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The Power of Portraiture of the Favorites of James I

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The Power of Portraiture of the Favorites of James I SMU Journal of Undergraduate Research Volume 6 Issue 2 Article 4 April 2021 Unto One Man’s Hand: The Power of Portraiture of The Favorites of James I Maria Rosario Katsulos Southern Methodist University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.smu.edu/jour Recommended Citation Katsulos, Maria Rosario (2021) "Unto One Man’s Hand: The Power of Portraiture of The Favorites of James I," SMU Journal of Undergraduate Research: Vol. 6: Iss. 2, Article 4. DOI: https://doi.org/10.25172/ jour.6.2.4 Available at: https://scholar.smu.edu/jour/vol6/iss2/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by SMU Scholar. It has been accepted for inclusion in SMU Journal of Undergraduate Research by an authorized administrator of SMU Scholar. For more information, please visit http://digitalrepository.smu.edu. Katsulos: Unto One Man’s Hand: The Power of Portraiture of The Favorites of Unto One Man’s Hand: The Power of Portraiture of The Favorites of James I Maria Rosario Katsulos mkatsulos@ smu.edu 1 Kathleen Wellman ABSTRACT This paper discusses the study and analysis of portraiture of the favorites of King James I: Esmé Stuart, Robert Carr, and George Villiers. Although famous female mistresses (such as Anne Boleyn before her queenship or Madame de Pompadour) often did wield immense political power, there is better historical documentation for the power of male favorites in politics, the military, economics, and other areas of national affairs. Studying visual primary source material allows a new perspective on contemporary thought and propaganda of the time. Certain aspects of character are better communicated through the intricate symbology of the time, and portraiture allows a perfect avenue to bringing those observations to light. The art forms discussed—official depictions as well as engraved prints, which were more easily disseminated to a wider public—had very different audiences and therefore carried different messages. By analyzing these works, we can draw new conclusions about the ways in which the contemporaries of the favorites, regardless of social status, perceived these men. "Reading” visual and written sources through a queer lens will also provide a depth of understanding missed by earlier sources, which have historically lacked that lens. The subject of royal favorites has been of better communicated through the intricate symbology of the historical interest for quite some time, but these studies or time, and portraiture provides a perfect avenue to bring those fictionalized interpretations usually involve the female observations to light. This paper examines two forms of art favorites of kings (or, rarer still, the male favorites of meant for different audiences (those at court versus those queens).2 This latter category provides an interesting angle outside of that noble inner circle); thus, these works of art from which to approach the biographic studies of male had to carry different messages. Studying them individually figures in the favorite’s role. The study of male royal and comparing them suggests new conclusions about the favorites can therefore oppose the historical neglect of same- ways in which contemporaries of the favorites perceived sex relationships in royal courts through the colliding lenses these men. My working hypothesis is twofold. On a more of court history and queer history. This interdisciplinary tangible, pragmatic level, I believe that the painted portraits combination illuminates subjects that are seriously will be a more revealing, authentic representation of self- understudied in both fields when evaluated independently. image than written descriptions of these men. Rather than an Although female favorites often wielded immense political independent printer controlling the messaging, the artist, power, there is better historical documentation for the power patron, and subject did so for official pieces. Also, these of men in politics, the military, and the economy. Visual art portraits did not serve as far-reaching propaganda in the provides extensive historical documentation of the same way that prints, which were more easily disseminated, importance of male figures, specifically in portraits (both would have; the improvement of the public persona within life-size and miniature) and in engraved prints. the court, however, was possible and was often Rather than focusing exclusively on written accomplished by commissioned portraits. Larger-scale sources, which have served as the major point of reference portraits allow for the greater use of object symbolism, and in extant studies of the favorites of James I, art historical the full-color paintings, whether miniature or life-size, analysis provides a new perspective on Jacobean-era English invoke the color symbolism of the time. Engraved prints, thought and propaganda. Certain aspects of character are which lack color, will be analyzed for object symbolism, 1 Dr. Kathleen A. Wellman is the Dedman Family Distinguished Professor and Altshuler Distinguished Teaching Professor in SMU’s William P. Clements Department of History. 2 Examples of the first situation include Philippa Gregory’s 2001 novel The Other Boleyn Girl and its corresponding film, or Colin Jones’ 2002 biography Madame de Pompadour: Images of a Mistress. As for the latter situation, a more contemporary example is that of the 2018 film Mary Queen of Scots, which features Joe Alwyn as Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. In this movie, the favorite of Queen Elizabeth engages in a romantic relationship with the queen. Published by SMU Scholar, 2021 1 SMU Journal of Undergraduate Research, Vol. 6, Iss. 2 [2021], Art. 4 poses, and any accompanying captions. Investigation of the The caption of the accompanying picture (the William differences between these two forms of visual art will help Larkin portrait analyzed later in this paper) reads: “James demonstrate differences in messaging and the audience made his beloved George one of the most powerful men in addressed, and further, will isolate explicit instances of England” (italics for emphasis).3 Contemporaries of James symbolism in these portraits. and George could certainly have put two and two together to From the perspective of a historiographical see that the relationship between these men went beyond the study—that is to say, a “literary” review in the subject of art- normal boundaries of male homosocial friendship of the historical analysis—there is much information to be gleaned time. Without putting too fine of a point on it, Villiers taking from the resources provided by art museums, namely the over the rooms meant for the Queen of England is quite National Portrait Galleries of England and Scotland. While representative of the power that royal favorites could hold, there were quite a few surviving portraits of George Villiers, both over the king himself and over the country’s politics. Duke of Buckingham, James’ last favorite, there are not Additionally, it is obvious from reading letters between the nearly as many specific existing analyses of visual king and his favorites that there was a romantic, if not representations of the earlier two favorites featured in this outright sexual, relationship between these men. Though not paper, Esmé Stuart and Robert Carr (the Duke of Lennox and technically public information, these letters were sent under the Earl of Somerset, respectively). I hypothesize that this the assumption that they could be opened and read by prying lack of extant information stems from the erasure of James eyes. Rather than try to conceal their relationship, these men I’s sexuality; within the context of their own times, Stuart wrote freely about their feelings for each other, sometimes and Carr were both major players in their respective royal going into erotic or romantic detail. James I even proposed a courts and thus would have been recognizable figures version of marriage to Villiers when he wrote, through their portraits. Though it is difficult to study I cannot content myself without sending omission or total lack of evidence, by examining that you this present, praying God that I may “negative space” (to use a more artistic term), I believe we have a joyful and comfortable meeting can draw important conclusions about how a lack of with you and that we may make at this preservation, if not an outright destruction, of certain records Christmas a new marriage ever to be make it seem to a more modern audience as if homosocial, kept hereafter; for, God so love me, as I homoerotic, and homosexual spaces, relationships, and desire only to live in this world for your figures did not exist before the turn of the twentieth century. sake, and that I had rather live banished The other part of my hypothesis operates on a in any part of the earth with you than much broader scale, expanding the study of the omissions of live a sorrowful widow’s life without queer figures from mainstream historical study. I hope also you. And so God bless you, my sweet to begin to illuminate ways in which the sexualities of these child and wife…4 men did or did not influence recorded public opinion of The seventeenth-century contemporaries of James I would them. My working hypothesis is that the fact that these men have been aware, not ignorant, of same-sex relationships, were in homosexual relationships with the king of England particularly one in which those involved used would have caused much less public unrest than modern heteronormative ideas and words to describe a version of audiences
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