Better known as Bess of Hardwick, Elizabeth Talbot came from a family of minor gentry in Derbyshire and rose to become one of the richer people in England. She married four times, each time to a richer and more powerful man, became a lady-in-waiting to Queen Elizabeth, guardian—read, jailer—of Mary, Queen of Scots, and twice was sent to the Tower of London herself for her ambitions. This portrait, thought to have been painted after the death of her fourth husband in 1590. shows Bess dressed plainly as a widow, the enormous ropes of pearls around her neck the only mark of her great wealth.
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