Nicholas Hilliard | The History Jar

PrincessElizabethMiniaturec1550attributedtoLevinaTeerlinc.jpg When we think of Elizabethan miniatures we tend to think of the wonderfully Hilliard portraits with their stunning azure backgrounds. However before Hilliard there was a professional female artist who created some equally evocative images. The image at the start of this post shows a young Elizabeth Tudor and is the work of Levina Teerlinc.

Levina started work for Henry VIII and in the twenty-first century in an era when we are still talking about the “pay gap” it’s worth noting that such was her repute as an artist was such that her pay was more than that of Holbein who had recently died and vacated the position of court artist. Levina was born in Flanders, the eldest of five daughters to Simon Benninck, a renowned illustrator of manuscripts. Simon must have seen talent in his daughter just as Holbein’s father saw talent in him because Levina trained to be an artist under her father’s tuition in their home town of Bruges.

In 1545 she is seen in the official record with her husband dealing with her father’s accounts suggesting that Simon may have died at this time. This in its turn might suggest why the daughter rather than the father arrived in London. In any event, even if Simon was still alive he may not have been of a mind or in sufficient health to make the journey.

In November 1546 Levina and her husband, George Teerlinc, arrived in London where Levina was paid forty pounds year to be Henry VIII’s court artist. Levina’s salary would go up every year and she would work for every one of the Tudors from Henry VIII onwards. She received £150 after the death of Mary Tudor suggesting that although she was much loved by the queen that her salary hadn’t always been paid. The only problem for art historians is that she did not sign her work.

lady_katherine_grey_and_her_son_lord_edward_beauchamp_v2.jpg

Teerlinc in her turn was followed by Nicholas Hilliard and Isaac Oliver. Hilliard thought that creating miniatures was the work of a gentleman rather than a woman not that it seems to have stopped some of the leading women of the period for sitting for Levina. Indeed, it may be that as a woman in Mary and then Elizabeth Tudor’s household that women were more able to sit for their portraits. It was Levina who painted the miniature of Lady Katherine Grey and her son (above). It should be noticed that she is wearing a ribbon round her neck from which a glimpse of another miniature can be seen – of her husband Edward Seymour. It should also be noted, I think, that this image is the first well-known secular image of a mother and child in the brave new Protestant world of Tudor England.

mary dudley.jpg This image of Mary Dudley, Lady Sidney is painted in water-colour in vellum but rather than being mounted on ivory or precious metal the image is stiffened by playing cards.

The miniatures themselves are a bit different from Holbein’s portraits. They were designed to be given as gifts that could be worn, often tucked out of sight. Several of Levina’s appear to have been commissioned as New year gifts. They are painted on vellum in the style of a manuscript artist. In addition to being exchanged by lovers and friends Teerlinc’s works formed the basis for other jewellery as well as for the Great Seal. She may have even written a text on how to make a limning as these miniatures were known and trained Hilliard who gained prominence in the 1570s.

She did not only paint miniatures in 1556 her New year’s gift to Queen Mary was a picture of the Trinity and in 1561 she gave Queen Elizabeth a “finely painted” box. It is possible that the majority of her work was destroyed in the Whitehall fire. There is also the possibility that since she did not sign her works some of the earlier ones have been ascribed to Holbein whilst the later ones may now be viewed as the work of Hilliard.

Levina died on 26 June 1576 when she was about sixty-six. I love the fact that her father as an illuminator of manuscripts was working in an artistic tradition that went back to the seventh century and that in training Levina, her miniatures which became so popular during the Tudor period, are a clearly route-marked bridge between traditions and art forms. I also love the fact that she was paid more than Holbein. It seems a shame though that although we have heard of Hans Holbein and Nicholas Hilliard that Levina is not so well remembered in popular memory.

James, Susan E. (2009) The Feminine Dynamic in English Art 1485-1603, Aldershot: Ashgate.

Bergmans, Simone. “The Miniatures of Levina Teerling.” The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, vol. 64, no. 374, 1934, pp. 232–236. JSTOR, JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/865738.

http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O174799/portrait-of-mary-dudley-lady-miniature-teerlinc-levina/

Is this Levina Teerlinc?

Henry Carey was the son of Mary Boleyn. He may or may not have been the son of Henry VIII. He in his turn married Anne Morgan and went on to father ten children with his wife and to work loyally for his royal cousin Elizabeth I.

George Carey, pictured here in 1601 by Nicholas Hilliard the celebrated miniaturist, was born in 1547. One of his younger brothers was Robert Carey who wrote an account of his time as warden on the marches between England and Scotland. He is without a shadow of a doubt my most favourite Tudor, so it was with delight that I discovered that big brother George who went on to become the second Baron Hunsdon upon his father’s death was the governor of Carisbrooke Castle for some twenty years.

George, a graduate of Trinity College, Cambridge began working on his royal cousin’s (or possibly royal auntie if you think that Henry was the illegitimate son of Henry VIII) behalf in his early teens when he travelled north for the baptism of the infant Prince James of Scotland who would one day become King James I of England. He turns up in Scotland again to discuss the possible marriage between Mary Queen of Scots and the Duke of Norfolk and later during the Rebellion of the Northern Earls when he assisted his father in cleansing the borders of undesirables. He was knighted in the field and went on campaign in the Netherlands. In short he did all the ‘Flasheartish’ things that Tudor gentlemen were supposed to do including a spot of light‘privateering.’

In 1599, he accompanied the Earl of Essex on his ill-fated trip to Ireland. His job was treasurer and he seems to have done rather well out of the whole venture, certainly he came home substantially richer than when he set out. Interestingly he was part of the Cecil faction – so quite what he was doing tagging along with the Earl of Essex is a matter for speculation as the two groups did not see eye to eye.

He also served as an MP on several occasions. His interest in Mary Queen of Scots seems to have continued as he is recorded as being part of the committee that discussed her fate.

George became governor of the Isle of Wight and captain-general of Hampshire. His period in office lasted for twenty years and included the Spanish Armada threat. Carey was known for his hospitality and his concerns about the defence of the island. He was, it turns out, unpopular with the local gentry. A chap called Robert Dillington took umbridge about his use of the title governor and his high-handed approach to getting what he wanted. A list of complaints was compiled. However Dillington’s timing was poor. England was being menaced by the Spanish Armada. The Privy Council sided with Carey and the following year Dillington found himself incarcerated in the Fleet.

George and his wife, a relation of the poet Edmund Spenser, had one daughter called Elizabeth to whom he left most of his wealth when he expired according to Wikipaedia of venereal disease and mercury poisoning in 1603–which is I suppose still rather Flasheartish.

(http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1558-1603/member/carey-sir-george-1547-1603 accessed 7/7/2015 21:24)