In the first article of these two looking at the career and painting of Eric Ravilious (1903–1942), I covered the period up to the start of the Second World War in 1939. When that broke out, he joined the Royal Observer Corps, and by the end of the year had been given the honorary rank of Captain in the Royal Marines as a full-time war artist, working for the Royal Navy.

During the calm before the storm of war, Ravilious seems to have spent much of his summer in Sussex.

Interior at Furlongs (1939) has the appearance, and many of the traits of, a print, and combines its interior view of a largely empty room in a cottage, with one view through the open door, the other view through a closed window. The landscape shown is that of the South Downs in East Sussex. The fragmented view shows woods, a distant hut or cottage, and golden fields of grain crops, so would have been painted in the late summer, at the outbreak of war.

The landscape and cottage are empty, the only sign of life being a coat hung on a hook on the back of the door. In its way, it is as eerie and foreboding as the more overtly visionary landscapes of Samuel Palmer, which had been painted in Kent.

Tea at Furlongs (1939) is even more eerily devoid of figures. A table has been laid up for tea under a parasol. With a teapot, jug of milk, two places set out, two chairs pushed back, it’s as if their occupants have just got up and vanished. This compares with Félix Vallotton’s abandoned harvest in The Sheaves (1915), set in the early part of the previous war.

Prior to the start of the war, Ravilious may have taken a trip to France, to paint this Pilot Boat at Le Havre (1939), another eerily figure-free scene (there are few ghostlike figures at the left) in what should have been a bustling port.

At some time around 1939, Ravilious visited the famous White Horse cut in the chalk downs at Uffington in Berkshire, another theme which overlapped with those of Paul Nash. The Vale of the White Horse (c 1939) shows the view from an unconventionally low angle, in pouring rain.

Ravilious extended his occasional interiors into a series. The Bedstead (1939), with its wide angle projection, is full of patterns: the wallpaper, floorboards and rugs.

In his Farmhouse Bedroom (1939) the patterns almost overwhelm, and its projection is so extreme that it distorts.

One of his ‘civilian’ landscapes from the war years is this view through a window of a Train Landscape (1940). He had intended producing a book showing the many chalk figures found on the Downs in the south of England. This is in the form of a triptych, harking back to van Eyck’s Rolin Madonna, showing another White Horse, this time near Westbury in Wiltshire.

Conservation work on this painting has shown that it’s a composite, assembled using collage, of two different views painted from compartments in trains. One, originally showing the Wilmington Giant, provides the train interior, the other shows the Westbury White Horse as seen through the windows.

For Ravilious these composite paintings of train interiors and landscape triptychs were quite different in intent from their ancestors. The railway carriage was much more than a framing device, and the landscape much more than a means to add depth to the interior. This type of travelogue motif was popular at the time, as a means of promoting travel to see places, and it’s likely that would have been an important theme had Ravilious been able to complete his book.

In February 1940, he reported for duty at the Royal Naval Barracks at Chatham in Kent, which have long since closed.

It was probably in Chatham Dockyard, or possibly Sheerness in the Thames Estuary, that he painted Submarines in Dry Dock (1940), an adventure in their unusual composite forms.

Then in late May he joined HMS Highlander, an escort to the aircraft carrier HMS Glorious, on deployment to recapture Narvik in north Norway. His ship returned briefly to Scapa Flow before returning to Narvik to recover the forces it had landed. In early June, HMS Glorious was sunk there with great loss of life.

Midnight Sun (1940) shows the aircraft carrier in the distance. In the left foreground is a depth charge launcher, used against submarines.

Following his return from Norway, Ravilious served briefly in Portsmouth, when his family moved to Ironbridge Farm, near Braintree in Essex.

His Ironbridge Interior (1941) is one of his most elaborate interiors, with a watercolour hanging on the wall and a jug of flowers.

Shelling by Night (1941) was most probably painted when Ravilious was on the south coast of England, during the summer of that year, before he was appointed to Scotland, where he stayed for a while with Paul Nash’s younger brother John, another painter.

In Scotland, his paintings concentrated on the Royal Naval Air Station at Dundee. However, his Wall Maps (1941) shows a view of an operational suite further south, possibly in the Home counties or on the Channel coast.

Similarly, The Operations Room (1942) was painted at an air station far to the south of the Scottish border. This hut was the centre for direction of flying operations in the Air Station, and normally bustling with staff and visiting aircrew.

Early in 1942, Ravilious was appointed to another air station at York, but his wife Tirzah required surgery so he was temporarily appointed to RAF Sawbridgeworth in Hertfordshire. This was a flying school at the time, allowing Ravilious to sketch from the rear cockpit during flight.

This air station flew the Tiger Moth (1942), which Ravilious has captured so well here.

He started this painting of Demonstrating a Machine Gun in 1942, but never completed it.

With Tirzah now recovered, Ravilious flew to Iceland, where he joined RAF Kaldadarnes on 1 September. Its primary role was to monitor the Iceland-Greenland gap, which required flying in some of the most hostile conditions. Losses were high, and on the day of Ravilious’ arrival a Lockheed Hudson failed to return from its patrol. Three aircraft took off at first light the following morning to search, one carrying Ravilious, who had chosen to join its crew. His aircraft also failed to return, and no trace was found of it.

The same sky that Paul Nash had come to fear took the life of his former pupil, and friend, Eric Ravilious.

References

Wikipedia
Artist’s website, operated by his family.

There are now several excellent books in print showing his work too.

Art forms part of the core of our social history, casting light on some of the oddest practices in society. Today and tomorrow I look at paintings of a sport which, according to modern authorities, didn’t arise until around 1860, and is supposed to have been brought to Europe from India. It’s even named after the Duke of Beaufort’s Gloucestershire seat, Badminton House, although no one seems to know why. The sport of badminton is featured on one well-known painting by Auguste Renoir, from about 1887, and I’ve shown a couple of others from the same period, by Laura Theresa Alma-Tadema and Charles Edward Perugini.

Racquet sports such as tennis have long appeared in paintings. One of the oldest references to that game is Michele Desubleo’s Odysseus and Nausicaä from about 1654, which gives a full account of this story from Ovid’s retelling of Homer’s Odyssey in his Metamorphoses. Odysseus is shown naked, clutching the leafy branch strategically to his crotch with his left hand. His right arm is held out, apparently pleading his case to the princess, sat in her beautiful robes, and in the process of handing him an item of clothing.

Nausicaä holds in her left hand a wooden bat, following an apocryphal story that she had been playing an early form of real tennis, for which the ball is towards the lower edge of the painting.

Whenever the modern sport of badminton started, its roots are in what was known as battledore and shuttlecock, or in French jeu de volant, thought to date back to the days of the Roman Empire. A battledore is the precursor of the modern strung racquet, and the shuttlecock has been a light object to which flight feathers are attached. For centuries, children are supposed to have knocked shuttlecocks around in the air using their battledores.

Each of these paintings is a bit like the popular Spot the Ball contest, in which participants are invited to mark where they think the ball is in a still image of a game of football (soccer). Only we’re here trying to spot the shuttlecock.

The earliest painted evidence that I’ve seen of this is in this portrait of Queen Christina of Sweden, painted by an unknown artist when the queen became monarch at the age of six, in 1632. She holds her battledore in the right hand, and quite a sophisticated shuttlecock in the left. She seems to be a keen player of the game well over two centuries before the advent of badminton.

Even better attested is this portrait of a Girl with Racket and Shuttlecock painted by Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin in 1737. Her racquet is strung with catgut, and the shuttlecock is in her left hand. Its construction is conventional: seven coloured feathers stuck into a cork cone. Suspended from her right elbow is a pair of scissors and a small purse.

J J Dailly’s magnificent Snuffbox with the Family of Louis XV (1761-62) is constructed from gold with painted enamel portraits on different sides. While her brother Louis, the Dauphin, flies a kite on its front, at the left end is a painting of Louise-Marie holding a battledore and shuttlecock.

Georg David Matthieu’s royal Portrait of the later Frederick Francis I, Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin and his sister Sophia Frederica from 1764 puts a battledore in his right hand, with the shuttlecock next to the chairleg, on the floor.

I’m a bit more doubtful as to the youth of William Williams’ Portrait of a Boy, Probably of the Crossfield Family (c 1770-75), but he too seems to want us to see his battledore and shuttlecock.

A little later, the popular printmaker Joseph Barney showed a group of five children playing what is here titled Badminton, which is a clear anachronism. They’re playing the childhood game of battledore, with no sign of any net between them.

This seems to have been quite a popular device in childhood portraits, such as that by William Beechey in this Portrait of Kenneth Dixon, Battledore Player from about 1790.

Although William Blake’s short poem The Fly, one of his Songs of Innocence and of Experience from 1794, doesn’t mention the game, the girl seen at the left is clearly playing it.

In tomorrow’s concluding article, I’ll look at how the nineteenth century transformed the childhood game of battledore.

In the first of these two articles looking at paintings of the early history of the sport of badminton, I looked at its origins as a childhood game, in which two or more participants knock a shuttlecock between themselves, using a racquet known as a battledore. At some time in the middle of the nineteenth century, that knockabout game of battledore and shuttlecock was transformed into the sport of badminton, which is played competitively either side of a high net.

By 1806, when Franciscus Joseph Octave van der Donckt painted this Portrait of Sylvie de la Rue, battledore was attracting rather older players. There’s no sign of this young woman’s battledore, but there’s a multi-coloured shuttlecock on the wooden floor at her feet.

Anton Petter’s undated Children Playing in the Park shows them engaged in games of childhood: riding a sheep, and flying what looks to be a wooden pigeon, with a battledore and shuttlecock cast on the foreground.

Alexander Varnek’s portrait of the studious young Nikolai Alekseevich Tomilov (1814-1858), aged eleven when he painted this in 1825, holds his racquet and a bowl of cherries. On the desk in front of him is a rather posher-looking shuttlecock.

Somewhere around 1860-63, the new sport of badminton seems to have emerged, played by two ‘sides’ on either side of a net.

In about 1868, the Aestheticist artist Albert Joseph Moore painted what may have been a pair of young women holding their racquets and a Shuttlecock, showing its transition from childhood game (above and below). These are typical of Moore’s paintings in dressing their figures for more classical times, but engaging them in more contemporary activities, just as he did in The Quartet, a Painter’s Tribute to Music from the same year.

The painting which truly marks the coming of age of this new sport is Charles Law Coppard’s Summer Sports in the Garden of a Country House from 1878. In its foreground are two men wearing hats, one of them holding a cricket bat. Behind them a woman is engaged in archery, and at the left side are two badminton players with a net strung high between them, much as in the modern sport.

By this time, badminton clubs were being formed across Britain, and in 1887 the club in Bath published a set of regulations for the sport. It also appears to have become popular in continental Europe.

It was in about 1887 that Pierre-Auguste Renoir painted Young Girls Playing Badminton in his new classically-inspired style, with figures so sharp against its landscape that they appear cut-out. This didn’t go down well with critics at the time, or his dealer Durand-Ruel.

The following year, Charles Dickens’ son-in-law Charles Edward Perugini painted A Summer Shower, showing three young women caught out by a sudden shower when playing badminton.

Unfortunately, Laura Theresa Alma-Tadema’s Battledore and Shuttlecock is undated and I don’t know how much reliance can be placed on its title. Its players aren’t young children, suggesting that they may have played badminton when outdoors.

The name battledore lived on: Robert Anning Bell’s print from 1896 proclaims this in its title of Battledore, and there’s no sign of any net.

Vittorio Matteo Corcos’ undated An Elegant Player attests to the new sport’s popularity among the young and beautiful of Italy.

Finally, by 1922 when ‘Shunkō’ painted this Beauty Holding Shuttlecock and Paddle, shuttlecock games were known in East Asian art. This most probably shows a young Japanese player of Hanetsuki, 羽根突き or 羽子突き, a traditional game closer to battledore than badminton, played with a rectangular wooden hagoita and a shuttlecock.

Anyone for a game of battledore?

The last and least-known of the children of the primordial deities Kronos and Rhea is Hestia (Greek Ἑστία), known to the Romans as Vesta, who was sister to Poseidon, Zeus, Hera, Ceres and Hades. In Greek, the word Hestia means a hearth in which a fire burns, and she was the goddess of the hearth to both Greeks and Romans. She is little-mentioned in classical literature, but one of a small group of protective household gods, along with the Romans’ Lares and Penates, whose responsibilities overlapped.

Hestia stood above those minor deities, though, in having several prominent temples in which eternal flames were tended in her honour. Most importantly, she remained a virgin, and her priestesses were required to follow suit as Vestal Virgins, on pain of death.

Hestia is almost completely absent from art: there are a couple of statues of her, and only one accessible image in a woolen tapestry made in Egypt in the six century.

Hestia Full of Blessings, or The Hestia Tapestry, shows her distributing blessings from her throne. Assisting her are six putti labelled Mirth, Good Cheer, Prosperity, Wealth, Blessing and Virtue. These are the blessings which each family seeks of her.

Painters have been far more interested in depicting Hestia’s priestesses, the Vestal Virgins, several of whom have had quite colourful lives, if legend is to be believed.

Sebastiano Ricci’s Sacrifice to the Goddess Vesta from 1723 is unusual for showing a temple to Hestia/Vesta which is everyday and busy with ordinary people, rather than a mystical place containing only Vestal Virgins. It is thus an attempt at some form of realism in mythological painting.

Jacques Gamelin’s undated painting of Vestals is more typical. He shows the priestesses as very young, and well covered with white clothing almost like nuns. Even the sacred flame is generating smoke to obscure what these girls are doing.

Jules-Joseph Lefebvre’s Sleeping Vestal from 1902 is even more of a surprise: an artist known for his nudes and other beautiful women swathes this young woman in a loose-fitting habit.

There are dozens of other paintings of Vestal Virgins, but the best known by far shows them outside their temple altogether, and proved extremely controversial.

Jean-Léon Gérôme started work on Pollice Verso before 1869, but had temporarily abandoned it during the Franco-Prussian War. It was not, therefore, intended as comment on that war, nor about France’s sudden transition from Second Empire to Third Republic.

Instead, Gérôme looks at the power of expression – here, a small gesture of the hand – in his favourite context, the Roman gladiatorial arena, which he had fallen in love with when he was first in Rome in 1843. It also develops a theme from his earlier Ave Caesar: that of spectators and their complicity in the horrific events taking place in front of them.

His earlier paintings of the arena had struggled to achieve the historical accuracy he desired, in armour, weapons, and other details. Far from being a flight of fancy, Gérôme had spent a great deal of time and effort trying to make everything shown in this painting as historically accurate as possible, given the knowledge of the day. For the artist, the success of the painting depended on its fine details.

To be able to bring out those fine details, and the thumb gesture which was central to its title and theme, Gérôme had to draw in from the wide-screen spectacle of Ave Caesar, and concentrate on the gladiators, and a small section of the spectators, including the emperor, his court, and those closest to him – a row of six Vestal Virgins, to the right.

The victorious gladiator stands with his right foot on the throat of the loser. He looks up at the crowd, to see whether he should kill that loser, indicated by thumbs pointing downward, or should spare his life, shown by thumbs pointing up. The title confirms what we can see: thumbs are down, and the gladiator on the ground is about to be brutally killed.

Critical commentary focussed on the row of Vestal Virgins; in Gérôme’s earlier Ave Caesar, they had been sufficiently distant that their expressions and body language couldn’t be read. Here there was no doubt: they were baying for blood, which some critics found frankly revolting. However, it speaks clearly about the Romans’ enjoyment of such events, and a moment’s reflection should make us think more deeply about our own disturbing fascination in the suffering of other humans and animals.

With the threat of the deposed king Tarquinius Superbus receding and the new Roman Republic formed, the city might have hoped for a period of peace. Although its consul Publicola managed to avoid direct confrontation with the Sabines, there were many internal conflicts and the problem of the Volscians. These came together in one prominent figure, Caius Marcius – a name you probably won’t recognise, but his story, as told in Plutarch’s Lives, was popularised much later in Shakespeare’s play about him, Coriolanus.

