The date of this portrait and a coat of arms (which has yet to be identified) appears on the upper right of the composition. The date is now generally read as 1569, though the 1818 inventory of Kensington Palace records it as 1563. Either of these dates matches the costume of the sitter. The traditional attribution is inscribed on the reverse and is clearly misleading: Hans Baldung died twenty years before it was painted. This would appear to be a local practitioner in the fashionable portrait style of the time within the Empire, strongly influence by Titian and seen at its best in the work of Antonis Mor (1517-77). The condition makes it difficult to judge, but this may even be a later version of a portrait of this date.

The sitter’s family name is also recorded on the reverse and in the 1861 inventory of Hampton Court. It presumably derives from an identification of the coat of arms, which has yet to be confirmed. The sitter is shown holding gloves; wearing a grey-green doublet over a claret-coloured undertunic with a black cap and a ruff.

Inscribed upper right (as far as can be deciphered): AETATIS SVE 41 / ANNO DNI / 1569 / WHH [JOINED BY CENTRAL BAR]