The Lady Katherine Grey 1549 Miniature
A Girl, formerly thought to be Queen Elizabeth I as Princess
Victoria and Albert Museum | P.21-1954
Roy Strong writes: «Attributed to Levina Teerlinc, Katherine Grey, Countess of Hertford, 1555-60. Lady Katherine Grey (1540-68), daughter of Frances, Marchioness of Dorset and Duchess of Suffolk and grand-daughter of Henry VIII’s sister, Mary, Queen of France and wife of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk. Together with her elder and younger sisters, Jane and Mary, enjoyed the status of Tudor princesses. Under Mary she first received the advances of the Duke of Somerset’s son, Edward Seymour, Earl of Hertford. In 1560, without royal permission, she secretly married him, a fact which the imminent birth of a child brought to light. Sent to the Tower by Elizabeth, she was later, in 1563, transferred to confinement in the country where she died in 1568. The miniature is in its original turned ivory box. The identification as Lady Katherine Grey is secured by the very early inscription on the back of the miniature. A second version, very much repainted, of the same miniature but bearing the date 1549 is also in the V&A (P.21-1954). The date, however, is a later addition and the costume is typical of Mary’s reign which would accord with the age of the sitter, about fifteen to twenty, c. 1555-60. The formula is derived from portraits by Hans Eworth and this relationship is clearer in the second version which is to the waist and includes hands clasped together. A third miniature of the same sitter, which may also be by Teerlinc, is at Belvoir Caslte (Duke of Rutland) (Erna Auerbach, Hilliard, pl. 8), depicting the Countess wearing a miniature of her husband and carrying her son in her arms. The dating can therefore be established as the child was born on September 21st 1561 and must be about a year to eighteenth months in the miniatures, i.e. late 1562 or early 1563. Large-scale paintings, probably derived from the miniature, exist of this, e.g. Audley End, Petworth, Syon and Trinity College, Oxford.» (Strong, Roy. Artists of the Tudor Court: the Portrait Miniature Rediscovered 1520-1620. London: The Victoria and Albert Museum, 1983. Cat. 38, p. 53.) Portrait miniature of Katherine Grey, Countess of Hertford | Victoria and Albert Museum | P.21-1954 / P.10&A-1979
Provenance:
This miniature was Lot 69 at Christie's, 25 June 1954 (reproduced in catalogue). It was sold by Col. the Hon. Thomas G. Morgan-Grenville, D.S.O., O.B.E., M.C., to whom it had descended from the collection of the 2nd Marquess of Breadalbane.
I have spent a lot of time trying to figure out how John Campbell, 2nd Marquess of Breadalbane was related to Lady Katherine Grey, without success.
Until I quite by accident came over this engraving in an old book:
From a Miniature by Holbein in the Collection of Sam.l Rogers Esq.
Now, this looks quite familiar. The book, Women of History, was published in 1890, too late for the most likely Samuel Rogers (30 July 1763 – 18 December 1855) to have been the owner at the time:
«The poet Samuel Rogers assembled a much-admired art collection, which became one of London’s prime attractions. It was so vast that when he died, the sale went on for nineteen days. Ranging from antiquities to paintings and sculpture, ancient and modern, it comprised 327 ‘illuminated miniatures’» Decorated initial | Victoria and Albert Museum
However, the engraving in the book appears to have been based on an even earlier engraving:
(add.info.: Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603). After a painting by Hans Holbein the Younger.)
Look and Learn / Valerie Jackson Harris Collection
© Look and Learn / Valerie Jackson Harris Collection
And, indeed, in the Sales Catalouge of THE VERY CELEBRATED COLLECTION OF WORKS OF ART, THE PROPERTY OF SAMUEL ROGERS, Esq., Deceased; from 1856, we find:
967 A Collection of Miniatures, in one frame; consisting of Petrarch’s Laura, the Lady Elizabeth, by Holbein, 1549—engraved in the Royal Collection ; Juana and Arabella of Arragon, Henry Stewart Lord Darnley, a Doge of Venice, and six others
Just to repeat:
the Lady Elizabeth, by Holbein, 1549—engraved in the Royal Collection
I think we may safely establish that the miniature hails from the Samuel Rogers Collection.
Perhaps a sleuth amongst my readers can discover from whence it got there.
The Marquis of Breadalbane was an eager buyer at this sale:
https://archive.org/details/catalogueofveryc1856chri/page/88/mode/2up?view=theater
Edited to add on the 9th of March 2026
Since, another, clearer copy of this engraving has emerged.
The engraving is from 1823, and the miniature was in the Samuel Rogers Collection at that time.
RCIN420944
Called Elizabeth I
Watercolour on Vellum Applied to Card
5.2 cm in diameter
©Royal Collection
The Samuel Rogers Collection was also the home of this miniature, RCIN 420944, which I have also always believed to depict Lady Katherine Grey.
«A portrait of Lady Jane Grey wearing the red and white roses in her hair was for many years ascribed to Princess, afterwards Queen, Mary, and was shewn by Mr. Sackville Bale at South Kensington in 1865, as a portrait of that lady, and attributed to Holbein. It came from the collection of Samuel Rogers.» (Foster, J.J., 1903. Miniature painters, British and foreign: With some account of those who practised in America in the eighteenth century. New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., p. 24.)
It was recorded in the sales catalogue as “lot 960. Princess Mary, daughter of Henry VIII, after Holbein.” (The Royal Collection Miniature Portrait – Lady Jane Grey Revisited)
(End edit.)
New Counter on the 6th of March 2026
The old counter measured, as I understand it, the whole site. The new one only the page it is on. The new counter counts from the date above.