Ernest I, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (1784-1844)

Ernest I, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, was the father of Prince Albert and thus Queen Victoria’s father-in-law. Hayter painted him in 1840, the year of Albert and Victoria’s wedding, when the Coburg family was consolidating its extraordinary network of European dynastic alliances. The Royal Collection portrait documents the patriarch of what became the most prolific royal house in modern European history. George Hayter was the preeminent British history and portrait painter of the early Victorian era, appointed Principal Painter in Ordinary to Queen Victoria in 1841.

The ducal portrait combines military decorations with courtly refinement, Hayter’s technique adjusted to meet German expectations of formal portraiture. The face shows the features Prince Albert inherited.