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Lot Essay
The collection of the Earls and Barons Brownlow, at Belton Park, Lincolnshire, and Ashridge Park, Hertfordshire, of which a part remains in situ in the collection of the National Trust at Belton, was formed primarily by three men, Lord Tyrconnel, Sir Henry Bankes (the father of Frances, Lady Brownlow) and Sir Abraham Hume (father-in-law of the 1st Earl Brownlow). Of those, the greatest part was probably that assembled by Sir Abraham Hume (1749-1838), through whom the Custs also inherited Ashridge, and included Bellini's Portrait of a Condottiere (Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art), Titian's Death of Actaeon (London, National Gallery), Rembrandt's Aristotle contemplating the Bust of Homer (New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art) and a group of Cuyps including The Maas at Dordrecht (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.).
Lord Tyrconnel inherited a significant number of pictures, chiefly family portraits, at Belton (an inventory of 1688 lists 175 pictures). The majority of his purchases, for the most part Old Masters acquired through 'Picture Merchants in London', were hung at his London residence. Of eclectic taste, the 152 paintings included Dutch, Flemish and Italian flower-pieces, views and religious and historical pictures; two of the most interesting to remain at Belton are Chiari's ricordi of his early altarpieces in S. Maria del Suffragio, Rome. An early patron in England of Philippe Mercier, Tyrconnel also commissioned from the artist (and is represented in) one of the masterpieces of his English period, the Belton Conversation-piece, also still in situ at Belton.
Lord Tyrconnel inherited a significant number of pictures, chiefly family portraits, at Belton (an inventory of 1688 lists 175 pictures). The majority of his purchases, for the most part Old Masters acquired through 'Picture Merchants in London', were hung at his London residence. Of eclectic taste, the 152 paintings included Dutch, Flemish and Italian flower-pieces, views and religious and historical pictures; two of the most interesting to remain at Belton are Chiari's ricordi of his early altarpieces in S. Maria del Suffragio, Rome. An early patron in England of Philippe Mercier, Tyrconnel also commissioned from the artist (and is represented in) one of the masterpieces of his English period, the Belton Conversation-piece, also still in situ at Belton.