Pope
by Louis François Roubiliac
1741
Yale Center for British Art, accession number B1993.27
Inscribed, chiseled on front of socle: "POPE"; on proper left under sitter's shoulder: "ALEX. POPE. Nats. LONDINI, | die 8o. junii anno MDCLXXXVIII. | Obiit in vico Twickenham prope | Urbem, die 8o. maii MDCCXLIV"; on front of twentieth century pedestal: "GIFT OF PAUL MELLON | IN MEMORY OF | BASIL TAYLOR | BRITISH ART HISTORIAN | 1922-1975 | FRIEND, MENTOR | AND GENEROUS SOURCE | OF WISE ADVICE | IN THE COURSE OF ASSEMBLING | THIS COLLECTION OF | BRITISH ART," Signed and dated by chisel under sitter's shoulder, proper right: "Anno Dom. | MDCCXLI. | L.F. Roubiliac | Scit. Ad vivum."
Angus Trumble notes on the Yale entry: "This fine version, which was given to the Center by Paul Mellon, was possibly commissioned by the author, Tory politician, and diplomat Viscount Bolingbroke (1678–1751) and was subsequently owned by two prime ministers. It is not clear whether it was one of the two marble busts of Pope that were listed as 'marble head' and 'marble bust' in the sculptor's studio sale of 1762. The socle is modern. The other three versions are at Temple Newsam House, Leeds; the Fitzwilliam collection at Minton, Peterborough; and the Shipley Art Gallery, Gateshead. George Vertue thought Roubiliac's busts of "Mr. Pope more like than any other sculptor has done I think" (Vertue, "Note Books"), and Reynolds told Malone that the sculptor had described Pope's appearance during the sittings "as that of a person who had been much afflicted with the headache, and that he should have known the fact from the contracted appearance of the skin above the eyebrows, though he had not otherwise been apprized of it" (Wimsatt, 1965, p. 229).
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