Lady Elizabeth Wriothesley, Lady Elizabeth Noel (d.c.1680) and an Attendant
Sir Peter Lely (Soest 1618 – London 1680)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
1660 - 1665
Materials
Oil on canvas
Measurements
1181 x 1207 mm (46 ½ x 47 ½ in)
Order this imageCollection
Petworth House and Park, West Sussex
NT 486278
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, Lady Elizabeth Wriothesley, Lady Elizabeth Noel (d.c.1680) and an Unidentified Attendant, Sir Peter Lely (Soest 1618 – London 1680), circa 1660/65. A three-quarter-length portrait of a woman, seated on the right-hand side, three-quarters left and wearing a gold and blue dress. On the left-hand side there is an unidenfitied child attednant, dressed in rose, plucking orange blossoms. The sitter was the daughter of Thomas Wriothesley, 4th Earl of Southampton (1607–1667) and his first wife Rachel de Ruvigny, married in 1661 Edward Noel, who succeeded his father Noel Baptist, 2nd Baron Noel of Ridlington, 3rd Viscount Campden & Baron Hicks of Ilmington (1611–1682), as Viscount Campden in 1682, and was created Earl of Gainsborough in the same year. She died in 1680 before his succession to these titles. Her half-sister, also called Elizabeth Wriothesley (1646–1690), the daughter of the Earl of Southampton’s second marriage, to Lady Elizabeth Leigh, became the wife of Josceline Percy, 11th Earl of Northumberland (1644–1670) (and is the sitter in PET/P125 & 485). The 4th Earl of Southampton’s third wife, with whom he was painted in a double portrait by Lely (formerly in the collection of Col. F. J. B. Wingfield Digby, Coleshill; Beckett, no.500, p.62 & pl.75), and whom he married in 1659, was Lady Frances Seymour, daughter of William, 2nd Duke of Somerset (the title was restored to whom in September 1660, a month before his death), and widow of Richard, 2nd Viscount Molyneux. Note on the Unidentified Attendant: That the attendant is a child of African descent suggests he may be enslaved. It is not known if the child was included by the artist as a trope or as a portrait of a real individual.
Provenance
In the collection of the 2nd Earl of Egremont (1710-1763) by 1863 thence by descent. Thence by descent, until the death in 1952 of the 3rd Lord Leconfield, who had given Petworth to the National Trust in 1947, and whose nephew and heir, John Wyndham, 6th Lord Leconfield and 1st Lord Egremont (1920-72) arranged for the acceptance of the major portion of the collections at Petworth in lieu of death duties (the first ever such arrangement) in 1956 by H.M.Treasury.
Marks and inscriptions
Lady Eliz. Wriothesley/married to Edward )?Noel created?)/Earl of Gainsborough
Makers and roles
Sir Peter Lely (Soest 1618 – London 1680), artist