Lady Mary Churchill, Duchess of Montagu (1689-1751)

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attributed to Enoch Seeman (c. 1694-1745), 1720s

oil on canvas, 141.6 x 114.3cm

The head of the Duchess in this unusually domestic portrait derives from the profile portrait by Kneller, c. 1720, also at Boughton (Boughton House, 1911(22)). The black page has in the past been identified as Ignatius Sancho (1729-80), born on a slave-ship, and taken into the Duchess's household, but is now considered to be the boy "Charles" referenced several times in the archives. The Dantzig-born painter Seeman came to England c. 1710. A version of this portrait, but without the page, is at Colonial Williansburg.

Ignatius Sancho and the boy Charles

PROVENANCE presumably by descent from the sitter.