ford madox brown - eTheses Repository - University of Birmingham

throughout [Austen Henry] Layard's Nineveh and Its Remains.' 86 In the mid-1840s
Layard (1817-1894) began excavating 'large sequences of stone bas-reliefs that had
once adorned a succession of royal palaces, in the Assyrian capitals at Nimrūd and
Nineveh.' 87 Esposito identified the illustration of Sacred Emblems round the Neck of
the King (N. W. Palace, Nimroud) (Fig. 147) as the source of the necklace worn by
Eglon. He also noted that:
'the dagger heads protruding from Eglon's ample girth are likely to have
been taken from Layard's work which gives a single example of a group
of these without citing the source of the illustration [Fig. 148]. In Brown's
composition, two daggers terminate with a chevron patter, accompanied
by a third ending with the head of a horse, exactly, and in the same
configuration, as in Layard's illustration (II, opposite p. 228). The
reversal of the arrangement suggests that Brown may have made a tracing
of the group. The decorative frieze behind Eglon is composed of
honeysuckle interspersed with other motifs, again as illustrated from a
pattern by Layard from Nimrūd. The throne and footstool are composites
from various sculpted examples, though the side-table resembles an
example from the Northwest Palace at Nimrūd.' 88
Esposito identified a number of the illustrations which Brown used as sources for his
design but closer inspection of Nineveh and Its Remains reveals more examples.
86 Op. cit. at note 69, p. 280. Nineveh and its Remains, 2 vols., London, 1849. It seems to have been
the illustrations from the second volume, in particular, which Brown used, a point not noted by
Esposito.
87 Op. cit. at note 69, p. 269.
88 Ibid. Tracing illustrations in sourcebooks was a form of notation that Brown used in the 1840s (see
cat. nos. 58-60). Esposito's page numbers are incorrect. The illustration appears in Nineveh and its
Remains, vol. 2, p. 299.
170