As a Marcius, he came from the noble family of the Marcii, descendants of Numa and the former king of Rome, Ancus Marcius, who had succeeded Tullus Hostilius. Others in the clan had attained fame by bringing Rome much of its supply of fresh water, but Caius Marcius is remembered for very different achievements. As a youth he served bravely in the last battle against Tarquinius, when he saved the life of a Roman soldier by killing his assailant. For that he was awarded a garland of oak leaves, the Roman equivalent of a medal of valour.

Later, when Rome went to war with the Volscians, Marcius encouraged other patricians to demonstrate their valour by rallying to the city’s call for men to fight in its army. The Romans then put the Volscian city of Corioli under siege, forcing its forces to divide between that siege, and meeting the Volscian army. The men of Corioli took advantage of this, overcame the Romans surrounding their city, and pursued them back to camp. Marcius led a small band of Romans to stop the men of Corioli, then rallied the other Roman forces to pursue their enemy back to their city, bursting into it with a small group of valiant Romans. This counter-attack took the enemy by surprise, and allowed Roman reinforcements to secure the city.

When the Roman soldiers started to plunder and pillage the city, Marcius cried out that he thought it a shame that they should concern themselves with getting booty, when other Romans could be fighting for their lives in battle nearby. He therefore led a small group of Romans out of the captured city towards the main Volscian force. He and his troops met up with the main Roman army as they were about to join battle with the Volscians, and he was granted permission to take on the fiercest of the enemy troops. In the battle which followed, Marcius again distinguished himself greatly, and it was his troops who were largely responsible for putting the Volscians to flight.

The following day, Cominius, the consul in command of the Romans, praised Marcius highly in front of the assembled army, and awarded him a tenth of the booty which had been taken, and a horse. For his part, Marcius accepted the latter, but declined to take any booty beyond his normal share. For this, Marcius was dubbed Caius Marcius Coriolanus, and became famous throughout Rome.

With the war against the Volscians settled in a truce, Rome faced famine, and dissent among its people. The citizens of Velitrae, though, had been decimated by an epidemic, and came to Rome to hand their city over and seek Roman colonisation. This too became the subject of dissent, and when the consuls called for Romans to go to Velitrae, the people refused.

Coriolanus led a volunteer force on an incursion into Antium, where they found and secured sufficient corn and other spoils to relieve the hunger in Rome. This further improved his reputation with the people, and he stood as a popular candidate in the next consular election. During his campaigning, though, the people saw that he was just another patrician: in the senate, Coriolanus strongly opposed the free distribution of grain, which had been sent as a gift from Syracuse, and would have greatly eased hunger among the ordinary people.

Matters quickly came to a head, and Coriolanus was summoned to answer to the people for his actions in the senate, which were claimed to incite civil war. Coriolanus responded by standing his ground and continuing his contempt for the people. The tribunes accordingly condemned Coriolanus to death as a traitor, and ordered him to be taken up to the Tarpeian Rock and thrown from it immediately.

When they tried to arrest him and do this, many realised what a monstrous act it would be, and he was surrounded and protected by a crowd of patricians and many plebeians too. It was then agreed with the tribunes that Coriolanus would be tried by the citizens in a little less than a month. Coriolanus recognised the difficulty that the senate had in its kindly feelings towards him and its fear of the common people, and brought the trial forward in an effort to clear his name.

The tribunes insisted at the start of his trial that votes should be cast not by ‘centuries’ (groups which divided the vote almost evenly between patricians and plebeians), but by tribes (families), which gave the plebeians a clear majority over the patricians and citizens of military class. At the end of the trial, when the vote was taken, he was found guilty by the tiny majority of three, and banished from Rome in perpetuity.

Coriolanus was probably the only patrician who kept his composure at this. He went home, where his mother and wife were in great distress at the news. He was then escorted by fellow patricians to the city gate, and left.

It is perhaps this which inspired Lawrence Alma-Tadema’s otherwise curious painting of the deserted Interior of Caius Martius’ House (1907), which he had carefully reconstructed.

After a few days in the country, Coriolanus decided to take vengeance on the Romans by inciting one of their enemies to wage war against Rome. He went to Tullus Aufidius, the leader of the Volscians, in their city of Antium, where he was welcomed and shown great kindness, and the two began to plot the war they would fight against Rome.

Meanwhile the Romans were torn apart by continuing dissension, and increasingly fearful of a series of bad portents. They should have been enjoying a two-year truce with the Volscians, but there were rumours that visiting Volscians would try to set the city alight. Tullus sent ambassadors to Rome to demand return of the territory which they had lost to the Romans, but Rome was indignant and suggested that the Volscians were manouevring to break the truce.

Coriolanus won the full support of both Tullus and the Volscians to wage war against Rome, and was appointed general alongside Tullus. They led a preliminary incursion into Roman territory, and won so much booty that they were unable to carry it all back. They then completed final preparations of the Volscian army for its campaign.

Coriolanus next took his Volscian division against the Roman colonial city of Circeii, which surrendered without any resistance. He moved on to lay waste the country of the Latins, but Rome refused to go to their aid, and Coriolanus captured their cities, enslaved their inhabitants, and plundered their property. His forces were by that time only twelve miles from the city of Rome.

The next city to which Coriolanus laid siege was Lavinium, which had been founded by Aeneas, and was still the location of the Romans’ sacred symbols of ancestral gods. At last Rome reacted: the commons proposed repealing the sentence against Coriolanus, and inviting him back to Rome, which was promptly vetoed by the senate.

Coriolanus marched against Rome, and camped just five miles from its gates, putting terror into the hearts of the Romans. Rome sent ambassadors to Coriolanus to beg him to stop the war, and to welcome him back to Rome. In front of the Volscians, Coriolanus repeated demands for Volscian territories to be returned, and for the Volscian people to be accorded equal civic rights with citizens of Rome. He gave the Romans thirty days to respond, then withdrew his forces.

He went on to attack more allies of Rome, capturing seven more cities, and ravaging their territories. The Romans didn’t come to their aid either, but sent more ambassadors to negotiate with Coriolanus, who merely gave them another three days to accept his previous demands. Rome then sent all its priests and religious people to try to persuade Coriolanus to relent. This too failed to change his mind, and the Romans decided to defend their city against imminent attack.

In Rome, Valeria, sister of the statesman Publicola, led a delegation of women to Volumnia, Coriolanus’ mother, where they also found his wife Vergilia. Valeria begged Volumnia and Vergilia, with her children, to join her and the other women in going to Coriolanus to plead with him not to attack Rome. They did so, and met Coriolanus in the Volscian camp.

After his mother had put their case to him, Coriolanus stood silent for a long time. Finally, he agreed that he and the Volscians would march away without attacking Rome; as he put it, he had been vanquished not by Rome, but by his own mother. He sent the women back, and ended the war. It is this extraordinary scene, in Act V Scene III of Shakespeare’s play, which has been painted so extensively.

More than a century before Shakespeare, this woodcut showing Veturia and Volumnia confronting Coriolanus (c 1473) appeared in a German translation of Giovanni Boccaccio’s De mulieribus claris.

It was perhaps Poussin who was the first to recognise its visual narrative, in Coriolanus Begged by his Family from about 1652-53. Under the shadow of the massive walls of the city, Coriolanus is symbolically drawing his sword, to show his intent to attack Rome.

To the left are Volumnia, Vergilia with at least two of their children, Valeria (standing, in ultramarine blue), and four other women (with a Roman soldier escort) all reaching out to the warrior. Just in case there is any doubt, Poussin provides an inscribed tablet in the foreground.

Only a decade later, Gerbrand van den Eeckhout’s Coriolanus’ Wife and Mother Beg Him to Spare Rome (1662) elaborated this further. Although Volumnia looks directly at Coriolanus, he avoids making eye contact.

A century later, Angelica Kaufmann’s more intimate Coriolanus, his Mother Veturia and his Wife Volumnia, Belittling him to Give up War (1765) has both mother and wife looking straight at Coriolanus, their hands also speaking eloquently.

This story attained peak popularity in the late eighteenth century, when Heinrich Friedrich Füger, for instance, drew Coriolanus Implored by his Family to Spare Rome.

At some time after 1771, Joseph-Marie Vien added a young infant, in The Family of Coriolanus, suggesting that at the time of his banishment, Coriolanus’ wife was pregnant.

I presume that this painting by Franz Anton Maulbertsch, Coriolanus at the Gates of Rome from about 1795, was an oil sketch for a finished work which I have been unable to locate. Although it includes a subtle reference to the earlier award to Coriolanus of a horse, and there is impending drama in its sky, I’m not sure that many would recognise the gates or walls of the city of Rome.

Richard Westall’s Volumnia Pleading with Coriolanus Not to Destroy Rome (1800) is another account which makes excellent use of direction of gaze to tell the story: all eyes are fixed on Coriolanus, who is looking away to the heavens in the hope of a divine solution.

The last painting which I have found showing this scene is Soma Orlai Petrich’s Coriolanus from 1869. This draws sharp contrast between the central group of women and children, huddled together and pleading, with the Volscians to the right who are drawing their weapons. Coriolanus sits between them, pondering his decision, his sword shown prominently still in its scabbard.

When Coriolanus returned to Tullus at Antium, the Volscian leader plotted to remove him immediately. Coriolanus was killed, though without the support of the majority of the Volscians, who gave him an honourable burial commensurate with his military rank. When the Volscians did attack Rome, they were defeated and Tullus himself was killed. As a result, they became its subjects rather than citizens.

The last episode completed the story of Una and the Redcrosse Knight (alias Saint George), reaching the end of the first book of The Faerie Queene.

Book 2: The Legend of Sir Guyon, or Of Temperance

Note: Sir Guyon is here accompanied by a palmer, a Middle English term for a pilgrim, typically one who has undertaken a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. As a mark of their devotion, they commonly bore the branch or leaf of a palm, giving rise to the name. The word lives on in the surname.

Canto 1

Guyon by Archimage abusd,
the Redcrosse knight awaytes,
Fyndes Mordant and Amavia slaine
With pleasures poisoned baytes.

Once the Redcrosse Knight has set off to return to the Faery Queene, the evil sorceror Archimago sees the opportunity to escape from the castle’s dungeon, and go in pursuit of the knight. He comes across a different knight, Sir Guyon, who bears a portrait of Gloriana herself; he is preceded by an elderly Palmer dressed in black, walking slowly with his staff to steady him. The magician turns himself into a squire and convinces the knight that he has just seen another knight brutally ravish a maiden.

Sir Guyon follows Archimago and reaches the young woman, whose clothing is torn and her hair dishevelled; she is really the evil Duessa. She tells Guyon that she was ravished by the Redcrosse Knight, which leaves him puzzled, but obliged to ride in search of her assailant. Sir Guyon eventually reaches a glade where he finds Redcrosse cooling off by a river. Guyon immediately charges with his lance at the ready, and Redcrosse leaps into the saddle to join battle. Just before the two reach one another, Guyon stops and explains himself.

When they turn to confront the squire and the maiden, both have fled. After the Palmer talks with Redcrosse, the latter resumes his journey, leaving the Palmer to lead Guyon on their travels.

After a long hot day a little later, the Palmer leads Sir Guyon into the cool of a forest, where they hear the cry of a woman in distress. When Guyon finds her, she is lying beside a spring with a dagger in her breast, clutching a baby who is dabbling its hands in her blood, with a knight dead beside her. Guyon removes the blade and staunches the bleeding, allowing her to return from the brink of death.

The woman is Amavia, and the dead knight her husband Sir Mordant, who had ridden on a quest when Amavia was still expecting her baby. He fell under the power of an evil enchantress, Acrasia, who enslaves men on her wandering island, the Bower of Bliss. Hearing of this, Amavia had gone to seek her husband, during which she had given birth to her son in a wood. Sir Mordant had fought Acrasia’s enchantments, but succumbed when he drank from that spring, and dropped dead. Amavia then decided to take her own life, and saying that, she dies in the knight’s arms.

Sir Guyon and the Palmer bury the knight and his lady.

Canto 2

Babes bloody handes may not be clensd,
the face of golden Meane.
Her sisters two Extremities
strive her to banish cleane.

The pair then try unsuccessfully to wash Amavia’s blood from the infant. The Palmer explains that water in that pool is enchanted, after a nymph had been turned into stone by Diana to protect her from pursuit by the lustful Faunus. This prevents the spring water from being defiled.

Guyon gives the baby to the Palmer to care for, but discovers his horse and lance have been stolen.

They walk on until they reach a castle built on a rock at the edge of the sea. Three sisters live within it, the oldest (Elissa) and youngest (Perissa) of them constantly bickering with the third, named Medina, who greets the knight and the Palmer. Medina’s sisters are with their lovers, Elissa with the foolhardy Sir Huddibras, and Perissa with the pagan knight Sansloy.

Huddibras and Sansloy head towards Guyon to challenge him, but on the way get into an argument which breaks into a furious fight. Guyon tries to separate them, so they turn on him. When he shows his skill with the sword, they back down. Medina then tells them to stop, and her sisters try to egg them on.

The middle sister wins the day, and they sit down together to eat dinner. During the meal, Elissa seems annoyed at the food and company, while Perissa overindulges and flirts with Sansloy. Medina keeps order and invites Sir Guyon to explain the nature of his quest for Gloriana, Queen of Faeryland. He explains that he had been at court when the Palmer complained of the wrongdoing of an evil enchantress, and he had been sent by the queen to put an end to the wickedness of Acrasia.

Canto 3

Vaine Braggadocchio getting Guyons
horse is made the scorne
Of knighthood trew, and is of fayre
Belphoebe fowle forlorne.

The next day, with Amavia’s baby safely in the care of Medina, the Palmer leads Sir Guyon off on their journey, still on foot.

The knight’s horse and lance have been stolen by a puffed-up waster and thief Braggadocchio, who is living up to his name with false pride. He rides up to a gaudily dressed man named Trompart, threatens him with the lance, and forces him to act as his servant. Trompart quickly learns how to flatter his new master to gain advantage of him.

Braggadocchio and his new servant soon come upon Archimago, who is plotting against his enemies. The sorceror tricks the pair into offering to find and wreak vengeance on Sir Guyon and the Palmer, for which Archimago will provide them with Prince Arthur’s sword. Braggadocchio’s boastful behaviour stops suddenly and he pales with fear and flees, Trompart chasing after him.

The pair hide in a forest, trembling like leaves when they hear a hunting horn followed by someone moving through the undergrowth. Braggadocchio hides even deeper, but Trompart sees a fine lady approaching, dressed for hunting, and carrying a boar-spear, bow and arrows; her name is Belphoebe. She sees Trompart and asks him if he has seen a deer she has wounded, to which he replies no. She then sees Braggadocchio moving in the undergrowth, and is preparing to shoot him with an arrow when Trompart warns her that she’s about to kill his master.

At that, Braggadocchio emerges casually and leers at the huntress. When he asks her why she is hunting rather than at court, she says that she prefers the value and honour which are the reward of the hunt. He moves towards her, lust in his eyes, until she raises her spear, then turns and races off into the forest. Braggadocchio rides awkwardly out of the trees, still talking boastfully, with Trompart in tow.

Principal Characters

Acrasia, an evil enchantress who lures men to her wandering island, the Bower of Bliss. Sir Guyon has been sent to put an end to her wickedness.

Archimago, an evil sorceror who tries to stop all knights in the service of the Faerie Queen.

Belphoebe, a young woman who prefers hunting to being at court. Adept with her spear, and bow and arrows.

Braggadocchio, a waster and thief, prone to boastfulness, with not an ounce of honour or goodness. He steals Sir Guyon’s charger and lance.

Duessa, Una’s opposite, personifying falsehood, and the symbol of the Roman Catholic Church.

Sir Guyon, hero of Book 2, “Temperance”, a knight at the Faery Queen’s court, who is sent to stop the wrongs of Acrasia.

The Palmer, an elderly man dressed in black, who is leading Sir Guyon in his quest to put a stop to the evil of Acrasia.

