Portrait of Sir Francis Drake, aged 43 (‘Franciscus Draeck nobilissimus Eques Angliæ ano æt sue 43’)

This large and important portrait is considered one of the best contemporary depictions of the controversial English admiral, privateer and pirate Sir Francis Drake (circa 1540-1596). According to the inscription along the upper edge he was 43 year of age when the print was made, which dates it around 1583. The most prominent seaman of the Elizabethan Age is here portrayed half-bust, his right hand resting on a richly decorated helmet, his left holding a admiral's baton. On the wall behind him at right we see his coat-of-arms while at left a window opens up to view over a city by a bay, surrounded by a wooded hills. From the ceiling hangs a globe, a reference to Drake's greatest achievement of being the first Englishman to circumnavigate the world, between 1577 and 1580.
Hind attributed the portrait to Jodocus Hondius, a cosmographer and engraver native from Ghent, who lived and worked in exile in London. Despite it being a celebratory portrait of a national hero, it is a rare, especially in contemporary impressions, presumably if was not completed during the engraver's or sitter's lifetime. Hollstein recorded only two impressions of the unfinished first state (British Museum, London; and Het Scheepvaartmuseum, Amsterdam). Even the present second state, completed by the engraver and antiquarian George Vertue (1684-1756) around 1733, rarely comes to the market. We could only trace two impressions sold at auction in the last thirty years, both at Christie's in the mid-1990's.