Oil painting (unframed). Andrea Doria, 1466-1560, was an aristocratic Genoese soldier of fortune, born in nearby Oneglia and orphaned at an early age. He served in the papal guard and under various Italian princes and in 1503 was fighting for the Genoese - Genoa then being under French vassalage. He subsequently led a rising that evicted the French from Genoa and became a celebrated Genoese admiral, defending the city's interests in the Mediterranean against Barbary corsairs and the Turks. He died aged 93 at Genoa. The original of this portrait was painted by Sebastiano del Piombo about 1520: this copy was made in Rome by William Henry Furse and accepted by the Board of Greenwich Hospital as a gift to the Naval Gallery there on 3 June 1843 (Board minute), the donor being J.B. Heath, the Sardninian Consul General. It added to a number of copy portraits of early figure presented by E.H. Locker in 1838, one of which was also by Furse (see BHC2627). [PvdM 7/11 and 1/17]