Redcrosse Knight, hero of Book 1, “Holiness”, a knight on his first adventure, Saint George.

Sansloy, a Saracen knight who, in Book 1, had tried to seduce then force himself upon Una.

Trompart, a lazy and sly man who wears gaudy clothes. He becomes Braggadocchio’s servant.

References

Wikipedia on The Faerie Queene, with a partial summary
Wikipedia on Edmund Spenser

Richard Danson Brown (2019) The Art of the Faerie Queene, Manchester UP. ISBN 978 0 7190 8732 5. (Note: this isn’t about visual art, but literary art and poetics.)
AC Hamilton (ed) (2007) Spenser, the Faerie Queene, 2nd edn, Routledge. ISBN 978 1 4058 3281 6. (Critical edition.)
Elizabeth Heale (1999) The Faerie Queene, A Reader’s Guide, 2nd edn, Cambridge UP. ISBN 978 0 521 65468 5.
Douglas Hill (1980) Edmund Spenser, The Illustrated Faerie Queene, Newsweek Books. No ISBN.
Richard A McCabe (ed) (2010) The Oxford Handbook of Edmund Spenser, Oxford UP. ISBN 978 0 1987 0967 1.

Telling stories in paintings which stand alone, and telling them in illustrations which accompany a text, are very different. Today and tomorrow I look at how the purpose of these types of visual art determines their approach, composition and style. I do this using some examples of the finest narrative painting, and of the best illustrations of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Standalone narrative paintings are viewed without any accompanying text, or just a short excerpt to provide an explicit link to the literary narrative to which they refer. To tell their story, they need to refer back to the past, before the scene shown in the painting, and forward to the future, what happens next. For greatest visual and narrative effect, the most powerful moment is normally that of peripeteia, revelation and transformation of fortunes.

There’s no better place to start than the walls of Brancacci Chapel in Florence, Italy, where Masaccio and others told stories from the New Testament in a way which hasn’t been equalled in the nearly six centuries since.

Masaccio’s Tribute Money (1425-8) packs in three separate scenes using multiplex narrative in a non-linear arrangement. In the centre, a tax collector asks Christ for temple tax. At the far left, as directed by Christ and Peter’s arms, Peter (shown a second time) takes a coin from the mouth of a fish: the surprise. At the right, Peter (a third time) pays the tax collector (shown a second time) with that coin.

Anyone with even the vaguest recollection of the Gospel account will immediately recognise the story, identify the scenes, and flesh the full narrative out around them.

This is but one of a large series of paintings in the chapel, which together tell the story of the Christian ministry of Saint Peter, with a particular emphasis on healing and redemption for the poor. Although this was the chapel for a rich and powerful family, the church of Santa Maria del Carmine was situated in what was, at that time, a very poor area of Florence. The episodes in Saint Peter’s life which are included appear to offer hope for those poor, that a good Christian life would be met with rewards for the spirit, if not in material existence.

Two centuries later, Nicolas Poussin had established himself as one of the greatest narrative painters in the European canon. One of the pinnacles of his storytelling is a simple scene from a then-popular epic poem.

It took the ingenuity of post-Renaissance artists to incorporate references to multiple scenes in a single, instantaneous narrative image. Poussin’s Rinaldo and Armida from about 1630 encapsulates a lot of story and a real moment of peripeteia.

The narrative is here taken from one of Poussin’s favourite literary works, Torquato Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata (Jerusalem Delivered), published in 1581. Today, unless you’re a scholar of Italian Renaissance literature (or have read my series starting here), you’ll see the surprising image of a pretty young woman on the one hand about to murder a sleeping knight with a dagger, and on the other hand caressing his brow. It is that conflict which brings subtle surprise, implicit recognition, and reveals the twist in the plot – the peripeteia.

The sleeping knight is Rinaldo, the greatest of the Christian knights engaged in Tasso’s romanticised and largely fictional account of the First Crusade, who has stopped to rest near the ‘ford of the Orontes’. On hearing a woman singing, he goes to the river, where he catches sight of Armida swimming naked.

Armida, though, had an evil aim. She had been secretly following Rinaldo, intending to murder him with her dagger. As the ‘Saracen’ witch who is trying to destroy the crusaders’ campaign, she had singled out its greatest knight for this fate. Having revealed herself to him, she sings and lulls him into an enchanted sleep so that she can thrust her dagger home.

Just as she is about to do this, she falls in love with him instead – and this is the instant, the peripeteia, shown here. A winged amorino, lacking the bow and arrows of a true Cupid, restrains her right arm bearing her weapon. Her facial expression and left hand reveal her new intent, which is to enchant and abduct him in her chariot, so that he can become infatuated with her, and forget the Crusade altogether.

In contrast, the illustrator’s task is to support the text which their visual art represents. There is no need for backward or forward reference, as the words nearby provide the narrative context. Instead of showing the peripeteia, the illustrator is more likely to depict a key scene involving leading characters, often in physical action, or a complex event in which they can help the reader visualise what is happening.

Faithfulness to the words is absolutely essential: the standalone painter can get away with many variations in detail provided they capture the spirit; the illustrator must adhere in every detail to the words. Depicting the heroine as a dark-haired older woman would be catastrophic if the author wrote that she was a young blonde.

But above all, the illustrator doesn’t have to tell the story, which is what the words are for.

Walter Crane’s illustration for Baby’s Own Aesop (1887), engraved by Edmund Evans, underlines many of the differences between such illustrations and narrative paintings. First, the illustration here supports the text on the page, and doesn’t stand alone from it. Look at the picture and you could hardly deduce the accompanying text, but put the two together and you can see how the picture depicts the narrative in the text.

There are other stylistic clues, such as the use of drawn outlines throughout illustrations, and plain, simple drawings, which are much more likely in illustrations than in standalone paintings, although from the late 1800s onwards these appeared increasingly in paintings. This is one of Crane’s examples of multiplex narrative in an illustration; although he makes this work wonderfully, it’s a narrative technique which is rarely used in illustrations, without dividing the image into cells like a comic.

Crane’s watercolour and ink drawing for The Mirror, in Arthur Kelly’s The Rosebud and Other Tales (1909), is another example of an illustration which is almost impossible to read without the text to accompany it.

My next example comes from the work of the great Arthur Rackham, one of the most brilliant illustrators of the day, who I don’t think painted a single standalone narrative work.

In Charles Dickens’ novella A Christmas Carol, Scrooge is visited by the ghost of his former business partner Marley, who wanders the earth shackled by chains and cashboxes after his lifetime of greed. The ghost warns Scrooge that he faces the same miserable fate as Marley did, but has one chance of redemption. He will be visited by three further spirits who will show him how. When Marley’s ghost leaves, Scrooge looks out from his window to see many more spirits, each similarly shackled.

Although Rackham’s painting is brilliant, it lacks forward or backward references, and without the accompanying text even those familiar with Dickens’ story could find it hard to identify which moment it depicts.

There are always some artists who choose a different path, which isn’t such a good fit for either model. Take William Hogarth, for example, who made several major series of images which he painted for transfer to prints, telling quite elaborate visual stories. Among his best-known is Marriage A-la-Mode (c 1743).

The first painting in this series of six is The Marriage Settlement, which opens in the Earl of Squander’s bedroom, in his town house. Here the Earl and an Alderman, and their lawyers, are agreeing a contract of marriage and settlement for the Earl’s son, Viscount Squanderfield, to marry the Alderman’s daughter.

The Earl brandishes his nobility at every opportunity. At his left hand is a family pedigree tracing his ancestry back to William the Conqueror, which is almost certainly spurious. Coronets decorate many items in the room, even his crutches. He is finely dressed in a slightly old-fashioned court style, but his right foot suffers from gout. Outside, the builders of his new, more grandiose, house are idle as he has run out of money to pay them.

The Alderman is something of a social misfit, wearing plain rather than elegant clothes. He clutches the centrepiece of the painting, the document of marriage settlement, whilst he and the Earl continue to haggle over it. However, his money, in the form of bags of gold coins, is already spread in front of the Earl.

At the left, backs towards one another, are the groom and the bride. The Viscount is dressed in the latest fashion, but is clearly a foolish fop. On the left side of his neck, he already bears the black poxmark of syphilis. His bride is in intimate discussion with her father’s young lawyer, Silvertongue. She wears her wedding dress in anticipation of the settlement, but is sullen and not engaged in the matter.

In front of the couple, a dog and bitch are chained together, as the bride and groom soon will be. Behind them all, the paintings are ‘dark old masters’, including the ominous Medusa, martyrdoms of Saints Lawrence and Agnes, Cain Slaying Abel, and Judith with the Head of Holofernes. They culminate, by the window, in a huge portrait of the Earl himself. Hogarth uses paintings within his paintings extensively in this series, to add meaning from their content.

As an example of prints produced by Hogarth, I show the third in his series The Four Stages of Cruelty, from 1751. These weren’t based on oil paintings, but on quite rough studies which were then engraved by Hogarth himself. They were intended to be simpler images, which conveyed his case against cruelty, particularly that toward animals, and aimed downmarket. Each bears three verses at its foot which provides a brief verbal account of the scene shown above.

It is the dead of night, 0105 by the church clock, in a graveyard. The ‘hero’ of the series Tom Nero has been apprehended by local people at the dead body of a woman, who turns out to be his pregnant partner. Her throat has been cut to the point of almost severing her neck, and she also has deep cuts at the left wrist and on the left index finger. That finger points to an open book which reads “God’s Revenge against Murder”, and next to that is the book of Common Prayer. By her body is a box of her valuables, bearing her initials “A G” for Ann Gill, and a bag containing stolen goods.

On the ground around Tom is a pistol, a couple of presumably stolen pocket watches, and one of the group of men restraining him holds a letter from the dead woman reading:
Dear Tommy
My mistress has been the best of women to me, and my conscience flies in my face as often as I think of wronging her; yet I am resolved to venture body and soul to do as you would have me, so do not fail to meet me as you said you would, for I will bring along with me all the things I can lay my hands on. So no more at present; but I remain yours till death.
Ann Gill.
Next to that letter is its open envelope, addressed to Tom Nero.

Hogarth’s series are neither standalone, in that each in the series depends on the others to establish its narrative, nor are they illustrations integral to a literary narrative. What he effectively had invented was the graphic novel, in which specialised visual techniques tell a story in a series of many images. It’s multiplex narrative unbundled into a series of images.

In tomorrow’s article, I’ll show more direct comparisons between works intended to be standalone paintings, and illustrations, from artists who mastered both forms.

In yesterday’s article, I discussed some of the differences between paintings intended to stand alone and illustrations, with respect to telling stories. These arise from their contrasting narrative context, in that standalone images must tell their own story, whereas illustrations almost invariably appear next to a verbal version of the narrative.

Today I’ll show a selection of paintings and illustrations by two artists who proved highly talented at both forms: Gustave Doré (1832–1883) and Walter Crane (1845-1915).

Doré isn’t well known for his standalone paintings today, but at the time was well-received at the Salon, and one of the most successful illustrators of the century.

In about 1857, he created the drawing from which this engraving was made, to illustrate Canto 32 of Dante’s Inferno. This shows the ninth circle of Hell, with Virgil and Dante standing on the frozen surface of a lake within which are the spirits of those who committed sins of malice, such as treachery.

About four years later, he painted this version of a similar scene in oils. Rather than showing a specific moment in which Virgil and Dante tackle one of the sinners in torment, as he did in his illustration, Doré makes this more generic, which transforms it into a static tableau rather than narrative.

William Blake’s last and unfinished project was to illustrate an edition of Dante’s Inferno. Among his most famous watercolours for this is his brilliant depiction of Paolo and Francesca da Rimini, the adulterous lovers who were murdered by Francesca’s husband Giovanni Malatesta.

Alongside Dante’s description of this whirlwind of lovers, Blake’s image takes no effort to read. As a standalone painting, though, it falls short of Doré’s version of forty years later.

Doré shows the lovers, Francesca’s stab wound visible near the middle of her chest, Paolo’s still bleeding, as they are blown around and buffetted for their sins. At the lower right he shows Dante and Virgil looking on. This was first shown at the Salon in 1863, where it was praised by the critics.

Such direct comparisons aren’t possible with the images available to me of Walter Crane’s paintings and illustrations.

These two pages from the story of Bluebeard, in a children’s picture book, show how tightly bound are Crane’s illustrations to the text on those pages. In each case, he appears to have visualised each line of poetry. He has added some forward references, such as the key play in the first page, which links with the second. There are also some stranger cross-references, in the second page to the story of the Fall of Man.

Crane’s standalone account of the myth of the abduction of Persephone by Hades is quite conventional for a narrative painting of its time. He shows Persephone at the moment of her abduction, the peripeteia. She had been picking spring flowers in the meadow with the three other women shown at the left, and is seen still holding her posy, the link with the previous moments. Hades brought his chariot, complete with its pair of black horses symbolising the underworld, and is seen gripping Persephone’s right arm, ready to move her into the chariot and make off into the future, the dark cavern to the right, which will take the couple down to the underworld.

Crane’s paintings are as rich in their literary references as his illustrations. My final example from his work is drawn from Edward FitzGerald’s popular translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, and was originally exhibited with two verses quoted from that:

Would that some winged angel ere too late
Arrest the yet unfolded Roll of Fate,
And make the stern recorder otherwise
Enregister, or quite obliterate!

Ah love! could you and I with him conspire
To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire,
Would we not shatter it to bits – and then
Remould it nearer to the heart’s desire!

The Roll of Fate (1882) shows a male winged angel on bended knee before the figure of Time. The latter holds his scroll, on which the destiny of all mankind is recorded. The angel’s hands are intertwined with those of Time: each right hand grasps the quill which is used to record destiny, each left hand the other end of the scroll. The angel looks up, pleading, at Time, but Time looks down at him with a frowning scowl.

In front of the dais on which the angel kneels and Time sits is an hour glass. The whole is set inside a circular building which shows the stars through its roof, like a planetarium.

I hope these examples have given a clearer idea of the differences in approach used by such accomplished artists when tackling illustrations, compared with standalone narrative paintings. Simply being good at visual art isn’t sufficient to turn someone into a fluent narrative painter, nor to make them a good illustrator.

When did you last welcome a complete stranger into your house, feed them, and put them up for the night? Unless you live somewhere really remote, I suspect the answer is never. Use the word hospitality now, and it’s almost invariably followed by industry, an oxymoron if ever I heard one. And our hospitals have far less to do with hospitality than they do with the healthcare industry, even when they’re funded from public money.

Go back a few centuries or a couple of millenia, and hospitality to strangers was high on the list of virtues expected of every person, however rich or poor they might have been. To ensure that those living in the ancient world respected the code of hospitality, there were several myths which helped guide the mind. Today and tomorrow I look at how paintings have communicated the need to be hospitable.

The first myth is brief, part of the saga of Perseus and Andromeda, but decidedly memorable.

After Perseus has beheaded the gorgon Medusa, he flies over the desert sands of Libya, the blood still dripping from Medusa’s head and falling onto the sand to form snakes. With dusk approaching, he decides to set down in the lands of the giant Atlas. He introduces himself to Atlas, including explanation of his divine paternity, and asks for rest and lodging for the night.

The giant, mindful of a prophecy that a son of Jupiter will ruin him, rudely refuses the request, and starts to wrestle with his spurned guest. Perseus responds by offering him a gift, then – averting his own face – points Medusa’s face at Atlas, who is promptly transformed into a mountain.

In Edward Burne-Jones’ Atlas Turned to Stone (1878) the giant has been turned to stone and now stands bearing the cosmos on his shoulders as Perseus flies off to Aethiopia.

The definitive classical myth stressing the importance of showing hospitality is the story of Philemon (husband) and Baucis (wife), as told in Ovid’s Metamorphoses Book 8.

This pious elderly couple live in a town in Phrygia, now west central Anatolia, in Turkey. One day, two ordinary peasants walked into the town, looking for somewhere to stay for the night. Everyone else rejected them, but when they asked this couple, who were among the poorest inhabitants and had but a simple rustic cottage, they were welcomed in.

