Portrait Miniature of Margaret Roper

Holbein's Portrait Miniature of Margaret Roper (1535) is a small-scale companion to his full-scale portrait of Thomas More's learned daughter, produced in the year following her father's execution. The miniature format was ideally suited for intimate portraits intended for private possession and viewing — to be worn in a locket close to the body or kept in a small cabinet as a personal memento. Margaret Roper's miniature portrait, produced in the same year as her larger-format one, suggests a commission intended for close family circulation: perhaps a copy for William Roper, for one of her children, or for transmission to the European humanist community who had celebrated her scholarship.

The miniature format displays Holbein's extraordinary precision at small scale, with the sitter's intelligent features and fine costume details rendered with jewel-like clarity.