Portrait of Lancelot Blackburne DD, Lord Archbishop of York, 1727

A line engraving of Lancelot Blackburne DD, Archbishop of York, aged 68 years, by George Vertue, after a portrait by Isaac Seeman, 1727.

A large black and white rectangular engraving of a white middle-age male with dark eyebrows and strong nose. It is a knee-length portrait with the sitter seated on a high-backed chair facing to the left of the frame. His right hand leans on his knee and his left hand rests on a book placed on a covered table next to the chair. He wears a large puff-sleeved shirt and dark vestments along with a grey curled jaw-length wig. A column makes up the background on the left-hand side, the rest of the background is plain and dark. Italic script directly under the image on the left reads: ‘I Zeeman pinx:’ and on the right: ‘Geo: Vertue Sculp: 1727’. A coat of arms with crossed keys and stars topped with a bishop’s mitre sits central underneath the image, and italic script on both sides of the crest reads, ‘LANCELOT BLACKBURNE DD Lord Archbishop of York Primate of England & Metropolitane and Almoner to his Majesty Aged 68 Dec y 10 AD 1726’. Small text bottom right reads: ‘Sold by G. Vertue in Brownlow Street Drury Lane.’

This is the second portrait held in the collections at the DEI of Lancelot Blackbourne (Blackburne, Blackburn or Blackbourn). The ‘DD’ listed after his name stands for Doctor Divinitatis, a Doctor of Divinity. This theological title likely refers to an honorary degree bestowed upon him after obtaining the position of Bishop (either of Exeter, 1717, or York, 1724.) He finds him listed as Number 10 in a feature on ‘Super Scandalous Clergymen’, with HTR Williams writing: ‘To this day, his legacy remains steeped in intrigue and scandalous rumour. While the Anglican Church likes to style him as a pious missionary…serving as a chaplain aboard a Caribbean pirate ship, Blackburne was clearly no innocent. He was widely believed to have indulged in piracy himself.’ This rumour is also mentioned by Benerson Little, author of maritime history non-fiction, who mentions Blackbourne in his 2007 book, The Buccaneer’s Realm: Pirate Life on the Spanish Main, 1674-1688. He cites that in 1681, ‘Lancelot Blackburn, who would become arch-bishop of York in 1724, travelled to Nevis [a small island near Saint Kitts in the Caribbean.] As a cleric, rumours abounded that among his many purported vices was Caribbean Piracy.’ (More information about Blackbourne can be found in this listing of another portrait, 04646 held by the Devon & Exeter Institution.)

The artist, Polish-born Isaac Zeeman (or Seeman) was a portraitist in the 18th Century, who died in 1751. George Vertue (1684-1756) was a prolific printmaker and historian of British art, with many papers held in the British Library known as the ‘Vertue Notebooks’, partly published by the Walpole Society.

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Portraits