and Monasticon. His income fell as booksellers continued to decline his work, during this time he lost his young son, also reputed to have artistic ability, to the plague. He lived eight years after his return, still working for the booksellers and he died in extreme poverty, his last recorded words being a request to the bailiffs that they would not carry away the bed on which he was dying. Hollar is interred in St Margarets Church in Westminster and he was one of the best and most prolific artists of his time
2.
Bruges
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Bruges is the capital and largest city of the province of West Flanders in the Flemish Region of Belgium, in the northwest of the country. The area of the whole city amounts to more than 13,840 hectares, including 1,075 hectares off the coast, the historic city centre is a prominent World Heritage Site of UNESCO. It is oval and about 430 hectares in size, the citys total population is 117,073, of whom around 20,000 live in the city centre. The metropolitan area, including the commuter zone, covers an area of 616 km2 and has a total of 255,844 inhabitants as of 1 January 2008. Along with a few other canal-based northern cities, such as Amsterdam and Stockholm, Bruges has a significant economic importance thanks to its port and was once one of the worlds chief commercial cities. Bruges is well known as the seat of the College of Europe, the name probably derives from the Old Dutch for bridge, brugga. Also compare Middle Dutch brucge, brugge, and modern Dutch bruggehoofd, the form brugghe would be a southern Dutch variant. The Dutch word and the English bridge both derive from Proto-Germanic *brugjō-, Bruges was a location of coastal settlement during prehistory. This Bronze Age and Iron Age settlement is unrelated to medieval city development, in the Bruges area, the first fortifications were built after Julius Caesars conquest of the Menapii in the first century BC, to protect the coastal area against pirates. The Franks took over the region from the Gallo-Romans around the 4th century. The Viking incursions of the century prompted Count Baldwin I of Flanders to reinforce the Roman fortifications, trade soon resumed with England. Bruges received its city charter on 27 July 1128, and new walls and canals were built, in 1089 Bruges became the capital of the County of Flanders. Since about 1050, gradual silting had caused the city to lose its access to the sea. A storm in 1134, however, re-established this access, through the creation of a channel at the Zwin. The new sea arm stretched all the way to Damme, a city became the commercial outpost for Bruges. Bruges had a location at the crossroads of the northern Hanseatic League trade. They developed, or borrowed from Italy, new forms of merchant capitalism, whereby several merchants would share the risks and profits and they employed new forms of economic exchange, including bills of exchange and letters of credit. The city eagerly welcomed foreign traders, most notably the Portuguese traders selling pepper and other spices, the citys entrepreneurs reached out to make economic colonies of England and Scotlands wool-producing districts
3.
Artist of the Tudor court
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The Tudor period was one of unusual isolation from European trends for England. At the start the Wars of the Roses had greatly disrupted artistic activity, however these were both painted abroad. In the Tudor period foreign artists were recruited and often welcomed lavishly by the English court, much energy was also expended on decorative painting of fixtures and fittings, often of a very temporary nature. There was also the Master of the Revels, whose Office was responsible for festivals and tournaments, jewellery and metalwork were regarded as extremely important, and far more was spent on them than on painting. Holbein produced many designs for now-vanished table ornaments in precious metals. The main artistic interests of Henry VIII were music, building palaces and tapestry, of which he had over 2,000 pieces, the Flemish set with the Story of Abraham still at Hampton Court Palace is one grand set from late in his reign. She is reputed to have had paintings of her burnt that did not match the image she wished to be shown. There was also probably much decorative painting, the scattered fragments and images that have survived suggest that the awestruck accounts of visitors were not exaggerated. Many of the artists active at the Tudor court were connected by ties of family, marriage, Lucas Horenbout, who began painting and illuminating for Henry VIII in the mid-1520s, was accompanied in his workshop by his sister Susannah, who was also an illuminator. It is generally accepted that Lucas Horenbout taught Hans Holbein the Younger the techniques of painting miniatures on vellum when Holbein was engaged by Henry VIII in the early 1530s. In Bruges, Gerard was associated with Sanders Bening or Benninck and his son Simon, Simon Benings eldest daughter Levina Teerlinc was also trained as an illuminator. John Bettes the Elder apprenticed his son, John the Younger to Hilliard, hilliards most famous student, Isaac Oliver, later limner to Anne of Denmark and Henry, Prince of Wales, was married to the niece of Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger. Gheeraerts was also the brother-in-law of Lucas de Heeres apprentice John de Critz the Elder, who took the dynasty into the Stuart period,1545 until his death in 1558. Hans Eworth, in England from c,1549, portrait-painter and recorded as a designer for the Office of the Revels Steven van Herwijck, portrait medallist, visited 1562, resident 1565 until his death in 1567. Steven van der Meulen, arrived 1560, naturalized 1562, and he submitted alternative designs for Henrys tomb, and a painted terracotta bust by him may be of Henry VIII as a boy. De Cock Dutch portrait and history painter, probably in England c. Browne died in office in December 1532. Andrew Wright, 1532–1544, about whom little is known Antony Toto, really Antonio di Nunziato dAntonio, a Florentine pupil of Ridolfo Ghirlandajo, from 1544 and he was the first Serjeant Painter who can be evidenced as an artist rather than an artisan. He had a Florentine colleague Bartolommeo Penni, brother of the more distinguished Gianfrancesco, Raphaels right-hand man, and Luca
4.
Hans Eworth
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Hans Eworth was a Flemish painter active in England in the mid-16th century. Along with other exiled Flemings, he made a career in Tudor London, painting allegorical images as well as portraits of the gentry, about 40 paintings are now attributed to Eworth, among them portraits of Mary I and Elizabeth I. Eworth also executed commissions for Elizabeths Office of the Revels in the early 1570s. Nothing is known of Eworths early life or training, as Jan Euworts, he is recorded as a freeman of the artists Guild of St Luke in Antwerp in 1540. A Jan and Nicholas Ewouts, painter and mercer were expelled from Antwerp for heresy in 1544, by 1545 Eworth was resident in London, where he is well recorded from 1549. Eworths earliest surviving works date from 1549 to 1550. The original — signed with the HE monogram Eworth consistently used — was donated to the Courtauld Institute of Art by Lord Lee of Farnham in 1932, the painting was in badly damaged condition when it was donated to the Institute, although it has subsequently been conserved and restored. Although there is no evidence that Eworths most important patron was the Catholic queen Mary I. All his known portraits of Mary I appear to be variants of a portrait in the National Portrait Gallery, London which is signed HE, a second portrait, now in the Society of Antiquaries collection, is also signed and dated 1554. Two other portraits show Mary I in later fashions and are thought to have painted between 1555 and Marys death in 1558. Another is in the collection of Trinity College, Cambridge, over the next decade, Eworth continued to paint portraits of the aristocracy, including paired portraits of the Duke of Norfolk and his second wife and of the Earl and Countess of Moray. Despite the frequent appearance of a characteristic HE monogram, the attribution of works to Eworth—and the identification of his sitters—remains in flux, Eworths last known works date from 1570-3. Like many other artists of the Tudor court, Eworth was also engaged in decorative work, payment records show that Eworth was designing for the Office of the Revels as late as 1573, and he is believed to have died in 1574. The Portrait of Sir John Luttrell, A Tudor Mystery, London, Cooper, Tanya, A Guide to Tudor & Jacobean Portraits, National Portrait Gallery, London,2008, ISBN 978-1-85514-393-7 Cooper, Tanya. Hans Eworth, Four case studies of painting methods and techniques, in The Concise Grove Dictionary of Art. Cust, Lionel, The Painter HE, Second Annual Volume of the Walpole Society 1912-1913, Oxford & London, hearn, Karen, ed. Dynasties, Painting in Tudor and Jacobean England 1530-1630
5.
Anthony van Dyck
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Sir Anthony van Dyck was a Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England, after enjoying great success in Italy and Flanders. He also painted biblical and mythological subjects, displayed outstanding facility as a draughtsman, the Van Dyke beard is named after him. Antoon van Dyck was born to parents in Antwerp. By the age of fifteen he was already an accomplished artist, as his Self-portrait, 1613–14. He was admitted to the Antwerp painters Guild of Saint Luke as a master by February 1618. His influence on the young artist was immense, Rubens referred to the nineteen-year-old van Dyck as the best of my pupils. At the same time the dominance of Rubens in the small and declining city of Antwerp probably explains why, despite his periodic returns to the city, van Dyck spent most of his career abroad. In 1620, at the instigation of George Villiers, Marquess of Buckingham, van Dyck went to England for the first time where he worked for King James I of England, receiving £100. After about four months he returned to Flanders, but moved on in late 1621 to Italy and he was already presenting himself as a figure of consequence, annoying the rather bohemian Northern artists colony in Rome, says Giovan Pietro Bellori, by appearing with the pomp of Zeuxis. He was mostly based in Genoa, although he travelled extensively to other cities. In 1627, he went back to Antwerp where he remained for five years, a life-size group portrait of twenty-four City Councillors of Brussels he painted for the council-chamber was destroyed in 1695. He was evidently very charming to his patrons, and, like Rubens, well able to mix in aristocratic and court circles, by 1630 he was described as the court painter of the Habsburg Governor of Flanders, the Archduchess Isabella. In this period he produced many religious works, including large altarpieces. King Charles I was the most passionate and generous collector of art among the British monarchs, and saw art as a way of promoting his elevated view of the monarchy. In 1628, he bought the collection that the Gonzagas of Mantua were forced to dispose of. In 1626, he was able to persuade Orazio Gentileschi to settle in England, later to be joined by his daughter Artemisia and some of his sons. Rubens was a target, who eventually came on a diplomatic mission, which included painting, in 1630. He was very well-treated during his visit, during which he was knighted
6.
Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder
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Born in Bruges, Flanders, Gheeraerts fled to England in 1568 with his son, Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger, due to the Alvan religious persecutions. There he married his wife, Sussanah de Critz, a close relative of Queen Elizabeth Is serjeant-painter. He was in London for at least 9 years but may have returned to Flanders around 1577 to continue his career in Antwerp. However, Gheeraerts retained links with England, he had his son enrolled in the guild and one of his daughters, Sarah. Gheeraerts is most noteworthy as a printmaker and he was a keen innovator and experimented with etching at a time when woodcut and engraving were dominant techniques. For example, his 1562 birds-eye view of the town of Bruges was etched on no fewer than 10 different plates, Gheeraerts style resembles that of Pieter Bruegel the Elder. He etched the title page and 107 fable illustrations and had his friend, Edewaerd de Dene, Gheeraerts based most of his motifs on woodcuts by Virgil Solis and Bernard Salomon but gave his subjects greater naturalism. Gheeraerts added another 18 illustrations and a new page for a French version of the Fabulen that was published in 1578 under the title Esbatement moral des animaux. A Latin version, Mythologia ethica, was published in the year with a title page likely based on a drawing by Gheeraerts. The copper plates were used in well into the 18th Century. Gheeraerts also etched a series of 65 illustrations for the fable book Apologi creaturarum. However, the etchings were smaller than those of the first series, karel van Mander wrote in his Schilderboeck from 1604 that Gheeraerts was a good landscape painter, who often had the habit of including a squatting, urinating woman on a bridge or elsewhere. A similar detail is seen in one of his fable illustrations, main treatise Edward Hodnett, Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder of Bruges, London, and Antwerp, Utrecht 1971. Ashworth, Marcus Gheeraerts and the Aesopic connection in seventeenth-century scientific illustration, Art Journal,44, reginald Lane Poole, Marcus Gheeraerts, Father and Son, Painters, The Walpole Society,3, 1-8. Arthur Ewart Popham, The etchings of Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder, Print Collectors Quarterly,15, eva Tahon, Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder, in, M. P. J. Martens, Bruges and the Renaissance, Memling to Pourbus, Bruges 1998, 231–238
7.
Painting
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Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface. The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, Painting is a mode of creative expression, and the forms are numerous. Drawing, gesture, composition, narration, or abstraction, among other aesthetic modes, may serve to manifest the expressive, Paintings can be naturalistic and representational, photographic, abstract, narrative, symbolistic, emotive, or political in nature. A portion of the history of painting in both Eastern and Western art is dominated by motifs and ideas. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action, the term painting is also used outside of art as a common trade among craftsmen and builders. What enables painting is the perception and representation of intensity, every point in space has different intensity, which can be represented in painting by black and white and all the gray shades between. In practice, painters can articulate shapes by juxtaposing surfaces of different intensity, thus, the basic means of painting are distinct from ideological means, such as geometrical figures, various points of view and organization, and symbols. In technical drawing, thickness of line is ideal, demarcating ideal outlines of an object within a perceptual frame different from the one used by painters. Color and tone are the essence of painting as pitch and rhythm are the essence of music, color is highly subjective, but has observable psychological effects, although these can differ from one culture to the next. Black is associated with mourning in the West, but in the East, some painters, theoreticians, writers and scientists, including Goethe, Kandinsky, and Newton, have written their own color theory. Moreover, the use of language is only an abstraction for a color equivalent, the word red, for example, can cover a wide range of variations from the pure red of the visible spectrum of light. There is not a register of different colors in the way that there is agreement on different notes in music. For a painter, color is not simply divided into basic, painters deal practically with pigments, so blue for a painter can be any of the blues, phthalocyanine blue, Prussian blue, indigo, cobalt, ultramarine, and so on. Psychological and symbolical meanings of color are not, strictly speaking, colors only add to the potential, derived context of meanings, and because of this, the perception of a painting is highly subjective. The analogy with music is quite clear—sound in music is analogous to light in painting, shades to dynamics and these elements do not necessarily form a melody of themselves, rather, they can add different contexts to it. Modern artists have extended the practice of painting considerably to include, as one example, collage, some modern painters incorporate different materials such as sand, cement, straw or wood for their texture. Examples of this are the works of Jean Dubuffet and Anselm Kiefer, there is a growing community of artists who use computers to paint color onto a digital canvas using programs such as Adobe Photoshop, Corel Painter, and many others. These images can be printed onto traditional canvas if required, rhythm is important in painting as it is in music
8.
Elizabeth I of England
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Elizabeth I was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, his second wife, who was executed two and a half years after Elizabeths birth. Annes marriage to Henry VIII was annulled, and Elizabeth was declared illegitimate, edwards will was set aside and Mary became queen, deposing Lady Jane Grey. During Marys reign, Elizabeth was imprisoned for nearly a year on suspicion of supporting Protestant rebels, in 1558, Elizabeth succeeded her half-sister to the throne and set out to rule by good counsel. She depended heavily on a group of trusted advisers, led by William Cecil, one of her first actions as queen was the establishment of an English Protestant church, of which she became the Supreme Governor. This Elizabethan Religious Settlement was to evolve into the Church of England and it was expected that Elizabeth would marry and produce an heir to continue the Tudor line. She never did, despite numerous courtships, as she grew older, Elizabeth became famous for her virginity. A cult grew around her which was celebrated in the portraits, pageants, in government, Elizabeth was more moderate than her father and half-siblings had been. One of her mottoes was video et taceo, in religion, she was relatively tolerant and avoided systematic persecution. Elizabeth was cautious in foreign affairs, manoeuvring between the powers of France and Spain. She only half-heartedly supported a number of ineffective, poorly resourced military campaigns in the Netherlands, France, by the mid-1580s, England could no longer avoid war with Spain. Englands defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588 associated Elizabeth with one of the greatest military victories in English history, Elizabeths reign is known as the Elizabethan era. Some historians depict Elizabeth as a short-tempered, sometimes indecisive ruler, towards the end of her reign, a series of economic and military problems weakened her popularity. Such was the case with Elizabeths rival, Mary, Queen of Scots, after the short reigns of Elizabeths half-siblings, her 44 years on the throne provided welcome stability for the kingdom and helped forge a sense of national identity. Elizabeth was born at Greenwich Palace and was named after both her grandmothers, Elizabeth of York and Elizabeth Howard and she was the second child of Henry VIII of England born in wedlock to survive infancy. Her mother was Henrys second wife, Anne Boleyn, at birth, Elizabeth was the heir presumptive to the throne of England. She was baptised on 10 September, Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, the Marquess of Exeter, the Duchess of Norfolk, Elizabeth was two years and eight months old when her mother was beheaded on 19 May 1536, four months after Catherine of Aragons death from natural causes. Elizabeth was declared illegitimate and deprived of her place in the royal succession, eleven days after Anne Boleyns execution, Henry married Jane Seymour, who died shortly after the birth of their son, Prince Edward, in 1537
9.
Henry Lee of Ditchley
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Sir Henry Lee KG, of Ditchley, was Queens Champion and Master of the Armouries under Queen Elizabeth I of England. Margaret Wyatt was a sister of the poet Sir Thomas Wyatt, Lee had three younger brothers, Robert Lee, Thomas Lee, and Cromwell Lee, who compiled an Italian-English dictionary. Lee also had an illegitimate half-brother, Sir Richard Lee, Lee became Queen Elizabeth I’s champion in 1570 and was appointed Master of the Armoury in 1580, an office which he held until his death. As Queens Champion, Lee devised the Accession Day tilts held annually on 17 November and he retired as Queens Champion in 1590, and the poems His Golden Locks by George Peele and Times Eldest Son were set to music by John Dowland and performed at the lavish retirement pageant. He was made a Knight of the Order of the Garter in 1597 and he was a Member of the Parliament of England for Buckinghamshire in 1558,1559,1571 and 1572. Sir Henry, like most courtiers of the day, had a portrait painted by a leading artist, in Lees picture, his sleeves are decorated with armillary spheres, a symbol of wisdom and also his device as queens champion. His sleeves are decorated with lovers knots which, combined with the armillary spheres can be seen to represent his love for learning. Lee also wears several rings tied to his arm, and has his finger through a ring around his neck. This may represent his marriages, and the ring, which is not quite on his finger. Lees wife, Anne, was buried at Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, there is a monument to her in St. Mary the Virgin, Aylesbury. After her death, Lee lived openly with his mistress, Anne Vavasour, Lee built up an estate at Ditchley in Oxfordshire, from 1583. He was later noted for refusing to receive his monarch a second time, three suits of armour were made for Sir Henry Lee by the renowned Greenwich armoury, and are depicted in the album of drawings left behind by that workshop. Portions of the armour survive to the present day, one of the armours currently stands in the hall of the Armourers and Brasiers company in London. His heir and cousin, also Sir Henry Lee, became 1st baronet of Quarendon and he died on 12 February 1611. A descendant of Henry Lee of Ditchley was Edward Lee, 1st Earl of Lichfield, ancestor of Mary Custis Lee, the Dormant and Extinct Baronage of England. Sir Henry Lee, An Elizabethan Portrait, jack, Sybil M. Paget, William, first Baron Paget. Everingham, Kimball G. ed. Magna Carta Ancestry, A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, Sir Henry Lee Accessed July 26,2008 The Worshipful Company of Armourers and Brasiers
10.
James VI and I
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James VI and I was King of Scotland as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until his death. The kingdoms of Scotland and England were individual sovereign states, with their own parliaments, judiciary, and laws, though both were ruled by James in personal union. James was the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, James succeeded to the Scottish throne at the age of thirteen months, after his mother Mary was compelled to abdicate in his favour. Four different regents governed during his minority, which ended officially in 1578, in 1603, he succeeded the last Tudor monarch of England and Ireland, Elizabeth I, who died without issue. He continued to reign in all three kingdoms for 22 years, a period known after him as the Jacobean era, until his death in 1625 at the age of 58. After the Union of the Crowns, he based himself in England from 1603, only returning to Scotland once in 1617 and he was a major advocate of a single parliament for England and Scotland. In his reign, the Plantation of Ulster and British colonization of the Americas began, at 57 years and 246 days, Jamess reign in Scotland was longer than those of any of his predecessors. He achieved most of his aims in Scotland but faced difficulties in England, including the Gunpowder Plot in 1605. James himself was a scholar, the author of works such as Daemonologie, The True Law of Free Monarchies. He sponsored the translation of the Bible that would later be named after him, Sir Anthony Weldon claimed that James had been termed the wisest fool in Christendom, an epithet associated with his character ever since. Since the latter half of the 20th century, historians have tended to revise Jamess reputation and treat him as a serious, James was the only son of Mary, Queen of Scots, and her second husband, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. Both Mary and Darnley were great-grandchildren of Henry VII of England through Margaret Tudor, Marys rule over Scotland was insecure, and she and her husband, being Roman Catholics, faced a rebellion by Protestant noblemen. James was born on 19 June 1566 at Edinburgh Castle, and as the eldest son and heir apparent of the monarch automatically became Duke of Rothesay and Prince and he was baptised Charles James or James Charles on 17 December 1566 in a Catholic ceremony held at Stirling Castle. His godparents were Charles IX of France, Elizabeth I of England, Mary refused to let the Archbishop of St Andrews, whom she referred to as a pocky priest, spit in the childs mouth, as was then the custom. The subsequent entertainment, devised by Frenchman Bastian Pagez, featured men dressed as satyrs and sporting tails, Jamess father, Darnley, was murdered on 10 February 1567 at Kirk o Field, Edinburgh, perhaps in revenge for Rizzios death. James inherited his fathers titles of Duke of Albany and Earl of Ross, Mary was already unpopular, and her marriage on 15 May 1567 to James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell, who was widely suspected of murdering Darnley, heightened widespread bad feeling towards her. In June 1567, Protestant rebels arrested Mary and imprisoned her in Loch Leven Castle and she was forced to abdicate on 24 July 1567 in favour of the infant James and to appoint her illegitimate half-brother, James Stewart, Earl of Moray, as regent. The care of James was entrusted to the Earl and Countess of Mar, to be conserved, nursed, and upbrought in the security of Stirling Castle
11.
Anne of Denmark
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Anne of Denmark was Queen consort of Scotland, England, and Ireland as the wife of King James VI and I. The second daughter of King Frederick II of Denmark, Anne married James in 1589 at age 15, Anne appears to have loved James at first, but the couple gradually drifted and eventually lived apart, though mutual respect and a degree of affection survived. In England, Anne shifted her energies from factional politics to patronage of the arts and constructed her own magnificent court, after 1612, she suffered sustained bouts of ill health and gradually withdrew from the centre of court life. Though she was reported to have been a Protestant at the time of her death, historians have traditionally dismissed Anne as a lightweight queen, frivolous and self-indulgent. However, recent reappraisals acknowledge Annes assertive independence and, in particular, Anne was born on 12 December 1574 at the castle of Skanderborg on the Jutland Peninsula in the Kingdom of Denmark. Her birth came as a blow to her father, King Frederick II of Denmark, but her mother, Sophie of Mecklenburg-Güstrow, was only 17, three years later she did bear Frederick a son, the future Christian IV of Denmark. With her older sister, Elizabeth, Anne was sent to be raised at Güstrow in Germany by her maternal grandparents, the Duke and Duchess of Mecklenburg. Christian was also sent to be brought up at Güstrow but two later, in 1579, the Rigsraad successfully requested his removal to Denmark, and Anne. Anne enjoyed a close, happy family upbringing in Denmark, thanks largely to Queen Sophie, James other serious possibility, though 8 years his senior, was Catherine, sister of the Huguenot King Henry III of Navarre, who was favoured by Elizabeth I of England. The constitutional position of Sophie, Annes mother, became difficult after Fredericks death in 1588, when she found herself in a power struggle with the Rigsraad for control of King Christian. As a matchmaker, however, Sophie proved more diligent than Frederick and, overcoming sticking points on the amount of the dowry, Anne herself seems to have been thrilled with the match. Whatever the truth of the rumours, James required a match to preserve the Stuart line. On 20 August 1589, Anne was married by proxy to James at Kronborg Castle, Anne set sail for Scotland within 10 days, but her fleet was beset by a series of misadventures. Finally being forced back to the coast of Norway, from where she travelled by land to Oslo for refuge, accompanied by the Earl Marischal and others of the Scottish and Danish embassies. According to a Scottish account, he presented himself to Anne, with boots and all, Anne and James were formally married at the Old Bishops Palace in Oslo on 23 November 1589, with all the splendour possible at that time and place. So that both bride and groom could understand, Leith minister David Lindsay conducted the ceremony in French and she giveth great contentment to his Majesty. The couple moved on to Copenhagen on 7 March and attended the wedding of Annes older sister Elizabeth to Henry Julius, Duke of Brunswick and they arrived in the Water of Leith on 1 May. Five days later, Anne made her entry into Edinburgh in a solid silver coach brought over from Denmark
12.
