Susannah Maria Cibber (née Arne)
1 portrait by Thomas Hudson
Share thisSusannah Maria Cibber (née Arne)
by Thomas Hudson
oil on canvas, feigned oval, engraved 1749
30 in. x 24 3/4 in. (762 mm x 629 mm)
Purchased, 1967
Primary Collection
NPG 4526
Sitterback to top
- Susannah Maria Cibber (née Arne) (1714-1766), Actress and singer. Sitter in 6 portraits.
Artistback to top
- Thomas Hudson (1701-1779), Portrait painter and art collector. Artist associated with 182 portraits.
This portraitback to top
Susannah Maria Arne, the actress and singer, was the sister of the composer Thomas Augustus Arne. In 1734 she married the playwright Theophilus Cibber, the son of the actor Collay Cibber. Appearing frequently opposite Garrick, her greatest successes date from c.1744. The contralto songs in Handel's Messiah were written for her.
More detailed information from an out-of-print National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue.
Linked publicationsback to top
- Kerslake, John, Early Georgian Portraits, 1977, p. 55
- Perry, Gill (introduction) Roach, Joseph (appreciation) and West, Shearer (appreciation), The First Actresses: Nell Gwyn to Sarah Siddons, 2011 (accompanying the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery from 20 October 2011 to 8 January 2012), p. 82
- Saywell, David; Simon, Jacob, Complete Illustrated Catalogue, 2004, p. 125
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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See this portrait
On display on the Second Floor at Beningbrough Hall
