The lining of the canvas is annotated in black ink on its back: "Shakespeare / Copied from Engravings / TS 1864." Presumably this annotation repeats information on the back of the original canvas
Also available as a digital reproduction
Bought by Folger from Charles Sessler, Importer and Bookseller, 1314 Walnut St., Philadelphia, December 1924, $1500
Provenance: By descent to Dr. Matthew Woods, whose family purchased the painting for $3000; sold at auction in Philadelphia for $1100; bought by Sessler $1300 (above information from Sessler correspondence in Folger file)
Title from Pressly
Publications
Matthew Woods, Rambles of a Physician: or, A Midsummer Dream, Philadelphia, 1889, vol. 1, p. 218, repr. on p. 219 with the following caption: "SULLY'S 'THREE THOUSAND DOLLAR SHAKESPEARE' IN POSSESSION OF THE AUTHOR), PAINTED BY THAT ARTIST FROM HIS COLLECTION OF NEARLY 400 PICTURES OF SHAKESPEARE, AND WHICH HE MAINTAINED 'CONTAINED THE EXCELLENCIES OF ALL, AND THE FAULTS OF NONE'"; Biddle and Fielding 1921, no. 1570
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