Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Luttrell, Edward
LUTTRELL or LUTTEREL, EDWARD (fl. 1670–1710), crayon painter and mezzotint engraver, appears to have been a native of Dublin, and to have come early in life to London, where he entered at New Inn as a student of law. After practising art for his own pleasure, he finally adopted it as a profession. He obtained some repute as a painter of portraits in crayons, and invented a method of laying a ground on copper on which to draw in crayons. In the National Portrait Gallery there are crayon portraits by Luttrell of Samuel Butler (drawn on an oak panel), Archbishop Sancroft, and Bishop George Morley. A portrait-drawing by him is in the print room at the British Museum. Luttrell was one of the earliest native practitioners of the art of mezzotint engraving. According to Vertue (Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 23068, f. 22) he was led to experiment with the rocker himself, in imitation of the engravings by Abraham Blooteling, and, not being very successful, induced Lloyd the publisher to bribe one Blois, an assistant to Blooteling, to reveal his master's method. Blois revealed it to Lloyd, but Lloyd refused to communicate it to Luttrell, and revealed it to another engraver, Isaac Beckett [q. v.] Luttrell continued his efforts unaided until he met with Jan Van Somer [q. v.], the mezzotint engraver, who gave him the required knowledge. Subsequently Luttrell worked with and for Beckett and Lloyd, and as he did not always put his name to his engravings, they are somewhat difficult to identify. Among those by him are portraits from his own drawings of Bishop Burnet, Dr. Robert Cony (1707), Rev. Francis Higgins, the two ambassadors from Bantam (drawn from life by Luttrell at the Duke's Theatre), and Robert, earl of Yarmouth, with other portraits after Sir P. Lely, John Greenhill, and others. From the address on the portrait of the Rev. F. Higgins, Luttrell would appear to have had a print-stall in Westminster Hall. Luttrell drew a series of portraits, which were engraved by Vanderbanck for Bishop Kennett's ‘History of England.’
[Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting, ed. Wornum; Chaloner Smith's British Mezzotinto Portraits.]