My first thought when I saw the painting is that it must surely be a portrait of Catherine Howard, the unfortunate fifth wife of Henry VIII. It is listed in the collections of the Met Museum, New York as ‘Portrait of a Young Woman in the style of Hans Holbein the Younger’ but a look through the work’s provenance reveals that I am not the only one to wonder if perhaps this is not just a genuine Holbein but also a painting of the elusive Catherine Howard.
The reasons for this tentative identification are the sitter’s age, which is given as seventeen; the richness of her clothes and her auburn prettiness – all of which would fit with Catherine Howard, who probably didn’t live past her twentieth birthday and was said to be a petite, vivacious, pretty redhead with a fondness for costly, lavish garments.
Fashions didn’t change all that rapidly during the reign of Henry VIII, although one can track small changes in the vogue of the time as it would have been worn by the more fashion conscious young courtiers. The girl in the New York portrait is dressed in a style that would have been popular in the early 1540s – shimmering satin, full sleeves and a prettily decorated French hood, which we know was very much favoured by Catherine Howard, who was executed on the 13th February 1542.
Compare the painting with this well known miniature by Holbein, that has been traditionally been identified as a painting of Catherine:
The miniature of Catherine Howard has been identified thanks to the lavish jewels that she wears and which are clearly the same as the ones that appear in the Holbein portrait of Jane Seymour and are known to belong to the personal collection of the Queen of England. As one commenter has pointed out, it is more than a little bit creepy that portraits of Henry’s wives are identified by the jewels that they shared but alas, that’s mostly all that we have got to go on.
In the miniature of Catherine, we have the same clear fondness for gorgeous clothes and jewels, the French hood and a similar auburn prettiness. However, there are differences about the face – a thinner mouth for instance and a rounder face.
Perhaps the miniature is a portrait of Henry’s niece Lady Margaret Douglas, the daughter of his sister Queen Margaret of Scotland. Lady Margaret, who was born in October 1515 lived at the English court and was even romantically involved with Catherine Howard’s half brother, Charles at one point. You can imagine how this went down with her uncle Henry…
There also exists a Holbein sketch that has been very tentatively identified as being of Catherine and which, I think bears even more resemblence to the New York portrait with a similar nose, eyes and arched eyebrows:
Of course there are plenty of other young ladies at Henry VIII’s court that this portrait could depict – it may depict one of her two sisters, Margaret or Mary for instance or someone not related to her at all!
It’s all hypothetical of course but I rather like the idea of a new portrait of Catherine Howard coming to light. What do you think? I’ve always thought that miniature portrait, despite the royal fabulousness of the clothes looks too ‘old’ to be pretty Mistress Howard who, if not the idiot that she is popularly portrayed to be (quite the reverse – she was more literate than average for a girl of her age at this time), was a typically flighty and fun loving young girl in her teens.
Not to mention this much discussed Holbein portrait, which was always traditionally identified as the unfortunate Catherine until suddenly opinion decided that it was actually a painting of Elizabeth Seymour, Jane’s sister and Thomas Cromwell’s daughter in law. Gosh, they liked to keep things complicated and a bit close knit didn’t they but remember what I said on a recent post about there only being less than a hundred female courtiers at Henry’s court amongst all those men? Lately however, David Starkey has decided that actually this IS a painting of Catherine after all because of, you guessed it, the jewellery that she is wearing.
I really don’t like this attribution though – for a start she looks too old to be warm hearted, jolly teen bride Catherine, who probably didn’t even make it to the twenty one years of age that this lady is. However, I don’t know, do you think there is something a bit whimsical, playful even in her eyes? Am I imagining it? No, I think that I must be. She just looks a trifle smug doesn’t she?
The thing is, can you imagine men dying for a kiss (okay it was a bit more than a kiss but this is a family blog) from those thin coyly smiling lips? Can you imagine an elderly King ‘so amorous of her that he cannot treat her well enough and caresses her more than he did the others’? Even allowing for taste, which in Henry’s case I suspect tended towards the more obviously attractive. Can you imagine the woman in this portrait setting men’s hearts aflame with dangerous and reckless lust?
No, me neither. Sorry Portrait Lady, for all I know you could have had more tricks than the Mata Hari but I’m going to have to disbelieve it on physical evidence alone.
The girl in the first portrait though? Hm, maybe…
What a great line of thought!
They are beautiful paintings and I do think the NY one is very special!
It’s beautiful isn’t it? :)
I think there’s some similarity around the eyes and brow, but I’m less sure about the nose and mouth – the portrait has a very distinct full mouth and the sketch looks thinner-lipped to me. Or is it just that only the darkest lines in the sketch are showing up on my monitor?
I thought the sketch looked rather pouty too but you are probably right. I think she definitely has the Howard Look though so maybe she is another one of the cousins, possibly one of Katherine’s sisters? :)
Well, it’s not like there was a shortage of Howards. :)
I’m somewhere between ‘fascinated’ and ‘creeped out’ at successive Henry VIII wives being identified by their jewellery. I bet someone somewhere’s written a YA novel from the perspective of that necklace.
