This striking image of James in armour implies that its subject – by now in his fifties and with many disappointments behind him – remains confident that military victory is imminent. Indeed, the early 1740s looked promising for the Jacobites. Nearly twenty five years of peaceful relations between Britain and France ended when the War of the Austrian Succession placed them on opposing sides. The two main architects of this long detente were removed from the picture – the British prime minister Robert Walpole lost office in 1742 and Cardinal Fleury of France died the following year.

This portrait was commissioned by Captain William Hay, a Scottish Jacobite who added it to his ‘set’ of Stuart royal portraits on the eve of his departure from Rome.