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This lyrical and arresting portrait was painted by George Gower, an artist who has ascended in status in recent years thanks to new scholarship.[1] He has emerged as one of the most successful and long-serving court painters of the Elizabethan age. Until recently, the well-dressed sitter in this portrait was thought to be Thomas Arundell, 1st Baron Arundell of Wardour. However, recent research has confirmed that it actually depicts Thomas’s younger brother, William. The confusion occurred due to a misunderstanding of the coat of arms in the upper right corner, which includes a previously overlooked crescent-shaped ‘cadency’ mark on the crest, indicating the subject was a second son.[2]

The history of the Arundell family parallels the turbulent times in which they lived. William’s grandparents were Sir Thomas Arundell, an influential government officer and landowner, and Margaret (née Howard), sister of Queen Catherine Howard who was beheaded in 1542 on charges of treason. In 1544 Thomas acquired Wardour Castle in Wiltshire, which was built in the 1390s by John, 5th Baron Lovell. His imposing new family seat did little to impress his peers, however, and as a staunch Catholic living during the reign of a protestant king, Thomas found himself in a precarious position. Nevertheless, he refused to renounce his faith and following an ill-judged alignment with Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset – the muchdisliked Lord Protector of England – he was arrested and convicted of conspiring to overthrow the government. He was beheaded on Tower Hill on 26 February 1552.

On the accession of the Catholic Mary I in 1554, Thomas’s son Matthew received the bulk of the family inheritance by grant of the queen and in 1570 he reacquired Wardour Castle. The Arundells, however, were never free from the messy politics of religion; Matthew’s brother Charles was a notorious recusant who was imprisoned on the accusation of spying for Philip II of Spain and later became the leader of the English Catholic exiles in France.

William, the subject of our portrait, was born in 1561 and was the second son of Sir Matthew Arundell and his wife Margaret, daughter of Sir Henry Willoughby of Wollaton, Nottinghamshire. William’s life was short, but judging by surviving records, was one of privilege and comfort. One of the most compelling documents relating to his life is, ironically, his will, which sheds light on his circle of friends and his possessions at the time of his death.[3]

There were three executors named in the will: Lord William Howard, the third son of Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk, Edward Gage, son of James Gage of Bentley, Sussex, and John Budden of Shaftesbury, Dorset. The last was a successful lawyer who enjoyed a close relationship with Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, whose favour he gained through the sharing of confidential information relating to the highly profitable business of distributing wardships. Salisbury was immensely influential, so it is little surprise that he was also a friend of Arundell, who bequeathed a silver basin and ewer to Lord and Lady Salisbury in his will.[4]

As well as money, bracelets and bowls, Arundell also lists some more intriguing items in his will. To Lord William Howard, for example, he bequeathed twenty pounds and ‘my two pictures’.[5] On the basis that later in the will Arundell refers specifically to ‘my mother’s picture’ and ‘my picture of Saint Peter’, it seems likely that when referring to ‘my two pictures’ Arundell is alluding to pictures of himself. This raises the tantalising question as to whether the present work, painted twelve years previously in 1580, was one of the two pictures he gave to Howard. It is impossible to know this for certain, but it is nevertheless an intriguing possibility worthy of further consideration.

In the upper left corner of this portrait, we see an impresa depicting a centaur placed above a Latin inscription ‘Non spirat Qui non afpirat’, which roughly translates as ‘no one respires who does not aspire’.[6] The inscription is also a play on words; aspirat is both a synonym for breathing (as in ‘aspirate’) and a word used to mean aspire or desire. The fusion of enigmatic imagery with witty wordplay was championed in portraiture during this period and reflects the Elizabethan obsession with secrecy, puzzles and complex visual enigmas which aimed to intellectually stimulate and perplex the viewer.

The fashion was inspired by the publication of emblem books in mainland Europe, the most popular being Alciati’s Emblematum Liber published in 1531 and reprinted in over one-hundred editions before the 1620s.[7] Each emblem in the book was titled and accompanied by a short verse. Emblem books became a source of great curiosity for the educated classes in Elizabethan England and the imagery was soon transposed onto painted portraits.

Unlike an emblem, which contained a message applicable to everyone, an impresa was intended to reflect the aspirations of the bearer at a specific moment in their life or in their lifetime in general.[8] The centaur seen here is Sagittarius (also known as ‘the Archer’), one of the twelve signs of the zodiac, corresponding, presumably, to the months in which the sitter was born. Sagittarius is associated with the centaur Chiron from Greek mythology, who was the tutor of Achilles and was known for his strength, wisdom and knowledge. As a centaur, Chiron possessed both human and beastlike qualities; he showed compassion and intelligence, but also lust and a warrior-like attitude when facing his enemies. As an archer, he never missed his target.

