Chats on Old Miniatures

by J. J. Foster

Every tyro in art knows, it may be said, the eminence of Hans Holbein the Younger as a painter, and especially as a portrait painter. He had other gifts as well, to which we shall refer by and by, but perhaps all my readers may not be aware that Holbein must be regarded as the actual founder of the art of miniature painting in England.

As Hans Holbein came to London in 1526 it will be seen that the art of limning has, in this country, a genealogy, so to speak, of nearly four hundred years. And during all that long period, and amidst the great number of artists who worked therein, there is no greater name to be found than that of the Augsburg painter. It is to Erasmus that he owed his introduction to this country, which he visited for the first time when he was about thirty-two years of age. The painter's acquaintance with Erasmus was made at Basle, where, by the way, in the Salle des Dessins, one of the best portraits of Holbein is to be found—a drawing in body colour on vellum, beautifully finished, which I here reproduce. Sir Thomas More was a friend of Erasmus, and it was to the house of this distinguished man that Holbein went on his arrival. There he remained some time, painting portraits of eminent men with whom he must have come in contact at Chelsea, amongst others—Archbishop Warham, Sir Henry Guildford, Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, Sir Thomas More himself, and two generations of the More family.

After a while he returned to Switzerland, and when he revisited this country in 1531 his friend had become Lord Chancellor. We need not attempt to follow his career here in detail; there is no doubt that he soon was taken into the service of Henry VIII., and, becoming a favourite of that monarch, was attached to the Royal household, and appears to have had apartments in the palace at Whitehall. In 1538 he is spoken of as "a sarvand of the Kynges Majesties named Mr. Haunce." At this time his salary was £30 per annum, as to which the relative value of money, then and now, must not be forgotten. In this year he was at Brussels with Sir Philip Hobby, having a commission to paint the portrait of the young widowed Duchess of Milan. It is a magnificent full-length portrait, one of his finest works, and may be seen in the National Gallery to-day, having been lent by the Duke of Norfolk. This demure-looking lady may be credited with having a pretty wit of her own, if the story told of her reception of an offer of marriage by Henry VIII. be true; the answer she made to these overtures was that she must beg to be excused as she was possessed of but one neck.

The collection of pictures and drawings for pictures attributed to Holbein, and now preserved at Windsor, is well known and justly celebrated. But it is with the miniatures which are supposed to be his work that we have most to do in this book. It is somewhat remarkable that so great an authority as the late Mr. Ralph Wornum must be allowed to be should dispute the fact of Holbein having ever painted any miniatures at all. In his "Life and Works of Holbein" he distinctly asserts that there is not a single miniature in existence which can be positively assigned to Holbein.

PETER OLIVER.

SIR KENELM DIGBY.
(Burdett-Coutts Collection.)

VENETIA, LADY DIGBY
(Burdett-Coutts Collection.)

The learned late Keeper of the National Gallery would probably not have disputed that Holbein did paint miniatures, in the face of Van Mander's explicit statement that "he [Holbein] worked equally well in oil and in water-colours; he painted also miniatures of a special excellence, which last art he learned from one Master Lucas, then in London, whom, however, he soon surpassed." Then we have the testimony of Sandrart, who says: "Holbein began practising the art when in the King's service, having been incited thereto by the excellence of the works of Master Lucas." There is no question, either, that Van der Doort regarded Holbein as a limner; in his catalogue of King Charles I.'s collection he speaks of two miniatures of Henry VIII. which he ascribes to Holbein. But Mr. Wornum says of these that it is next to impossible to identify them now. Then there is the express statement of Nicholas Hilliard, who declares himself as the pupil of Holbein in the art of limning.