Archaeologia http://journals.cambridge.org/ACH Additional services for Archaeologia: Email alerts: Click here Subscriptions: Click here Commercial reprints: Click here Terms of use : Click here VII.—On a Votive Painting of St. George and the Dragon, with kneeling Figures of Henry VII., his Queen and Children, formerly at Strawberry Hill, and now in the possession of Her Majesty the Queen George Scharf Archaeologia / Volume 49 / Issue 02 / January 1886, pp 243 ­ 300 DOI: 10.1017/S0261340900006287, Published online: 25 January 2012 Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0261340900006287 How to cite this article: George Scharf (1886). VII.—On a Votive Painting of St. George and the Dragon, with kneeling Figures of Henry VII., his Queen and Children, formerly at Strawberry Hill, and now in the possession of Her Majesty the Queen. Archaeologia, 49, pp 243­300 doi:10.1017/S0261340900006287 Request Permissions : Click here Downloaded from http://journals.cambridge.org/ACH, IP address: 128.250.144.144 on 20 Mar 2013 VII.—On a Votive Painting of St. George and the Dragon, with kneeling Figures of Henri/ VII., his Queen and Children, formerly at Strawberry Hill, and now in the possession of Her Majesty the Queen. By G-EOBGE SCHARF, G.B., F.S.A., Director of the National Portrait Gallery. Read November 29, 1883. THE PICTUEE. THE Picture which, by Her Majesty's gracious permission, is exhibited before the Society this evening, may be regarded as one of the accepted landmarks of historical painting in England. The grouping of the figures has been made familiar to all students of art by a well executed line engraving taken from the picture in 1762, by Ch. Grrignion, and published in the 4to. edition of "Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting issued at that date. This was copied on a somewhat smaller scale by Ph. Audinet for the Rev. James Dallaway's edition of the Anecdotes published in 1826, and employed again in the more amplified reprint annotated by Ralph Nicholson Wornum in 1849. The plate which accompanies this paper is a photographic reproduction of a choice impression of Grignion's original engraving in 1762. Whilst reserving for a later period all points of artistic detail and technicali- ties, the following brief description of the painting, dwelling only on those characteristics which arrest attention at the first glance, may be found serviceable. The picture is almost square in shape, measuring four feet eight inches by four feet six inches and a half, and painted in oil upon oak panels composed of six vertical planks. The scene is laid in an extensive and unbroken landscape, without subdivision into compartments or any architectural ornamentation. The horizon is bounded by trees and palaces, which appear dark against a calm sunset sky. Two lofty towers rise from a wooded eminence, with gabled dwellings among the trees, on the extreme right. In the central far distance appears a VOL. XLIX. 2 K „•> 244 On a Votive Painting of 8t. George and the Dragon, large temple-like building, with pinnacles and flying buttresses, surmounted by a ball, and a small steeple or belfry on it. In the front, in a flowery mead, are pitched two large hexagonal tents," one on each side of the picture, striped white and red, having large crowned roses upon them. These roses are entirely red and the crowns above them are royally arched. They are placed at the junction per pale of the red and white divisions of the tent. Near the apex of each tent is a circlet of fleurs de Us with small writing along the band. The part above the circlet is black, with gold wavy lines like roots upon it descending from a golden mound and cross held above it by a small flying angel. Out of the cross rises a rod terminated by a gilt fieur de Us and a small rose, as if of metal gilt, speared upon it. In the centre, upon the flowery mead, stands an angel with wings erect, wearing a long white alb gathered in plaits close round the neck. He holds in each hand the end of the side curtain of one of the tents which serves the pur- pose of a canopy; that to his right sheltering a kneeling monarch and his three sons, and the other to his left, a queen and her four daughters. The angel seems to draw them together. Both sovereigns are royally crowned, and both kneel at desks, on each of which is a crystal globe and cross with a book of hours laid open. Between the globe and the book on the king's desk is laid a mace-like sceptre. The books lie open on the flat desks, without any intervening cushion, and it is remarkable that the votaries themselves have no cushions to kneel