Mary Delany (née Granville)

This portraitback to top

NPG 1030 is virtually a replica of the portrait in the Royal Collection, for which the eighty-two year old Mrs Delany sat at the command of George III and Queen Charlotte early in 1782. [1] On 14 February Walpole wrote that Opie ‘has done a head of Mrs Delany for the King - oui vraiment, it is pronounced like Rembrandt, but as I told her, does not look older than she is, but older than she does’; [2] it was doubtless the picture ‘of an old lady’ which Opie mentioned in a letter of 11 March as painted for the King and Queen. [3] Lady Bute then induced Mrs Delany to sit a second time to Opie, for NPG 1030, ‘that he might paint a portrait of her from life in exactly the same dress and position’. [4] In the event there are some very slight differences in the folds of the head scarf and cloak.
NPG 1030 remains in the frame which Horace Walpole designed for Lady Bute following the death of Mrs Delany in April 1788. [5] Elaborately carved, the principal ornaments were described by Lady Llanover as emblematic of Mrs Delany’s accomplishments; ‘at the top are a group of musical instruments, interspersed with sprays of bay and laurel, and at the bottom a palette forms the centre, with a miniature easel, pencils and brushes’; on the palette is written a commemorative text by Walpole (completed on 13 May 1788):

Mary Grenville/Niece of Lord Lansdown/Correspondent of Dr Swift,/Widow/of Mr Pendarvis,/and of Dr Delany Dean of Downe./Her piety and Virtues, her excellent understanding,/and her Talents and Taste in Painting & Music,/were not only the Merits, Ornaments & comforts/of an uniform life,/but the Blessings that crowned & closed/the termination of her existence/at the uncommon age of 88.
A third version, formerly in the Wellesbourne collection, with further slight differences in the disposition of the cloak and shawl, was sold in 1955; [6] miniature derivations include those formerly in the collection of Sir Arthur Harford and with R. A. E. Herbert in 1984; [7] a pencil copy was sold Sotheby’s, 19 November 1992 (within lot 232).

Footnotesback to top

1) Sir Oliver Millar, The Later Georgian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen, 1969, no.975, pl.135; engraved anon. 1842 ‘from the original Painting at Hampton Court’.
2) To William Mason; Wal. Corr., XXIX, p 185.
3) J. J. Rogers, John Opie and his Works, 1878, p 24; Wolcot also mentioned ‘the portrait of a lady which [Opie] painted expressly for [the King].’ (ibid., p 23).
4) Lady Llanover ed., The Autobiography and Correspondence of Mary Granville, Mrs Delany, 1861-62, VI, p 497.
5) See J. Simon, The Art of the Picture Frame, NPG, 1997.
6) Illus. R. Granville, The Granville Family, 1895, f.p.452; exhibited Birmingham Houses, 1938 (115); Sotheby’s, 6 July 1955, lot 164 as Opie (see Sir Oliver Millar, The Later Georgian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen, 1969, sub no.975; A. Earland, Opie and his Circle, 1911, p 273).
7) Listed respectively in J. Steegman, Portraits in Welsh Houses, II, p 29, no.25, and p 152, no.28.

Referenceback to top

Earland 1911
A. Earland, Opie and his Circle, 1911.

Millar 1969
Sir Oliver Millar, The Later Georgian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen, 1963, I, no.975.

Physical descriptionback to top

Light brown eyes, white hair, wearing widow’s dress of a black lace shawl, white bonnet and a black cloak; from a black ribbon round her neck hangs the heart-shaped locket, inscribed CR beneath a crown, surrounded by pearls and containing a hair of Queen Charlotte, which had been given her, together with a cameo of the King, by Their Majesties.¹ Within a painted oval.

¹ Described and illus., Lady Llanover ed., The Autobiography and Correspondence of Mary Granville, Mrs Delany, 1861-62, I, 1861, front., and VI, p 489.

Provenanceback to top

Commissioned by Mary, Countess of Bute (d. 1794); the Marquess of Bute [presumably the 2nd Marquess] to the sitter’s great-niece, Mrs Georgina Mary Ann Waddington;¹ her daughter, Augusta, Lady Llanover, by whom bequeathed 1896.<sup>2

1</sup> This provenance given in Lady Llanover ed., The Autobiography and Correspondence of Mary Granville, Mrs Delany, 1861-62, VI, p 498 (‘The picture and the frame were given by the late Marquis of Bute to the Editor’s mother’).
² With a portrait by Mrs Delany of her sister Mrs Anne D’Ewes which was declined by the Trustees.

Exhibitionsback to top

Opie, Plymouth, 1957 (22); Opie, Arts Council, 1962-63 (22); Designs for English Picture Frames, Wiggins, London, 1987 (40); Mrs Delany's Flower Collages, Bath, 1988; Beningbrough 1979-.

Reproductionsback to top

J. Brown 1861 (Lady Llanover ed., The Autobiography and Correspondence of Mary Granville, Mrs Delany, 1861-62, I, front.).


This extended catalogue entry is from the out-of-print National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue: John Ingamells, National Portrait Gallery: Mid-Georgian Portraits 1760-1790, National Portrait Gallery, 2004, and is as published then. For the most up-to-date details on individual Collection works, we recommend reading the information provided in the Search the Collection results on this website in parallel with this text.

View all known portraits for Mary Delany (née Granville)

View all known portraits for John Opie