Printmaking
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Printmaking is the process of making artworks by printing, normally on paper. Printmaking normally covers only the process of creating prints that have an element of originality, except in the case of monotyping, the process is capable of producing multiples of the same piece, which is called a print. Each print produced is not considered a copy but rather is considered an original, a print may be known as an impression. Printmaking is not chosen only for its ability to multiple impressions. Prints are created by transferring ink from a matrix or through a screen to a sheet of paper or other material. Screens made of silk or synthetic fabrics are used for the screenprinting process, other types of matrix substrates and related processes are discussed below. Multiple impressions printed from the matrix form an edition. Prints may also be printed in book form, such as illustrated books or artists books, Printmaking techniques are generally divided into the following basic categories, Relief, where ink is applied to the original surface of the matrix. Relief techniques include woodcut or woodblock as the Asian forms are known, wood engraving. Intaglio, where ink is applied beneath the surface of the matrix. Intaglio techniques include engraving, etching, mezzotint, aquatint, planographic, where the matrix retains its original surface, but is specially prepared and/or inked to allow for the transfer of the image. Planographic techniques include lithography, monotyping, and digital techniques, stencil, where ink or paint is pressed through a prepared screen, including screenprinting and pochoir. Other types of printmaking techniques outside these groups include collagraphy and viscosity printing, collagraphy is a printmaking technique in which textured material is adhered to the printing matrix. This texture is transferred to the paper during the printing process, Contemporary printmaking may include digital printing, photographic mediums, or a combination of digital, photographic, and traditional processes. Many of these techniques can also be combined, especially within the same family, for example, Rembrandts prints are usually referred to as etchings for convenience, but very often include work in engraving and drypoint as well, and sometimes have no etching at all. Woodcut, a type of print, is the earliest printmaking technique. It was probably first developed as a means of printing patterns on cloth, woodcuts of images on paper developed around 1400 in Japan, and slightly later in Europe. These are the two areas where woodcut has been most extensively used purely as a process for making images without text, the artist draws a design on a plank of wood, or on paper which is transferred to the wood
13.
Protestantism
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Protestantism is a form of Christianity which originated with the Reformation, a movement against what its followers considered to be errors in the Roman Catholic Church. It is one of the three divisions of Christendom, together with Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy. The term derives from the letter of protestation from German Lutheran princes in 1529 against an edict of the Diet of Speyer condemning the teachings of Martin Luther as heretical. Although there were earlier breaks from or attempts to reform the Roman Catholic Church—notably by Peter Waldo, John Wycliffe, Protestants reject the notion of papal supremacy and deny the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation, but disagree among themselves regarding the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. The Five solae summarize the reformers basic differences in theological beliefs, in the 16th century, Lutheranism spread from Germany into Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, the Baltic states, and Iceland. Reformed churches were founded in Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Scotland, Switzerland and France by such reformers as John Calvin, Huldrych Zwingli, the political separation of the Church of England from Rome under King Henry VIII brought England and Wales into this broad Reformation movement. Protestants developed their own culture, which made major contributions in education, the humanities and sciences, the political and social order, the economy and the arts, some Protestant denominations do have a worldwide scope and distribution of membership, while others are confined to a single country. A majority of Protestants are members of a handful of families, Adventism, Anglicanism, Baptist churches, Reformed churches, Lutheranism, Methodism. Nondenominational, evangelical, charismatic, independent and other churches are on the rise, and constitute a significant part of Protestant Christianity. Six princes of the Holy Roman Empire and rulers of fourteen Imperial Free Cities, the edict reversed concessions made to the Lutherans with the approval of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V three years earlier. During the Reformation, the term was used outside of the German politics. The word evangelical, which refers to the gospel, was more widely used for those involved in the religious movement. Nowadays, this word is still preferred among some of the historical Protestant denominations in the Lutheran and Calvinist traditions in Europe, above all the term is used by Protestant bodies in the German-speaking area, such as the EKD. In continental Europe, an Evangelical is either a Lutheran or a Calvinist, the German word evangelisch means Protestant, and is different from the German evangelikal, which refers to churches shaped by Evangelicalism. The English word evangelical usually refers to Evangelical Protestant churches, and it traces its roots back to the Puritans in England, where Evangelicalism originated, and then was brought to the United States. Protestantism as a term is now used in contradistinction to the other major Christian traditions, i. e. Roman Catholicism. Initially, Protestant became a term to mean any adherent to the Reformation movement in Germany and was taken up by Lutherans. Even though Martin Luther himself insisted on Christian or Evangelical as the only acceptable names for individuals who professed Christ, French and Swiss Protestants preferred the word reformed, which became a popular, neutral and alternative name for Calvinists
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Hapsburg Netherlands
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Habsburg Netherlands is the collective name of Holy Roman Empire fiefs in the Low Countries held by the House of Habsburg and later by the Spanish Empire, also known as the Spanish Netherlands. Then known as Seventeen Provinces, they were held by the Spanish Empire from 1556, in 1581, the Seven United Provinces seceded to form the Dutch Republic, the remaining Spanish Southern Netherlands eventually passed on to Habsburg Austria. Finally the Austrian Netherlands were annexed by the French First Republic in 1795, the Habsburg Netherlands was a geo-political entity covering the whole of the Low Countries from 1482 to 1581. The centre of the Burgundian possessions was the Duchy of Brabant, deeply disappointed, he entered into the disastrous Burgundian Wars and was killed in the Battle of Nancy. Upon the death of Mary of Burgundy in 1482, her possessions including the Burgundian Netherlands passed to her son. Through his father Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor from 1493, Philip was a Habsburg scion, the period 1481–1492 saw the Flemish cities revolt and Utrecht embroiled in civil war, but by the turn of the century both areas had been pacified by the Spanish rulers. Philips son Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, born in Ghent, succeeded his father in 1506 and his grandfather Emperor Maximilian I incorporated the Burgundian heritage into the Burgundian Circle, whereafter the territories in the far west of the Empire developed a certain grade of autonomy. Attaining full age in 1515, Charles went on to rule his Burgundian heritage as a native Netherlander and he acquired the lands of Overijssel and the Bishopric of Utrecht, purchased Friesland from Duke George of Saxony and regained Groningen and Gelderland. His Seventeen Provinces were re-organised in the 1548 Burgundian Treaty, whereby the Imperial estates represented in the Imperial Diet at Augsburg acknowledged a certain autonomy of the Netherlands. It was followed by a sanction by the Emperor the next year. By a 1522 inheritance treaty with his younger brother Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria, Emperor Charles V had established the Austrian, upon his abdication in 1556, the Seventeen Provinces fell to the Spanish Crown. Charless son and successor King Philip II of Spain by his despotism and Catholic persecutions sparked the Dutch Revolt, the Spanish hold on the northern provinces was more and more tenuous. In 1579 the northern provinces established the Protestant Union of Utrecht, after the secession of 1581, the southern provinces, called t Hof van Brabant remained with the House of Habsburg until the French Revolutionary Wars. After the extinction of the Spanish Habsburgs and the War of the Spanish Succession, the southern provinces were also known as the Austrian Netherlands from 1715 onwards
15.
St Mary Abchurch
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St Mary Abchurch is a Church of England church off Cannon Street in the City of London. Dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary, it is first mentioned in 1198–1199, the medieval church was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666, and replaced by the present building. The church dates back to the century and is dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The additional name Abchurch may be a variant of Upchurch, referring to its position on high ground. After the Reformation, Archbishop Parker persuaded Elizabeth I to grant the church to his college, Corpus Christi, Cambridge, restored and beautified in 1611 at the cost of the parishioners, St Marys was destroyed in the Great Fire of London of 1666. The church was rebuilt by the office of Sir Christopher Wren in 1681–1686, the parish was united with that of the nearby church of St Laurence Pontney, also destroyed in the Great Fire but not rebuilt. A bomb hit the church in September 1940 during the London Blitz, the greatest damage was to the dome. W. Godfrey Allen repaired the church between 1948–1953, the dome was restored by E. W. Tristan, and work on it was completed after his death in 1952 by the artist Walter Hoyle. Many sources describe the reredos as having been shattered into pieces by the bombing. In fact it was removed from the church by order of the church wardens, the church was designated a Grade I listed building on 4 January 1950. The church has a red brick exterior with stone dressings, there is a four-storey, 51-foot-high tower with a leaded spire. The ceiling of the church takes the form of a dome and it springs from four plain brick walls, has no external thrusts and measures more than forty feet across. It was painted with the present decorative scheme in 1708, when the church went under repair. Painted in oils directly on the plaster, the decorations are divided in two horizontally by a painted Trompe-lœil cornice, above this a choir of angels and cherubs in adoration surrounds a golden glow, in the centre of which it the name of God in Hebrew characters. Below it are eight seated female figures painted in monochrome in imitation of sculpture, the painting was restored once in the 18th century and twice in the 19th. The pulpit is by William Grey, and the door cases and its grand altar-piece is by Grinling Gibbons. Gibbons original bill for what he called the Olter Pees was rediscovered in the Guildhall Library in 1946, also to be seen there are original high box pews on three sides of the church. The church was without an organ until 1822, when public subscription allowed one to be built by J. C. Bishop
16.
Lucas de Heere
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Lucas de Heere was a Flemish portrait painter, poet and writer. De Heere, a Protestant, was born in Ghent, and became a refugee from the Dutch Revolt against Philip II of Spain, de Heere had to flee to England, where he became an elder of the Dutch stranger church of Austin Friars. After the Pacification of Ghent in 1576 he was able to return home and he was once again forced to leave the city in 1584 when Ghent surrendered to Spanish Habsburg forces. He was very popular during his career and became immensely rich and his portrait of Katheryn of Berain is held by the National Museum Cardiff. He painted a head of Philip II from the life in 1553, as a letter of Cardinal Granvelle documents, in England he trained other young Netherlanders, John de Critz, probably Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger, and possibly as well the English Robert Peake the Elder. Artists of the Tudor court Cultural depictions of Philip II of Spain Valois Tapestries Van Dam, tableau Poétique, A Recently Discovered Manuscript by the Flemish Painter-Poet Lucas DHeere. CC-licensed High-Resolution scans at Ghent University Library 6 Painting by or after Lucas de Heere at the Art UK site
17.
John de Critz
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John de Critz or John Decritz was one of a number of painters of Flemish and Dutch origin active at the English royal court during the reigns of James I of England and Charles I of England. He held the post of Serjeant Painter to the king from 1603, at first jointly with Leonard Fryer, De Critz was born in Antwerp. De Critz established himself as an independent artist by the late 1590s and he also painted bravely for court masques, dramatic spectaculars which required elaborate scenery and scenic effects. De Critzs father was Troilus de Critz, a goldsmith from Antwerp, John de Critzs sister Magdalena married Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger, another Flemish court painter, who may also have been a pupil of de Heere. De Critz was succeeded as Serjeant Painter by his son John the Younger, John the Younger was killed shortly afterwards in the fighting at Oxford. Other painters from the family include John the Elders sons Emmanuel, who worked for the court. Thomas also worked for the Crown between 1629 and 1637, oliver de Critz was a son of John the Younger by his third wife, his portrait in the Ashmolean Museum may be a self-portrait. In a patent issued on 7 May 1679 for Robert Streater, De Critz was given the post in 1603 but is first described as sharing the office with Leonard Fryer, who had held it since 1595. Robert Peake the Elder was appointed jointly with de Critz in 1607, a payment made to de Critz in 1633 shows that he was paid a retainer of £40 a year. For three portraitss made in 1606, of the King, Prince Henry, and Anne of Denmark, to be sent to the ambassador in Austria, de Critz was paid £53 six shillings and eight pence. In particular, Walpole quoted from a scrap of paper, a memorandum in his own hand, on the other side is a demand for payment for work on the royal barge, John De Critz demaundeth allowance for these parcells of Worke following, viz. The two figures of Justice and Fortitude most an end being quite new painted and guilded, John de Critzs final bill for painting these barges and their carvings by Maximilian Colt in 1621 was over £255. 3s. 4d. De Critz also gilded Maximilian Colts marble effigy for the tomb of Elizabeth I, completed in 1606, all traces of the painting and gilding have now disappeared. Art historian William Gaunt describes de Critzs role as mainly that of a handyman and it is not certain in precisely which part of London de Critz had his studio, but it is known that he moved to the parish of St Martin-in-the-Fields before his death in 1642. He stated in his will that he had lived for thirty years in the parish of St Andrew. Horace Walpole notes George Vertues comment that there were three rooms full of the pictures at de Critz’s house in Austin-friars. He died in London in 1642, the date is unknown. Although de Critz was a painter, few of his works have been clearly identified
18.
