Effigy of Henry VII
by TORRIGIANO, Pietro, Plaster cast painted with restored gilding
This is a plaster cast of the tomb effigy of Henry VII (1457-1509), after the original in gilt bronze in Henry VII’s Chapel, Westminster Abbey, completed in 1517. The bronze effigy of Henry VII lies next to that of his Queen, Elizabeth of York, at the centre of the chapel which bears his name, at the extreme east end of the Abbey. Torrigiani was a Florentine sculptor, who had worked alongside Michelangelo in Rome. He worked in the Netherlands, and then spent some years in Britain, working for the Tudor court, notably in terracotta. He was subsequently active in Spain, where he was to die in 1528. The plaster cast was almost certainly made in London in the 1850s.