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56-3 Who Might be the Model?

The earliest known historical mention of Leonardo’s La Belle Ferronnière occurs in a book published in 1642 describing works of art belonging to the French royal family at the Château de Fontainebleau. There it is described that the painting was made by Leonardo and is a “portrait of a Duchess of Mantua.” Later records almost unanimously describe it simply as Portrait of a Woman, but at the end of the eighteenth century, it was first proposed that the model was Lucrezia Crivelli (1464–1534), a mistress of Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan. She was also a lady-in-waiting to Ludovico’s wife Beatrice d’Este (no. 52) and became his mistress. A poet and contemporary of Leonardo, Antonio Tebaldeo (1463–1537), mentioned in a poem that Leonardo had painted a portrait of a woman named Lucrezia, which is one reason the model for the work has been identified as Lucrezia Crivelli.

In his poem, Tebaldeo wrote that the soul of Lucrezia, the woman in Leonardo’s portrait, belonged solely to Ludovico, Duke of Milan. If Lucrezia Crivelli was indeed the model for Leonardo’s La Belle Ferronnière, her gaze, which seems directed at the viewer but also elsewhere, may be intended for Ludovico alone. The stone parapet in the foreground may also have been placed there deliberately as a means of making her seem unapproachable to viewers other than Ludovico.

Other suggestions have been made about potential models for the work, including Isabella of Aragon (no. 54), wife of the previous Duke of Milan, and Beatrice d’Este (no. 52), but there is no conclusive evidence supporting any of those proposals. Today, most scholars support the theory that the woman in this portrait was indeed Lucrezia Crivelli.