Portrait of Dido Elizabeth Belle and Lady Elizabeth Murray

Feature image: Portrait of Dido Elizabeth Belle and Lady Elizabeth Murray via Wikipedia

One of the most famous paintings depicting female friendship is the Portrait of Dido Elizabeth Belle and Lady Elizabeth Murray on canvas, completed in 1778 by Scottish artist David Martin. The portrait is displayed in Scotland’s Scone Palace in Perthshire, Scotland. As of today, this is the only known painting of Dido Belle Lindsay and Elizabeth Murray. Two central themes that made the portrait stand out are British fashion and their roles as women. Dido and Elizabeth appear as equals based on their outfits, making a fashion statement as aristocratic women rather than focusing on their interracial backgrounds. Despite the women’s cultural background, they were treated and saw one another as equals through their story and fashion, which is the epitome of friendship. 

Given the historical background and context, the portrait juxtaposes the two women. Dido Elizabeth Belle and Lady Elizabeth Murray were second cousins in the 1800s. They were raised together in the same household by their great uncle, Lord Mansfield. Despite their ethnic and cultural differences, they were both treated as equals and ladies. Kenna Libes wrote in her 2020 article for Fashion History Timeline, “It has been claimed that this painting presents Dido and Elizabeth “more or less as social equals,” with both looking straight at the viewer.” Martin had painted both women looking straight at their viewer smiling. By having both women looking directly at their viewer, this characterizes them at the same dignified level. For Dido, this is imperative because Martin doesn’t depict her, a colored woman, as enslaved. No other painting in the 17th and 18th centuries portrays a person of color in fancy aristocratic clothes. Let alone have them standing beside a person who’s Caucasian and be viewed as an equal in education and society. During the era of this painting, the transatlantic slave trade was going on in the Atlantic Ocean. According to a 2019 article from Retrospect Journal by Sophie Whitehead, “Scottish artist David Martin, who was the protégé of the painter, but also husband to John Lindsay’s sister – Allan Ramsay. This would help support the idea that Dido Belle is not being orientalized but instead being presented on her terms as a more fashionable and fresh version of her somewhat frumpy and less enchanting cousin Elizabeth.” Due to Martin’s connections to the Lindsay family, he could paint an honest image of Dido, focusing on who she was rather than giving a stereotypical portrayal. 

Interestingly, the portrait had various names throughout the years, such as “Lady Elizabeth and Mrs. Daviner” and “Portrait of Lady Finch Hatton, seated in the garden with an open book and a negress attendant.” Both titles featured the married last names of both women, but today, the painting is titled Portrait of Dido Elizabeth Belle Lindsay and Lady Elizabeth Murray. This official title confirmed their full maiden names. In addition, the only time the portrait was portrayed in the media was in 2013, when a film called Belle came out covering Dido’s life story and her friendship with Elizabeth. The film starred Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Dido and Sarah Gadon as Elizabeth, providing their backstory. The end credits of the film reveal a shot of the portrait.

Dido Elizabeth Belle was a free black British woman living in England. Initially, she was an illegitimate child born into slavery. Her biological father was Sir John Lindsay, a naval officer, and her mother, Maria Belle, was an enslaved person from the West Indies. Her father placed her in the care of his uncle William Murray at Kenwood House in Hampstead. Therefore, she was raised and educated as a free gentlewoman, which was uncommon at the time for illegitimate children. Dido lived in the Kenwood House for 30 years. She was known to assist Lord Mansfield, an abolitionist, in the court cases regarding the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Sophie Whitehead wrote, “It has been suggested that the Dido Belle portrait would appeal to abolitionists, though it contrasts to other abolitionist artwork such as the Wedgewood medal ‘Am I, not a man and a brother,’ which highlighted the brutality of the slave trade. It can be argued that they both make the same point of shared humanity and fraternity, although in this case, it is of a woman and, as she is shown in relation to Elizabeth, a sister too.” Nevertheless, Dido’s very image “contradicts many assumptions that people have about the position of black people in pre- 1948 society.” 

Unlike Dido, Lady Elizabeth Murray was a free British aristocrat who was just a year older than Dido. Elizabeth had gone to live with Uncle William Murray after her mother died. It is rumored Dido was taken in to become a playmate and friend to Elizabeth, who was only six years old at the time. She was raised along with Dido, and as aristocratic women, they were both educated, and married wealthy men with whom they had children. Apart from Elizabeth’s background, she is known for her exquisite fashion. In Martin’s portrait, Elizabeth is roughly eighteen years old, and her pink dress and hairstyle were the highlight for women during the 17 ^th century. More specifically, in the portrait, she’s painted wearing a bib apron, a string of pearls, and petticoat lines, and her hair is rounded above her head. This was the ideal fashion for aristocratic women during the mid-to-late 1760s, especially the bibbed apron at Elizabeth’s waist, which was considered protective and decorative. Kenna Libes argues that Elizabeth’s style of string of pearls, bib apron, and petticoat indicates her transition from childhood into adulthood for women. 

The Portrait of Dido Elizabeth Belle Lindsay and Lady Elizabeth Murray focuses on the fashion of two aristocrats of different ethnicities. Despite their backgrounds and looks, they were raised the same way, which made the painting unique at the time. The painting represents fashion and female friendship during the eighteenth century. Yet, Kenna Libes wrote, in her 2020 article, “Their (Dido and Elizabeth) poses and expressions have been read as speaking of “sisterhood [and] companionship,” with Dido and Elizabeth on equal ground (Butchart 7:10), but many aspects of this painting are in the tradition of servant-and-master portraiture.” However, this could be the first impression and interpretation of the portrait for twenty-first-century viewers, as Libes implies in her article. Enough evidence proves Dido and Elizabeth had a real and lasting friendship during their time. Something women today can take after for their friendships.

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