Imagery of Chiron appears in numerous emblem books from the period, including the 1546 edition of Alciati’s Emblematum Libellus beneath the title Consiliarii Principum (‘councillor of princes’). When viewed in tandem with the Latin motto, we can presume that the impresa is intended to reflect the sitter’s intelligence, but also his aspirations and ambition. We are being told that those with no ambition cannot claim to have lived.

George Gower’s talent is manifest in the quality of his work. His stylistic characteristics are evident in the emphatically expressed facial features, the blocky, three dimensionality of the anatomy, and the creamy opacity of the flesh tones. But despite our growing awareness of his capabilities, and the patrons he attracted, in the absence of historical records, Gower still remains a somewhat elusive figure.

Gower’s earliest recorded works are two portraits of Sir Thomas Kytson and his wife Elizabeth Cornwallis, Lady Kytson. Their authorship is confirmed by a payment in Kytson’s accounts in September 1573 to ‘Gower of London payntr for v pictures vi li vs’ (five pictures for £6.5s., or twenty-five shillings each).[9] Using these portraits as a basis for comparison, in the late 1960s the art historian Sir Roy Strong expanded Gower’s oeuvre to include twenty-five paintings dated to between 1572 and 1586.[10] Strong’s research was published in his seminal work The English Icon (1969) which remains an important source of information on portraiture from this period.

Recently, however, scholars have undertaken the formidable task of studying Gower’s work in greater detail and piecing together surviving documentary evidence with the aim of answering certain questions about this mysterious yet distinguished artist.[11] A few biographical details on Gower had already been established. It was known that he was the grandson of Sir John Gower (d.1513) of Stittenham in North Riding, Yorkshire, and that by 1573, when he painted the Kytson portraits, he was an established portrait painter working in London. It has now been suggested, however, that Gower, who came from a Protestant family, was born in London soon after his father gained the freedom of the Mercer’s Company in 1537.[12] It seems likely that Gower, like his father, would have enrolled as a merchant’s apprentice, but then fled London with his family on the accession of the Catholic Mary I in 1554.[13]

It is also now known that in 1556-7 Gower gained the freedom of the city of York, but then returned to London where on 9 February 1565/6 he married a woman named Grace Webb at the Savoy Chapel, in the parish of St Mary-le-Strand, Westminster.[14] By this date Gower’s reputation was growing and in 1571, through his late father’s membership of the Mercer’s Company, he gained the freedom of the city, giving him greater access to the upper echelons of the court.

One of the most intriguing questions regarding Gower’s early career is where and with whom he trained. Although it is impossible to know for certain given the absence of records, there were several artists and workshops within Westminster who could have trained Gower or at least influenced his work.[15] It is known that prominent portrait painter John Bettes lived nearby as did a painter named Arnold Derickson, about whom little is known but may possibly be the artist identified by Strong as the Master of the Countess of Warwick.[16] As observed by scholars Edward Town and Jessica David, Gower seems to have absorbed from Bettes ‘a tactile combination of solid, corporeal volume based upon nuanced, linear drawing; from the Master of the Countess of Warwick, a tendency to elongate the silhouette, emphasise deep shadows beneath the flesh, reinforce linear facial features and layer detail that created opulent but stubbornly two-dimensional depictions of threedimensional objects’.[17]

Regardless of Gower’s training, he was evidentially considered a painter worthy of patronage and a record in the household accounts of Sir Henry Sidney (1529–1586) reveals payment for ‘one picture of my lord himself, in full payment, 62s. 6d, and IIJ other pictures of noblemen 33s’ between 1 February 1572/3 and 20 May 1574.’[18] The portrait referred to above is now thought to be the impressive full-length portrait of Sidney now at Petworth House, Sussex. A further full-length portrait of Sidney’s sister Frances Sidney (1531–1589) Countess of Sussex, thought to have been painted around 1572, is now also attributed to Gower.[19]

The latter is particularly interesting, as infra-red imaging has revealed the portrait was painted over the top of a full-length image of Elizabeth I, the composition of which bears a strong resemblance to the ‘Hampden’ portrait, now in a private collection and formerly with Philip Mould & Company.[20] This discovery, combined with the obvious compositional affinities between the Hampden portrait and that of the Countess of Sussex, may indicate that Gower, or at least his workshop, was responsible for both works.

