This delicate small portrait, datable to the 1640s–1650s, reveals its era through costume details: the wide, transparent collar modestly veiling the young woman's shoulders, and the hairstyle—wavy cascades framing the face, tied with two black bows (a similar solution appears in Justus Suttermans’ 1647 Portrait of Maria Leopoldina of Austria, daughter of Claudia de’ Medici).

Possibly a token of love anticipating matrimony, the portrait aligns with Florentine culture and recalls Giovanni Martinelli’s vivid female half-length figures.

Though known for frescoes and altarpieces, Martinelli excelled in allegorical portrayals of women. His style emerges in the pensive eyelids, volumic modeling of nose and chin, and the pale complexion offset by vermilion lips. A recurrent motif—his signature—is the cord around the neck, one hand near the neckline, here adorned with a jewel matching the earring and pearl necklace, hinting at noble status.

The smoky application typical of his large canvases becomes, in this small format, a trembling touch technique animating light on the hair and feather at the nape, as seen in another small oval Portrait of a Young Woman attributed to Martinelli.