1959.143: "The Allegorie of a Faire Ladye"

Identification and Creation

Object Number

1959.143

People

Unidentified Artist

Title

"The Allegorie of a Faire Ladye"

Other Titles

Alternate Title: A Riddle

Classification

Paintings

Work Type

painting

Date

1570-1579

Culture

British

Persistent Link

https://hvrd.art/o/228438

Physical Descriptions

Medium

Oil on panel

Dimensions

45.7 x 54.3 cm (18 x 21 3/8 in.)
frame: 66.9 x 57.3 x 3.7 cm (26 5/16 x 22 9/16 x 1 7/16 in.)

Inscriptions and Marks

• inscription: in image, above scene: Mi faire ladie I praie you tell me, what & of whence be yonder three / That cum out of ye castell in such degree, & of there decente & nativete
• inscription: in image, below scene: Sir the one is my brother by my father's syde, the truth you to showe / The other by my mother's syde, be my brother also / The thyrde is my own sonne, lawfullye begott / And all be sonnes to my husbande, that sleapeth one my lappe, / Without hurte of lyneage, in anye degree, / Shewe me by reason, howe this thynge maye be.
• label: on back of panel, handwritten in ink: [in black:] Sir Thomas Cave, Knt. / of Stanford, Co. North- / ampton, 1st husband / [red:] man reclining; [in black:] = Elizabeth Danvers, / dau. & coheir of Sir / John Danvers of / Waterstock Co. Oxon / [in red:] lady seated; [in black:] = James Skeffington / son of William / Skeffington of / Fisherwick, Co. Staff. / by Joanna Leveson / [in red:] brother to Lady Cave's / son in law; [in black:] Roger Cave / of Stanford / Co. North- / ampton / [in red:] one of the / three men; [in black:] = Margaret Cecil / married circa 1562 / sister of William, / Lord Burghley, / Lord Treasurer of / England; Mary Cave, married / to William Skeffington / of Skeffington / son of Thomas Skeffington / by Mary Stanley / [in red:] one of the three men; [in black:] Alice Cave, married / circa 1570 John / Skeffington / of Fisherwick, Co., Stafford. (son of / William Skeffington / by Joanne Levison) / [in red:] one of the three men
• inscription: on back of panel, stencilled in black: 915EW
• label: on back of panel, printed in black: Property of Capt. G. Pitt-Rivers, / of the Manor House Hinton / St. Mary, and formed part / of the collection of the last / Lord Rivers
• inscription: on back of frame, handwritten in blue ballpoint: Elizabethan primitive panel
• inscription: upper center, white chalk: 557 / [illeg.]

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History

Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt Rivers (1827-1900)? to ? Alexander Edward Lane Fox-Pitt-Rivers (1855-1927), by descent; to Captain George Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers (1890-1966), sold [through Christie's, London, April 5, 1929, part of lot 26]; to Tudor Craig. [Julius Weitzner, New York], sold; to Robert Rantoul Endicott, gift; to Fogg Art Museum, 1959

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line

Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Gift of Robert Rantoul Endicott

Accession Year

1959

Object Number

1959.143

Division

European and American Art

Contact

am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu

Permissions

The Harvard Art Museums encourage the use of images found on this website for personal, noncommercial use, including educational and scholarly purposes. To request a higher resolution file of this image, please submit an online request.

Publication History

• Edgar Peters Bowron, European Paintings Before 1900 in the Fogg Art Museum: A Summary Catalogue including Paintings in the Busch-Reisinger Museum, Harvard University Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 1990)
• Karen Hearn, ed., Dynasties: Painting in Tudor and Jacobean England, exh. cat. (London, 1995), pp. 98-99, fig. 41
• Old Master & British Paintings, Evening Sale, auct. cat. (London, December 8, 2010), p. 40, under lot 14
• Lyndan Warner, "Kinship Riddles", Genealogy (2022), vol. 6, no. 43, pp. 1-30, pp. 10, 20-21, repr. as fig. 16 and 17b

Verification Level