Despite the arrival of the supremely talented limner Nicholas Hilliard (c.1547–1619) at the court of Elizabeth I, Gower held his own, and in 1581 he was made Serjeant Painter. Although this role traditionally included more routine decorative work around the palaces, Gower appears to have focussed his energies on producing portraits of the queen and her court, and in 1584 a draft patent was drawn up, probably by Gower, bestowing him the exclusive right to produce likenesses of Elizabeth in oils.[21] Although his wish was never granted, it did little to dampen his spirits, and is it now thought that Gower was the artist responsible for one of Elizabeth’s most iconic portraits from the latter half of her reign – the ‘Ermine’ portrait, painted in 1585. Over four hundred years after Gower’s death in 1596, scientific analysis coupled with extensive archival research has shone a new light on the life and work of this previously overlooked iconographer of the Elizabethan age. There are still questions which remain unanswered, but as more of his works come to light, these missing details might too emerge from the shadows.

[1] For the most up to date biography on George Gower see: Town, E and David, J. (2020) ‘George Gower: portraitist, Mercer, Serjeant Painter’, The Burlington Magazine, no. 162, pp. 730-747.

[2] We are grateful to John Tunesi of Beacon Genealogical and Heraldic Research for his assistance in identifying the coat of arms in this portrait.

[3] Will of William Arundell of Le Savoy, London. 23 February 1592. National Archives PROB 11/79/169. Transcribed (with modern spelling) by Nina Green, 2017 [online]. Available at: http://www.oxford-shakespeare.... [accessed 14 Dec. 2020].

[4] Will of William Arundell of Le Savoy, London. 23 February 1592. National Archives PROB 11/79/169. Transcribed (with modern spelling) by Nina Green, 2017 [online]. Available at http://www.oxford-shakespeare.... [accessed 14 Dec. 2020].

[5] Will of William Arundell of Le Savoy, London. 23 February 1592. National Archives PROB 11/79/169. Transcribed (with modern spelling) by Nina Green, 2017 [online]. Available at http://www.oxford-shakespeare.... [accessed 14 Dec. 2020].

[6] We are grateful to William Aslet and Laura Mackinnon for their assistance with the translation of the inscription.

[7] For more information on the use of emblems and imprese in Elizabethan art see: Strong, R. (2019) ‘A Choice of Emblems: The Emblematic Portrait’, The Elizabethan Image: An Introduction to English Portraiture 1558 to 1603. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, pp. 84–113.

[8] Strong. (2019) ‘Choice of Emblems’, pp. 86-89.

[9] Goodison, J.W. (1948) ‘George Gower, Serjeant Painter to Queen Elizabeth’, The Burlington Magazine, Vol. 90, No.546, pp. 262-63, Quoted in Town, E and David, J. (2020) ‘George Gower (ca. 1538–1596): Portraitist, Mercer, Serjeant-Painter’, The Burlington Magazine, vol.162, no.1410, p. 731.

[10] See Strong, R. (1969) The English Icon: Elizabethan and Jacobean Portraiture, London: Paul Mellon Foundation, pp. 167–184.

[11] For the most complete overview of the life and work of George Gower, see: Town. and David, (2020) ‘Gower’, pp. 730-747.

[12] Town. and David, (2020) ‘Gower’, p. 737.

[13] Ibid.

[14] City of Westminster Archive Centre, parish register of St Mary-le-Strand. In Town. and David, (2020) ‘Gower’, p. 738.

[15] Town. and David, (2020) ‘Gower’ pp. 740-742.

[16] For further information on the possible identification or Derickson as the Master of the Countess of Warwick see: Town. and David, (2020) ‘Gower’, pp. 740-742 and Town, E. ‘A Portrait of the Miniaturist as a Young Man: Nicholas Hilliard and the Painters of 1560s London’, British Art Studies, Issue 17, Available at: https://doi.org/10.17658/issn.... [accessed 19 Dec. 2020]. For Roy Strong’s work on the Master of the Countess of Warwick see: Strong (1969) English Icon, pp. 107–114.

[17] Town and David, (2020) ‘Gower’, p. 742.

[18] Arnold, for my lord’s pycture’, Historical Manuscript Commission, Report on the Manuscripts of Lord De l’Isle and Dudley preserved at Penshurst Place, Kent, London, 1925, I, p. 248 in Town and David, (2020) ‘Gower’, p. 743.

[19] Town and David, (2020) ‘Gower’, p. 743-4.

[20] For a more complete discussion of this discovery and its implications see Town and David, (2020) ‘Gower’, p. 743.

[21] Auerbach, E. (1954) Tudor Artists: A Study of Painters in the Royal Service and of Portraiture on Illuminated Documents from the Accession of Henry VIII to the death of Elizabeth I. London: Athlone, p.109.