upon. The rich brocade, however, which covers the desks is spread out at great length over the grass, and serves the purpose of a carpet. All the kneeling figures have their hands folded in prayer with their faces directed towards the central angel. In a distant plain, between the flowery mead and the central temple already mentioned, is represented a colossal St. George mounted on a brown charger encountering the dragon. The princess kneels within dangerous proximity of the combatants, in the central open ground, accompanied by a lamb; neither of them expressing any sign of fear. The saint in full armour gallops to the left raising his right arm across his chest to deal a final blow with his falchion from left to right at his assailant. The dragon in the picture is mounted in the air, in the act of springing at St. George, and thereby encountering him on a level with his face; a conception which I do not remember to have met with elsewhere. As in so many other representations in mediaeval art, the first weapons directed a Or rather canopies. See post, page 290. •N ^ 5s K y c H ^ with kneeling Figures of Henry VII., his Queen and Children. 245 against the dragon have failed. "We see the broken tilting-spear and its vamplate lying on the ground, whilst the upper part of the lance, and the red-cross pennon attached to it, has lodged in the neck of the infuriated monster. His wings are distended, and the lacertine character of the animal with its long wavy tail is strongly marked. The long ends of the actual pennon, or standard,a which has been "threaded" through the dragon's neck, remain hanging down outside and are twisted into a form, perhaps intentionally, resembling the letter G. The armour of St. George and his prancing steed accords more closely with the costume seen on the great seal of Henry VIII. than on that of his father Henry VII. We here observe that the helmet is decorated with long descending plumes. Three plumes also rise from the horse's head. The plaited skirt or " bases " reaching nearly to the knees, appended to the doublet and much worn by civilians, first appears on one of the great seals of Henry VIII.b In French art it is seen earlier. With respect to the furious Dragon, it is worth noting that a somewhat similar monster flying in the air occurs in the large and well-known picture of the Meeting of Francis I. and Henry VIII. on the Field of the Cloth of Gold, 1520, which is still preserved at Hampton Court Palace.0 In that painting the animal has only two legs and the wings are less wide-spread; the attitude is less defiant, and the long tail more gracefully curled. It is, most probably, a salamander, in reference to Francis I. and his favourite device; but in this representation the flames are omitted. Viewing this picture of St. George in connection with other representations of the encounter, it is remarkable that there is no indication of the parents of the princess. They generally appear as witnesses of the scene from afar; and, where space is limited, the heads alone are seen. It may be found worthy of observation, that throughout this picture all gold- smiths' work adorning the figures is represented by colour alone. This absence of gilding very mainly serves to distinguish between the German and Flemish styles of art. In the works of Holbein, gold is almost always employed upon golden a The latter, when made " to be borne," was slit at the end. See Machyns Diary, Camden Society, 1848, page xxvii. of Introductory Notes. b See Collas, Tresor de Numismatique, Sceaux d'Angleterre, Paris, 1835, PL 13, fig. 2, and Sand- ford, Genealogical History, London, 1677, page 427. Montfaucon, Monumens, Pll. cxcvi. ccxxi. and ccxxii. c No. 342 of Ernest Law's Catalogue of Pictures at Hampton Court, 1881, page 115. It i& engraved on a large scale by Basire. 2K2 246 On a Votive Painting of St. George and the Dragon, objects, but in those of Van Eyck and Memling, paint alone suffices to produce the effect. This circumstance, combined with the fluttering draperies of the angels, would go far to show that the painting of this Strawberry Hill picture is of Flemish origin, under the influence of Van Eyck. Mr. J. C. Robinson, the learned Surveyor of the Crown Pictures, has already imparted to the Society the assumed title and history of the picture on the authority of the Honourable Horace Walpole, afterwards Earl of Orford." There remains, however, to be added a brief note of later ownership from the period of Lord Orford's decease, the 2nd of March, 1797, to the 30th of July, 1883, when it was purchased at Strawberry Hill for the Royal Collection.