Calligrapher, miniaturist, and manuscript illuminator One of the few women in early modern England who can be considered a professional artist, Esther Inglis was a meticulous, gifted calligrapher and miniaturist; during her career she produced over fifty extant manuscripts, which she presented to members of the monarchy and aristocracy in the hope of patronage.
Inglis’s parents were French Huguenots who had fled the religious persecution of their homeland around 1570. They moved to Scotland and established a French school in Edinburgh. Though we know little about Inglis’s childhood, the fine education and training in calligraphy she received from her parents is evident. In her twenties she married a minister, Bartholomew Kello, who was employed as a scrivener by King James VI of Scotland and who acted as a messenger during the transition between the end of Elizabeth’s reign and James’s ascension to the English throne. Inglis and her husband moved to England in 1604, and Kello assumed a rectorship in Essex. They had six children, four of whom survived to adulthood; though their marriage was plagued by poverty, there is evidence that it was an otherwise happy relationship.
For the purposes of her work, Esther did not assume her husband’s last name; she anglicized her father’s name, Langlois, to Inglish, or Inglis. Over her career, she dedicated her works to various powerful patrons, including Queen Elizabeth, King James, Prince Henry, Prince Charles, the Earl of Essex, and members of the Sidney and Herbert families. Most of the texts she illustrated comprise religious verses written or transcribed by Kello; what is most remarkable about these books is their artistic rendering: the books display intricate borders and are bound in leather, silk, or velvet. They are small and delicate, often only a few inches wide. The often microscopic calligraphy is detailed and exquisite. Also notable is the deliberate assertion of self-identity that accompanies these works. In the dedications to several of the books, Inglis employs the modesty topos, apologizing for assuming to present her work to the public since she is only a woman; yet she also takes obvious pride in her work, concluding many manuscripts with a self-portrait and with the motto, Vive la plume! Inglis’s husband may have used some of her books to gain access to circles of power in his service to the government.
Inglis received recompense for some of her manuscripts, but she was still in debt when she died in 1624. Her portrait, painted in 1595, now hangs in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery.
Jo Eldridge Carney
See also Art and Women; Fetti, Lucrina; Killigrew, Anne; Nelli, Plauilla;Work and Women.
Bibliography
Frye, Susan. “Materializing Authorship in Esther Inglis’s Books.” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 32, no. 3 (2002): 469—491.
Ziegler, Georgianna. “ ‘More Than Feminine Boldness’:The Gift Books of Esther Inglis.” In Women, Writing, and the Reproduction of Culture. Pages 19—37. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2000.
World History
