ford madox brown - eTheses Repository - University of Birmingham

In an historical composition, correctness in the auxiliaries is scarcely less
important than in the more prominent parts, for the introduction of a
wardrobe or a chair of the time of Queen Anne in the representation of an
apartment of the reign of Henry the Sixth, is as glaring an error as to
depict soldiers in a painting of the Battle of Cressy in the uniform and
with the weapons of the dragoon guards of the present day. Extreme
accuracy, even in the minutest detail, can alone produce that illusion
which is requisite for the perfect success of a work of art; everything must
be consistent to be complete, and an anachronism in an historical picture
is as offensive to the eye of taste as is an imperfect metaphor or a
defective verse to the ear. 99
History Books and Reading Rooms
A number of the history books on which Brown relied can be traced as he used
quotations from them to accompany his paintings when they were exhibited. For The
Body of Harold brought before William the Conqueror he found the inspiration and
facts for the picture in David Hume’s History of England from the Invasion of Julius
Caesar to the Revolution in 1688 (first published 1762) and The History of the
Conquest of England by the Normans (1825) by Augustin Thierry. 100
His diary is another source; in his first entry he described in detail how he chose the
subject for The Seeds and Fruits of English Poetry, the books he consulted and which
99 Henry Shaw, Specimens of Ancient Furniture, drawn from existing Authorities with Descriptions by
Sir Samuel Rush Meyrick, London, 1836, p. 2.
100 Whilst still living in France Brown was inspired by a French translation of John Lingard’s A History
of England (pub. 1819) to paint The Execution of Mary Queen of Scots. In 1842 it was accepted at the
Salon and he included a quotation from the book in his catalogue entry.
108