BARBARA VILLIERS,
DUCHESS OF CLEVELAND
by Sir Peter Lely, c.1664

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- The Portrait

The Sitter

Barbara Villiers was the daughter of William, 2nd Viscount Grandison and his wife Mary. In 1659 she married Roger Palmer but shortly afterwards she became the mistress of Charles II. In 1661 she and her husband were created Earl and Countess of Castlemaine. Barbara Villiers was the King's leading mistress until 1668, although their liaison probably continued periodically for several more years. Much to the Queen's distress, Villiers was made a Lady of the Bedchamber, a position she held until 1673. She was made Duchess of Cleveland in her own right in 1670. The King acknowledged five of her children as his own. The child shown here is almost certainly her eldest son, Charles Fitzroy, later created Duke of Southampton and then Duke of Cleveland. Her other sons were also created Dukes, and her daughters given the rank of daughters of Dukes.

Barbara Villiers was a household name in her day, a symbol, both at that time and subsequently, of much that characterised the Restoration court as a whole. After the relative sobriety of the pre-civil war Stuart court and the austerity of the Interregnum, the character of the new court came as a shock to some and a liberating force to others. It was characterised by excess and promiscuity, but also by a new acknowledgment of the humanity of the King, much greater prominence for women and a luxuriant and ostentatious new visual culture. At the centre of all this was the King's most important mistress, whose beauty set the standard for the day, and who was used by commentators at all levels of society to represent all that was good and especially all that was bad about the new regime. The subject of popular satire, numerous diary entries by Samuel Pepys and the poetry of Rochester, she was also written about extensively and censoriously by the historians of the period, Bishop Burnet and Lord Clarendon.

As the first acknowledged royal mistress in England for some centuries, Barbara Villiers was to an extent able to define her own role. Her chief goal was probably the acquisition of wealth and status for herself and her children, but, particularly through the access she could provide to the King, she also exerted significant political influence. This was recognised by the King's ministers and those who sought to gain political positions; she was also courted by foreign ambassadors. She was associated with the downfall of a number of powerful political figures, notably her great enemy the Earl of Clarendon, Charles's chief minister during the first decade of his reign. In addition she effected reconciliations between the King and several of courtiers who had fallen from favour, in particular the 2nd Duke of Buckingham.

The catalogue of the exhibition Painted Ladies: Women at the Court of Charles II provides much additional information on both the Duchess of Clevalnd and Sir Peter Lely and can be purchased through our online shop.

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All images and text are subject to copyright protection. 08 October 2008