Editing Robert Hooke (section)

== Likenesses ==
[[File:Jan Baptist van Helmont portrait.jpg|thumb|upright=0.75|Portrait conjectured to be Hooke,{{sfnp|Jardine|2003|pp=15{{ndash}}19}} but almost certainly [[Jan Baptist van Helmont]]{{sfnp|Jensen|2004|pages=263{{ndash}}268}}]]

No authenticated portrait of Robert Hooke exists, a situation that has sometimes been attributed to the heated conflicts between Hooke and Isaac Newton, although Hooke's biographer [[Allan Chapman (historian)|Allan Chapman]] rejects as a myth claims Newton or his acolytes deliberately destroyed Hooke's portrait.{{sfnp|Chapman|2005|loc=Appendix}} German antiquarian and scholar [[Zacharias Conrad von Uffenbach]] visited the Royal Society in 1710 and his account of his visit mentions him being shown portraits of "Boyle and Hoock", which were said to be good likenesses but, while Boyle's portrait survives, Hooke's has been lost.{{sfnp|Chapman|1996}}{{sfnp|Inwood|2003|p=411}} In Hooke's time, the Royal Society met at Gresham College but within a few months of Hooke's death Newton became the Society's president and plans for a new meeting place were made. When the Royal Society moved to new premises in 1710, Hooke's was the only portrait that went missing{{sfnp|Gribbin|2003|p=283}} and remains so. According to Hooke's diary, he sat for a portrait by renowned artist [[Mary Beale]], so it is possible such a portrait did at some time exist.{{sfnp|Jardine|2003|p=18}}  Conversely, Chapman draws attention to the fact that Waller's extensively illustrated work, ''Posthumous works of Robert Hooke'', published shortly after Hooke's death, has no portrait of him.{{sfnp|Chapman|2005|loc=Appendix}}

Two contemporaneous, written descriptions of Hooke's appearance have survived; his close friend John Aubrey described him in middle age and at the height of his creative powers:

{{blockquote|{{notatypo|He is but of midling stature, something crooked, pale faced, and his face but little below, but his head is lardge, his eie full and popping, and not quick; a grey eie. He haz a delicate head of haire, browne, and of an excellent moist curle. He is and ever was temperate and moderate in dyet, etc.}}|source=''Brief Lives''{{sfnp|Aubrey|1898|p=411}}}}

Richard Waller, writing in 1705 in ''The Posthumous Works of Robert Hooke'', described the elderly Hooke:

{{blockquote|As to his Person he was but despicable, being very crooked, tho' I have heard from himself, and others, that he was strait till about 16 Years of Age when he first grew awry, by frequent practising, with a Turn-Lath&nbsp;... He was always very pale and lean, and laterly nothing but Skin and Bone, with a Meagre Aspect, his Eyes grey and full, with a sharp ingenious Look whilst younger; his nose but thin, of a moderate height and length; his Mouth meanly wide, and upper lip thin; his Chin sharp, and Forehead large; his Head of a middle size. He wore his own Hair of a dark Brown colour, very long and hanging neglected over his Face uncut and lank&nbsp;...{{sfnp|Waller|1705|p=xxvii}}}}

On 3 July 1939, ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' magazine published a portrait, supposedly of Hooke, but when [[Ashley Montagu]] traced the source, it was found to lack a verifiable connection to Hooke. Montagu found the two contemporaneous written descriptions of Hooke's appearance agree with one another but that neither matches the portrait in ''Time''.{{sfnp|Montagu|1941|pages = 15–17}}

In 2003, historian [[Lisa Jardine]] conjectured that a recently discovered portrait was of Hooke,{{sfnp|Jardine|2003|pp=15{{ndash}}19}} but this proposal was disproved by [[William B. Jensen]] of the [[University of Cincinnati]] who identified the subject as the Flemish scholar [[Jan Baptist van Helmont]].{{sfnp|Jensen|2004|pages=263{{ndash}}268}}

Other possible likenesses of Hooke include:
* A seal used by Hooke displays an unusual profile portrait of a man's head, which some have said portrays Hooke.{{sfnp|Chapman|2005|loc=Appendix}}
* The engraved frontispiece to the 1728 edition of [[Ephraim Chambers|Chambers' ''Cyclopedia'']] shows a drawing of a bust of Robert Hooke.{{sfnp|She-philosopher|2022}} The extent to which the drawing is based on a real work of art is unknown.
* A memorial window existed at [[St Helen's Church, Bishopsgate]], London, but it was a formulaic rendering rather than an accurate likeness.{{sfnp|Chapman|2005|loc=Appendix}} The window was destroyed in the [[1993 Bishopsgate bombing]].

[[file:13 Portrait of Robert Hooke.JPG|thumb|upright 0.7|Rita Greer's imagined portrait of Hooke]]
In 2003, the amateur painter Rita Greer embarked on a project to memorialise Hooke and produce credible images of him, both painted and drawn, which she believes match Aubrey's and Waller's descriptions of him. Greer's images of Hooke, which are free to use under the [[Free Art License]], have been used for television programmes in the  UK and the US, in books, magazines and for public relations.{{sfnp|Chapman|2005|loc=Appendix}}

In 2019, Larry Griffing, an associate professor in Biology at [[Texas A&M University]], proposed that a portrait by [[Mary Beale]] of an unknown sitter and referred to as ''[[Mary Beale#Portrait of a Mathematician|Portrait of a Mathematician]]''{{snd}}is actually of Hooke, noting the physical features of the sitter in the portrait match Hooke's. The figure points to a drawing of elliptical motion that appears to match an unpublished manuscript created by him. The painting also includes an [[orrery]] depicting the same principle. According to Griffing, buildings included in the image are of [[Lowther Castle]], now in [[Cumbria]], and its Church of St Michael. The church was renovated under one of Hooke's architectural commissions, which Beale would have known from her extensive body of work for the Lowther family.{{sfnp|Griffing|2020}} According to Griffing, the painting would once have been owned by the Royal Society but was abandoned when Newton, its president, moved the Society's headquarters in 1710.{{sfnp|Griffing|2020}} Christopher Whittaker of the School of Education, [[University of Durham]], England, has questioned Griffing's analysis; according to Whittaker, it is more likely to be of [[Isaac Barrow]].{{sfnp|Whittaker|2021}} In a response to Whittaker,{{sfnp|Griffing|2021}} Griffing reaffirmed his deduction.