Cinquante Octonaires . . . Dediez a monseigneur le Prince, pour ses étrennes, de l’an, 1607. RCIN 1047001. Royal Library. Windsor.

2024 marks the 400th anniversary of the death of Esther Inglis on 30 August 1624. Throughout the year we’ll be blogging in this space about many of her works on or close to the dates when they originally appeared. We’re beginning with the magnificent self-portrait, in a manuscript dedicated to Prince Henry when he was about thirteen years old. Only four of these full-color portraits are known to survive, all made between 1605 and 1606 when she was living in London and may have been learning from miniature masters, Nicholas Hilliard and Isaac Oliver. The other three manuscripts were given to Christian Friis, Chancellor of Denmark (July 1606), Thomas Egerton, Lord Ellesmere (New Year’s 1606), and Ludovic Stewart, 2nd Duke of Lennox (New Year’s 1607). The copy of Antoine de la Roche Chandieu’s popular Octonaires was a New Year’s gift for Prince Henry in 1607.

Twenty-five of her manuscripts from 1591 to 1624 are dated from January, and nineteen of these are specifically designated 1 January, meant as New Year’s gifts. A list follows below. New Year’s Day was the eighth of the Twelve Days of Christmas, a festive season following the religious commemoration of the Birth of Christ. On this day gifts were traditionally given at court, and many of Inglis’s manuscripts were meant for members of the Stewart court, though her first one for this day was directed to Elizabeth I in 1591.

1591 – Discours de la Foy, Queen Elizabeth I

1606 – Proverbs: Lucy, Countess of Bedford

1606 – Proverbs: Robert Sidney

1606 – Proverbs: Elizabeth, Lady Erskine

1607 – Octonaires: Prince Henry

1607 – Ecclesiastes: Thomas Puckering

1607 – Octonaires: Ludowic Stewart, Duke of Lennox

1607 – Quatrains: Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury

1607 – Quatrains: James Hay (later) Earl of Carlisle

1607 – Octonaires: Gilbert Talbot, 7th Earl of Shrewsbury

1608 – Treatise of Preparation to the Holy Supper: David Murray

1608 – Argumentum Psalmorum: Prince Henry

1609 – Book of the Armes of England: Prince Henry

1609 – Octonaries: Lord Petre

1615 – Quatrains: [Lost, dedicatee unknown, Sloan MS 808]

1615 – Quatrains: Prince Charles

1615 – Pseaumes de David: King James VI/I

1615 – Octonaires: Prince Charles

1615 – Quatrains: Robert Kerr, Earl of Somerset

Those dated January but not the 1st:

1607 – Argumenta in librum Psalmorum: Sir Thomas Egerton

1608 – Argumenta in Librum Geneseos: Sir Edward Stanhope

1614 – Quatrains/Octonaires: David Murray

1616 – Octonaires: John Spotiswood, Archbishop of St. Andrews

1622 – Emblematical drawing of Marie Stewart, Countess of Mar for the Earl of Mar

1624 – Emblemes Chrestiens (by Georgette de Montenay): Prince Charles