Follower of Arnold von Bronckhorst

half length, wearing black robes, and a chain of office, holding a rod

Edmund Farrer, Portraits in Suffolk Houses East, Vol.II, MSS, p.151, no.23 in the list of pictures at Broke Hall;
Roy Strong, Tudor & Jacobean Portraits, 1969, Text Volume, p.31

One of history's finest statesmen William Cecil was the son of Richard Cecil (d.1553) and Jane, daughter of William Heckington of Bourne, Lincolnshire.  He entered St John's College, Cambridge in 1535 and, although he never formally graduated, he left with a mastery of classical learning.  He entered the service of Princess Elizabeth, and in 1550 she appointed him her surveyor.  On her accession to the throne eight years later Queen Elizabeth appointed him Secretary of State.  Cecil soon became the pre-eminent statesman at court and was instrumental in making the peace with France and Scotland.  He dealt deftly with the court intrigues of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester and others, and by 1570 he  was in sufficient favour with the Queen that she granted him the power to stamp her signature on routine official documents.  The following year he was raised to the peerage as Baron Burghley and in 1572 he relinquished his role as Secretary of State and succeeded as Lord Treasurer.