Edith Recovering Harold's Body after the Battle of Hastings

Edith Recovering Harold's Body after the Battle of Hastings
ArtistHorace Vernet
Year1827
TypeOil on canvas, history painting
Dimensions370 cm × 430 cm (150 in × 170 in)
LocationMusée Thomas-Henry, Cherbourg

Edith Recovering Harold's Body after the Battle of Hastings is an 1827 history painting by the French artist Horace Vernet.[1] It depicts the aftermath of the Battle of Hastings in 1066 during the Norman Conquest of England. The English monarch Harold Godwinson was defeated and killed in the fighting. It shows a famous scene as Edith the Fair, accompanied by some monks, scoured the battlefield for the fallen Harold. He is discovered in a broken palisade, a sheet hiding the face which has been disfigured by an arrow.[2]

British historical themes were very fashionable in France during the Restoration era, particularly those of Walter Scott. Vernet produced several paintings including this one.[3]

It was one of several historical paintings Vernet exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1827.[4] In 1828 it was exhibited in London at William Armfield Hobday's gallery in Pall Mall.[5] Today it is in the collection of Musée Thomas-Henry in Cherbourg.[6]

References

  1. ^ Ruutz-Rees p.12-13
  2. ^ Harkett & Hornstein p.162-64
  3. ^ Fahy p.326-27
  4. ^ Harkett & Hornstein p.162
  5. ^ The London Magazine. Baldwin, Cradock, and Joy, 1828. p.229-30
  6. ^ https://www.culture.gouv.fr/regions/drac-normandie/Actualites/Restauration-d-un-tableau-d-Horace-Vernet-Edith-retrouvant-le-corps-d-Harold-apres-la-bataille-d-Hastings

Bibliography

  • Fahy, Everett (ed.) The Wrightsman Pictures. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2005.
  • Harkett, Daniel & Hornstein, Katie (ed.) Horace Vernet and the Thresholds of Nineteenth-Century Visual Culture. Dartmouth College Press, 2017.
  • Ruutz-Rees, Janet Emily. Horace Vernet. Scribner and Welford, 1880.
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