Tree ring dating reveals Henry VIII portrait was painted at time of Anne Boleyn scandal
THE furrowed brow and pursed lips may already hint at which period this portrait of Henry VIII was painted, but now scientists have confirmed it.
Scans of the wood panel beneath the paint have revealed tree rings which show the oak was felled in 1525, the year Henry became bewitched by Anne Boleyn.
The painting currently hangs in the Art Gallery of New South Wales, in Sydney, Australia, and curators were hoping to find out who painted it, as in the past it has been wrongly attributed to both Hans Holbein the Younger and Jan Van Scorel.
Although the scans did not help identify the artist, they showed not only the date but also that the oak tree originally grew in Sussex. Dr Matthew Brookhouse, of the Australian National University Fenner School of Environment & Society, said: “One of the images had the appearance of wood grain and it was so clear, I could see the treerings in the oak. I was immediately excited because I knew there was a good chance I could work out the date the tree was felled.”
The findings show that the painting could only have been created in 1525 or later, a crucial period in English history.
By then Henry had given up hope that Catherine of Aragon, his wife, would bear him a male heir and had started to consider breaking with Rome so he could divorce and marry again, a path which would eventually lead to the Reformation. To peer beneath the layers of the painting, Dr Brookhouse used the Australian Synchrotron in Melbourne, a particle accelerator which creates X-rays that can penetrate artworks without causing damage. The team then collaborated with the University of St Andrews in Scotland and University College London to compare the scan with Britain’s tree ring databases.
Simon Ives, a painting conservator at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, said: “It really clarifies the origin of the painting and gives us a greater connection with it. Having a date was also crucial to the conservation project for the panel because it allowed us to determine which layers of paint were original and which were added much later.
“We then removed the non-original paint and revealed hidden features like the original placement of the king’s fingers, which had been altered.”