The lady in the mystery portrait, doesnt she look so like Scarlett Johannssen? Such a beautiful portrait.
She does, doesn’t she? There’s an irony there after people said she was too pretty to be Mary Boleyn… ;)
I feel sure it is Queen Katherine, and indicates that she was born in 1524 or 1525, thus being seventeen or eighteen at the time of her execution.
Yes, my feeling is that it’s Katherine too. I think I may post again about this one and have a proper look at it! :)
I love the hypothesising! Personally, I can’t make up my mind whether I think it’s her or not but your train of thought about the ages in the other pictures certainly makes sense. Definitely food for thought.
Oh me too – I am probably totally wrong but I adore the sleuthing aspect of history! It’s such fun!
I think that I basically just want it to be her because it’s a lovely painting and I feel so sorry for poor Catherine and feel that she would have been really happy to be remembered as a pretty girl. I mean, that’s probably a bit shallow in the general scheme of things but I just get a feeling that this would have really mattered to her.
Would the minature that she is wearing on her chest be of any significance in trying to identify her? If it is Catherine who do you think it is likely to be a portrait of?
I thought this – apparently it’s similar to a design by Holbein, who of course, used to design amazing jewels for the Tudor court as a side line to his painting. I think I need to delve a bit deeper into this though.
I do know though that the wood panel that the painting is on dates from around 1521. :)
My guess is that it is someone of authority at court – at the very least one of Catherine’s ladies in waiting. Most of the Usual Suspects like Lady Mary Howard and Lady Margaret Douglas were in their mid twenties in the early 1540s though so we can rule them out. We’re looking for a girl in her late teens at this time – the main candidate being, of course, the Queen herself.
I have only just started looking at this, but I would expect that Catherine liked to surround herself with women of a similar age to herself so her attendants were probably in their late teens too.
Lots of investigating to be done! :)
Don’t forget that the court artisans usually tried to make their subjects look better (or more in style) than they actually appeared in person which also causes issues when you are trying to identify the subject. (I really liked the sketch)
I agree with you that the second women looks too self contained and someone who follows every single rule.. I couldn’t imagine men falling at her feet… more like they would marry her for her fortune.
I didn’t know they used jewels to identify portraits, that seems logical and wearing former princess/queen jewels is a bit creepy… like Lady Diana’s ring on Kate’s finger. I think they should wait a few generations before using it again…
Heh, yes, I know but I generally absolve Holbein of flattery as he seems to have been extremely committed to veracity when painting his sitters. I’d be more wary when looking at a possible work by another artist though – Vigée Lebrun springs to mind here, as she was clearly an arch flatterer of her subjects.
The miniature just doesn’t scream ‘Catherine Howard’ to me – it’s pretty much accepted to be of her now, but I just don’t see it. Yes, the jewels and clothes add up but the face doesn’t for me. It looks like a smug, plump girl in her twenties to me not a vivacious young Queen.
It’s grim isn’t it about the jewels but makes sense. However, fashion was fairly static at this time so I suspect everyone had pretty much the same trinkets on as well, not to mention the sharing of particularly costly pieces within the family.
I strongly believe it is Katherine Howard. The portrait identified by David Starkey as being Queen Katherine is not her, I believe, I think it’s more likely to be Mary Tudor – who was 21 in 1537, when Jane Seymour died, so is it not possible Mary was dressed in mourning clothes to mourn her stepmother’s death?? – or Margaret Douglas, perhaps. Furthermore, I don’t think Katherine was born anywhere near as early as 1520-21 and was in fact more likely born around 1524.. which this portrait would seem to justify.
Actually there is a look of Mary about the girl in the black dress isn’t there? That’s really interesting as I hadn’t considered her as a possible sitter for that particular portrait.
The first painting definitely fits my idea of Catherine more than the others!
I do think this could be Katherine Howard as far as her looks. The one in the black dress I have never thought it could be her the sitter is old looking and matronly. Since Henry viii favored Thomas culpepper as well, wonder if there were ever a painting done of him as he was reportedly dashing? I do think only 1 painting was done of Katherine though because like Jane Seymour who only had one done she was only Queen like 18 months of that on progress too and several months isolated on a honeymoon. No portrait would be done before her marriage. Also Anne Bassett was much favored by the King or what about Bessie Blount? The sketch looks like a similar sketch that was claimed to be Anne Boleyn during pregnancy. The one that everyone says is Katherine Howard wearing the sane jewels to me looks like Thomas Howard with the large nose. She is not attractive to me tho and looks older. The one with the auburn hair is quite pretty and young and what I always believed Katherine to look more like. However what is the brooch she’s wearing? It looks like a young man and not the King?
There is something about the first portrait that suggests energy and vivacity. I can imagine the sitter having difficulty staying still…
Wouldn’t it make more sense for the lady in the portrait to be Katherine Parr? Considering her age, matronly appearance, time frame and the mourning clothes, this would lead me to believe it’s Henry’s 6th wife especially since the jewellery is from the queens collection.