Isaac Oliver
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Isaac Oliver or Olivier was a French-born English portrait miniature painter. Born in Rouen, he moved to London in 1568 with his Huguenot parents Peter and he then studied miniature painting under Nicholas Hilliard, and developed a naturalistic style, which was largely influenced by Italian and Flemish art. His first wife, Elizabeth, died in 1599, with her he fathered Peter Oliver, who was also eminent in miniature painting. In 1602 he married Sara, daughter of the portrait painter Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder. Susannah was the daughter of Troilus de Critz, a goldsmith from Antwerp, and close relative of John de Critz and she was also the older sister or cousin of Magdalen de Critz who married Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger. After the death of Elizabeth I, he became a painter of James Is court, painting portraits of the queen Anne of Denmark and Henry Frederick. Some of his work is housed in Windsor Castle, some of his pen drawings are located in the British Museum. List of British artists Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Oliver, Isaac Oliver online Three Louvre miniatures recently attributed to Isaac Oliver Nicholas Hilliard & his Pupil Isaac Oliver. 6 Painting by or after Isaac Oliver at the Art UK site
19.
Roy Strong
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Sir Roy Colin Strong, CH FRSL is an English art historian, museum curator, writer, broadcaster and landscape designer. He has served as director of both the National Portrait Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Roy Colin Strong was born the third son of George Edward C. Strong and Mabel A. Strong, in Winchmore Hill, then in Middlesex, Strong graduated with a first class honours degree in history from Queen Mary College, University of London. He then earned his Ph. D from the Warburg Institute, in 2007 Strong listed his qualifications as DLitt PhD FSA. He became assistant keeper of the National Portrait Gallery in London in 1959, in 1967, aged 32, he was appointed its director, a post he held until 1973. He set about transforming its conservative image with a series of extrovert shows, dedicated to the culture of the 1960s and 1970s, Sir Roy went on to amuse audiences at the V&A in 1974 with his collection of fedora hats, kipper ties and maxi coats. By regularly introducing new exhibitions he doubled attendance, reflecting on his time as director of the National Portrait Gallery, Strong pinpointed the Beaton exhibition as a turning point in the gallery’s history. The public flocked to the exhibition and its run was extended twice, the queues to get in made national news. The Gallery had arrived, Strong wrote in the catalogue to Beaton Portraits, in 1973, aged 38, he became the youngest director of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. In 1977, following government cuts, he oversaw the closure of the much lamented Circulation Department of the V&A, in 1980, he was awarded the prestigious Shakespeare Prize by the FVS Foundation of Hamburg in recognition of his contribution to the arts in the UK. He was awarded The Royal Photographic Societys Presidents Medal and Honorary Fellowship in recognition of a sustained, among other work for television, in 2008 Strong hosted a six-part TV reality series The Diets That Time Forgot. The weekly series was first aired on 18 March on Channel 4, Strong is a notable scholar of Renaissance art, especially English Elizabethan portraiture, on which he has written many books and articles. In 2005, he published Coronation, A History of Kingship and he had a monthly column in The Financial Times for much of the 1970s and 1980s, and has written articles for many other magazines and newspapers. In 2000 he wrote Gardens Through the Ages and is a patron of the Plantation Garden and they enjoyed a belated honeymoon in Tuscany. She died in 2003 of pancreatic cancer, Strong lives in the village of Much Birch in Herefordshire,8 miles south of Hereford on the A49 trunk road. Here, with his wife, he designed one of Britains largest post-war formal gardens, in 1995 he and his wife commissioned the artist Jonathan Myles-Lea to paint a portrait of the house and gardens, which was completed the same year. Since 2010 the gardens have been open to the public by appointment, an offer by Strong to bequeath Laskett Gardens to the National Trust was rejected in 2014 after it was deemed that they fail to reach the high rung of national and historic importance. Strong later announced plans to have the gardens destroyed on his death and he later relented and in 2015 agreed to bequeath the gardens to the horticultural charity Perennial
20.
William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley
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William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley KG PC was an English statesman, the chief advisor of Queen Elizabeth I for most of her reign, twice Secretary of State and Lord High Treasurer from 1572. Albert Pollard says, From 1558 for forty years the biography of Cecil is almost indistinguishable from that of Elizabeth, Burghley set as the main goal of English policy the creation of a united and Protestant British Isles. His methods were to complete the control of Ireland, and to forge an alliance with Scotland, protection from invasion required a powerful Royal Navy. While he was not fully successful, his successors agreed with his goals, derek Wilson says, Few politicians were more subtle or unscrupulous than William Cecil. He was the founder of the Cecil dynasty which has produced politicians including two Prime Ministers. Cecil was born in Bourne, Lincolnshire, in 1520, the son of Sir Richard Cecil, owner of the Burghley estate, seisyllt is the original Welsh spelling of the anglicised Cecil. There is now no doubt that the family was from the Welsh Marches, the family had connections with Dore Abbey. However, the move to Stamford provides information concerning the Lord Treasurers grandfather, David, he, according to Burghleys enemies, David somehow secured the favour of the first Tudor king, Henry VII, to whom he seems to have been Yeoman of the Guard. He was Sergeant-of-Arms to Henry VIII in 1526, Sheriff of Northamptonshire in 1532, and his eldest son, Richard, Yeoman of the Wardrobe, married Jane, daughter of William Heckington of Bourne, and was father of three daughters and the future Lord Burghley. William, the son, was put to school first at The Kings School, Grantham, and then Stamford School. The precaution proved useless and four months later Cecil committed one of the rare acts of his life in marrying Mary Cheke. The only child of this marriage, Thomas, the future Earl of Exeter, was born in May 1542, and in February 1543 Cecils first wife died. William Cecils early career was spent in the service of the Duke of Somerset, who was Lord Protector during the years of the reign of his nephew. Cecil accompanied Somerset on his Pinkie campaign of 1547, being one of the two Judges of the Marshalsea and he also seems to have acted as private secretary to the Protector, and was in some danger at the time of the Protectors fall in October 1549. The lords opposed to Somerset ordered his detention on 10 October, Cecil ingratiated himself with Warwick, and after less than three months he was out of the Tower. On 5 September 1550 Cecil was sworn in as one of King Edwards two secretaries of state, in April 1551, Cecil became chancellor of the Order of the Garter. But service under Warwick carried some risk, and decades later in his diary, to protect the Protestant government from the accession of a Catholic queen, Northumberland forced King Edwards lawyers to create an instrument setting aside the Third Succession Act on 15 June 1553. Cecil resisted for a while, in a letter to his wife, he wrote, Seeing great perils threatened upon us by the likeness of the time, but at Edwards royal command he signed it
21.
Nicholas Hilliard
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Nicholas Hilliard was an English goldsmith and limner best known for his portrait miniatures of members of the courts of Elizabeth I and James I of England. He mostly painted small oval miniatures, but also some larger cabinet miniatures, up to ten inches tall. He enjoyed continuing success as an artist, and continuing financial troubles and his paintings still exemplify the visual image of Elizabethan England, very different from that of most of Europe in the late sixteenth century. He was the son of Richard Hilliard of Exeter, Devon, England, a staunchly Protestant goldsmith who was Sheriff of Exeter in 1568, and Laurence, daughter of John Wall, a London goldsmith. Hilliard may have been a relative of Grace Hiller, first wife of Theophilus Eaton. He appears to have been attached at an age to the household of the leading Exeter Protestant John Bodley. Calvinism does not seem to have struck with Hilliard, but the fluent French he acquired abroad was later useful. Thomas Bodley, two older, continued an intensive classical education under leading scholars in Geneva, but it is not clear to what extent Hilliard was given similar studies. Hilliard painted a portrait of himself at the age of 13 in 1560 and is said to have executed one of Mary, Queen of Scots, when he was eighteen years old. She was the daughter of Simon Bening, the last great master of the Flemish manuscript illumination tradition, after his seven years apprenticeship, Hilliard was made a freeman of the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths in 1569. He set up a workshop with his younger brother John, another brother was also a goldsmith, and he married Brandons daughter Alice in 1576 and they had seven children. Hilliard emerged from his apprenticeship at a time when a new royal portrait painter was desperately needed, Two panel portraits long attributed to him, the Phoenix and Pelican portraits, are dated c. Francis Bacon was attached to the embassy, and Hilliard did a miniature of him in Paris. He appears in the papers of the duc dAlençon, a suitor of Queen Elizabeth, under the name of Nicholas Belliart, peintre anglois, in 1577, money was a persistent problem for Hilliard. The typical price for a miniature seems to have been £3 — which compares well with prices charged by Cornelis Ketel in the 1570s of £1 for a head-and-shoulders portrait, a portrait of the Earl of Northumberland cost £3 in 1586. Nonetheless, he was imprisoned in Ludgate Prison that year, after standing surety for the debt of another. His father-in-law evidently had little trust in his financial acumen, his will of 1591 provided for his daughter by an allowance administered by the Goldsmiths Company. The same year the Queen gave him £400, an amount, after he made a second Great Seal
22.
Frans Pourbus the Elder
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Frans Pourbus the elder was a Flemish Renaissance painter. He was known primarily for his religious and portrait painting and worked mainly in Antwerp and his father was painter Pieter Pourbus and his son was painter Frans Pourbus the younger. Frans Pourbus the Elder on Artcyclopedia
23.
Portrait miniature
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A portrait miniature is a miniature portrait painting, usually executed in gouache, watercolour, or enamel. They were especially valuable in introducing people to other over distances. Soldiers and sailors might carry miniatures of their loved ones while traveling, the first miniaturists used watercolour to paint on stretched vellum. During the second half of the 17th century, vitreous enamel painted on copper became increasingly popular, in the 18th century, miniatures were painted with watercolour on ivory, which had now become relatively cheap. As small in size as 40 mm ×30 mm, portrait miniatures were used as personal mementos or as jewellery or snuff box covers. The portrait miniature developed from the manuscript, which had been superseded for the purposes of book illustration by techniques such as woodprints. Lucas Horenbout was another Netherlandish miniature painter at the court of Henry VIII and these might be paintings, or finished drawings with some colour, and were produced by François Clouet, and his followers. Following these men we find Simon Renard de St. André, others whose names might be mentioned were Joseph Werner, and Rosalba Carriera. The colours are opaque, and gold is used to heighten the effect and they are often signed, and have frequently also a Latin motto upon them. Hilliard worked for a while in France, and he is identical with the painter alluded to in 1577 as Nicholas Belliart. Hilliard was succeeded by his son Lawrence Hilliard, his technique was similar to that of his father, but bolder, Isaac Oliver and his son Peter Oliver succeeded Hilliard. Isaac was the pupil of Hilliard, Peter was the pupil of Isaac. The two men were the earliest to give roundness and form to the faces they painted and they signed their best works in monogram, and painted not only very small miniatures, but larger ones measuring as much as 10 in ×9 in. They copied for Charles I of England on a small scale many of his famous pictures by the old masters, other miniaturists at about the same date included Balthazar Gerbier, George Jamesone, Penelope Cleyn and her brothers. Samuel Cooper was a nephew and student of the elder Hoskins and he spent much of his time in Paris and Holland, and very little is known of his career. His work has a breadth and dignity, and has been well called life-size work in little. His portraits of the men of the Puritan epoch are remarkable for their truth to life and he painted upon card, chicken skin and vellum, and on two occasions upon thin pieces of mutton bone. The use of ivory was not introduced until long after his time and his work is frequently signed with his initials, generally in gold, and very often with the addition of the date
24.
Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex
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Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, KG, PC was an English nobleman and a favourite of Elizabeth I. Politically ambitious, and a general, he was placed under house arrest following a poor campaign in Ireland during the Nine Years War in 1599. In 1601, he led an abortive coup détat against the government and was executed for treason, Essex was born on 10 November 1565 at Netherwood near Bromyard, in Herefordshire, the son of Walter Devereux, 1st Earl of Essex, and Lettice Knollys. His maternal great-grandmother Mary Boleyn was a sister of Anne Boleyn and he was brought up on his fathers estates at Chartley Castle, Staffordshire, and at Lamphey, Pembrokeshire, in Wales. His father died in 1576, and the new Earl of Essex became a ward of Lord Burghley, in 1577, he was admitted as a fellow-commoner at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1579, he matriculated, and in 1581 he graduated as Master of Arts. On 21 September 1578, Essexs mother married Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, Elizabeth Is long-standing favourite, Essex performed military service under his stepfather in the Netherlands, before making an impact at court and winning the Queens favour. In 1590, he married Frances Walsingham, daughter of Sir Francis Walsingham and widow of Sir Philip Sidney, by whom he was to have several children, Sidney, Leicesters nephew, died in 1586 at the Battle of Zutphen in which Essex also distinguished himself. In October 1591, Devereuxs mistress, Elizabeth Southwell, gave birth to a son who survived into adulthood. Essex first came to court in 1584, and by 1587 had become a favourite of the Queen, in June 1587 he replaced the Earl of Leicester as Master of the Horse. After Leicesters death in 1588, the Queen transferred the late Earls royal monopoly on sweet wines to Essex, in 1593, he was made a member of her Privy Council. Essex underestimated the Queen, however, and his behaviour towards her lacked due respect and showed disdain for the influence of her principal secretary. On one occasion during a heated Privy Council debate on the problems in Ireland, in 1591, he was given command of a force sent to the assistance of King Henry IV of France. In 1596, he distinguished himself by the capture of Cadiz, so when the 3rd Spanish Armada first appeared off the English coast in October 1597, the English fleet was far out to sea, with the coast almost undefended, and panic ensued. This further damaged the relationship between the Queen and Essex, even though he was given full command of the English fleet when he reached England a few days later. Fortunately a storm dispersed the Spanish fleet, and though there were a few landings, Essexs greatest failure was as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, a post which he talked himself into in 1599. The Nine Years War was in its stages, and no English commander had been successful. More military force was required to defeat the Irish chieftains, led by Hugh ONeill, Essex led the largest expeditionary force ever sent to Ireland—16,000 troops—with orders to put an end to the rebellion. Essex had declared to the Privy Council that he would confront ONeill in Ulster, rather than face ONeill in battle, Essex entered a truce that some considered humiliating to the Crown and to the detriment of English authority
25.
National Portrait Gallery, London
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The National Portrait Gallery is an art gallery in London housing a collection of portraits of historically important and famous British people. It was the first portrait gallery in the world when it opened in 1856, the gallery moved in 1896 to its current site at St Martins Place, off Trafalgar Square, and adjoining the National Gallery. It has been expanded twice since then, the National Portrait Gallery also has regional outposts at Beningbrough Hall in Yorkshire and Montacute House in Somerset. It is unconnected to the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh, the gallery is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. The gallery houses portraits of important and famous British people, selected on the basis of the significance of the sitter. The collection includes photographs and caricatures as well as paintings, drawings, one of its best-known images is the Chandos portrait, the most famous portrait of William Shakespeare although there is some uncertainty about whether the painting actually is of the playwright. Not all of the portraits are exceptional artistically, although there are self-portraits by William Hogarth, Sir Joshua Reynolds, some, such as the group portrait of the participants in the Somerset House Conference of 1604, are important historical documents in their own right. Portraits of living figures were allowed from 1969, the three people largely responsible for the founding of the National Portrait Gallery are commemorated with busts over the main entrance. At centre is Philip Henry Stanhope, 5th Earl Stanhope, with his supporters on either side, Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay and it was Stanhope who, in 1846 as a Member of Parliament, first proposed the idea of a National Portrait Gallery. It was not until his attempt, in 1856, this time from the House of Lords. With Queen Victorias approval, the House of Commons set aside a sum of £2000 to establish the gallery, as well as Stanhope and Macaulay, the founder Trustees included Benjamin Disraeli and Lord Ellesmere. It was the latter who donated the Chandos portrait to the nation as the gallerys first portrait, Carlyle became a trustee after the death of Ellesmere in 1857. For the first 40 years, the gallery was housed in locations in London. The first 13 years were spent at 29 Great George Street, there, the collection increased in size from 57 to 208 items, and the number of visitors from 5,300 to 34,500. In 1869, the moved to Exhibition Road and buildings managed by the Royal Horticultural Society. Following a fire in buildings, the collection was moved in 1885. This location was unsuitable due to its distance from the West End, condensation. Following calls for a new location to be found, the government accepted an offer of funds from the philanthropist William Henry Alexander, Alexander donated £60,000 followed by another £20,000, and also chose the architect, Ewan Christian
26.
Chivalry
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Chivalry, or the chivalric code, is a code of conduct associated with the medieval institution of knighthood which developed between 1170 and 1220. The code of chivalry that developed in medieval Europe had its roots in earlier centuries, the term chivalry derives from the Old French term chevalerie, which can be translated to horse soldiery. Gautier states that emerged from the Moors as well as the Teutonic forests and was nurtured into civilization. Over time, its meaning in Europe has been refined to emphasise social and moral virtues more generally, in origin, the term chivalry means horsemanship, formed in Old French, in the 11th century, from chevalier, from Medieval Latin caballārius. In English, the term appears from 1292, thus, chivalry has hierarchical meanings from simply a heavily armed horseman to a code of conduct. Based on the three treatises, initially chivalry was defined as a way of life in which three essential aspects fused together, the military, the nobility, the religion. Gautiers Ten Commandments of chivalry are, Thou shalt believe all that the Church teaches, Thou shalt respect all weaknesses, and shalt constitute thyself the defender of them. Thou shalt love the country in which thou wast born, Thou shalt not recoil before thine enemy. Thou shalt make war against the infidel without cessation and without mercy, Thou shalt perform scrupulously thy feudal duties, if they be not contrary to the laws of God. Thou shalt never lie, and shalt remain faithful to thy pledged word, Thou shalt be generous, and give largesse to everyone. Thou shalt be everywhere and always the champion of the Right, though these ten commandments are often accepted to be what knights would use, these would not necessarily be what a knight actually followed in the medieval era. This code was created by Leon Gautier in 1883, long after the knight had ceased to exist in its traditional form. Chivalry in a sense was more of a subjective term. It is a version of the myth of the Golden Age, from Jean Charles Léonard de Sismondi, We must not confound chivalry with the feudal system. The feudal system may be called the life of the period of which we are treating, possessing its advantages and inconveniences, its virtues. Chivalry, on the contrary, is the world, such as it existed in the imaginations of the Romance writers. Its essential character is devotion to woman and to honour, Sismondi alludes to the fictitious Arthurian romances about the imaginary Court of King Arthur, which were usually taken as factual presentations of a historical age of chivalry. He continues, The more closely we look into history, the more clearly shall we perceive that the system of chivalry is an invention almost entirely poetical and it is impossible to distinguish the countries in which it is said to have prevailed
27.
Iconography
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The word iconography comes from the Greek εἰκών and γράφειν. A secondary meaning is the production of images, called icons, in the Byzantine and Orthodox Christian tradition. In art history, an iconography may also mean a depiction of a subject in terms of the content of the image, such as the number of figures used, their placing. Sometimes distinctions have been made between iconology and iconography, although the definitions, and so the distinction made, varies, when referring to movies, genres are immediately recognizable through their iconography, motifs that become associated with a specific genre through repetition. Gian Pietro Bellori, a 17th-century biographer of artists of his own time, describes and analyses, not always correctly, many works. Lessings study of the classical figure Amor with a torch was an early attempt to use a study of a type of image to explain the culture it originated in. These early contributions paved the way for encyclopedias, manuals, mâles lArt religieux du XIIIe siècle en France translated into English as The Gothic Image, Religious Art in France of the Thirteenth Century has remained continuously in print. In the United States, to which Panofsky immigrated in 1931, students such as Frederick Hartt, the period from 1940 can be seen as one where iconography was especially prominent in art history. These are now being digitised and made online, usually on a restricted basis. For example, the Iconclass code 71H7131 is for the subject of Bathsheba with Davids letter, whereas 71 is the whole Old Testament and 71H the story of David. A number of collections of different types have been classified using Iconclass, notably types of old master print, the collections of the Gemäldegalerie, Berlin. These are available, usually on-line or on DVD, the system can also be used outside pure art history, for example on sites like Flickr. Central to the iconography and hagiography of Indian religions are mudra or gestures with specific meanings, the symbolic use of colour to denote the Classical Elements or Mahabhuta and letters and bija syllables from sacred alphabetic scripts are other features. Under the influence of art developed esoteric meanings, accessible only to initiates. The art of Indian Religions esp, for example, Narasimha an incarnation of Vishnu though considered a wrathful deity but in few contexts is depicted in pacified mood. Conversely, in Hindu art, narrative scenes have become more common in recent centuries, especially in miniature paintings of the lives of Krishna. Eventually the Church would succeed in weeding most of these out, after the period of Byzantine iconoclasm iconographical innovation was regarded as unhealthy, if not heretical, in the Eastern Church, though it still continued at a glacial pace. More than in the West, traditional depictions were often considered to have authentic or miraculous origins, the Eastern church also never accepted the use of monumental high relief or free-standing sculpture, which it found too reminiscent of paganism
28.
Accession Day tilt
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The Accession Day tilts were a series of elaborate festivities held annually at the court of Elizabeth I of England to celebrate her Accession Day,17 November, also known as Queens Day. The last Elizabethan Accession Day tilt was held in November 1602, tilts continued as part of festivities marking the Accession Day of James I,24 March, until 1624, the year before his death. Sir Henry Lee of Ditchley, Queens Champion, devised the Accession Day tilts, the celebrations are likely to have begun somewhat informally in the early 1570s. Lee himself oversaw the annual festivities until he retired as Queens Champion at the tilt of 1590, the pageants were held at the tiltyard at the Palace of Whitehall, where the royal party viewed the festivities from the Tiltyard Gallery. The Office of Works constructed a platform with staircases below the gallery to facilitate presentations to the queen, tilt lists for the Accession Day pageants have survived, these establish that the majority of the participating jousters came from the ranks of the Queens Gentlemen Pensioners. Entrants included such members of the court as the Earl of Bedford, the Earl of Oxford, the Earl of Southampton, Lord Howard of Effingham. Sir James Scudamore, a knight who tilted in the 1595 tournament, was immortalized as Sir Scudamour in Book Four of The Faerie Queene by Edmund Spenser. A squire presented a pasteboard pageant shield decorated with the device or impresa to the Queen. In the painting on the left, Essex wears black armour, at this particular tilt, Essex entered as the head of a funeral procession, carried on a bier by his attendants. This was meant to atone for his failure to subdue Ireland, Sidney, in particular, as both poet and knight, embodied the chivalric themes of the tilts, a remembrance of Sidney was part of the tilt programme of 1586, the year after his death. Sidneys friend and protégé Sir James Scudamore, who would go on to be one of the competitors in the Accession Day tilt in 1595. About twelve o’clock the queen and her ladies placed themselves at the windows in a room at Weithol palace, near Westminster. From this room a broad staircase led downwards, and round the barrier stands were arranged by boards above the ground, so that everybody by paying 12d. would get a stand and see the play. Many thousand spectators, men, women and girls, got places, not to speak of those who were within the barrier and paid nothing. During the whole time of the tournament all those who wished to fight entered the list by pairs, the combatants had their servants clad in different colours, they, however, did not enter the barrier, but arranged themselves on both sides. Some gentlemen had their horses with them and mounted in full armour directly from the carriage, there were some who showed very good horsemanship and were also in fine attire. The manner of the combat each had settled before entering the lists, the costs amounted to several thousand pounds each. When the speech was ended he in the name of his lord offered to the queen a costly present. Now always two by two rode against each other, breaking lances across the beam, the fête lasted until five o’clock in the afternoon
29.
Favourite
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A favourite or favorite was the intimate companion of a ruler or other important person. In medieval and Early Modern Europe, among other times and places, from 1600 to 1660 there were particular successions of all-powerful minister-favourites in much of Europe, especially in Spain, England, France and Sweden. The term is sometimes employed by writers who want to avoid terms such as royal mistress, or friend. Too close a relationship between monarch and favourite was seen as a breach of the order and hierarchy of society. Since many favourites had flamboyant over-reaching personalities, they led the way to their own downfall with their rash behaviour. As the opinions of the gentry and bourgeoisie grew in importance, dislike from all classes could be especially intense in the case of favourites who were elevated from humble, or at least minor, backgrounds by royal favour. Titles and estates were usually given lavishly to favourites, who were compared to mushrooms because they sprang up suddenly overnight, the Kings favourite Piers Gaveston is a night-grown mushrump to his enemies in Christopher Marlowes Edward II. Their falls could be even more sudden, but after about 1650, favourites who came from the higher nobility, such as Leicester, Lerma, Olivares, and Oxenstierna, were often less resented and lasted longer. Oxenstierna and William Cecil, who died in office, successfully trained their sons to succeed them. Elizabeth I had Cecil as Secretary of State and later Lord High Treasurer from the time she ascended the throne in 1558 until his death 40 years later. She had more colourful relationships with several courtiers, the most lasting and intimate one was with Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, who was also a leading politician. Only in her last decade was the position of the Cecils, father and son, challenged by Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, Cardinal Wolsey was one figure who rose through the administrative hierarchy, but then lived extremely ostentatiously, before falling suddenly from power. Cardinal Granvelle, like his father, was a trusted Habsburg minister who lived grandly and it has been claimed that le Daims career was the origin of the term, as favori first appeared around the time of his death in 1484. Privado in Spanish was older, but was partly replaced by the term valido, in Spanish. Queen Victorias John Brown came much too late, the devotion of the monarch, in England, the scope for giving political power to a favourite was reduced by the growing importance of Parliament. Strafford can therefore hardly be called a favourite in the usual sense even though his relationship with Charles became very close and he was also from a well-established family, with powerful relations. After several years in power, Strafford was impeached by a Parliament now very hostile to him, there were later minister-favourites in England, but they knew that the favour of the monarch alone was not sufficient to rule, and most also had careers in Parliament. In France, the movement was in the opposite direction, the absolute monarchy pioneered by Cardinal Richelieu, Mazarins predecessor, was to be led by the monarch himself
30.
