Anne of Denmark (1574-1619), consort of King James VI and I (see next lot) was the second daughter of Frederick II (1534-1588), King of Denmark and Norway, and his wife Sophia (1557-1631). She married James in 1589 and they had seven children together, four of whom survived into adulthood, including the future Charles I (1600-1649) and Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia (1596-1662). On James's accession to the English throne in 1603, Anne became the first Queen of England, Scotland and Wales.
Queen Anne was a patron of the arts and played a key role in the development of the court masque. Shortly after James I's ascension to the throne and their subsequent move to England, the queen commissioned and performed in six masques at Hampton Court Palace and Whitehall between 1604 and 1611. Written by Samuel Daniel and Ben Jonson, the design of the masques fell to Inigo Jones, who the queen also employed for various architectural projects. She enjoyed music and dancing, poetry, literature, and learned to speak Italian. She expanded the Royal Collection through acquisitions and commissions to artists such as Paul van Somer, Daniel Mytens and Isaac Oliver.
There are a small number of other examples of miniatures of Anne of Denmark by Hilliard, notably in the collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum (inv. no. P.148-1910) and the Fitzwilliam Museum (inv. no. 3855). Another miniature of Anne of Denmark by Hilliard was sold Christie's, London, 10 December 2002, lot 47. Queen Anne began to patronise the miniaturist Isaac Oliver in 1604, while Hilliard remained official court painter to James I. The present miniature may be a pendant portrait to one of her husband James I by Nicholas Hilliard, dated 1608, sold as the preceding lot in the Christie's, London, 10 July 1984 sale (lot 167).