A servant of King Henry VIII

The whole portrait is less than 12 centimetres across, small enough to hold in one hand. The man in it was 30 in 1534, according to the inscription beside him, and the letters HR worked into his clothing, for Henricus Rex, mark him as a servant of Henry VIII's household. His name is not known. 1534 was the year Parliament passed the Act of Supremacy, making the king supreme head of the church in England, and Holbein had been back in London for two years, painting the people of the court. The little picture came to Vienna from Ambras Castle near Innsbruck, the Renaissance collection of Archduke Ferdinand II of Tyrol.