Portrait miniature of a man, said to be Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset, watercolour on vellum, painted by John Hoskins, ca.1620 [Once attributed to Isaac or Peter Oliver].

Portrait, head and shoulders, turned slightly to right and looking to front. Features stippled and hatched in red with some dark brown, blue for the shadows and touches of white in the eyes, on a warm carnation ground; hair hatched in black over pale brown wash; collar and shirt modelled in white over pale brown; robe in black; background floated wet-in-wet in lake; a gold marginal strip (truncated); on vellum put down on pasteboard, painted brown on the back.

Frame: An apparently nineteenth-century gold locket, the hanger removed, set in a wood frame, turned and stained black.

Alan Evans Bequest, given by the National Gallery

Murdoch, John. Seventeenth-century English Miniatures in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum. London: The Stationery Office, 1997.
Catalogue number: 39, p.77. Full Citation:

Cat no. 39. A Man, said to be Robert Can, Earl of Somerset (b.c.1587 d.1645), c.1620
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Oval 38 x 32 mm (irregular)

Features stippled and hatched in red with some dark brown, blue for the shadows and touches of white in the eyes, on a warm carnation ground; hair hatched in black over pale brown wash; collar and shirt modelled in white over pale brown; robe in black; background floated wet-in-wet in lake; a gold marginal strip (truncated); on vellum put down on pasteboard, painted brown on the back.

Condition: Faded; somewhat scratched and rubbed; retouched with red in the face.

Signed: Not signed.

Frame: An apparently nineteenth-century gold locket, the hanger removed, set in a wood frame, turned and stained black.

Provenance: A B Willson, from whom purchased by the Hon. F H A Wallop in 1917; lent by him to theV&A 1927-49, and the ownership transferred to Alan Evans, 1933; by him bequeathed to the National Gallery, 1974; placed on indeterminate loan at the V&A, and acquired by by the V&A by transfer February 1994.

Wallop regarded this as autograph Peter Oliver but Long commented:' An old miniature but not, I think, either by Isaac Oliver or by Peter Oliver". (1) by the time of the Christie's valuation of the Evans Collection (1969), the miniature was listed as 'school of Oliver'.

The hand is in fact quite skilled, probably of the type described here as 'studio'. Peter Oliver worked somewhat in this style c.1620, but the original here is certainly the portrait of Carr by Hoskins, of which there are (or were) other versions in the Royal, Buccleuch and Rayne Collections.(2) The Buccleuch version (3) is signed with the IH monogram. The identification as Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset, has not apparently been questioned and it is impressive that all four of the miniatures have the same label.

Robert Carr, or in the original Scots spelling Ker or Kerr, was the younger son of Sir Thomas Ker of Ferniehurst. He came to London as a page of James I and rapidly became favourite en titre: knighted in December 1607; given on Sir WaIter Raleigh's attainder the Sherborne estates in 1609; raised to the English peerage as Viscount Rochester and admitted KG (1611); Earl of Somerset and Treasurer of Scotland (1613) and Lord Chamberlain and Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal (1614). Meanwhile, having fallen in love with the Countess of Essex, procured the annulment of her marriage and married her in December 1613, he became implicated in her attempt to revenge herself on Sir Thomas Over bury for the alleged slander of her character. Numerous clumsy attempts at poisoning him finally culminated in a lethal injection administered on the Countess's behalf by an apothecary. The Countess was tried and found guilty, and her trial was followed in 1615 by that of her husband, the prosecution being led by Francis Bacon. Although their accomplices were executed, the Earl and Countess were pardoned by the King, who remained stubbornly loyal despite these events, his favourite's bad temper, and the beginning of the ascendancy of George Villiers. The Somersets remained in the Tower until 1622 and lived fairly quietly until, in 1630, the Earl was prosecuted in the Court of Star Chamber for having earlier written a letter advising James to rule without Parliament. He died in July 1645.

1 Undated MS note in the Wallop Loan Book.
2 Photos V&A: see also for the miniatures and for the confused iconography of Robert Kerr, or Ker or Carr: Piper 1963, p. 322; Strong 1969, vol.1, pp. 256-7.
3 Kennedy 1917, p. 32.

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