Philemon and Baucis served their guests food and wine; the latter was strange, because as fast as Baucis could pour wine into her guests’ beechwood goblets, the pitcher of wine refilled. Philemon tried to catch the goose which guarded their cottage, to kill and cook it for their guests, but it ran to the safety of a guest’s lap. Realising that they were entertaining gods, the couple raised their hands in supplication and craved indulgence for their humble cottage and fare.

Revealing themselves as the gods Jupiter/Zeus and Mercury/Hermes, the guests told them not to kill the goose, but to leave the town, as it was about to be destroyed, together with all those who had not offered them hospitality. The gods then took the couple out to climb a mountain, telling the couple not to look back until they had reached the top. Once at the summit, they turned to see the town obliterated by a flood; their cottage had been spared, though, turned into a temple, and Philemon and Baucis were made its guardians.

The couple finally asked the gods that, when it came to the time for one of them to die, they should both die together. When that happened, they were then metamorphosed into an intertwining pair of trees, one an oak, the other a lime (linden).

This long and rambling story is a tough challenge to the narrative painter, but has inspired some truly exceptional paintings.

Adam Elsheimer, in his small oil on copper painting Jupiter and Mercury with Philemon and Baucis (1609-10), shows Philemon (right) and Baucis (centre right) giving their hospitality generously to Jupiter (left) and Mercury (centre left), in their tiny, dark cottage. All four are depicted in more contemporary dress, although Mercury’s winged helmet is an unmistakeable clue as to his identity.

Their modest stock of food is piled in a basket in the right foreground, and the goose is just distinguishable in the gloom at the lower edge of the painting, below Mercury’s feet.

Peter Paul Rubens, in his Stormy Landscape with Philemon and Baucis (c 1625?), attempts a broader view of a later moment to tell more of the story. His dramatic landscape shows stormclouds building over the hills, a raging torrent pouring down the mountainside, dragging large trees and animals in its swollen waters, and the four figures on a track at the right. Philemon and Baucis are struggling up the track with their sticks, Jupiter points to a rainbow formed over a waterfall at the lower left corner, and Mercury is all but naked.

David Rijckaert, in his Philemon and Baucis Giving Hospitality to Jupiter and Mercury, gives what has become the most popular depiction: Mercury (left) and Jupiter (left of centre) seated at the table, with Philemon (behind table) and Baucis (centre) waiting on their every need, ensuring that they eat and drink their fill. Baucis has almost caught the evasive goose, and an additional person is shown in the background preparing and serving food for the gods.

Rembrandt’s Baucis and Philemon (1658) shows Jupiter (looking decidedly Christlike) and Mercury (the younger, almost juvenile, figure) sat at the table of a very dark and rough cottage, lit by a lamp behind Mercury.

Philemon and Baucis are crouched, chasing the evasive goose towards Jupiter. A humble bowl of food is in the centre of the table, and there is a glass of what appears to be beer. As is usual in Rembrandt’s narrative paintings, he dresses them in contemporary rather than historic costume.

The moral here doesn’t need to be spelled out any further: fail in your duty to offer hospitality to strangers and the gods may end your life. Another myth told by Ovid in his Metamorphoses isn’t quite as damning. Instead of death, you could be turned into a frog instead. So says Ovid’s account of the Lycians who shunned the goddess Leto when all she needed was a drink of water.

Fearing reprisals from the jealous Hera (Juno), when Leto (Latona) is about to give birth to her twins, she flees to Lycia, at the western end of the south coast of modern Turkey. This was a centre for Leto’s worship, but at some stage the goddess must have become scorned by those living in the country there.

When the twins, Diana and Apollo, had drunk Leto’s milk and she was dry and thirsty under the hot sun, she saw a small lake among marshes, where local peasants were cutting reeds. She went down and was about to drink from the lake when those locals stopped her. Leto told them that drinking the water was a common right, and that she only intended to drink and not to bathe in it.

The locals continued to prevent her, threatening her and hurling insults. They then stirred up the mud on the bottom of the lake, to muddy the water, incurring the goddess’s anger and causing her to curse them to remain in that pool forever as frogs. It is this transformation which forms the basis for the many paintings of this myth.

Annibale Carracci’s Latona and the Lycian Peasants probably from 1590-1620 is the first truly masterly painting of this myth. Latona is here placing her curse on the locals, and behind them one appears to have already been transformed into a frog. Although the babies’ heads are disproportionately small (as was the case for several centuries), they and their mother are very realistically portrayed, and contrast markedly with the uncouth and obdurate locals.

It is, though, Jan Brueghel the Elder’s panel showing Latona and the Lycian Peasants (1595-1610) which is one of the finest depictions. Set in a dense forest – surely inappropriate for Lycia – the locals are busy cutting reeds and foraging. Leto, at the bottom left, is seen remonstrating with a peasant, over to the right. As the detail below shows, the goddess is in need, as are her babies. The peasant closest to her, brandishing his fist, is already rapidly turning into a frog. There are many other frogs around, including a pair at the bottom left corner, near the feet of one of the babies.

David Teniers the Younger’s Latona and the Frogs from around 1640–50 is not perhaps in the same class as Brueghel’s, but still tells the story well, and shows Lycians being transformed for refusing to help the goddess.

François Lemoyne’s Latona and the Peasants of Lycia (1721) stops short of showing the metamorphosis or resulting frogs, but Latona and the peasants are clearly engaged in their dispute.

The story survived in narrative painting well into the latter half of the nineteenth century, when Gabriel Guay, an eminent former pupil of Jean-Léon Gérôme, painted his Latona and the Peasants (1877). Leto and her babies now seem not just real but almost contemporary, minimising her divinity.

In tomorrow’s sequel, I will look at subsequent stories which tell of the obligation of hospitality, from the Old Testament onwards.

In the first article, I looked at paintings of three classical myths which tried to enforce the principle of hospitality to strangers by warning people of the dire consequences of failing to respect it: Atlas was turned to stone, people were drowned in a flood, and others turned into frogs.

There are also many examples of hospitality given in the Old and New Testaments, although these start to reflect changing values which perhaps anticipated more modern codes.

Henry Ossawa Tanner’s painting of Abraham’s Oak (1905) shows an ancient oak tree, which only died in 1996. Tradition (if not legend) holds this to mark the place where three angels appeared to Abraham, or Abraham pitched his tent. The location is just southwest of Mamre, near Hebron, and its story runs that Abraham washed the feet of three strangers who appeared there, and showed them hospitality. They revealed themselves to be angels, and informed Abraham that his wife would become pregnant and bear him a son. This is used as an example of the importance of showing hospitality to others.

Perhaps the most revealing stories are those in the teachings of Jesus Christ, concerning Israelites whose origins were in Samaria, Samaritans, who by that time had become shunned by the Jews, which is hardly in accordance with the ancient code.

In Maximilien Luce’s Good Samaritan (1896), for example, the artist combines a brilliantly colourful dusk landscape with a classical narrative painting, showing the well-known parable of the Good Samaritan from the New Testament, in which a Samaritan gives aid to a traveller who has been robbed and beaten up on the roadside. Jesus uses this to explain who your ‘neighbour’ is, a key point in the obligation of hospitality.

Less well-known is the story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well, told in the Gospel of John, chapter 4, verses 4-26, in which Christ arrived at a well in Samaria, tired and thirsty after his journey. A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus asked her to give him a drink. That surprised her, as at that time most Jews would not have spoken to a Samaritan like her. They then became involved in conversation, in which Jesus preached to her, and revealed himself as the Messiah.

Henri-Jean Guillaume Martin’s Christ and the Samaritan Woman (1894) depicts this using fine brushstrokes rather than the dots of ‘pointillisme’ to build colour and form, and in places those strokes have become organised in the way that Vincent van Gogh’s rather coarser strokes did.

More startling still is Odilon Redon’s Christ and the Samaritan Woman (The White Flower Bouquet) from about 1895. In this unique interpretation Christ appears to be holding a bouquet of white flowers for the woman. There are other adornments, such as the elaborate floral object between the two, and a bright blue object high above Christ’s head. Both the figures have their eyes closed.

The brilliant Polish artist Jacek Malczewski cast himself in the title role of his Christ and the Samaritan Woman from 1911.

Hospitality to strangers has been a recurrent theme in the lives of many different saints.

Bartolomé Esteban Murillo painted a particularly apposite scene in his Saint Thomas of Villanueva (Villanova) Dividing his Clothes among Beggar Boys from about 1667. This shows a story from the childhood of Saint Thomas of Villanueva de los Infantes (1488-1555), which claims that when he was a child, he often came home naked, having given all his clothing to poorer children. Thomas became a friar of the order of Saint Augustine, and was famed for his care of the poor when he later became the Archbishop of Valencia.

Thomas is the boy in the clean white shirt to the right of centre, who has just given his jacket to the boy to the left, who is dressed in dirty rags. It looks like Thomas is preparing to part with his trousers too. These children could just as easily have appeared in one of Murillo’s secular paintings of street life in Seville, but here tell a moralising story from the life of the saint.

Early paintings of hospitals also stress their original role in hospitality.

The sick have traditionally been cared for by their families. But for those without families, particularly anyone away from home, there have long been charitable institutions and others prepared to offer hospitality. They could have been slaves in the Roman empire, soldiers in mediaeval Baghdad, those returning from the Crusades in Europe, or refugees crossing mountainous areas through passes.

Few early hospitals provided much in the way of medical care, which was generally expensive and ineffective in any case. Most were little more than large inns, and any care staff were usually members of religious orders. A few took in cases of transmissible diseases which had become proscribed locally – conditions such as leprosy, and plague – in an attempt to confine the disease and prevent spread. The richer you were, though, the greater the chance and desire of being nursed at home.

Jacopo Pontormo’s fresco showing an Episode from Life in Hospital from 1514 shows nuns from a religious order caring for other women, perhaps the sick from their own convent.

The rise of social realism and Naturalism during the nineteenth century provides insights into contemporary society, and its attitudes to strangers and those outcast from society.

Évariste Carpentier’s The Foreigners from 1887 shows the arrival of outsiders in a close-knit community. At the right, sat at a table under the window, a mother and daughter dressed in the black of recent bereavement are the foreigners looking for some hospitality. Instead, everyone in the room, and many of those in the crowded bar behind, stares at them as if they have just arrived from Mars. Even the dog has come up to see whether they smell right. So much for hospitality.

Although many of the paintings of vagrants made by Augustus Edwin Mulready appear over-sentimental or even disingenuous, and his models are invariably sparklingly clean and well cared-for, some had more worthy messages. His Uncared For from 1871 shows a young girl with exceptionally large brown eyes staring straight at the viewer as she proffers a tiny bunch of violets.

Behind her and her brother are the remains of posters: at the top, The Triumph of Christianity is attributed to the French artist and illustrator Gustave Doré, who illustrated an edition of the Bible in 1866, visited London on several occasions afterwards, and in 1871 produced illustrations for London: A Pilgrimage, published the following year, which showed London’s down and outs.

Naturalists like Jean-Eugène Buland took on challenging motifs with challenging readings. In Alms of a Beggar (1880), a young woman dressed immaculately in white is sat outside a church seeking charity. Approaching her, a coin in his right hand, is a man who can only be a beggar himself. His clothes are patched on patches, faded and filthy, and he wears battered old wooden shoes. Yet he is about to give the young woman what is probably his last coin. And we don’t doubt that she accepted it.

Perhaps we could all do with a good dose of mythology instead.

Hephaistos (Greek Ἥφαιστος, also commonly spelled Hephaestus), and his Roman counterpart Vulcan, is the blacksmith and artisanal fabricator to the gods, although generally considered to have been cast out from Olympus, only to be rehabilitated later. There’s also general agreement that his mother was Hera, and if he had a father it was most probably Zeus.

He had the misfortune to have been born lame, as a result of which Hera tried to be rid of him, and threw him into the sea. He was there cared for by Thetis and others. He later assumes his role as the god of fire, volcanoes, and crafts allied to blacksmithing, including sculpture. Inevitably, his attributes derive from his role, and include the hammer, anvil and tongs, as used in the working of metals.

In paintings, Vulcan is characteristically seen in his forge, as in Tintoretto’s painterly Vulcan’s Forge (1578), one of four mythological paintings which he made for the Atrio Quadrato in the Palazzo Ducale in Venice.

It’s not clear how, but Hephaistos married Aphrodite, a union which was marked by the overt unfaithfulness of both partners. Hephaistos had a series of relationships, and Aphrodite’s adulterous affair with Ares (Mars) is one of the most celebrated stories in classical mythology, and the basis for a great many paintings.

It is the version in Homer’s Odyssey which is probably best-known, and most frequently the basis for paintings. After he met Nausicaä on the island of the Phaeacians, Odysseus is entertained by King Alcinous. To cheer Odysseus up, the bard Demodocus tells the tale of the affair between Ares and Aphrodite. Hephaistos catches the couple making love in his marriage bed, and quickly forges a very fine but unbreakable net to throw over them. Once they have been made captive by his net, he summons the other gods, who come and roar with laughter at the ensnared couple.

Homer’s story is retold by Ovid in his Metamorphoses, the likely source for Diego Velázquez’s The Forge of Vulcan from 1630. This shows Apollo, at the left, visiting Hephaistos (to the right of Apollo) in his forge, to tell him about this infidelity. As shown in the faces, this arouses great shock.

Paintings showing the adulterous couple naked together have long been one of the most risqué themes in art.

Tintoretto’s Venus and Mars Surprised by Vulcan from about 1545 offers an unusual interpretation: Hephaistos is inspecting his wife, as Ares cowers under the bed at the right. A small dog is drawing attention to Ares’ hiding place, and Aphrodite’s child, Eros, rests in a cradle behind them.

Within this is skilful mirror-play: the circular mirror behind the bed reflects an image of Hephaistos leaning over Aphrodite (below). The artist also shows off his technique in other ways, in a glass jar on the window sill at the upper right, and optical effects in the window glass.

Joachim Wtewael is not only known for his ostensibly unpronounceable surname, but for his remarkably explicit figures. In Mars and Venus Surprised by the Gods from about 1606-10, he gives a full visual account of the story, and leaves the viewer in no doubt as to what the couple were doing, even adding a flush to the cheeks of Aphrodite.

He uses multiplex narrative too: Hephaistos is seen forging his fine net in the far background, and again at the right, as he is about to throw the finished net over the couple. Ares’ armour is scattered over the floor, and there is a chamber-pot under the bed. Behind Hephaistos the other gods are arriving, and laughing with glee at the raunchy scene being unveiled to them.

Homeric Laughter (1909) is one of Lovis Corinth’s most complex, even abstruse, paintings of classical myth. He provides a good clue as to its interpretation in his inscription (originally in German translation):
unquenchable laughter arose among the blessed gods as they saw the craft of wise Hephaistos
together with the reference to Homer’s Odyssey book 8 line 326.

In this first version, Corinth shows Aphrodite recumbent on the bed, shielding her eyes from the crowd around her. Ares struggles with the net which secures the couple, looking frustrated. Hephaistos, clad in black with his tools slung around his waist, is talking to Poseidon (who wears a crown) with Dionysos/Bacchus behind him (clutching a champagne glass). At the right edge is Hermes/Mercury, with his winged helmet. Sundry putti are playing with Ares’ armour, and an arc of putti adorns the sky.

Corinth also painted a second version, which he etched in 1920 for prints.

Some painted references to the story are more curious still, including the first painting commissioned of Andrea Mantegna by Isabella d’Este for her private collection.

Mantegna’s Mars and Venus, known better as Parnassus (1496-97) was probably painted largely in tempera, only after his death being repainted using oils.

The lovers are shown standing together on a flat-topped rock arch, as the Muses dance below. To the left of Ares’ feet is Aphrodite’s child Eros who is aiming his blowpipe at Hephaistos’ genitals, as he works at his forge in the cave at the left. At the right is Hermes, messenger of the gods, with his caduceus and Pegasus the winged horse. At the far left is Apollo making music for the Muses on his lyre.

It’s an unusual theme for a woman of the time to have chosen, although it has largely been interpreted with reference to a contemporary poem which seems less concerned with the underlying story of adultery exposed.

