Property of a Gentleman Attributed to Rowland Lockey (c. 15...

Estimate

£40,000 - £60,000

Property of a Gentleman

Attributed to Rowland Lockey (c. 1565-1616)
c. 1602
A double portrait of Edward Neville, 8th Baron Bergavenny (1551-1622) with an enigmatic lady, possibly Lady Mary Sackville

Oil on canvas
In an ebonised and gilded frame
Inscribed, upper left 'Lord Abergany, AEta: 51.',  and upper right 'and Lady AEta: 21.'
Gallery labels verso

Lot Essay: 
This is an unusual double portrait. It depicts Edward Neville, born in 1550, son of Edward, 7th Baron Bergavenny but the lady is not his wife, Rachel Lennard, who would have been in her 40s at the date of this painting.

The Lady could be Edward Neville’s daughter-in-law Lady Mary Sackville who would have been about 21 in 1602. She married Henry Neville before 1602.  A reason for the unusual painting of a man with his daughter-in-law might be that this was a celebration of the continuance of the Roman-Catholic faith in the family.  Lady Mary was a confirmed Catholic who brought her children up accordingly. This might also explain the rare depiction at this date of a man with his arm around a lady.

The attribution to Rowland Lockey, who had been apprenticed to Nicholas Hilliard, is based on stylistic similarities.  It is also possible that Lockey worked regularly for recusant families. His group portrait of Sir Thomas More with his parents, family and descendants is derived from an earlier work by Holbein but adds Elizabethan sitters. It is a genealogical memorial of the staunchly Roman-Catholic More family over five generations, commissioned by More’s grandson. It is now in the National Portrait Gallery.

Provenance:

• By descent from the sitter to Capt. The Hon. Rupert Neville;


• Stanley Seeger, Sutton Place;


• The Sutton Place Heritage Trust;


• Sotheby’s, Sutton Place Sale, 17 March 1987, lot 55;


• Private Collection, United Kingdom