HILLIARD, Nicholas
(b. 1547, Exeter, d. 1619, London)

Young Man among Roses

c. 1587
Watercolour on vellum stuck onto card, 135 x 73 mm
Victoria and Albert Museum, London

This portrait is perhaps the most famous of English miniatures. It epitomises the romantic Elizabethan age and is a masterpiece of miniature paintings by its greatest exponent, Nicholas Hilliard. It shows a young man, full length, oval, leaning against a tree among roses. Inscribed above the head is a Latin motto taken from Lucan's De Bello Civili: 'Dat / poenas laudata fides' ('a praised faith'). The young man is possibly Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex.