boards must have been cut before Jane died in February 1554. A date after 1554 would render the painting a posthumous one. But for the moment, a date of execution in the mid- to late-sixteenth century seems supportable.
The painting has a fragmentary inscription in the upper left quadrant that apparently once read “Lady Jayne.” Much of the paint of the inscription has deteriorated, rendering the writing less than clear, but authorities agree that “Lady Jayne” is the likely text. Dr Sheldon believes that the inscription is exactly contemporaneous with the painting itself. This is critical, as it supports the veracity of the association of the inscription with the sitter depicted. It was not unusual for inscriptions to be added years or decades later; nor was it unusual for such later inscriptions to be erroneous. An exactly contemporaneous inscription that uses the same paint, as this one seems to do, suggests that the sitter really is someone called “Lady Jayne.”
The style of the costume is also correct for the period 1550–1553. The V-shaped bottom hem of the bodice became popular after the 1540s. The farthingale sleeves passed out of popularity around 1555, so that the painting probably pre-dates that time. The French hood and chemise collar are also correct for the early 1550s.
As with the Eworth portrait, the number and quality of the jewels also suggest a person of quite high social and economic status. The richly embroidered silken and velvet fabrics are also indicative of high status.
And again as with the Eworth portrait, the sitter wears no wedding ring, suggesting the young lady was unmarried. If Jane is the sitter, the portrait must therefore date to before her marriage in May 1553.
There are, however, certain questions that arise from the costume. The chemise collar is embroidered along the edge with fleur-de-lis. That design served as a heraldic emblem for the Crown of France. And while the English monarchs of the Tudor period also laid nominal claim to the crown of France, and Jane’s grandmother was briefly Queen Consort of France, the right to bear those emblems was limited in law. Jane was not, prior to June 1553, herself an heir to the throne of England, and thus would have had no right to the French heraldic emblems. Their usage in this portrait is, to me, a reason to question an identification of the sitter as Jane Grey, though not an insurmountable one.
The floral design of the embroidery on the underskirt is “contentious” and “ambiguous,” according to Christopher Foley of Lane Fine Art. The design has variously been identified as strawberries, gilly flowers, and pinks. To my eye, they resemble Scots thistles. Pinks were, however, a badge of the Grey family (see T.E. Scott-Ellis, Baron Howard de Walden, Banners, Standards, and Badges from a Tudor Manuscript in the College of Arms [London: De Walden Library, 1904], p. 98) . Indeed, the sitter in the Jane Grey/Katherine Parr portrait in the National Portrait Gallery (NPG 4451) holds a pink, one reason why that painting was formerly identified as Jane Grey. A more definitive identification of the design, if such a determination is even possible, would be useful for “firming up” the identification of the sitter.
The Streatham portrait (my ‘nickname’ for it) is exactly identical to another portrait once owned by Lord Houghton. That picture (the ‘Houghton portrait,’ I shall call it, no image available yet) originated with the Rodes family of Houghton Hall in Yorkshire and was part of a larger collection of portraits of Protestant luminaries. The Houghton portrait was displayed in a national exhibition in 1866 as a portrait of Jane Grey. The existence of two identical but quite separate works under the same identification suggests that the identification is authentic.
The overall quality of the painting is notably crude. It was painted by an artist with considerably less skill than someone like Eworth or Holbein. The quality might be described as naive, primitive, or even folk art. This does not mean, however, that it is not an authentic portrait of Jane Grey. In my opinion, this suggests that both the Streatham and Houghton portraits are in all likelihood copies of a now-lost original, possibly an original of much higher quality. The results of any eventual dendrochronological analysis may clarify this issue. It seems unlikely, for example, that an artist of such relatively low skill working after Jane’s death would have known to portray her in clothing from an earlier period. However, a post-1554 copyist working from a pre-1554 original would have reproduced the earlier costume ... on post-1554 boards.
For the time being, pending a full evaluation by the National Portrait Gallery, I am comfortable that the painting is an authentic but primitive attempt to depict Lady Jane Grey. I strongly suspect, however, that it is not an original life portrait. It is at best a later copy of an earlier but now lost original, itself perhaps but not necessarily a life portrait. At worst, it is another of the many posthumous portraits created as part of the emergent hagiography created to construct Jane Grey as a Protestant martyr. If the latter is the case, it may well be one of the first of that kind. The National Portrait Gallery’s assessment will hopefully provide a greater degree of confidence in the painting’s authenticity as a true portrait of Jane Grey, whether ad vivum or posthumous.
Post Script : In an email of 1 November 2006, Mr. Christopher Foley of Lane Fine Art was kind enough to convey to me the results of a dendrochronological analysis of the boards on which this portrait was painted. Dendrochronology, the study of the age of wood samples based on tree ring patterns, is a precise science that can determine within a few years the time at which wood was harvested. In the case of this portrait, the analysis reveals that the wood was harvested no earlier than the 1590s. The painting therefore cannot have been created before that time, so that this cannot be a life portrait of Jane Grey. It may, however, be a later copy of a lost original.
Post post script, January 2007 : The National Portrait Gallery (London) has now acquired the portrait (NPG accession number 6804) and will be placing it on permanent display in the Tudor Gallery in the summer of 2007 following conservation work. The NPG believes the portrait does, in fact, depict Lady Jane Grey, though they also note that it was not painted until at least forty years after her death, perhaps as a copy of a lost original.
Much of the information used to produce this assessment was generously provided by
Mr Christopher Foley of Lane Fine Art of London.
The opinions expressed here are entirely my own.
Updated 7 February 2007
Copyright © 2006 - 2008, J. Stephan Edwards
May not be reproduced in part or in whole without the written permission of the author.
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