Portrait of Henry II of France

Francis I of France died at the end of March 1547 and his second son became Henry II, crowned at Reims that July. The inscription across the top of this canvas states it flatly, Henry, second of that name, king of France.

It is the official portrait, the one made to be copied. Versions went out to courts and houses across France, and a small panel version is in the Louvre. For a long time this full-length was given to Pourbus instead, and a recent cleaning returned it to Clouet and established it as the prototype the copies came from.

It reached Florence, most likely, in 1589, in the dowry Christine of Lorraine brought when she married Ferdinando de' Medici. She was Henry's granddaughter, the child of his daughter Claude.