JAMESONE (George), an excellent painter, justly termed the Vandyck of Scotland, was the son of Andrew Jamesone, an architect; and was born at Aberdeen, in 1586. He studied under Rubens, at Antwerp; and, after his return, applied with indefatigable industry to portraits in oil, though he sometimes practised in miniature, and also in history and landscapes. His largest portraits were somewhat less than life. His earliest works are chiefly on board, afterwards on a fine linen cloth smoothly primed with a proper
Jamyn, Jane. proper tone to help the harmony of his shadows. His excellence is said to consist in delicacy and softness, with a clear and beautiful colouring; his shades not charged, but helped by varnish, with little appearance of the pencil. When king Charles I. visited Scotland in 1633, the magistrates of Edinburgh, knowing his majesty's taste, employed this artist to make drawings of the Scottish monarchs; with which the king was so pleased, that, inquiring for the painter, he sat to him, and rewarded him with a diamond-ring from his own finger. It is observable, that Jamestone always drew himself with his hat on, either in imitation of his master Rubens, or on having been indulged in that liberty by the king when he sat to him. Many of Jamestone's works are in both the colleges of Aberdeen; and the Sybils there he is said to have drawn from living beauties in that city. His best works are from the year 1630 to his death, which happened at Edinburgh in 1644.