Tea at Trianon: Thomas Howard before Henry VII

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Thomas Howard before Henry VII

I once saw a version of this painting at the National Gallery in Washington, DC when it was on tour with an exhibit about the art of the North of England. (Click on image to make larger.) The painting is by Mather Brown (1761-1831) and although the costumes are off by some two hundred years, it is an interesting commentary on English politics immediately following the Wars of the Roses. Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey, stands before Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. Queen Elizabeth holds a white rose in her hand as she listens with a bittersweet smile to Howard as he justifies his loyalty to Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth Field. Richard, of course, was Elizabeth's uncle. In spite of Henry's concerned expression, Howard was not executed that day and went on to become the 2nd Duke of Norfolk. Share