There’s another more obscure and unusual myth which has been painted occasionally, in which Hephaistos is either trying to rape Athena, or about to consummate marriage to her, and his ejaculate ends up on the earth, where it impregnates Gaia, who gives birth to Erichthonius, who was later to become the king of Athens, hence the city’s allegiance with Athena.

Tintoretto’s Minerva, Vulcan and Cupid (Birth of Erichthonius) (1541-42) shows Hephaistos at the left, about to try to rape Athena, stood at the right, with Eros quite inappropriately in the sky above them.

Hephaistos’ forge is the source of weapons and armour for the gods, and in rare circumstances for certain mortals.

Benjamin West’s Thetis Bringing the Armour to Achilles was painted in 1804, and shows some influence, perhaps, by the neo-classical narrative works of David.

During the Trojan War, Achilles, the son of Thetis (who you will recall cared for Hephaistos after he was rejected by Hera) and greatest of the Greek warriors, took Briseis as a prize of war. At the start of the account in the Iliad, Agamemnon, leader of the Greek forces, has decided that he will take Briseis for himself. Achilles resents this, and withdraws from involvement in the fighting.

In Achilles’ absence, his close friend Patroclus leads a battle in which he wears Achilles’ armour. Patroclus is killed there, and Achilles laments over his corpse. His mother Thetis visits Achilles during this, to console him in his grief, and promises to return with impregnable armour forged by Hephaistos.

When she does return with the shield and armour, Achilles is still lamenting over Patroclus, worried now that his friend’s body will decay if he returns to battle. Thetis protects the body of Patroclus with ambrosia and nectar, enabling Achilles to return to battle and kill Hector, the leading warrior of Troy.

After the failed Volscian attack on Rome, the city settled down to its new republican order. There was continued friction between the patricians, who came from noble families, and plebeians or plebs, the vast majority of Roman citizens who made the city tick. There were occasional famines, the odd epidemic, and the administration of the city changed with the addition of tribunes, elected by the plebs.

There were still battles too. In 458 BCE, the Aequi living to the east of Rome tried to take the Roman town of Tusculum. When Rome responded, one of its two armies was quickly pinned down and besieged by the Aequi, and its second army was unable to help. The Senate panicked, and decided to appoint Cincinnatus as dictator. Deputies were sent out to tell him of his appointment, and found him ploughing on his farm outside Rome.

It’s this scene which was painted so wonderfully by Alexandre Cabanel, then still a student, which reveals his precocious skill. His Cincinnatus Receiving the Deputies of the Senate shows in quite neo-Classical style what had been a well-known moment in Roman history.

By about 390 BCE, a more serious threat came from the north, in the form of invasion by Gallic tribes. It took the leadership of Marcus Furius Camillus to save Rome from annihilation by the Gauls. Yet Camillus never served as one of Rome’s consuls. Instead, he was five time made its dictator, and celebrated four triumphs. He lived in troubled times, when military tribunes ran Rome.

Camillus first came to prominence during a battle with the Aequians and Volscians, when he dashed out on his horse in front of the Roman army, engaged the enemy despite a wound in his thigh, and put them to flight. He was rewarded with the office of censor, from which he persuaded single Roman men to marry some of the city’s many war widows.

One of the most costly campaigns of that period had been the siege of the Tuscan city of Veii, which at the time was a match for Rome itself. That city was well fortified, and the Roman army had been forced to maintain the siege year-round, instead of spending winters back in Rome. In the tenth year of the war against Veii, Camillus was made dictator, sole ruler of Rome, by its Senate. Camillus made a vow that, should Rome succeed in the war, he would celebrate with games, and dedicate a temple to the goddess Mater Matuta (later equivalent to Aurora), whose temple had been destroyed in 506 BCE.

Most of the paintings of this period in the history of Rome come from the superb frescoes made by Francesco de’ Rossi (also known as Francesco Salviati) in the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, Italy, between about 1543-45. In Camillus Receives the Charge of a Dictator, he shows a young bearded Camillus being made the ruler of Rome, much to the amazement of his young wife.

When Camillus took command of the siege, he had mines dug while distracting the enemy defending their walls against conventional attacks. This allowed the tunnels to reach into the heart of Veii, from where the Romans took the city by storm. Veii was sacked, the war ended, and Camillus returned to Rome with an image of the goddess Juno. He there undertook his first triumph, in which his chariot was drawn by four white horses through the city – a unique event which the citizens found offensive, as only the god Jupiter was entitled to do that.

De’ Rossi’s frescoes show this as the Triumph of Furius Camillus. The young general rides high on a podium placed inside the chariot, at the left. This is drawn by four white horses, and the whole of Rome has come out to watch. At the right is the statue of the goddess Juno, with her trademark peacocks on its roof. There is even a suit of armour being paraded, in honour of the first such triumph.

Camillus also became unpopular because he opposed half of Rome being moved to populate Veii, something the poor felt would prove to their advantage. Most of all, though, the Romans objected to Camillus allowing his soldiers full enjoyment of the spoils of Veii, rather than giving a tenth to the temple of Apollo at Delphi. Camillus claimed that he had forgotten that he had vowed to give that share to the temple.

These matters were overtaken by events, when Camillus was one of six to be appointed to rule Rome as a military tribune, and was immediately called to lead its army in an invasion of the territory of the Faliscans, and to lay siege to the city of Falerii. Being another well-fortified city, life went on as normal in Falerii during the siege. Its citizens employed one teacher for its boys, and he wanted to betray the city using those pupils. Each day, the teacher led his school further and further out from its city walls, until he finally reached the Roman forces. He then handed the children over to the enemy, and demanded to see Camillus.

The Roman commander was not swayed by this, and condemned the teacher’s action. Camillus said that a great general wages war using his own valour, not on the baseness of other men. He had the teacher stripped and his hands tied, then gave the boys rods with which to beat him back into the city. This action caused the citizens to sue for peace, and the Faliscans made an alliance with Rome.

This short story inspired Nicolas Poussin to paint Camillus Delivers the Schoolmaster of Falerii to His Pupils in 1637. The teacher grimaces at the right, as his pupils get their own back by beating him, for once. In the background is the fortified city of Falerii, high on a hill and not to be taken by force easily.

In about 1764-66, Domenico Corvi made this copy, after Poussin, of Camillus and the Schoolmaster of Falerii. Although less grand than Poussin’s surviving version above, the teacher is still getting a sound beating from his younger pupils.

Unfortunately, when the general and his army returned to Rome, his success made him even less popular, as this time his soldiers had not won any booty at all. Camillus also lost his two sons to sickness, presumably during one of the epidemics which periodically ravaged the city, and he was overcome by grief. He was next accused of the theft of bronze doors from Tuscan booty, and voluntarily went into exile.

It was then that the Gauls laid siege to the Tuscan city of Clusium, whose leaders asked the Romans for their assistance. Rome sent envoys to speak to the Gauls, but quickly realised that there was no coming to terms with them. The Roman envoys slipped into Clusium, where they encouraged the Tuscans to go out and fight the Gauls; one of those envoys led by example, and was recognised by the Gauls, who decided to attack Rome instead.

Rather than the Romans condemning the actions of their envoy, the people appointed him and his brothers to the military tribune, which strengthened the resolve of the Gauls to attack and defeat Rome.

In the absence of Camillus, the Roman army lacked good leadership, and was surprised by the Gaulish army when they were only eleven miles from the city of Rome. The Gauls overwhelmed the Romans, who fled back to Rome or the city of Veii. Taken aback at their success, the Gauls didn’t press on immediately to take Rome, which had been abandoned by most of its citizens.

Three days after their rout of the Roman army, the Gauls entered the city of Rome, occupied it, and put a guard around its Capitol, which remained in the hands of Romans. Although this was peaceful at first, a Gaul and a Roman clashed, leading to overreaction by the Gauls, who then killed the remaining Romans, and sacked and plundered the city.

Hearing of this, Camillus raised forces from Ardea, and with them attacked a Gaulish camp at night, when most of its troops were drunk and asleep. Surviving Romans rallied to the cause, but Camillus would not assume leadership of a reconstituted Roman army without the agreement of the Romans still defending the Capitol. Those remaining there eagerly agreed, and Camillus was again appointed dictator and military commander.

One night, the Gauls attempted an assault on the Capitol, and succeeded in scaling its cliffs. However, they were detected by the sacred geese of the temple of Juno, and were repelled. Then the tide turned against those occupiers, who were themselves effectively under siege by Camillus and his growing army. They were cut off from supplies of food obtained by foraging outside the city, suffering from outbreaks of disease, and were unable to cope with the heat of the city in late summer.

Conditions drove the Romans besieged in the Capitol to make peace with the Gauls besieged in the rest of the city. Rome was to pay the Gauls a thousand pounds of gold, but even there the Gauls cheated the Romans and tampered with the scales. While this was taking place, Camillus entered Rome as its appointed leader, and told the Gauls to quit without any gold, as Rome delivered its city with iron (the sword) instead.

De’ Rossi shows this in composite form in his fresco of the Attack on the Gauls who Sacked Rome. In the foreground, the Gauls and Romans are still arguing about the weight of gold, as Camillus’ forces start to take possession of the ruins of what had been Rome.

The Gauls withdrew with Camillus and his army in hot pursuit, killing and routing Gauls until they were well clear of Rome. After seven months of occupation, the city was finally back in the hands of the Romans.

Camillus then oversaw its rebuilding. That was controversial at first, but eventually became so hasty that the city was rebuilt with confused and narrow streets, forming a maze of houses.

Camillus Inaugurates a Temple in de’ Rossi’s series of frescoes may refer to this time, or to the earlier vow to dedicate a temple to Mater Matuta.

This peace didn’t last long, though, and Latins, Tuscans, and other tribes laid siege to the city of Sutrium, an ally of Rome. Camillus was appointed dictator a third time, and manoeuvred his army into a position so that it surrounded the enemy, who decided to fence themselves in behind a wooden palisade and await the arrival of reinforcements. The Romans attacked with fire, using the strong wind which blew to fan the flames and force their enemy out.

Camillus then invaded the enemy’s territory, and drove on towards the city of Sutrium, only to discover that its people had already surrendered and been forced to abandon it as refugees. The Roman commander attacked the occupied city, recapturing it and earning Camillus his third triumph in Rome.

The Inhabitants of Sutrium Supplicate to Camillus to Free them from Tyranny is another of de’ Rossi’s frescoes, here showing some of the refugees from the city pleading with Camillus to recapture their city.

Once again, Camillus became unpopular because of jealousy. The people became seditious, under the leadership of Marcus Manlius Capitolinus, who had heroically defeated the Gauls when they had attacked the Capitol. He was arrested, and his trial started on the Capitol, from where he could arouse the emotions of his judges. Camillus moved the court outside the city, out of sight of the Capitol, enabling Capitolinus to be convicted and hurled from the Tarpeian Rock for his crime.

By now, Camillus was growing old, and declined appointment to the military tribune for a sixth time. But the people refused to let him quit, claiming that he didn’t need to physically lead the army into battle any more. He therefore appointed a field commander, who was such a disaster that the army was put to flight. Camillus took charge, turned the fleeing soldiers around, and crushed their Tuscan enemy. The following day, he led the army on to recapture the Roman city of Satricum.

De’ Rossi may be referring to this episode in his fresco of Camillus Called to Battle. The general is noticeably older here, his beard fully white. At the left, he is helped into his clothes by a servant, then rides off in his armour at the right. Behind them are retreating Romans, travelling in the opposite direction – something that Camillus was just about to reverse.

On his return to Rome, the city was in turmoil again, and Camillus was made dictator for the fourth time, against the wishes of the people, and against his own desire. As the crisis deepened, Camillus could see that he couldn’t solve it, so he withdrew to his house, claimed to be sick, and finally resigned his office.

News reached Rome that the Gauls were again on the march, and heading for Rome. Camillus was made dictator for a fifth time, and prepared his army by having helmets forged for them, to protect against the slashing blows that were commonly used by Gauls. The Romans also added bronze edging to their wooden shields, and Camillus trained them to use their javelins like spears.

Camillus led his soldiers out and caught the Gauls unawares as they were still gorged with food and drink. When the Gauls tried to fight back, they found that their swords quickly blunted against the Romans’ helmets, and volleys of javelins caught the Gauls defenceless. The Romans went on to capture Velitrae in this, the last campaign of Camillus’ long career.

His final public act was to see for the first time in Roman history one consul chosen by the patricians, the other from the plebeians. The following year, Rome suffered an epidemic which killed many of its citizens, among them Camillus.

In the first episode of Book 2, Sir Guyon and the Palmer continued their journey on foot, as the knight’s horse and lance had been stolen by Braggadocchio, who forced Trompart to act as his servant. The latter pair were tricked by Archimago into wreaking vengeance on Sir Guyon, but when they realised what they had let themselves in for, they fled and hid in a forest. There they were discovered by the noble huntress Belphoebe, whom Braggadocchio lusted after. When she rushed off, they made their way out of the trees, Braggadocchio riding Sir Guyon’s charger clumsily.

Canto 4

Guyon does Furor bind in chaines,
And stops Occasion;
Delivers Phaon, and therefore
By Strife is rayld uppon.

Sir Guyon and the Palmer walk on towards the sound of tumult. When they reach the scene, they discover a man dragging a youth along the ground by his hair, and beating him from time to time. Following them is an old hag who goads the man on to renewed violence towards the young man. When Sir Guyon tries to pull the old man away, the latter attacks him like a madman.

The knight falls, rises and draws his sword, but the Palmer intervenes and explains that Sir Guyon cannot overcome Furor with ordinary weapons. His first task, though, is to silence the old hag, Occasion, who is the root of all wrath. Guyon throws the hag to the ground, silences and binds her. The old man stops assaulting the youth and tries to flee, but Guyon catches him and binds him in a hundred chains. The knight then turns to attend to the wounds of the young squire named Phedon.

The squire explains that he had been tricked into believing that his noble fiancée had been unfaithful to him, and in his rage he had killed her. When he discovered the truth, he killed the false friend who had tricked him, after which he had come across Furor and the hag. The Palmer explains how the squire had allowed his emotions to grow too strong.

As they are talking, a page runs up to them, bearing a shield with the emblem of flames on a blood red background, and two darts whose tips are covered with blood and the poison of malice. Atin the page cheekily warns Sir Guyon to depart before he is in great danger from his knight the great Pyrrhochles, brother of Cymochles, both of whom are descended from immortals. He has been sent to fetch the old hag Occasion, and when Sir Guyon points the woman out, the page bursts into rage at her treatment, and throws one of his darts at the knight. He deflects it with his shield, and the page runs off.

Canto 5

Pyrrhochles does with Guyon fight,
And Furors chayne untyes,
Who him sore wounds, whiles Atin to
Cymochles for ayd flyes.

Soon Pyrrhochles himself rides up in his blood red armour, on his red charger. As he nears Sir Guyon, he brings his lance to the ready and charges at the knight. Guyon, still on foot, dodges the lance, strikes back with his sword, and cuts the head off Pyrrhochles’ horse. Its rider crashes to the ground in the pool of blood, and getting back onto his feet, he strikes Guyon’s shield with his sword. Guyon responds with a blow which cuts deep into the flesh of Pyrrhochles’ shoulder.

Pyrrhochles lashes out wildly at Sir Guyon, who bides his time until his opponent tires, then strikes him so hard that Pyrrhochles is forced onto his knees, then flat out under Guyon’s boot, where he pleads for mercy and yields. Guyon grants him that, in return for Pyrrhochles’ pledge of allegiance, and admonishment for his blind fury.

Pyrrhochles then explains that his rage had been the result of Guyon’s treatment of Furor and his mother Occasion. Guyon lets Pyrrhochles free the pair, who quickly start to attack him. When Furor gets the better of Pyrrhochles, the knight calls to Sir Guyon for help. The Palmer cautions his knight to hold back, though, as it was Pyrrhochles who wanted to free Furor and the hag. With that, Sir Guyon and the Palmer resume their journey on foot.

