ford madox brown - eTheses Repository - University of Birmingham

copied the portrait, keeping his pose to the same side of the body and including the
same details, such as the style of his beard and robes. In 1851, to make the face more
naturalistic, Brown blended the features of his friend, the artist and poet, Dante
Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882) with the portrait. 110
When Brown depicted Chaucer in Wycliffe he used a full length version of the portrait
as the basis for his design but was bolder, turning the figure round to suit his
composition. He may well have used the portrait of him in Shaw’s Dresses and
Decorations of the Middle Ages which includes the accessories found in almost all
portraits of Chaucer, a rosary and a horn writing implement. In addition, like
Marshall's statue, Brown's Chaucer has a book tucked under his arm. Rabin believes
that rather than using Rossetti's face, for this earlier depiction of Chaucer Brown used
a professional model and his own face, when the model was not available, thus
creating a more natural portrait. 111 Following the publication of Brown's diaries it is
now possible to support at least part of her argument with an entry written on 21
January 1848 in which he records that he 'drew in the head of Chaucer from myself in
two looking glasses.’ 112
Books were not his only source of portraiture; from his study of Milton for The Seeds
and Fruits of English Poetry at BMAG we know that he also used tomb effigies for
historical accuracy (cat. no. 43). This drawing was taken from Milton's tomb in
110 Mary Bennett, entry on the replica of Chaucer at the Court of Edward III (1851 - 1868, oil on
canvas, Tate, London), The Pre-Raphaelites, exh. cat., Tate, London, 1984, p. 54.
111 Op. cit. at note 51, p. 108.
112 Op. cit. at note 66, p. 26. Rabin does not give evidence herself although it is possible that she was
able to see the relevant sections of the diary before their owner Mr John Bryson bequeathed them to the
Ashmolean in 1977. Surtees did not publish the entire diary until 1981, although in 1977 Deborah
Cherry transcribed a later section of the diary held at the Pierpont Morgan Library (An annotated
Edition of the Diary and selected Letters of Ford Madox Brown 1850-1870, unpublished PhD, London
University, 1977).
113