Chenguang's Blog 1: Imaging the Past: Pre-Raphaelite History Paintings and Contemporary Historical Dramas

Pre-Raphaelite artists worked in a number of different genres; however, they devoted much effort and passion toward history paintings. Such works covered a wide range of subjects derived from antiquity and the Middle Ages. The inspirations ranged from biblical stories and Arthurian legends, which fascinated Dante Gabriel Rossetti and William Holman Hunt, to the classical mythology that captured the interest of the second generation of the Pre-Raphaelite movement—William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones, and John William Waterhouse. Striving for a realistic depiction of the natural world, these artists did meticulous studies for their history paintings. Hunt journeyed to Egypt to observe the environment of the biblical stories, and Millais studied historical costumes in the British Museum for his paintings.

Despite such study and emphasis on realism, Pre-Raphaelite history paintings can hardly be considered as a faithful depiction of the past, as many of the works contain historical inaccuracies and anachronisms. For instance, although Burne-Jones’ The Doom Fulfilled (c.1884-85, Figure 1) portrays a Greek legend, the armor covering the majority of Perseus’s body resembles medieval armor rather than ancient Greek armor, which usually only had helmet, breastplate, and greaves.

Anachronistic points also exist in the medieval world depicted by Pre-Raphaelite artists. Burne-Jones accurately painted a German suit of armor circa 1480 for the knight in The Merciful Knight (1863, Figure 2); however, the narrative of this painting is about an eleventh-century Florentine knight, Sir John Gualberto, who could not have possessed fifteenth-century articulated plate armor.¹ The Pre-Raphaelite artists’ adherence to realism did not necessarily mean that they averted historical inaccuracy.

The Pre-Raphaelite artists’ interest in recreating the past is also seen in contemporary culture. For example, there are a number of very popular historical films and TV series. In recent years, such films have appeared in cinemas in every season, and almost all major TV channels have iconic historical TV dramas. However, just as people in the twenty-first century share the interest of nineteenth-century artists in the recreation of history, today’s historical films and TV series also share the historical inaccuracies and anachronisms of history paintings in the Victorian era. Printed flyers in Gladiator (2000 film), the ironclad warship in 300: Rise of an Empire (2014 film), the Battle of Bosworth Field happened in a forest in The White Queen (2013 TV Mini-Series)… the list of historically inaccurate plots and scenes in films and TV series is seemingly endless.

There are multiple causes of historical inaccuracy in Pre-Raphaelite paintings. One can begin by blaming the problematic ideas and preconceptions of the artists themselves. Based on his understanding of the Orient as a land without change, Hunt believed that what he saw in the Middle East was exactly what the people in biblical stories experienced, and thus he recreated the past in a present setting. These artists probably also faced the problem of limited access to accurate sources. Had Burne-Jones had the opportunity to study an 11th-century Italian armor, he may not have depicted a 15th-century German armor in his The Merciful Knight. More importantly, it is likely that these artists only wanted to use the historical subjects to evoke a mood or to emphasize certain values, such as the piety and chivalry in the story of Knights of the Round Table or the gender roles in Greek legends in which the heroic male rescues and protects the vulnerable female. In the case of The Doom Fulfilled, the large collection of Greek pottery in the British Museum provided Burne-Jones adequate sources for studying the ancient Greek armor, but Burne-Jones did not believe that only a completely faithful depiction to the past could convey his ideas. He felt that people could understand the role of Perseus as a protector of the female no matter what kind of armor he wore.

Similar to such ideas in the 19th-century, it is unlikely that a contemporary director wants his or her films or TV series to be a perfectly accurate recreation of the past. After all, the primary concern of entertainment media is gaining profit by providing amusement. Although the making of many historical dramas involved consulting historians, these films and TV series have the liberty to change or eliminate some historical stories and add fabricated plots to increase the attractiveness of the films. In some stories, the writer or director seeks for a connection between the past and present—probably trying to make the story more attractive and understandable to contemporary audience or using a story in the past as the critique to contemporary phenomena and ideas. In an article in History Today, Suzannah Lipscomb points out that Henry VIII, his six queens and his courtiers in The Tudors (TV Series 2007–2010), “were really secularists with modern ideas about sexuality.”² She argues that this question—“whether such tellings can be authentic to the conceptual realities of the time they seek to depict”—is what we need to cared about more, compared with the anachronistic objects or stories.

In both the nineteenth century and the contemporary era, people have attempted to recreate the past; however, their efforts are rarely based completely on historical reality. Their recreational works about history are grounded on their own objectives of such recreation, as well as their own understanding and interpretation of the past. For the legend of Perseus and Andromeda, the historical evidence about ancient Greek costume or even the conventional story itself are less important. Perseus can wear the medieval armor in The Doom Fulfilled or develop a romantic relationship with his father Zeus’ lover Io in Clash of the Titans (2010), as long as the creators of these works were satisfied.

1 Stephen Fliegal, "Gothic Art for the Industrial Age: The Middle Ages Revisited in the Art of the Pre-Raphaelites," Aldus Past Programs, accessed Oct. 26, 2014, http://www.aldussociety.com/fliegal_speech.htm.

2 Suzannah Lipscomb, "Does Fantasy Fiction Beat Period Drama?" History Today 64, issue 4 (2014): 31. Online Version: http://www.historytoday.com/suzannah-lipscomb/game-thrones-does-fantasy-fiction-beat-period-drama.

Figure.1. Edward Burne-Jones, The Perseus Series: The Doom Fulfilled, c.1884-5. Bodycolor. 153.8 × 138.4 cm (60½ × 54½). Southampton City Art Gallery.¹ Picture derived from: http://uploads3.wikiart.org/images/edward-burne-jones/the-doom-fulfilled-1885.jpg.

1 David Peters Corbett, Edward Burne-Jones (London: Tate Publishing, 2004), 53.

Figure 2. Edward Burne-Jones. The Merciful Knight, 1863. Watercolor. 101.4 × 58.6 cm. Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery.¹ Picture derived from: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/be/Edward_Burne-Jones_-_The_Merciful_Knight.jpg.

1 “Watercolor—The Merciful Knight,” Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery, accessed Oct. 26, 2014, http://www.bmagic.org.uk/objects/1973P84.