This miniature of the Sophia, Electress of Hanover dates from c. 1670 and is rare example of the work of Jean Michelin, who is said to have been born in Langres, France, and died in Jersey. He became a member of the Académie Royale in 1668 and worked for the Hanoverian court from 1668 until 1686. The miniature features among a group of eighty-eight representing German and other families first recorded in Queen Caroline’s Closet at Kensington Palace in 1743.

Princess Sophia was the youngest daughter of Frederick V and Elizabeth of Bohemia, youngest daughter of James I of England. She married, in 1658, Ernest Augustus, later Elector of Hanover. According to the terms of the Act of Succession of 1701, she and her heirs, as Protestants, became successors to the British Crown in the event that Queen Anne should die without heirs. As a result, the Electress's eldest son became George I, King of England on the death of Queen Anne in 1714. Here the Electress is depicted at half-length, wearing a richly brocaded dress embroidered with flowers. The identity of the sitter is recorded in the inscription on the reverse of the miniature but is also substantiated with reference to a three-quarter length portrait by Adriaen Hanneman, dated 1660 (coll. Duke of Brunswick, 1952).

The presence of the Elector and Electress in the Hanoverian gallery of portraits represented in Queen Caroline’s closet can be explained by their importance as the immediate forebears of George I. However, the Electress Sophia was also known personally to the young Caroline of Ansbach, as the older woman spent much time at the court of her daughter Sophia Charlotte, Electress of Brandenburg, and Queen of Prussia, where Caroline lived after the death of her own mother in 1696. As a widely travelled, knowledgeable and cultured woman, the Electress was an influential model on the future Queen Caroline.

Inscribed in ink on the reverse: No. 34 Sophie Duchesse de Broun: et de Luneb: nee Princesse Palatine.

Text adapted from The First Georgians: Art and Monarchy 1714-1760, London, 2014.