As they walk away, Pyrrhochles’ page goes in search of his knight’s brother Cymochles, who is to be found in Acrasia’s Bower of Bliss, reclining on lilies among half-naked young women. Atin cheekily tells Cymochles off for neglecting his brother in his need. The knight dresses in his armour and rides off at speed to rescue his brother.

Canto 6

Guyon is of immodest Merth,
led into loose desyre,
Fights with Cymochles, whiles his bro-
ther burnes in furious fyre.

As Cymochles heads towards Guyon, his road is blocked by a lake, on which there’s a gondola with boughs woven into an arbour. Inside that is a pretty young woman laughing and singing to herself. Cymochles asks her to ferry him across to the other side, which she does, but refuses to carry Atin as well. Despite its lack of oars or sail, the gondola transports them both towards an island in the middle of the lake. The damsel informs Cymochles that she is Phaedria, another of Acrasia’s servants, and the body of water is the Lake of Idleness.

Cymochles calms down, thanks to Phaedria’s playfulness and singing, and disembarks on an island in the middle of the lake, where Phaedria takes him to rest in a shady dell. She soon lulls him to sleep, and gets back into her boat.

By the time that Phaedria is back out on the water, Sir Guyon arrives on the shore, in company with the Palmer. The knight also asks to be ferried across, and Phaedria repeats her little journey, refusing to carry the Palmer despite the knight’s wishes. Guyon resists her charms, and when the boat reaches the island he is more irritated than amused by her frivolity.

As Phaedria and Guyon wander round the island, Cymochles wakes and bumps into them. Immediately, Cymochles draws his sword and attacks Guyon. They slash into one another’s armour, drawing blood from underlying wounds. This culminates in two simultaneous hammer-blows, one which cuts part of Guyon’s shield away, the other splitting Cymochles’ helmet, cutting through to his skull and knocking him senseless.

At this point, Phaedria steps between the knights and halts their fight. Guyon still insists that he wants to resume his journey, so Phaedria and her boat drop him off where it had picked up Cymochles, close to Atin. Seeing his arrival, the page first hurls insults at Guyon before running away.

A few moments later, the page is surprised to see the arrival of a knight covered in dried blood and dirt. This is Pyrrhochles, who rushes to the water and throws himself in, not caring whether he drowns. The wounded knight shouts to his page that his body is burning, and the page struggles out into the foul and muddy water.

As those two are floundering around in the lake, Archimago passes by on the shore. The page calls for his assistance, and the two of them tow the knight to the bank, where they strip him of his armour. The wizard then invokes charms and magic to undo the persistent burning in the wounds made by Furor.

Principal Characters

Acrasia, an evil enchantress who lures men to her wandering island, the Bower of Bliss. Sir Guyon has been sent to put an end to her wickedness.

Archimago, an evil sorceror who tries to stop all knights in the service of the Faerie Queen.

Atin, an insolent page (“varlet”) and servant to Pyrrhochles.

Belphoebe, a young woman who prefers hunting to being at court. Adept with her spear, and bow and arrows.

Braggadocchio, a waster and thief, prone to boastfulness, with not an ounce of honour or goodness. He steals Sir Guyon’s charger and lance.

Cymochles, an immortal knight, famed warrior, brother of Pyrrhochles, and lover of Acrasia. He has an unstable character.

Sir Guyon, hero of Book 2, “Temperance”, a knight at the Faery Queen’s court, who is sent to stop the wrongs of Acrasia.

The Palmer, an elderly man dressed in black, who is leading Sir Guyon in his quest to put a stop to the evil of Acrasia.

Phaedria, a beautiful young woman in service to Acrasia. She represents superficial and earthly pleasure.

Pyrrhochles, an immortal knight, brother of Cymochles, of fiery temper.

Trompart, a lazy and sly man who wears gaudy clothes. He becomes Braggadocchio’s servant.

References

Wikipedia on The Faerie Queene, with a partial summary
Wikipedia on Edmund Spenser

Richard Danson Brown (2019) The Art of the Faerie Queene, Manchester UP. ISBN 978 0 7190 8732 5. (Note: this isn’t about visual art, but literary art and poetics.)
AC Hamilton (ed) (2007) Spenser, the Faerie Queene, 2nd edn, Routledge. ISBN 978 1 4058 3281 6. (Critical edition.)
Elizabeth Heale (1999) The Faerie Queene, A Reader’s Guide, 2nd edn, Cambridge UP. ISBN 978 0 521 65468 5.
Douglas Hill (1980) Edmund Spenser, The Illustrated Faerie Queene, Newsweek Books. No ISBN.
Richard A McCabe (ed) (2010) The Oxford Handbook of Edmund Spenser, Oxford UP. ISBN 978 0 1987 0967 1.

Too long ago, I bought a wonderful book by Kirsty Stonell Walker, titled Pre-Raphaelite Girl Gang. Don’t be deterred by those words, though: it’s an unusually broad survey of some of the most important women responsible for the Pre-Raphaelite Movement, and goes a long way to redress the balance in art history.

Where that book falls short is its limited coverage of the works of some of the very best of the Pre-Raphaelites, those of the ‘sisterhood’ which still tends to get overlooked. This sadly short series tries to add some better information and examples of paintings from some of the brilliant women artists who were associated with the movement.

Louisa Anne Beresford (née Stuart), Marchioness of Waterford (1818-1891)

It was only when I researched the paintings of Louisa Beresford to write a celebration of the bicentenary of her birth, a couple of years ago, that I realised that she was a friend of both Dante Gabriel Rossetti and John Ruskin, and a member of the Pre-Raphaelite inner circle.

She was born in Paris into British nobility, the daughter of a Baronet whose family home was a castle overlooking the English Channel, who happened to be the British Ambassador in Paris at the time. It was Ruskin who taught her to draw, and it’s claimed that Rossetti taught her to paint, despite him being ten years younger than her.

One of her family estates included the small village of Ford, close to the eastern end of the Scottish border in Northumberland. When Beresford’s husband died in a riding accident in 1859, she determined to improve the welfare of her tenants, so rebuilt their houses and the village church, and had a new school constructed for them in 1860, in which she painted extensive murals.

Outside her painted school, few of her paintings are in public collections, but this undated watercolour of Sleeping Disciples now in the Tate gives an idea of her affinity with the movement.

Sophie Gengembre Anderson (1823–1903)

Sophie Gengembre Anderson is another pioneering painter who is usually omitted from the Pre-Raphaelite canon, and like Louisa Beresford isn’t covered in Kirsty Stonell Walker’s book. She too was born in Paris, the daughter of an accomplished French architect and his British wife. At the age of 25, she and her family fled France for America, where she eventually settled in Manchester, PA. Having married an American portrait painter, the couple moved to London in 1854, where she established her reputation exhibiting with the Society of British Artists and at the Royal Academy.

One of her most fascinating paintings is among her best, and best-known: Elaine or The Lily Maid of Astolat (1870). She exhibited this in Liverpool, at the first Autumn Exhibition there, where it was very well-received, and was purchased for the city, becoming the first work by a woman artist to enter the Walker Art Gallery collection.

It shows the corpse of Elaine of Astolat being rowed by a servant to Camelot, after she had died of a broken heart for her unrequited love of Sir Lancelot. Her body is ghostly white, and holds lilies as a sign of virginity, and her parting letter to the knight.

The story has many similarities with another popular Arthurian legend of the Lady of Shalott, and both were painted at around the same time by recognised members of the Pre-Raphaelite Movement.

Marie Spartali Stillman (1844–1927)

Arguably the finest and most prolific of all the Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood, Marie Spartali Stillman gained entry to the inner circle through her parents’ cultivation of artistic circles at their garden parties and dinners. In her late teens, together with her two cousins Maria Zambaco and Aglaia Coronio, collectively known as The Three Graces, she was admired by Dante Gabriel Rossetti as a “stunner”. At the age of 19, the Graces were often used as models, and the following year she started as a pupil of Ford Madox Brown, receiving two days of studio teaching with him each week.

Marie Spartali, as she was then, was first sent to the pioneer photographer Julia Margaret Cameron (1815–1879) at her father’s wish. Cameron’s Marie Spartali Stillman (1868) is an example from that commissioned series. Later, Mrs Cameron put her in a variety of roles as a model, in her studio at Freshwater on the Isle of Wight, close by Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s winter residence there. Cameron was one of the earliest ‘artistic’ portrait photographers, specialising in women, and another important member of the Sisterhood.

The following year, Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828–1882) sketched her in red chalk; Rossetti openly expressed his admiration of her beauty, and his inability to capture it in his work. He used her as a model for several of his paintings.

By then, she had already painted Mariana (1867), a remarkably accomplished watercolour version of this popular motif, set here in the context of Shakespeare’s character in Measure for Measure, and Tennyson’s poem of 1830. In the former, Mariana is a betrothed woman who, when rejected by her suitor, lives in a moated house. In the latter, the rejected and world-weary woman becomes suicidal. Despite a favourable reception when shown in the Dudley Gallery, the artist kept the painting, and it didn’t re-appear until the 1980s. It was probably an inspiration for Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s Mariana of 1868-70.

Annie Louisa Swynnerton (1844-1933)

Annie Louisa Robinson, as she was before marriage, had a more modest background, being born into a middle class family in Hulme in the city of Manchester. She quickly demonstrated her artistic talent, winning a scholarship at the Manchester School of Art which took her to Rome. She then trained at the Académie Julian in Paris, where she became influenced by the Naturalist paintings of Jules Bastien-Lepage.

On her return to Manchester, Swynnerton and her friend Susan Isabel Dacre founded the Manchester Society of Women Painters. Swynnerton’s first painting to be exhibited at the Royal Academy was in 1879. Although her early style is Naturalist, later in her career she painted more as a Pre-Raphaelite. She moved with her newly-wedded husband, a sculptor, to live mainly in Rome in 1883, and was an active member of the Suffragette movement.

Swynnerton’s Cupid and Psyche from 1891 follows the long-standing tradition of showing the couple as being very young. Thankfully Henrietta Rae had earlier blazed the trail which enabled this, a painting of nude male and female by a woman, to be exhibited in polite company.

Evelyn De Morgan (1855–1919)

Mary Evelyn Pickering was born into a wealthy upper-middle class family in London. Her father was friends with William Gladstone, who was to become Prime Minister, and she was introduced to art by her mother’s brother, Roddam Spencer-Stanhope, who was one of the first-generation Pre-Raphaelites. He introduced her to the Rossettis, Watts, Holman Hunt, and others.

At the age of only 17, she started attending the newly-formed South Kensington National Art Training School (now the Royal College of Art) in London, from where she moved on to the Slade. She visited Italy repeatedly, sometimes stayed with her uncle, Roddam Spencer-Stanhope, in his villa near Florence. She set up her studio in Chelsea, London, in the early 1880s, where she became friends with John Ruskin, philosopher JS Mill, Lady Byron, and the social reformer Elizabeth Fry. She too was a strong feminist, and a Suffragette.

Her Aurora Triumphans, or Dawn from about 1876 shows the Roman goddess of the dawn reclining at the lower right, the shackles of the night shown as roped roses. At the lower left, Night is flying away in her dark robes. Above them, three winged angels resplendent in their golden tunics sound the fanfare bringing day. Aurora is triumphant in dispelling Night.

This painting has an interesting history. First exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery in London, it seems to have gone into a private collection until coming onto the market in about 1922. At that time, De Morgan’s signature had been overpainted with that of Burne-Jones. It was on the strength of that that it was purchased for the Russell-Cotes Museum in Bournemouth, where it now is, unveiled as one of Evelyn De Morgan’s paintings instead.

Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale (1872–1945)

Although she might sound like a wizard hockey player and head girl of her private school, and was certainly something of an anachronism, Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale was a fine painter and another campaigner for women’s rights.

She was born to an affluent family: her father was a leading barrister, and home was in the leafy lanes of Upper Norwood in Surrey, England. She was a precocious artist, and started her studies at the Crystal Palace School of Art, before entering the Royal Academy Schools in 1897. Women had only been admitted to the Schools since 1860, and she was already working beyond the bounds normally expected of women artists, by producing commercial illustrations for magazines, including Country Life.

Her major influences seem to have been John Byam Liston Shaw, who in turn was influenced by John Everett Millais and J W Waterhouse. Her work received rare praise from George Frederick Watts, then a veteran of Victorian painting.

The Pale Complexion of True Love (1899) was her first major painting, and was exhibited at the Royal Academy. Its title is taken from Shakespeare’s As You Like It – such literary quotations being popular with Victorian artists, and often used by her. Although it was fifty years since the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood had revived styles from the early Renaissance and before, she has depicted an Elizabethan scene in similar style, and brilliant colour.

Among the other women painters who should be included with the Pre-Raphaelite Movement are:

• Anna Blunden (1829-1915), most of whose paintings were destroyed during the Second World War
• Rosa Brett (1829-1882)
• Joanna Boyce (1831-1861), who died following childbirth at the age of only thirty
• Emma Sandys (1843-1877), whose paintings have been attributed to her brother Frederick
• Louise Jopling (1843-1933)
• Lucy Madox Brown (1843-1894), who stopped painting when she married William Michael Rossetti
• Anna Lea Merritt (1844-1930)
• Kate Bunce (1856-1927)
• May Cooksey (1878-1943)
• Noel Laura Nisbet (1887-1956).

Among those whose influence came through their modelling are Lizzie Siddal, best known for her role as Ophelia in Millais’ classic from about 1851-52, Fanny Cornforth, Jane Morris, the Pettigrew sisters, and a couple of dozen more.

I look forward to telling and showing you more about them over the coming months.

Reference

Kirsty Stonell Walker, Kingsley Nebechi (illustrator) (2018) Pre-Raphaelite Girl Gang, Unicorn. ISBN 978 1 911604 63 1.

The first of my Pre-Raphaelite Sisters was an active and successful painter in London at the time of the Movement, but there’s scant documentation about her associates and influences when she lived and worked in England. The best evidence to support her inclusion is one marvellous painting which could have been made by one of the recognised Pre-Raphaelites.

Sophie Gengembre Anderson (1823–1903) was French by birth and descent, having been born in Paris as Sophie Gengembre, the daughter of an accomplished French architect and his British wife. When she was about ten, the family had to leave Paris, and didn’t return from the country until she was twenty. She started studying portrait painting under Charles de Steuben, but he soon left for Russia, and she was left to learn by herself and with the assistance of friends.

With the 1848 Revolution, the family fled again, this time leaving France for the USA, eventually settling in Manchester, PA, where Sophie is thought to have married Walter Anderson, a portrait painter. At that time she worked as a chromolithographer, but developed her own portraiture business and assisted her husband.

The couple moved to London in 1854, where Sophie exhibited at the Society of British Artists the following year, and at the Royal Academy. In 1856, she painted this delightful No Walk Today, which was purchased in 2008 for over £1 million. It shows a small girl, dressed up in highly fashionable clothing, looking sadly and wistfully through a window. It tells the story that she is not able to go out for a walk, although dressed for it.

This is a ‘puzzle picture’ in that it invites the viewer to speculate as to why this little girl should be confined to the house, but gives us very few clues. She is apparently not ill, nor is the weather inclement. Neither is she dressed in subfuse or mourning clothing, which might have indicated a family bereavement.

Her undated painting of Foundling Girls in the Chapel may date from around this time. It shows girls who had been abandoned by their mothers, at prayers in the London Foundling Hospital’s chapel in the late nineteenth century.

It’s Touch and Go to Laugh or No (1857) is set amid flowering heather in the Highlands of Scotland, although the figures were almost certainly painted in the studio. The young boy and girl are playing a game, in which he is trying to make her laugh by tickling her face with a stem of grass. The children who modelled for this were most probably those of the artist.

Sophie and Walter Anderson returned to the USA from 1858 to 1863, where they both had work exhibited at the National Academy of Design. They then went back to live and work in London, where Sophie made herself a successful career, exhibiting with the major institutions including the Royal Academy.

