ABSTRACT
Unlike some of their continental counterparts, there is no evidence to suggest that the monarchy in Britain were great art collectors, at least until the seventeenth century. Certainly, Henry II (12071272) had a collection of pictures, plate and relics. Equally the Renaissance and its aftermath influenced the royal households of Britain. Poetry and music flourished under the patronage of Henry VIII (1491–1547), who also appointed the country’s only King’s Antiquary, John Leyland, to describe and list material of antiquarian interest in England and Wales. But it was not until the reign of Charles I (1600–1649) that the first royal collection of significance was established in England.
