- Museum number
- 1858,0417.1629
- Description
-
The Newcastle Family; interior of a dining room with several finely attired people seated in a circle and telling stories, William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Newcastle, and his second wife Margaret Lucas seated at right and wearing laurel crowns, the family of ten in a circle by a large canopied hearth at left, nine seated and one standing, an attendant behind the Duke, another opening a window behind
Pen and brown ink, with brown and grey wash, heightened with white
- Production date
- 1656 (c.)
- Dimensions
-
Height: 182 millimetres
-
Width: 160 millimetres
- Curator's comments
- Mounted with the print by Clouet 1972,U.668. See Hind for the identity of the figures.
The drawing was engraved by Petrus Clouet (for two impressions see 1972,U.668 and 1868,0822.828) and inscribed with English verses: "Thus in this Semy-Circle, Wher they Sitt,/ Telling of Tales of pleasure & of witt [...]". For a copy after the engraving by Clouet see also 1881,0611.234.
For a more finished drawing of this scene by Diepenbeeck, in the BM's extra-illustrated Clarendon, see Kk,5.7.71. Another drawing by Diepenbeeck of the Newcastle family in front of a fire is in Berlin: see U.Härting in 'Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen NF24 (2006), pp.15-28.
Text from L. Stainton and C. White, 'Drawings in England from Hilliard to Hogarth', 1987, p.83, no.43:
Opposite an elaborate chimney-piece supported on either side by a male and female figure, the Duke and Duchess are seated beneath a canopy in conversation with a large group of men and women arranged in a circle around them in front of the fire. One servant opens or closes the window, while another stands behind the ducal couple. The style of the architecture of the small room is Flemish rather than English, and the drawing demonstrably represents the Duke and his family during their exile in Antwerp (1648-1660), since the group includes the Duke's son, Henry, who was born in 1631, and his wife. It may well have been intended as one of the illustrations to the Duke's book on horsemanship (see Stainton & White 1987, cat. no. 41), but, if so, was not used. (His family does, however, appear in a different arrangement in plate 42 of the book.) The drawing was engraved in the same direction by Petrus Clouet (Hollstein IV, p.174, no.15), and inscribed with verses: "Thus in this Semy-Circle, Wher they Sitt, / Telling of Tales of pleasure & of witt. . .".
Further lit.: Saskia van Altena, 'Rubens's most truthful follower' Abraham van Diepenbeeck as a draftsman' Master Drawings 58:4 (2020), fig. 25.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
1987 Jun-Aug, BM, 'Hilliard to Hogarth'
1987 Sep-Nov, New Haven, 'Hilliard to Hogarth'
2006 Oct-Dec, Antwerp, Rubenshuis, 'Royalist Refugees...'
- Acquisition date
- 1858
- Acquisition notes
- This drawing was not part of the purchase from the Heywood Hawkins collection (1858,0417.1571 to 1628). It was entered in the Bill Book on 2 October 1857.
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1858,0417.1629