It was during their second stay in London that she painted one of her finest, and best-known works: Elaine or The Lily Maid of Astolat (1870). She exhibited this in Liverpool, at the first Autumn Exhibition there, where it was well-received, and was purchased for the city, becoming the first work by a woman artist to enter the Walker Art Gallery collection, and one of the first of any woman artist to enter a British public collection.

Sir Lancelot is due to take part in a tournament, at which he will appear in disguise, for reasons relating to his secret affair with Queen Guinevere. The knight seeks the help of Bernard of Astolat, who lends him armour, colours and a shield. While he visits to borrow those, Bernard’s daughter Elaine falls in love with him, and begs him to wear a token of her affection at the tournament – something which he finds difficult. Elaine is entrusted with his shield until Lancelot returns.

Lancelot wins the tournament, but is slightly wounded in the process. He recuperates in Bernard’s castle, with Elaine devotedly nursing him back to health. However, she learns that her love for the knight will remain unrequited. When Lancelot departs, Elaine wishes for death, and ten days later dies of a broken heart.

Elaine had made clear that on her death, she wished her body to be taken by boat to Camelot, bearing a last letter. Her wishes are followed by her father and brothers, who place her in a boat with one of their servants, who is stricken with grief at her death. That is the scene shown here: Elaine’s body is ghostly white, and holds lilies as a sign of virginity, together with her parting letter to the knight.

Although less popular among painters than the similar Arthurian legend of the Lady of Shalott, these are typically Pre-Raphaelite themes which were used by the likes of J W Waterhouse and John Atkinson Grimshaw.

For comparison, this is John William Waterhouse’s famous first painting of The Lady of Shalott from 1888.

And this is John Atkinson Grimshaw’s The Lady of Shalott from about 1875. This scene was also painted in 1862 by Walter Crane, and by Arthur Hughes in about 1872-73, shortly after Sophie Gengembre Anderson’s painting of Elaine became so well known.

The year after her success with Elaine of Astolat, the Andersons moved to Capri, which was then an affluent artist’s colony with residents such as Frederic, Lord Leighton and John Singer Sargent.

She next entered the faerie painting sub-genre with Take the Fair Face of Woman, and Gently Suspending, With Butterflies, Flowers, and Jewels Attending, Thus Your Fairy is Made of Most Beautiful Things (1880). The title is taken from verse allegedly by Charles Ede, who hadn’t even been born then, and I’ve been unable to trace its true source.

The Bonfire appears to be another composite with figures painted in the studio, children who are getting a bit grubby poking around in the embers of a small bonfire. The background could be almost anywhere in England or Wales, but there is a suggestion of another bonfire in the right distance, which might time the scene to Bonfire Night, 5th November. This may have been influenced by John Everett Millais’ earlier Autumn Leaves (1856).

There is no doubt about the season in Christmas Time – Here’s The Gobbler! which shows a proud boy carrying in a huge turkey destined for Christmas lunch. That and the decor places this in a comfortably middle-class home.

During her years living on Capri, Sophie Anderson painted many works showing local people. There is no evidence, though, to suggest that she travelled to the Middle East where she might have painted Scheherazade, the storyteller in One Thousand and One Nights, but the Victorian fad for Orientalism made this a popular motif. Sir Richard Burton’s translation of these stories was published in 1885, suggesting that Anderson probably painted this portrait soon afterwards.

Wait for Me! or Returning Home from School is possibly the finest of Anderson’s many child paintings, showing a little girl trying to get herself together for the walk back home after school. By her school bag is a small chalk tablet which she would have been using to learn to write, and more, before graduating to an exercise book and pencil.

In 1894, Sophie and Walter returned to the UK, where they settled in Falmouth, Cornwall, which was (and remains) an artists’ colony predating that nearby at Saint Ives. They both died there in early 1903.

Sophie Gengembre Anderson was very much a New Woman, a pioneer who made for herself and her art a career independent of her husband. For me, her painting of Elaine of Astolat stands alongside any of the Pre-Raphaelite works showing similar legends, and places her in the Sisterhood.

Reference

Wikipedia.

Three hundred years ago tomorrow, one of the most famous and prolific print makers of Italy was born: Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778). In this article I look at his career and work generally, and tomorrow I concentrate on his remarkable series of prints showing imaginary prisons, which has proved so influential on art.

Piranesi was born in a town near Mestre, the city on the mainland adjacent to Venice. He developed an early interest in classical architecture and remains: his brother introduced him to the Latin language, his father was a stonemason, and he was indentured as an apprentice with his uncle, an architect responsible for restoring historical buildings.

He started to learn to etch and engrave when in Rome, where he initially worked as a draughtsman. His first independent print-making started in 1743, when he made views of the city of Rome in conjunction with students at the French Academy in Rome. In the mid-1740s, he worked in Venice, where it’s thought he became friends with Giovanni Battista Tiepolo.

A Battle of Nude Men is a pen and ink drawing which Piranesi made in 1744-45, possibly when he was in Venice.

In the late 1740s, Piranesi returned to Rome, where he started work on a major series of views of the city and its classical ruins.

The Skeletons from 1747-49 is an etching and drypoint with burnishing which already declares his interest in the ‘ghoulish’. In this fantasy, the ruins appear to have come alive with the remains of the dead. At the upper right is the zodiac, showing Sagittarius and Cancer. By this time, Piranesi had started work on the series of prints which depict his imaginary views of prisons, which I look at in tomorrow’s article.

The Temple of Diana, etched in 1748 for Piranesi’s first major series of views of Roman ruins, shows the remains of one of the oldest temples, by legend claimed to have been built during the initial rule of Rome by kings.

If you’ve ever visited Rome, you’ll surely recognise the famous sight of a Side View of the Trevi Fountain, one of the prints included in Piranesi’s hugely successful Views of Rome, in 1747-48. The largest fountain in the city, it dates from 19 BCE, when it was built at the end of the Acqua Vergine aqueduct. Work to create the modern version had started in 1732, but had been interrupted, and wasn’t completed until 1762. That accounts for some of the sculpture being incomplete.

Piranesi continued to make prints of Rome and other locations in Italy with classical remains throughout the rest of his career. Veduta with the Temple of Jove from about 1750-58 is a finished etching which shows the lesser of the two temples to Jupiter on the Capitoline Hill. This lies between the larger and more important Temple to Jove Capitoline and the Forum. It’s seen here in a state of ruin, with trees growing nearby, and livestock.

Piranesi’s later collection of views published under the title of Campus Martius in 1762 included this fine etching of the exterior of the Pantheon.

He also made several beautifully lit interior views, including this undated Interior View of the Pantheon.

In 1763, Piranesi was commissioned by Pope Clement XIII to restore the choir of the Church of San Giovanni in Laterano, which had been a favourite of a succession of popes. After that failed, he was responsible for restoring the Church of Santa Maria del Priorato on the Aventine Hill, the only architectural work which he completed in Rome.

Another familiar landmark for those who have visited Rome is Trajan’s Column, erected in its own forum in 113 CE to commemorate the victory of the emperor Trajan in the Dacian Wars. One of Piranesi’s last major projects, in 1774, was to document this in painstaking detail, for example in this View of the Main Face of Trajan’s Column.

The buried city of Pompeii was rediscovered and excavated during Piranesi’s career, starting in about 1763. The artist visited the site late in his life, making drawings such as this of The Tomb of the Istacidi, Pompeii (c 1777).

Although relatively few of Piranesi’s original drawings are now accessible, this chalk study of The Octagonal Room in the Small Baths at the Villa of Hadrian (Tivoli) was made in about 1777.

By 1777, Piranesi’s health was failing, and died in Rome the following year.

In all, it’s thought that Piranesi made about two thousand prints, overwhelmingly of classical ruins in the city of Rome. They remain a reference, extensively used by other artists, invaluable to archaeologists and antiquaries, and now widely available from the Internet.

Reference

Wikipedia, which has a good directory of other resources too.

In the first article about the art of Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778), to celebrate today, the three-hundredth anniversay of his birth, I looked at his career and works, except for his series of etchings of Imaginary Prisons which he made between about 1745-50. Those extraordinary prints are the subject of this article.

Piranesi is thought to have started work on this series in about 1745. I like to think that they originated in the doodles of an architect who had a particular interest in the classical ruins of Rome. Inspired perhaps by flights of fancy from trying to reconstruct old ruins in his mind, he must have given his imagination free rein.

Their style is far freer and more sketchy than his normally tight and precise marks in his published engravings of Roman antiquities, and from some of the more detailed descriptions, he used chemical methods of toning too.

These engravings were published in two editions during his lifetime. The first, in 1750, consisted of 14 first state prints. In about 1760 he revised those originals, adjusting some of their projections to form impossible geometries, and adding two further etchings. Those were published in a second edition in 1761. They have since been reprinted in many different editions, and are believed to have formed inspiration for Gothic-Romantic and Surrealist artists in all media. The visionary British poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) referred explicitly to them forming a part of his creative process.

The title page differs considerably between the two editions. The first, shown above, credits the publisher in its inscription, but Piranesi was sufficiently well known by the second edition to give his own name.

The Round Tower is the first plate in the first edition, but in the second was preceded by an additional plate normally known as The Man on the Rack.

The Grand Piazza is next, and in the second edition was followed by an additional plate normally titled The Lion Bas-Reliefs.

Perspective of Arches, with a Smoking Fire follows.

The Drawbridge is next, and in both editions is followed by The Staircase with Trophies.

After that comes The Giant Wheel.

Prisoners on a Projecting Platform is next, after which both editions have two prints, The Arch with Shell Ornament, and The Well.

The Pier with a Gothic Arch follows.

The Pier with a Lamp is the penultimate.

The Pier with Chains is the final plate of both series.

Piranesi was one of the most important makers of prints, in terms of his influence on art as a whole. His Gothic inventions can be seen informing subsequent visual art over the next three centuries, which is perhaps a unique feat in European art.

Reference

Wikipedia, which has a good directory of other resources too.

Ares (Greek Ἄρης), whose Roman counterpart is Mars, is one of the major classical deities, one of the twelve Olympians, and lives on in the name of the planet. The son of Zeus and Hera, he seems to have been as promiscuous as his father, siring children by Aphrodite, his most famous lover, and several other goddesses and mortals. His attributes are any part of the arms and armour of a warrior, usually at least a helmet and shield.

Ares has been most frequently painted together with, or making love to, Aphrodite. Botticelli’s Venus and Mars from about 1485 is unusual for its modest portrayal of Aphrodite, who is seldom seen clothed in other paintings. Ares is clearly sleeping off their lovemaking, as a group of mischievous fauns are playing around with his arms.

It was Diego Velázquez who painted what must be the finest solo portrait of Ares, in about 1639-41. This was one of a trio of portraits ‘from antiquity’ which he painted for the king’s hunting lodge at El Pardo, near Madrid, known as the Torre de la Parada. The other two showed Aesop (of fables) and Menippus the philosopher.

Sometimes known as Mars Resting, the god is shown off-guard in a moment of relaxation, his armour and shield dumped on the floor, and wearing just a loincloth and helmet. He looks like he just got out of bed after a long siesta.

By this time, other artists recognised the role of Ares in allegories, and he developed a life independent of his mythological origin.

One of the first of these is Tintoretto’s Minerva and Mars, from 1578. Here Athena is pushing the god of war away from her, as her right hand rests on the shoulder of Peace, with Prosperity at the left edge of the canvas.

It was Peter Paul Rubens who brought this use of Ares to full fruition, in a series of paintings which spanned the most productive years of his career.

In the young Rubens’ The Triumph of Victory (c 1614), made when he was the finest painter in Flanders, Ares is almost glorified.

The Treaty of Antwerp had been signed in 1609, and the city was flourishing in the Twelve Years’ Truce which ensued. Painted for the Antwerp Guild of St George, its organisation of archers, Ares dominates, his bloody sword resting on the thigh of Victoria, the personification of victory. She reaches over to place a wreath (either of oak or laurel) on Ares, and holds a staff in her left hand. At the right, Ares is being passed the bundle of crossbow bolts that make up the attribute of Concord.

Under the feet of Ares are the bodies of Rebellion, in the foreground, who still holds his torch, and Discord, on whose cheek a snake is crawling. The bound figure resting against the left knee of Ares is Barbarism.

When Rubens was in his early fifties, and working as a diplomat to try to bring peace across the continent of Europe, his world-view had changed and Ares had changed sides.

When Rubens as acting as envoy to King Philip IV of Spain and trying to agree peace between Spain and King Charles I of England, he painted this, one of his greatest narrative paintings, as a gift with a message for the king of England.

Its central figures are those of Demeter (Ceres), here in the role of Pax (the personification of peace), and Athena, behind her. In attendance are Ares, Hymen, Plutus, and Alecto (one of the Furies), with sundry Bacchantes, a Satyr, putti, and the attributes of Dionysus (Bacchus) and Hermes (Mercury). It’s like an away day from Olympus, or part of an index to Ovid.

Demeter and Athena are at the heart of the painting. Rubens shows Demeter expressing milk from her left breast, which arcs into the mouth of her son Plutus, the god of wealth, who is grasping her left arm.

The figures of Demeter and Plutus are almost identical to those of Aphrodite and Eros in Rubens’ earlier Venus, Mars and Cupid (c 1633), which introduces ambiguity to her figure. However, in this painting Eros is shown winged, with his traditional bow and arrows. In Peace and War, the infant is clearly not Eros as he has neither wings nor bow and arrows: he is Plutus there.

Being the goddess of agriculture, Demeter stands for values which are strongly associated with the benefits of peace – bread rather than starvation, fertility rather than barrenness and pestilence. Her son Plutus represents the growth of wealth during times of peace.

Although the figure immediately behind Demeter might be mistaken for a man (hence Ares, perhaps), her staff and helmet are characteristic of Athena, the goddess with a curious mixed portfolio of wisdom, industry, and war (a hangover from her part-Etruscan origins). Immediately above her is a winged putto carrying a caduceus, a short staff with wings at the top and entwined snakes, normally an attributed of Hermes, but also associated with commerce. That putto leans forward to place a laurel wreath, the crown of the victor and a symbol of peace, on Demeter’s head.

Athena is pushing away the bearded figure of Ares, the god of war, who also wears his characteristic black armour. Rubens painted Ares not infrequently, and was very flexible over his age and appearance, which vary according to context. With Aphrodite and Eros above, he is younger and clean-shaven.

In Venus and Mars he appears more like an ageing general than a warrior, and Aphrodite is past the beauty of her youth too. Perhaps they had succumbed too often to the temptations of Dionysus, seen brandishing an empty glass behind.

At the far right of Peace and War is Alecto, the Fury responsible for dealing with the moral offences of humans, usually by driving them mad. Rubens refrains from giving her snakes in her hair, but lays emphasis on madness, here the madness of war.

On the opposite (left) side of the painting is a Bacchante holding her tambourine (tympanum) aloft, and another bearing earthly riches at her left side. A Satyr crouches low over a leopard, and proffers a cornucopia filled with fruit to the figures at the right.

Rubens’ personal life was also changing at the time. When he returned to Antwerp, he married the sixteen year-old Hélène Fourment, having lost his first wife four years earlier. In 1635, he bought a country estate near Antwerp, the Steen, which was to be his base until his death, and where he must have worked on one of his last great allegories.

With Europe nearing the end of the Thirty Years’ War, Rubens must have been only too delighted to be commissioned by Ferdinand de’ Medici, then the Grand Duke of Tuscany. Tuscany had been largely uninvolved in the war, and this time Rubens had no diplomatic mission to accomplish. He could afford to be frank in his story, and we are fortunate in having the artist’s own description of the painting.

The central figures in The Consequences of War (1637-38) are Aphrodite and Ares. The god of war is advancing forcefully having just rushed from the temple of Janus, moving from left to right, with his sword bloodied and held low. His head is turned back to look at Aphrodite, whose left arm is caught around his right, and who is clearly trying unsuccessfully to restrain him. Standing against the right thigh of Aphrodite is a winged Eros, the couple’s child.