Trinity College, Cambridge
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Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge in England. With around 600 undergraduates,300 graduates, and over 180 fellows, by combined student numbers, it is second to Homerton College, Cambridge. Members of Trinity have won 32 Nobel Prizes out of the 91 won by members of Cambridge University, five Fields Medals in mathematics were won by members of the college and one Abel Prize was won. Other royal family members have studied there without obtaining degrees, including King Edward VII, King George VI, along with Christs, Jesus, Kings and St Johns colleges, it has also provided several of the well known members of the Apostles, an intellectual secret society. In 1848, Trinity hosted the meeting at which Cambridge undergraduates representing private schools such as Westminster drew up the first formal rules of football, Trinitys sister college in Oxford is Christ Church. Like that college, Trinity has been linked with Westminster School since the schools re-foundation in 1560, the college was founded by Henry VIII in 1546, from the merger of two existing colleges, Michaelhouse, and Kings Hall. At the time, Henry had been seizing church lands from abbeys, the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, being both religious institutions and quite rich, expected to be next in line. The King duly passed an Act of Parliament that allowed him to any college he wished. The universities used their contacts to plead with his sixth wife, the Queen persuaded her husband not to close them down, but to create a new college. The king did not want to use royal funds, so he combined two colleges and seven hostels to form Trinity. Contrary to popular belief, the lands granted by Henry VIII were not on their own sufficient to ensure Trinitys eventual rise. In its infancy Trinity had owed a great deal to its college of St Johns. Its first four Masters were educated at St Johns, and it took until around 1575 for the two colleges application numbers to draw even, a position in which they have remained since the Civil War. Bentley himself was notorious for the construction of a hugely expensive staircase in the Masters Lodge, most of the Trinitys major buildings date from the 16th and 17th centuries. Thomas Nevile, who became Master of Trinity in 1593, rebuilt and this work included the enlargement and completion of Great Court, and the construction of Neviles Court between Great Court and the river Cam. Neviles Court was completed in the late 17th century when the Wren Library, in the 20th century, Trinity College, St Johns College and Kings College were for decades the main recruiting grounds for the Cambridge Apostles, an elite, intellectual secret society. In 2011, the John Templeton Foundation awarded Trinity Colleges Master, Trinity is the richest Oxbridge college, with a landholding alone worth £800 million. Trinity is sometimes suggested to be the second, third or fourth wealthiest landowner in the UK – after the Crown Estate, the National Trust, in 2005, Trinitys annual rental income from its properties was reported to be in excess of £20 million
31.
Armillary sphere
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As such, it differs from a celestial globe, which is a smooth sphere whose principal purpose is to map the constellations. It was invented separately in ancient Greece and ancient China, with use in the Islamic world. With the Earth as center, a sphere is known as Ptolemaic. With the sun as center, it is known as Copernican, the flag of Portugal features an armillary sphere. The armillary sphere is also featured in Portuguese heraldry, associated with the Portuguese discoveries during the Age of Exploration and this section refers to labels in the diagram below. The exterior parts of machine are a compages of brass rings. The equinoctial A, which is divided into 360 degrees for showing the right ascension in degrees. The Arctic Circle E, and the Antarctic Circle F, each 23½ degrees from its respective pole at N and S.5. The equinoctial colure G, passing through the north and south poles of the heaven at N and S, the solstitial colure H, passing through the poles of the heaven, and through the solstitial points Cancer and Capricorn, in the ecliptic. Within these circular rings is a terrestrial globe J, fixed on an axis K. On this axis is fixed the flat celestial meridian L L and this flat meridian is graduated the same way as the brass meridian of the common globe, and its use is much the same. The globe may be turned by hand within this ring, so as to any given meridian upon it. The horizon is divided into 360 degrees all around its outermost edge, within which are the points of the compass, for showing the amplitude of the sun and the moon, both in degrees and points. The celestial meridian L passes through two notches in the north and south points of the horizon, as in a common globe, both here, if the globe be turned round, the horizon and meridian turn with it. At the south pole of the sphere is a circle of 25 hours, fixed to the rings, in the box T are two wheels and two pinions, whose axes come out at V and U, either of which may be turned by the small winch W. If the earthly globe be turned, the hour-index goes round its hour-circle, but if the sphere be turned, and so, by this construction, the machine is equally fitted to show either the real motion of the earth, or the apparent motion of the heaven. — Then turn the winch, and observe when the sun or moon rise and set in the horizon, throughout Chinese history, astronomers have created celestial globes to assist the observation of the stars. The Chinese also used the sphere in aiding calendrical computations and calculations
32.
Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany
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Ferdinando I de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany was Grand Duke of Tuscany from 1587 to 1609, having succeeded his older brother Francesco I. Ferdinando was the son of Cosimo I de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany and Eleanor of Toledo, the daughter of Don Pedro Alvarez de Toledo. He was made a Cardinal in 1562 at the age of 14 but was never ordained into the priesthood, at Rome, he proved an able administrator. He founded the Villa Medici in Rome and acquired works of art. When his brother Francesco I de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany died in 1587, in many ways, Ferdinando was the opposite of his brother who preceded him. Approachable and generous, he set out to rule mildly and he re-established the justice system and was genuinely concerned about the welfare of his subjects. During his reign, Tuscany revived and regained the independence his brother had given up, Ferdinando fostered commerce and gained great wealth through the Medici banks, which were established in all the major cities of Europe. He enacted an edict of tolerance for Jews and heretics, and he established the Medici Oriental Press, which published numerous books in the Arabic script. He improved the harbor Cosimo I had built and diverted part of the flow of the Arno River into a canal called the Naviglio, which aided commerce between Florence and Pisa. He fostered an irrigation project in the Val di Chiana, which allowed the flatlands around Pisa and Fucecchio, for the first two years of his reign, he retained his position as Cardinal. In 1589 he married Christina of Lorraine, the couple had a large reception at the Medici Villa in Poggio a Caiano. Christinas dowry was considerably large, it included 600,000 crowns in cash as well as jewellery with a value of 50,000 crowns. Also, the rights of the duchy of Urbino were transferred to Christina after the death of Queen Catherine and his foreign policy attempted to free Tuscany from Spanish domination. After the assassination of Henry III of France in 1589, he supported Henry IV of France in his struggles against the Catholic League, Ferdinando lent Henry money and encouraged him to convert to Catholicism, which he eventually did. Ferdinando also used his influence with the Pope to get him to accept Henrys conversion, Henry showed no appreciation for these favors, and Ferdinando let the relationship cool, maintaining his cherished independence. He supported Philip III of Spain in his campaign in Algeria and Rudolf II, for these undertakings, he found it necessary to raise taxes on his subjects. He finally obtained the investiture of Siena, which his father had conquered. Ferdinando also strengthened the Tuscan fleet, and it saw victories against pirates on the Barbary coast in 1607 and he also dreamed of a small African empire, and then considered the possibility of a colony in Brasil
33.
Palazzo Pitti
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The Palazzo Pitti, in English sometimes called the Pitti Palace, is a vast, mainly Renaissance, palace in Florence, Italy. It is situated on the side of the River Arno. The core of the present palazzo dates from 1458 and was originally the residence of Luca Pitti. The palace was bought by the Medici family in 1549 and became the residence of the ruling families of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. It grew as a treasure house as later generations amassed paintings, plates, jewelry. In the late 18th century, the palazzo was used as a base by Napoleon. The palace and its contents were donated to the Italian people by King Victor Emmanuel III in 1919, the palazzo is now the largest museum complex in Florence. The principal palazzo block, often in a building of design known as the corps de logis, is 32,000 square metres. It is divided into several principal galleries or museums detailed below, the construction of this severe and forbidding building was commissioned in 1458 by the Florentine banker Luca Pitti, a principal supporter and friend of Cosimo de Medici. The early history of the Palazzo Pitti is a mixture of fact, Pitti is alleged to have instructed that the windows be larger than the entrance of the Palazzo Medici. Besides obvious differences from the architects style, Brunelleschi died 12 years before construction of the palazzo began. The design and fenestration suggest that the architect was more experienced in utilitarian domestic architecture than in the humanist rules defined by Alberti in his book De Re Aedificatoria. Though impressive, the original palazzo would have no rival to the Florentine Medici residences in terms of either size or content. Whoever the architect of the Palazzo Pitti was, he was moving against the flow of fashion. The rusticated stonework gives the palazzo a severe and powerful atmosphere, reinforced by the series of seven arch-headed apertures. The Roman-style architecture appealed to the Florentine love of the new style allantica, work stopped after Pitti suffered financial losses following the death of Cosimo de Medici in 1464. Luca Pitti died in 1472 with the building unfinished, the building was sold in 1549 by Buonaccorso Pitti, a descendant of Luca Pitti, to Eleonora di Toledo. Raised at the court of Naples, Eleonora was the wife of Cosimo I de Medici of Tuscany
34.
Thomas Lee (army captain)
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Thomas Lee was an English army captain, who served under Queen Elizabeth I and spent most of his career in Ireland during the Tudor conquest of that country. Although of middle rank, he played a turbulent role in the politics of the time and was highly active during the Nine Years War. He was put to death at Tyburn for his involvement in the treason of the 2nd Earl of Essex, Thomas Lee was the grandson of Robert Lee by his second wife, Lettice Peniston, widow of Sir Robert Knollys, and daughter of Thomas Peniston of Hawridge, Buckinghamshire. His parents were Benedict Lee and Margaret Pakington, the daughter of Robert Pakington, Lee eventually became attached to Walter Devereux, 1st Earl of Essex. He probably arrived in Ireland in 1574 to take part in the scheme of Essex in eastern Ulster. By his marriage in 1578 to the Irish Catholic widow, Elizabeth Peppard, widow of John Eustace, he came into considerable property and he later bought Castle Reban, seeking its fee farm in April 1583, and much other property. In 1580 he was charged with robbery in Oxfordshire. In 1581, Lee and his wife were cited in a petition to Lord Deputy Grey for wrongs done to Robert Pipho, however, Grey was relying on him to counter the Eustace rebellion in the Pale and suppressed the charges. The following year in Waterford he had to himself of clamorous complaints. In February 1583, after the suppression of the rebellion, Lees company of 24 horsemen was disbanded. Lee had taken into his various properties of Baltinglas, for which he made petition, and managed to settle in Kildare. The privy council wrote to Lee in July 1583 granting the horse, in 1584-5 Lee complained of his loss of horse under Bagenal and Stanley in the north on campaign against Sorley Boy MacDonnell. He then visited England, and was employed in the autumn of 1585 by the new deputy, John Perrot. There he ran into the sheriff who grew to words and so to blows with him, Lee was outnumbered 300 to 60 but still captured the sheriff and killed several of his men. This event cemented the enmity of the Earl of Ormond, but Lee was able to rely upon the backing of Walsingham and Perrot, who allowed that he had acted according to duty. Lee plotted to take the leader of the rebellious bastard Leinster Geraldines, Walter Reagh, but the plot was betrayed by Lees wife, Lee separated from his wife in October 1587, but it seems he maintained some relations with her. By this time he had fallen out with Perrot - in part because of non-payment for his services - and was imprisoned for eight weeks in Dublin Castle and deprived of his company. Lee sent his wife to court to plead his case, in 1591 Lee suffered a great casual fire by the means of lewd servants at Castlemartin, which cost him £1,000 and left him and his wife with nothing but their clothes and some horses
35.
Order of the Garter
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The Most Noble Order of the Garter, founded in 1348, is the highest order of chivalry and the third most prestigious honour in England and the United Kingdom. It is dedicated to the image and arms of Saint George and it is awarded at the Sovereigns pleasure as a personal gift on recipients from the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms. Membership of the Order is limited to the Sovereign, the Prince of Wales, the order also includes supernumerary knights and ladies. New appointments to the Order of the Garter are always announced on St Georges Day, the orders emblem is a garter with the motto Honi soit qui mal y pense in gold lettering. Members of the wear it on ceremonial occasions. King Edward III founded the Order of the Garter around the time of his claim to the French throne, the list includes Sir Sanchet DAbrichecourt, who died on 20 October 1345. Other dates from 1344 to 1351 have also been proposed, the Kings wardrobe account shows Garter habits first issued in the autumn of 1348. Also, its original statutes required that member of the Order already be a knight. The earliest written mention of the Order is found in Tirant lo Blanch and it was first published in 1490. This book devotes a chapter to the description of the origin of the Order of the Garter, at the time of its foundation, the Order consisted of King Edward III, together with 25 Founder Knights, listed in ascending order of stall number in St.1431. Various legends account for the origin of the Order, the most popular legend involves the Countess of Salisbury, whose garter is said to have slipped from her leg while she was dancing at a court ball at Calais. When the surrounding courtiers sniggered, the king picked it up and returned it to her, exclaiming, Honi soit qui mal y pense, King Edward supposedly recalled the event in the 14th century when he founded the Order. This story is recounted in a letter to the Annual Register in 1774, The motto in fact refers to Edwards claim to the French throne, the use of the garter as an emblem may have derived from straps used to fasten armour. Medieval scholars have pointed to a connection between the Order of the Garter and the Middle English poem, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, in Gawain, a girdle, very similar in its erotic undertones to the garter, plays a prominent role. A rough version of the Orders motto also appears in the text and it translates from Old French as Accursed be a cowardly and covetous heart. While the author of that poem remains disputed, there seems to be a connection between two of the top candidates and the Order of the Garter. Scholar J. P. Oakden has suggested that it is related to John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, and, more importantly. Another competing theory is that the work was written for Enguerrand de Coucy, the Sire de Coucy was married to King Edward IIIs daughter, Isabella, and was given admittance to the Order of the Garter on their wedding day
36.
Lettice Knollys
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A grandniece of Anne Boleyn and close to Princess Elizabeth since childhood, Lettice Knollys was introduced early into court life. At 17 she married Walter Devereux, Viscount Hereford, who in 1572 became Earl of Essex, after her husband went to Ireland in 1573 she possibly became involved with Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. There was plenty of scandalous talk, not least when Essex died in Ireland of dysentery in 1576, two years later Lettice Knollys married Robert Dudley in private. When the Queen was told of the marriage she banished the Countess forever from court, the couples child, Robert, Lord Denbigh, died at the age of three, to the great grief of his parents and ending all prospects for the continuance of the House of Dudley. She continued to style herself Lady Leicester, the Countess was left rich under Leicesters will, yet the discharge of his overwhelming debts diminished her wealth. Lettice Knollys was always close to her family circle. Helpless at the eclipse of her eldest son, the second Earl of Essex. From the 1590s she lived chiefly in the Staffordshire countryside, where, in good health until the end. Lettice Knollys was born on 8 November 1543 at Rotherfield Greys and her father, Sir Francis Knollys, was a Member of Parliament and acted as Master of the Horse to Prince Edward. Her mother, Catherine Carey, was a daughter of Mary Boleyn, thus Catherine was Elizabeth Is first cousin, and Lettice Knollys her first cousin once removed. Lettice was the third of her parents 16 children, Sir Francis and his wife were Protestants. In 1556 they went to Frankfurt in Germany to escape persecution under Queen Mary I. It is unknown whether Lettice was among them, and she may have passed the next few years in the household of Princess Elizabeth with whom the family had a relationship since the mid-1540s. They returned to England in January 1559, two months after Elizabeth Is succession, Francis Knollys was appointed Vice-Chamberlain of the Royal Household, Lady Knollys became a senior Lady of the Bedchamber, and her daughter Lettice a Maid of the Privy Chamber. In late 1560 Lettice Knollys married Walter Devereux, Viscount Hereford, the couple lived at the family seat of Chartley in Staffordshire. Here the two eldest of their five children, the daughters Penelope and Dorothy, were born in 1563 and 1564, pregnant with her first son, she flirted with Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, the Queens favourite. The Queen found out at once and succumbed to a fit of jealousy, the Viscountess went back to Staffordshire where, in November 1565, she gave birth to Robert, later 2nd Earl of Essex. Two more sons followed, Walter, who was born in 1569, and Francis, Walter Devereux was raised to the earldom of Essex in 1572
37.
Essex's Rebellion
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The 2nd Earl of Essex, Robert Devereux was the main leader of Essexs Rebellion in 1601. The main tensions that led to the rebellion began in 1599 and he was sent to Ireland with the mission of subduing the revolts led by the Earl of Tyrone, leading one of the largest expeditionary forces ever sent to Ireland. In this dilemma, Devereux eventually made a truce with the rebels and this truce was seen as a disgrace to England and a detriment to the authority of those in power. He proceeded to leave Ireland and returned to England and his time spent as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland proved disastrous to him, his return was in express defiance of the orders of the Queen. She spoke out on his behaviour, calling it “Perilous and contemptable”, Devereux was deprived of his offices in June 1600 and promptly placed under house arrest. In disgrace as well as in political and financial ruin, Devereux wrote several letters of submission to the Queen and he spent further time sending letters in an attempt to gain permission to do so. In November 1600, Queen Elizabeth refused to renew his Government-granted monopoly on sweet wine and he began to create plans to seize the court by force. The Earls London residence, Essex House, became a point for people who were upset with Elizabeth’s government. On 3 February 1601, five of the leaders met at Drury House. Hoping to avoid suspicion, Devereux himself was not present, the group discussed Devereux’s proposals for seizing the court, the tower and the city. Their goal was to force the Queen to change the leaders in her government, particularly Robert Cecil, three days later, some of Devereux’s followers went to the Globe Theatre to ask the Lord Chamberlains Men to stage a special performance of Richard II with the deposition scene included. The company was hesitant to perform such a play. On 7 February, the council summoned Devereux to appear before them, Essex and his followers hastily planned the rising. At about 10am the next morning, Lord Keeper Thomas Egerton, Devereux seized the four messengers and kept them hostage while he and his followers made their way to the city. Meanwhile, Robert Cecil sent a warning to the mayor and the heralds denouncing Devereux as a traitor, once the word traitor was used, many of Devereuxs followers disappeared, and none of the citizens joined him as he had expected. Devereuxs position was desperate, and he decided to return to Essex House, when he got there, he found the hostages gone. The Queen’s men, under Lord High Admiral The Earl of Nottingham, by that evening, after burning incriminating evidence, Devereux surrendered. Devereux, the Earl of Southampton and the remaining followers were placed under arrest
38.
Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia
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Elizabeth Stuart was, as the wife of Frederick V, Elector Palatine, Electress Palatine, and briefly, Queen of Bohemia. Due to her husband’s reign in Bohemia lasting for just one winter and she was the second child and eldest daughter of James VI and I, King of Scots, England, and Ireland, and his wife, Anne of Denmark. She was also the granddaughter of Mary, Queen of Scots and she was four years older than her brother Charles, who became Charles I of England, Scotland, and Ireland. With the demise of the Stuart dynasty in 1714, her grandson succeeded to the British throne as George I of Great Britain, the reigning British monarch, Elizabeth II, is Elizabeth Stuarts direct descendant of the 10th and 11th generation through different paths. Elizabeth was born at Falkland Palace, Fife, on 19 August 1596 at 2 oclock in the morning, at the time of her birth, her father was King of Scots only. Named in honour of Queen Elizabeth I of England, the young Elizabeth was christened on 28 November 1596 in the Chapel Royal at Holyroodhouse, a couple of years later the kings second daughter, Margaret, was placed in their care as well. Elizabeth did not pay attention to this younger sister, as even at this young age her affections were with her brother. When Elizabeth I, the Queen of England, died in 1603, Elizabeth Stuarts father, James, along with her elder brother, Henry, Elizabeth made the journey south toward England with her mother in a triumphal progress of perpetual entertainment. Elizabeth remained at court for a few weeks, but there is no evidence that she was present at her parents coronation on 25 July 1603 and it seems likely that by this time the royal children already had been removed to Oatlands, an old Tudor hunting lodge near Weybridge. On 19 October 1603 an order was issued under the privy seal announcing that the King had thought fit to commit the keeping and education of the Lady Elizabeth to the Lord Harrington and his wife. Under the care of Lord Harington at Coombe Abbey, Elizabeth met Anne Dudley, the conspirators chose Elizabeth after considering the other available options. Prince Henry, it was believed, would perish alongside his father, Charles was seen as too feeble and Mary too young. Elizabeth, on the hand, had already attended formal functions. The conspirators aimed to cause an uprising in the Midlands to coincide with the explosion in London and she would then be brought up as a Catholic and later married to a Catholic bridegroom. The plot failed when the conspirators were betrayed and Guy Fawkes was caught by the Kings soldiers before he was able to ignite the powder, Elizabeth was given a comprehensive education for a princess at that time. This education included instruction in history, geography, theology, languages, writing, history, music. She was denied instruction in the classics as her father believed that Latin had the effect of making women more cunning. By the age of 12, Elizabeth was fluent in languages, including French
39.
Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales
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Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales was the elder son of King James I & VI and Anne of Denmark. His name derives from his grandfathers, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, Prince Henry was widely seen as a bright and promising heir to his fathers thrones. However, at the age of 18, he predeceased his father when he died of typhoid fever and his younger brother Charles succeeded him as heir apparent to the English, Irish and Scottish thrones. Henry was born at Stirling Castle, Scotland and became Duke of Rothesay, Earl of Carrick, Baron of Renfrew, Lord of the Isles and Prince and Great Steward of Scotland automatically on his birth. His father placed him in the care of John Erskine, Earl of Mar, although the childs removal caused enormous tension between Anne and James, Henry remained under the care of Mars family until 1603, when James became King of England and his family moved south. Henrys baptism on 30 August 1594 was celebrated with complex theatrical entertainments written by poet William Fowler, Henrys tutor Adam Newton continued to serve the Prince in England, and some Scottish servants from Stirling were retained, including poet David Murray. The king greatly preferred the role of schoolmaster to that of father, the princes popularity rose so high that it threatened his father. Relations between the two could be tense, and on occasion surfaced in public. At one point, the two were hunting near Royston when James criticised his son for lacking enthusiasm for the chase, and Henry initially moved to strike his father with a cane, most of the hunting party then followed the son. Upright to the point of priggishness, he fined all who swore in his presence, according to Charles Carlton, a biographer of Charles I, in addition to the alms box that Henry forced swearers to contribute to, he made sure his household attended church services. His religious views were influenced by the clerics in his household, Charles stamped on the cap and had to be dragged off in tears. With his fathers accession to the throne of England in 1603, as a young man, Henry showed great promise and was beginning to be active in leadership matters. Among his activities, he was responsible for the reassignment of Sir Thomas Dale to the Virginia Company of Londons struggling colony in North America. The Irish Gaelic lord of Inishowen, Sir Cahir ODoherty, had applied to gain a position as a courtier in the household of Henry, unknown to Sir Cahir, on 19 April 1608, the day he launched ODohertys Rebellion by burning Derry, his application was approved. Because of this Tyrone and his entourage mourned when the Prince met his early death, Henry died from typhoid fever at the age of 18. He was buried in Westminster Abbey, Prince Henrys death was widely regarded as a tragedy for the nation. According to Charles Carlton, Few heirs to the English throne have been as widely and deeply mourned as Prince Henry and his body lay in state at St. Jamess Palace for four weeks. On 7 December, over a thousand people walked in the cortege to Westminster Abbey to hear a two-hour sermon delivered by George Abbot
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Pelmet
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A pelmet is a framework placed above a window, used to conceal curtain fixtures. These can be used decoratively and also help insulate the window by preventing convection currents and it is similar in appearance to a valance, which performs the same function but is made of fabric. A pelmet can be made of plywood, and may be painted, exterior timber pelmets are a feature of some historic buildings, fitted on the outside of a window. These may be plain or decorative, with complex fretwork in some examples and these may be purely decorative, or serve to conceal an external blind mechanism. Due to the appearance of a pelmet, the term is used to describe an extremely short skirt
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William Larkin (painter)
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Larkin was born in London in the early 1580s, and lived in the parishes of St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, Holborn, and St Anne Blackfriars. He became a freeman of the Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers on 7 July 1606 under the patronage of Lady Arbella Stuart and Edward Seymour, 1st Earl of Hertford. Married before 1612, he buried a stillborn son in that year, a son, William, in 1613, another daughter called Mary was alive at the time of his death. He died sometime between the witnessing of his will on 10 April 1619 and its proving on 14 May, the date of his burial is unknown because the parish records were destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666. About 40 portraits by Larkin have been identified, of courtiers and gentry, a series of nine full-length portraits by Larkin formerly owned by the Earls of Suffolk and now known as the Suffolk Collection is housed in Kenwood House, London. For Sir Thomas Lucy, Cleaning revealed portions of inscriptions that Lees-Milne suggested showed that the portraits had been cut down from rectangular originals. In 1969, art historian Roy Strong identified Larkin with the artist formerly known as the Curtain Master based on Larkins patronage by the Earl of Dorset. The works of the Curtain Master are characterized by identically draped, silk-fringed curtains framing the sitter, rendered in various colours, and one of several carpets on the floor. Writing in 1960, Sir David Piper said of the now in the Suffolk collection and their ilk Artistically, they are a dead end. The deaths of Hilliard, Larkin, and fellow-portraitist Robert Peake the Elder in 1619 mark the end of this tradition in British art. Portraits by William Larkin at Bridgeman Art Library 25 Painting by or after William Larkin at the Art UK site Edmond, Hilliard and Oliver, The Lives and Works of Two Great Miniaturists. The Burlington Magazine, Vol.118, No, hearn, Karen, ed. Dynasties, Painting in Tudor and Jacobean England 1530–1630. Lees-Milne, James, Two Portraits at Charlecote Park by William Larkin, The Burlington Magazine, Vol.94, No. 597, pp.352 & 354–356, JSTOR, retrieved 20 January 2008 Ribeiro, Aileen, Fashion and Fiction, Dress in Art and Literature in Stuart England, Yale,2005, ISBN 0-300-10999-7 Strong, the English Icon, Elizabethan and Jacobean portraiture. London, Paul Mellon Foundation for British Art, New York, Pantheon Books,1969 Strong, Roy, The Surface of Reality, William Larkin,61, April 1993, Franco Maria Ricci Int
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Jacobean era
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The Jacobean era refers to the period in English and Scottish history that coincides with the reign of James VI of Scotland, who also inherited the crown of England in 1603 as James I. The practical if not formal unification of England and Scotland under one ruler was an important shift of order for both nations, and would shape their existence to the present day, in 1609 the Parliament of Scotland began the Plantation of Ulster. The most notorious event of James reign occurred on 5 November 1605, on that date, a group of English Catholics attempted to blow up the King and Parliament in the Palace of Westminster. However, the Gunpowder Plot was exposed and prevented, and the plotters were hanged, drawn. Frederick and Elizabeths election as King and Queen of Bohemia in 1619, before their Bohemian adventure, Elizabeth and Frederick were the focus of an outburst of romantic idealism. The Latin name Jacobus was transliterated from the Greek name Iakobos, in Hebrew, Jacob means Supplanter, and comes from the Hebrew verb aqab which means to take by the heel, assail, circumvent, or supplant. Political events and developments of the Jacobean era cannot be understood separately from the economic, James had inherited a debt of £350,000 from Queen Elizabeth, by 1608 the debt had risen to £1,400,000 and was increasing by £140,000 annually. The Jacobean era ended with an economic depression in 1620–1626. In literature, some of Shakespeares most prominent plays, including King Lear, Macbeth, Patronage came not just from James, but from James wife Anne of Denmark. Also during this period were powerful works by John Webster, Thomas Middleton, John Ford, Ben Jonson also contributed to some of the eras best poetry, together with the Cavalier poets and John Donne. In prose, the most representative works are found in those of Francis Bacon, the wildly popular tale of the Trojan War had until then been available to English readers only in Medieval epic retellings such as Caxtons Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye. Jonson was also an important innovator in the literary subgenre of the masque. His name is linked with that of Inigo Jones as co-developers of the literary, the fine arts were dominated by foreign talent in the Jacobean era, as was true of the Tudor and Stuart periods in general. Daniel Mytens was the most prominent portrait painter during the reign of James, some would also claim, as part of this trend, Cornelius Johnson, or Cornelis Janssens van Ceulen, born and trained in London and active through the first two Stuart reigns. The decorative arts — furniture, for example — became increasingly rich in color, detail, materials from other parts of the world, like mother-of-pearl, were now available by world-wide trade and were used as decoration. Even familiar materials, such as wood and silver, were worked more deeply in intricate, architecture in the Jacobean era was a continuation of the Elizabethan style with increasing emphasis on classical elements like columns. European influences include France, Flanders, and Italy, st Paul’s Cathedral designed by Sir Christopher Wren in London. In the domain of customs, manners, and everyday life, James I published his A Counterblaste to Tobacco in 1604, but the book had no discernible effect, by 1612, London had 7000 tobacconists and smoking houses
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Paul van Somer I
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He is sometimes designated as Paul van Somer I to distinguish him from the engraver of the same name who was active in England between 1670 and 1694. Paul van Somer is in ways a elusive figure, not much is known about him. According to Karel van Mander he was the brother of Barend van Someren, van Mander did not mention whether Paul had accompanied his brother to Italy or not, and only remarked that Paul was still a bachelor. According to the RKD Paul lived during the years 1612–1614 in the house of Steven de Gheyn in Leiden, during 1616 in Brussels, and after moved to London. Copies of van Somers royal portraits were commissioned, particularly as James disliked sitting for painters. Many variants also exist in printed form, van Somer is said to have introduced regalia into royal portraiture, for example that of the Order of the garter. Van Somer received additional commissions from non-royal sources, Lady Anne Clifford refers in her diary to being painted by him on 30 August 1619. A curiosity of van Somers oeuvre is his portrait of Elizabeth Drury, van Somer may have painted the portrait several years after Elizabeths death, or possibly during her visit to the continent with her parents shortly before she died. Some of van Somers work can still be seen today and he completed a much-reproduced portrait of James I in 1616 and one of Queen Anne in hunting attire with her dogs, in the grounds of Oatlands palace, a year later. Van Somer had by then become Annes favourite painter, supplanting John de Critz, other extant paintings include those of Lady Elizabeth Grey, countess of Kent, painted in about 1619, and a portrait of Ludovic Stewart, 2nd Duke of Lennox. 51 Painting by or after Paul van Somer I at the Art UK site
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Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers
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The Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers is one of the Livery Companies of the City of London. An organisation of painters of metals and wood, is known to have existed as early as 1283, a similar organisation of stainers, who generally worked on staining cloth for decorative wall hangings, existed as early as 1400. The two bodies merged in 1502, the new organisation was incorporated under a Royal Charter in 1581, each student receives £5,000 annually from the beginning of their second year until they complete their studies, and they are known as a Painters’ Company Scholar. The students are selected entirely on merit and this is the most meritocratically-awarded scholarship for art students in London today, with prize money of £30,000 the Prize is one of the most prestigious awards to artists in the UK. Eleven Liverymen have served the office of Lord Mayor since 1922, the Company ranks twenty-eighth in the order of precedence of Livery Companies. The Companys motto is Amor Queat Obedientiam, Latin for Love Can Compel Obedience, the Master for the year ensuing 19 October 2015 is Anthony John Ward, son of the late Liveryman and scribe to the Company, John Ward. The Clerk is Christopher John Twyman, the livery companys hall is situated between Huggin Hill and Little Trinity Lane, in the ward of Queenhithe
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Francis Drake
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Sir Francis Drake, vice admiral was an English sea captain, privateer, navigator, slaver, and politician of the Elizabethan era. With his incursion into the Pacific he inaugurated an era of privateering, Elizabeth I of England awarded Drake a knighthood in 1581. He was second-in-command of the English fleet against the Spanish Armada in 1588 and he died of dysentery in January 1596 after unsuccessfully attacking San Juan, Puerto Rico. His exploits made him a hero to the English but a pirate to the Spaniards, King Philip II was said to have offered a reward of 20,000 ducats, about £4 million by modern standards, for his life. Francis Drake was born in Tavistock, Devon, England, although his birth is not formally recorded, it is known that he was born while the Six Articles were in force. Drake was two and twenty when he obtained the command of the Judith and this would date his birth to 1544. A date of c.1540 is suggested from two portraits, one a miniature painted by Nicholas Hilliard in 1581 when he was allegedly 42 and he was the eldest of the twelve sons of Edmund Drake, a Protestant farmer, and his wife Mary Mylwaye. The first son was alleged to have named after his godfather Francis Russell. Because of religious persecution during the Prayer Book Rebellion in 1549, there the father obtained an appointment to minister the men in the Kings Navy. He was ordained deacon and was vicar of Upnor Church on the Medway. Drakes father apprenticed Francis to his neighbour, the master of a used for coastal trade transporting merchandise to France. The ship master was so satisfied with the young Drakes conduct that, being unmarried and childless at his death, Francis Drake married Mary Newman in 1569. She died 12 years later, in 1581, in 1585, Drake married Elizabeth Sydenham—born circa 1562, the only child of Sir George Sydenham, of Combe Sydenham, who was the High Sheriff of Somerset. After Drakes death, the widow Elizabeth eventually married Sir William Courtenay of Powderham. At age 23, Drake made his first voyage to the Americas, sailing with his cousin, Sir John Hawkins, on one of a fleet of ships owned by his relatives. In 1568 Drake was again with the Hawkins fleet when it was trapped by the Spaniards in the Mexican port of San Juan de Ulúa, following the defeat at San Juan de Ulúa, Drake vowed revenge. He made two voyages to the West Indies, in 1570 and 1571, of which little is known, in 1572, he embarked on his first major independent enterprise. He planned an attack on the Isthmus of Panama, known to the Spanish as Tierra Firme and the English as the Spanish Main
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Royal Collection
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The Royal Collection is the art collection of the British Royal Family and the largest private art collection in the world. The Queen owns some objects in the collection in right of the Crown, the Queens Gallery at Buckingham Palace in London was built specially to exhibit pieces from the collection on a rotating basis. There is an art gallery next to the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh. The Crown Jewels are on display in the Jewel House at the Tower of London. About 3,000 objects are on loan to museums throughout the world, few items from before King Henry VIII survive. The most important additions to the collection were made by Charles I, a collector of Italian paintings. Many works have been given from the collection to museums, especially by George III and Victoria, in particular, most of the then royal library was given by George III to the British Museum, now the British Library, where many books are still catalogued as Royal. The core of this collection was the purchase by James I of the collections of Humphrey Llwyd, Lord Lumley. Throughout the reign of Elizabeth II, there have been significant additions to the collection through purchases, bequests and through gifts from nation states. Numbering over 7,000 works, spread across the Royal Residences, numbering over 300 items, the Royal Collection holds one of the greatest and most important collections of French furniture ever assembled. The collection is noted for its range as well as counting the greatest cabinet-makers of the Ancien Régime. The Royal Collection is privately owned, although some of the works are displayed in areas of palaces, some of the collection is owned by the monarch personally, and everything else is described as being held in trust by the monarch in right of the Crown. All works of art acquired by monarchs up to the death of Queen Victoria in 1901 are heirlooms which fall into the latter category. Items the British royal family acquired later, including official gifts, ambiguity surrounds the status of objects that have come into Queen Elizabeth IIs possession during her reign. The Royal Collection Trust has confirmed that all pieces left to the Queen by the Queen Mother belong to her personally, non-personal items are said to be inalienable as they can only be willed to the monarchs successor. The legal accuracy of this claim has never been substantiated in court, in a 2000 television interview, the Duke of Edinburgh said that the Queen was technically, perfectly at liberty to sell them. In 1995, Iain Sproat, then Secretary of State for National Heritage, a registered charity, the Royal Collection Trust was set up in 1993 after the Windsor Castle fire with a mandate to conserve the works and enhance the publics appreciation and understanding of art. It employs around 500 staff and is one of the five departments of the Royal Household, buildings do not come under its remit
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