Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset

1 portrait of Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset

© National Portrait Gallery, London

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Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset

by Jacobus Houbraken, published by John & Paul Knapton
line engraving, published 1749
14 5/8 in. x 9 1/8 in. (372 mm x 231 mm) plate size; 20 in. x 13 1/8 in. (509 mm x 333 mm) paper size
Purchased with help from the Friends of the National Libraries and the Pilgrim Trust, 1966
Reference Collection
NPG D41813

Sitterback to top

Artistsback to top

  • Jacobus Houbraken (1698-1780), Engraver. Artist or producer associated with 435 portraits.
  • John & Paul Knapton (active 1735-1789), Booksellers and publishers. Artist or producer associated with 290 portraits.

Related worksback to top

  • NPG D18900: Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset (from same plate)
  • NPG D25787: Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset (from same plate)
  • NPG D41812: Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset (from same plate)

Events of 1749back to top

Current affairs

Royal Fireworks in Green Park to celebrate the Peace of Aix-La-Chapelle. 10,000 rockets are let off at a cost of £8,000. Composer George Frideric Handel's accompanying Music for the Royal Fireworks is performed for the first time.
George II is introduced to William Ansah Sessarakoo the 'Prince of Annamaboe'. The son of a wealthy chief from the West African Gold Coast, he had been taken prisoner and made a slave in the West Indies.

Art and science

Horace Walpole buys the house and grounds which he will transform into his neo-Gothic fantasy, Strawberry Hill, in Twickenham, London.
Henry Fielding publishes his comic novel Tom Jones.
John Cleland's erotic novel Fanny Hill (Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure) is published. The author is released from debtor's prison but arrested again later in the year and charged with corrupting the King's subjects.

International

George II grants a charter to Ohio Company to settle Ohio valley in the American colonies.
British settlement of Halifax, Nova Scotia is founded.
Sugar planters found Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

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