Drawing Ares forward is Alecto, her hair now looking more like that of a Fury but with few snakes visible, who bears a torch in her right hand. Monsters near her personify Pestilence and Famine, the inseparable partners of war at that time. On the ground below Alecto is a woman with her back towards the viewer: she is Harmony, whose lute has been broken in the discord brought by war.

Nearby, also on the ground, is a mother with her child in her arms, symbolising the effect of war on families and their rearing. At the lower right corner is an architect clutching his instruments, indicating how fine buildings are thrown into ruin by war. Under the right foot of Ares is a book, showing how war tramples over the arts.

On the ground to the left of Eros is a bundle of arrows or darts: these aren’t his arrows of desire, but when bundled up would form the symbol of Concord; thus war breaks Concord. To their left is the caduceus and an olive branch, attributes of Peace, also cast aside. The woman at the left in a black gown is the personification of Europe, whose globe (symbolising the Christian world) is carried by a putto behind her. Having endured the ravages of war for so long, her clothing is torn and she has been robbed of her jewels.

Aphrodite and Ares are well-known lovers. She is failing to restrain him from charging off to war, and in doing so breaking their bond of love. This element of the composition had evolved over a long period, coming originally from Titian, and referring to another of Venus’ lovers, Adonis.

Finally, for the Romans, Mars was special, a father of the Roman peoples, and one of the key players in the apotheosis of Romulus, founder of the city of Rome.

Jean-Baptiste Nattier painted thia apotheosis in his Romulus being taken up to Olympus by Mars from about 1700. Mars is embracing Romulus, with the standard of Rome being borne at the lower left, and the divine chariot ready to take Romulus up to the upper right corner, where the rest of the gods await him. And that is the most appropriate place to end this brief account of Ares or Mars in paintings.

Following the rebuilding of Rome, which had been sacked by the Gauls, there was a long period during which the plebeian nobility rose in power and influence, and Rome steadily came to dominate the Italian peninsula. It was, though, coming under increasing threat from Greece and Carthage.

When Rome was at war with Tarentum, in the ‘heel’ close to the west coast of Greece, its people appealed to the Greek king Pyrrhus to defend them, so that he could rule them too. Pyrrhus was persuaded to give them support, and sent forces in advance. When the king tried to cross the sea, though, their ships were scattered by a storm from the north. Eventually the whole of his army reached Tarentum, only to discover that its citizens would do nothing in their own defence, and Laevinus the Roman consul was on his way with his army.

In the protracted battle that ensued between Pyrrhus and the Romans, Pyrrhus himself was wounded, but the Romans were eventually defeated, with the loss of as many as 15,000 of their men. The Romans did not accept this as a defeat of their army, but blamed its leader, Laevinus. Pyrrhus sent Cineas as his representative to Rome, but he was unable to persuade its senate to accept any proposals for peace. Instead, the Romans demanded that Pyrrhus and his troops leave Italy, or they would continue to fight him so long as he remained.

Rome then sent Pyrrhus an embassy led by Caius Fabricius, who was held in high esteem in Rome but was exceedingly poor. Pyrrhus showed the Roman great hospitality, and offered him gifts of gold as a mark of friendship and respect. Caius Fabricius declined them.

This is shown in Ferdinand Bol’s Scene from Ancient History: The Incorruptibility of Gaius Fabricius from about 1650. Pyrrhus is the old, bearded man sat on the throne at the right, as Caius Fabricius (standing, in helmet and armour) declines the large gold plates and vases being offered to him.

Next, Pyrrhus tried a different tactic. Like Hannibal, he used elephants in battle, so the following day, he had one of his war-elephants concealed behind a large drape near where he met to speak with the Roman. When Pyrrhus gave the signal, the drape was removed, unveiling the huge elephant, which raised its trunk and emitted a fearful cry.

As Bol shows in his second painting, of The Fearlessness of Fabricius in the Camp of Pyrrhus (1655-56), the Roman turned calmly to Pyrrhus and told him that neither the gold nor the elephant made any impression on him.

Pyrrhus and Caius Fabricius (who later became consul) developed great mutual respect, but found no acceptable solution. After Pyrrhus dealt with a threat to his life, he engaged the Roman army again at Asculum, where he was eventually able to deploy his elephants with effect. However, casualties were heavy on both sides, and when Pyrrhus was congratulated on his narrow victory, he said: “If we are victorious in one more battle with the Romans, we shall be utterly ruined” – the origin of the phrase Pyrrhic victory.

Pyrrhus then sailed to Sicily, where he hoped for and got easier pickings. From success there, he briefly turned his attentions to Libya, where he was less than successful, so returned to Italy. His next battle was against Roman forces under Manius Curius at Beneventum, where Pyrrhus’ army was finally routed, and forced to return to Greece after six years of victorious but ultimately unsuccessful campaigning in the Pyrrhic War. When the Greek king was later killed in battle, Tarentum surrendered to the Romans, who then ruled the whole Italian peninsula.

Rome and Carthage had been allied against the Greeks, but with them out of play, disputes arose over Sicily and its control over the local sea.

Marcus Atilius Regulus was a Roman general and consul for a short period in 267 BCE. He was successful in the First Punic War against the Carthaginians, but in 255 BCE was defeated by them and taken prisoner. He was released so that he could return to Rome to negotiate peace, but then urged the Roman Senate to refuse any such proposal.

One of the most famous of JMW Turner’s paintings of classical history is his Regulus (1828, 1837), one of three narrative works painted and exhibited in Rome in 1828, and reworked before exhibition in 1837. Interestingly, this is the painting which Thomas Fearnley painted a sketch of Turner working on during a ‘varnishing day’.

Turner appears to have depicted Regulus leaving Rome in a dusk view referring strongly to the landscapes of Claude Lorrain. When he returned to Carthage, he was tortured to death; one account claims that his eyelids were excised and he was exposed to the North African sun until he was blinded by it.

One problem which already arises in this association is that, while Turner is known to have been familiar with the account given by Horace of Regulus’ story, that did not include details of his torture and blinding, which in any case took place after Regulus had left Rome. Nevertheless, it has been claimed that the dazzling low sunlight in this painting is a reference to Regulus’ fate.

The painting has an abundance of figures, none of which stands out as being a Roman general whose name is its title. John Gage has claimed that Turner puts the viewer in the position of Regulus, so that its dazzling light is intended to mimic the suffering which he experienced. This is supported by the fact that an engraving of this work gave it the title of Ancient Carthage — the Embarkation of Regulus.

Unfortunately, even if this painting were to represent Regulus departing from Carthage, he had not at that time been subject to mutilation to his eyes, nor does reference to that later act make any narrative sense at this stage.

Furthermore, unlike Rome which sits astride the River Tiber, ancient Carthage did not straddle any river of this nature. This view could have been obtained from looking along the length of its harbour, but that runs due south and could not show the sun low in the sky at any time of day.

When Turner tells us that his painting is narrative, reveals the story in its title, and still leaves us debating how to read it nearly two centuries later, we should be very cautious about trying to read in narrative when all the signs point to a regular landscape.

The Romans finally drove Carthage to settle for peace, at the end of the First Punic War, and exacted a high price which included the surrender of all Sicily to the expanding republic. To compensate for its loss of that island, Carthage turned to southern Spain. This led to the start of the Second Punic War, in which Hannibal used his gains in Spain to march his army of around 100,000 over the Alps into northern Italy. For painters, this has been marked by scenes of the Carthaginians’ 37 war-elephants.

Jacopo Ripanda devoted an entire room of frescoes in the Palazzo del Campidoglio in Rome to the Carthaginians and the Punic Wars. Among them is this detail of Hannibal Crossing the Alps from about 1510.

This canvas of Hannibal Crossing the Alps on Elephants has been attributed to Poussin, and dated to 1625-26, but is no longer considered to be by Poussin’s hand.

One of JMW Turner’s most radical early works, showing Snow Storm: Hannibal and his Army Crossing the Alps (1812), must have been influenced by the artist’s own firsthand experience of crossing Alpine passes. This is also radical in that the famous elephants are downplayed almost to the point of being invisible under Turner’s extraordinary storm sky. In fact, in the centre foreground, under a scarlet sheet, is what appears to be the black form of an elephant lying on the ground.

In the second episode of Book 2, Phaedria had lured Sir Guyon and Cymochles to her island on the Lake of Idleness, where they fought one another until Guyon knocked his opponent senseless. Guyon was then ferried back to the shore of the lake by Phaedria, and continued his journey without the Palmer, who had been left on another part of the shore. Cymochles’ brother Pyrrhochles then arrived, wounded from his encounter with Furor. The page Atin then tried to help him, but it was the sorceror Archimago who brought Pyrrhochles relief from his burning wounds.

Canto 7

Guyon findes Mammon in a delve,
sunning his threasure horde;
Is by him tempted, and led downe,
To see his secrete store.

Sir Guyon now walks on alone, his horse stolen and the Palmer missing. He eventually meets a grisly man whose beard is scorched, and whose skin is blackened by soot. His chain mail is made of grubby gold, and there are gold coins on his lap and piled in great heaps around him. Seeing the knight, the man starts pouring his gold into a hole in the ground. He reveals that he is Mammon, from whom all worldly riches flow, and offers the knight great wealth if he’ll pledge himself to him and his riches.

Guyon declines Mammon’s offer, declaring his devotion to honour rather than riches. Mammon claims that riches can bring him anything he wants, but the knight argues that covetousness is the root of unhappiness. Mammon invites Guyon to view his unseen fortune, and they descend through a cavern to Pluto’s underworld. Along the way, Guyon sees Pain, Strife, Revenge, Spite, Treason, Hate, Jealousy, Fear and Sorrow, and above them all is black-winged Horror.

They enter Mammon’s house, where there are mountains of gold. Guyon remains steadfast, though, so Mammon leads him to a hundred furnaces being worked by demons to refine yet more gold for him. With the knight still unmoved, Mammon tries to tempt him with his daughter, who takes Guyon into the Garden of Proserpine, where there are the golden apples of Discord.

The knight starts to feel weak from his exposure to the underworld. When Mammon returns him to the surface, he falls unconscious, so deeply that he appears to be dead.

Canto 8

Sir Guyon layd in swowne [swoon] is by
Acrates sonnes despoyld,
Whom Arthure soone hath reskewed
And Paynim [pagan] brethren foyld.

The Palmer had found his own way onwards, and is now hurrying on to catch Sir Guyon up. He hears a voice, but by the time he reaches the knight, he’s lying apparently dead on the ground. Beside him is a young man with angelic wings on his back, who reassures the Palmer that the knight will soon awaken, and hands back guardianship to the Palmer before vanishing.

He is approached by the brothers Pyrrhochles and Cymochles, and their page Atin, who have met up with Archimago. Pyrrhochles tells the Palmer to stand away from the body of the knight, but he refuses. The brothers proceed to take Guyon’s shield and start to remove his armour. As they’re doing that, Archimago sees Prince Arthur approaching, and warns them. As Pyrrhochles hasn’t a sword, he demands the sorceror hands him the sword he’s carrying, which he’d promised to Braggadocchio. Archimago warns Pyrrhochles that the sword is Arthur’s, and had been crafted for him by Merlin; because of that, it can’t be used against its rightful owner. Pyrrhochles ignores him and snatches the sword away.

When he arrives, Prince Arthur asks the Palmer what happened to Sir Guyon, and is told that the knight isn’t dead, but is being threatened by the two brothers. When Arthur politely warns them to leave Guyon alone, Pyrrhochles and Cymochles attack the prince. The former swings at him with the stolen sword, which is deflected away from Arthur by virtue of its magic, as expected.

The two brothers fight fiercely with the young prince, who defends himself against their rage and fury, letting them tire themselves out. Arthur then spears Cymochles’ thigh with his lance, whose tip breaks off in the deep wound. That allows the Palmer to snatch up Guyon’s sword and hand it to Arthur, whose fighting is transformed as a result. Cymochles wounds Arthur slightly, for which the prince returns a mighty blow cleaving his opponent’s brain and killing him. Pyrrhochles is further enraged and throws himself at Arthur, trying to force the magic sword to wound its owner. He finally throws the sword aside in frustration, and is grappled to the ground by Prince Arthur.

Arthur offers to spare Pyrrhochles’ life if he renounces his evil, but the latter refuses. Arthur swings his sword and beheads Pyrrhochles.

Sir Guyon then awakes, bows low to the prince and declares his debt to him for his actions. Arthur says that there is no debt, and the two talk together, as Atin and Archimago silently run off.

Canto 9

The house of Temperance, in which
doth sober Alma dwell,
Besiegd of many foes, whom straunger
knightes to flight compell.

Arthur and Guyon travel on together. During their conversation, the prince reveals that, although his desire is to serve the Faery Queen, he is still seeking her. When the sun is beginning to sink in the west they reach a castle in a peaceful river valley, but its gates are bolted and barred. Arthur’s squire blows his horn to announce their presence. With that, a figure appears atop its walls and tells them to ride away to save themselves from the thousand enemies who have been besieging the castle for the last seven years.

Suddenly, those thousand misshapen men surround the knights, waving their weapons and torches at them. After their initial shock, Arthur and Guyon charge the mob, driving them away. As those fiends flee from the castle gate, the knights are let in and made welcome by Alma, its virgin mistress, who wears a white dress with a long train carried by two maids.

Alma takes the knights on a tour of her castle, first showing them the walls which are formed from the earth. The building’s proportions are based on a circle and triangle, and the numbers seven and nine. At its main gate is a porter with thirty-two yeomen of the guard. The dining hall is overseen by its steward Diet, and a marshall named Appetite. The kitchens are supervised by the chef Concoction, helped by his clerk Digestion. Kitchen waste is expelled through a large pipe to the castle’s back gate.

They next visit the parlour, where there are many young men and women. Ascending into the high tower, they meet Alma’s three counsellors, whose chambers have decorated walls. Those of the sage who sees into the future have scenes from fantasies; those of the sage with wisdom of the present are covered with images of art and science; those of the third, an expert in the past, are covered with scrolls and books.

From that huge library, Arthur sees a book titled British Monuments, and Guyon one on Antiquity of Faeryland. The counsellor and Alma let them read their chosen books.

Principal Characters

Alma, the mistress of a castle, the House of Temperance, which has been besieged by a thousand foes for seven years. Her castle represents the human body.

Archimago, an evil sorceror who tries to stop all knights in the service of the Faerie Queen.

Prince Arthur, son of Uther Pendragon, bearer of a magic shield which blinds his enemies and turns them to stone, and future king.

Atin, an insolent page (“varlet”) and servant to Pyrrhochles.

Braggadocchio, a waster and thief, prone to boastfulness, with not an ounce of honour or goodness. He steals Sir Guyon’s charger and lance.

Cymochles, an immortal knight, famed warrior, brother of Pyrrhochles, and lover of Acrasia. He has an unstable character.

Sir Guyon, hero of Book 2, “Temperance”, a knight at the Faery Queen’s court, who is sent to stop the wrongs of Acrasia.

The Palmer, an elderly man dressed in black, who is leading Sir Guyon in his quest to put a stop to the evil of Acrasia.

Phaedria, a beautiful young woman in service to Acrasia. She represents superficial and earthly pleasure.

Pyrrhochles, an immortal knight, brother of Cymochles, of fiery temper.

References

Wikipedia on The Faerie Queene, with a partial summary
Wikipedia on Edmund Spenser

Richard Danson Brown (2019) The Art of the Faerie Queene, Manchester UP. ISBN 978 0 7190 8732 5. (Note: this isn’t about visual art, but literary art and poetics.)
AC Hamilton (ed) (2007) Spenser, the Faerie Queene, 2nd edn, Routledge. ISBN 978 1 4058 3281 6. (Critical edition.)
Elizabeth Heale (1999) The Faerie Queene, A Reader’s Guide, 2nd edn, Cambridge UP. ISBN 978 0 521 65468 5.
Douglas Hill (1980) Edmund Spenser, The Illustrated Faerie Queene, Newsweek Books. No ISBN.
Richard A McCabe (ed) (2010) The Oxford Handbook of Edmund Spenser, Oxford UP. ISBN 978 0 1987 0967 1.