5. after Sir Peter Lely
(1618-1680)
Madame Mary Davis Playing a Ten-String Guitar

(click on image to print)
after Lely, Madame Mary Davis

Madame Mary Davis Playing a Ten-String Guitar

Mezzotint, 339 x 248 mm., Chaloner Smith 11 ii/ii. Fine impression on laid paper, trimmed on or just within the platemark; a small bit of the lower left plate margin lost. Mary Davis was an actress, singer and dancer. Her singing attracted the attention (!) of King Charles II, by whom she had a daughter. Pepys, in his diary, mentions her dancing. The ten-string guitar was known then as the Spanish guitar or the quinterne. The print bears the name of R. Thompson as publisher, but the actual engravers of his plates are unknown, although Van Somer, Valck and Verkolje are thought to have done some of them.