This painting was described in the Cartwright inventory as 'Sr Martin furbushers pictur...', but the sitter does not resemble the known likenesses of the celebrated English navigator Sir Martin Frobisher (1535?-94). This identification might have been prompted by the fact that Frobisher was given 'a fair chain of gold' by Elizabeth I for his Arctic exploration, but chains like the one depicted here were not uncommon amongst gentlemen of the later 16th century (the costume is of c.1590). This painting could then be a copy after an unidentified late 16th-century portrait, possibly by Hieronimo Custodis.
