A scarce King Charles I Royalist memorial ring containing a ...

A scarce King Charles I Royalist memorial ring containing a portrait miniature of King Charles I (1600-1649) painted in watercolour and bodycolour on vellum beneath convex glass, the oval miniature depicting the monarch wearing the blue sash of the Order of the Garter, with a skull resting upon a draped support to his left, painted after the king’s execution in 1649, the composition belongs to the tradition of Royalist memorial jewellery commemorating Charles as the 'Royal Martyr', the skull serves both as a memento mori and as an allusion to his death, set within a cable-bordered gold bezel and mounted upon a similarly ornamented hoop, presented in an associated late 19th/ early 20th century fitted retailer’s case for Bravingtons, Goldsmiths and Jewellers, 71 Ludgate Hill and 296 & 298 Pentonville Road, King’s Cross, London References and Comparisons: Closely related Charles I pendant miniature, circa 1650–60: imageevent.com/bluboi/stuartcrystal? c=3&l=0&m=18&n=1&p=57&s=0&w=1&z=2 Sotheby’s, Charles I miniature ring with a skull and the inscription “30 jan 48”, English, circa 1700: sothebys.com/en/buy/ auction/2019/royal-and-noble/a-stuartcrystal- portrait-miniature-and-diamond Christie’s, vellum miniature of Charles I wearing the Garter sash and accompanied by a skull, early 18th century christies.com/en/lot / lot-5206481 London Museum: Charles I memento mori ring, circa 1649–50: londonmuseum.org.uk/ collections/v/object-118964/charles-imemento- mori-ring/ British Museum, eighteenth-century gold portrait ring with comparable wavy and pearled borders: britishmuseum.org/collection/ object/H_AF-1479

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