The
present portrait of an elegantly attired young woman is a fine example of the type
of portraiture that spanned the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods. Rich with
colour and detail, this style of painting dominated Elizabeth’s reign and
remained in vogue until the 1620s, when tastes began to shift towards a more
dynamic mode of depiction.

Painted
in the mid-1610s, this portrait shows a young woman bedecked in the trappings
of wealth and status. Her hair is worn in a fashionable upswept manner and is
embellished with a jewelled ‘tire’ of a floral design, which would have caught
the light and shimmered as she moved. A broad lace ruff frames her delicate
complexion, complemented by a large pearl – symbolic of purity – worn on her
ear. The bodice of the dress is decorated with floral motifs and embroidered
with glistening silver thread. Between her two fingers, the sitter gently holds
a necklace, likely made of rock crystal – a costly accessory that was evidently
of personal significance.

Stylistically,
this portrait bears apparent similarities with a group of portraits by or
attributed to Robert Peake, painted in and around 1615. These include the
portraits of Lady Anne Pope, 1615,[1] Lady Elizabeth Pope, c. 1615,[2]
and Portrait of a Lady, c. 1615.[3]
All these works feature young female sitters, often with their hands raised to
their chests, their heads slightly tilted downward, and a hint of a smile.

Robert Peake was born into a prosperous Lincolnshire family
and is first recorded by name on 30 April 1565 when he enrolled as an
apprentice to the London goldsmith Laurence Woodham.[4]
In 1576, he became a freeman of the London Goldsmith’s Company and, over the
next three years, was employed as a painter for the Office of Revels – a
department of the Royal Household responsible for staging events such as
banquets, masks, plays, and dances. He is now best known for his striking
depictions of the royal family, particularly those of Henry, Prince of Wales,
for whom he seems to have been the official portraitist. Having at one time been
in danger of obscurity, Peake, as one of the few court painters of note not to
be foreign, is now recognised as a major figure in the evolution of a British
School of painting. Like his contemporaries in the de Critz and Gheeraerts
families, Peake specialised in the meticulous depiction of costume and
jewellery demanded by late Elizabethan patrons.

[1] Tate, T00068.

[2] Tate, T00067.

[3] Phillips, London, 12 December 1995, lot 32.

[4] The most up to date biography on Peake is Karen Hearn’s entry in the
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2008).