The Knight of the Sun, by Arthur Hughes (1832-1915). c.1859-60. Oil on canvas. 40 1/4 x 52 1/4 inches (101.5 x 132.5 cm). Courtesy of the Andrew Lloyd Webber Collection.
Hughes exhibited the principal version of this work at the Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science at Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 1863. Although the painting has no literary source, this quotation from his friend George MacDonald's poem "Better Things," first published in 1857, is inscribed on the frame:
Better a death when work is done
Than earth's most favoured birth.
When it was exhibited at the Whitechapel Art Gallery in 1905, no. 442, it was described in the catalogue, possibly in Hughes's own words, as "an aged warrior mortally wounded, being carried by his men-at-arms to the shelter of a religious house (qtd. in Roberts 145-46). The principal version was initially owned by Hughes's principal patron Thomas Edward Plint and is now in the Andrew Lloyd-Webber Collection. In 1893 Alice Boyd, the mistress of William Bell Scott, asked Hughes to paint a smaller version for her but it appears likely he worked up the initial oil sketch he had retained for her instead. It is now in a private collection in London. A watercolour replica Hughes painted for the collector B. G. Windus is now in the Ashmolean Museum (accession no. WA1949.189).
The Knight of the Sun, c.1860, retouched in 1893. Oil on panel. 11 x 15½ inches (27.9 x 39.4cm). Private collection.
This is one of the finest of the "Arthurian" subjects that Hughes painted during his career. His interest in such subjects began in 1857 when he was involved in the "Jovial Campaign" with D.G. Rossetti, Edward Burne-Jones, William Morris and others in the decoration of the Oxford Union Debating Hall with subjects from Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur. Hughes had chosen the subject of The Death of Arthur for his mural.
Allen Staley feels the effect of the sunset in this picture, which was reflected in the river, was clearly inspired by Henry Wallis's The Stonebreaker that had been shown at the Royal Academy in 1858, but that behind both paintings lay J. E. Millais's Autumn Leaves and Sir Isumbras at the Ford (A Dream of the Past), exhibited in 1856 and 1857 respectively (Staley, 87). Trueherz felt the iconography of the scene was borrowed from paintings of the Entombment of Christ (166).
Contemporary Reviews of the Painting
Because this painting was not exhibited at the Royal Academy it was not as widely discussed as many of his paintings. It appears from a discussion by F.G. Stephens in his "Fine Art Gossip" column in The Athenaeum in 1860, that Hughes at first intended sending it in, but ultimately chose to sell it directly to Plint without exhibiting it: "Mr. Arthur Hughes proposes to send to the Royal Academy a picture, representing a knight, wounded to death, borne home by squires, followed by attendants bearing his arms. The time is sunset; and the warrior seems taking a farewell of life and day at once" (448).
In The Seaboard Parish, a novel by George MacDonald published in 1868, MacDonald describes a painting, supposedly by the fictional artist Percivale, but which is in fact, as MacDonald acknowledges in a footnote, by his friend Arthur Hughes. MacDonald has described from memory The Knight of the Sun, an oil painting completed by Hughes in 1860:
A dark hill rose against the evening sky which shone through a few thin pines on its top. Along a road on the hill-side, four squires bore a dying knight—a man past the middle age. One behind him carried his helm, and another led his horse, whose fine head only appeared in the picture. The head and countenance of the knight were very noble, telling of many a battle, and ever for the right. The last had doubtless been gained, for one might read victory as well as peace in the dying look. The party had just reached the edge of a steep descent, from which you saw the valley below, with the last of the harvest just being reaped, while the shocks stood all about in the fields, under the place of the sunset. The sun had been down for some little time. There was no gold left in the sky, only a little saffron; but plenty of that lovely liquid green of the autumn sky, divided with a few streaks of pale rose. The depth of the sky overhead, which you could not see for the arrangement of the picture, was mirrored lovelily in a piece of water that lay in the centre of the valley... it is evening. The sun's work is done, and he has set in glory, leaving his good name behind him in a lovely harmony of colour. The old knight's work is done too; his day has set in the storm of battle, and he is lying lapt in the coming peace. They are bearing him home to his couch and his grave. Look at their faces in the dusky light. They are all mourning for and honouring the life that is ebbing away. But he is gathered to his fathers like a shock of corn fully ripe; and so the harvest stands golden in the valley beneath. The picture would not be complete, however, if it did not tell us of the deep heaven overhead, the symbol of that heaven whither he who has done his work is bound: what a lovely idea to represent it by means of the water, the heaven embodying itself in the earth, as it were, that we may see it! And observe how that dusky hill-side, and those tall, slender, mournful-looking pines, with that sorrowful sky between, lead the eye and point the heart upward towards that heaven. It is indeed a grand picture—full of feeling—a picture and a parable. [252-53]
Stephens, in his series of articles in The Athenaeum, "The Private Collections of England," discussed Hughes's painting in 1873 when it was in the collection of Jacob Burnett:
In dealing with it Mr. Hughes has unwisely relied too much on the attitudinizing and face-making of his bearded model. The picture is styled The Knight of the Sun, and illustrates a legend, an incident of which declared how an old knight, whose badge was a sun, and who had led a Christian life throughout his career, was borne out of his castle to see, for the last time, the setting of the luminary he loved. His esquires have carried him to the side of a ravine, looking over a little river, which reflects the fading glories of the day, the gloom gathering in the forest, the darkening foliage, and the stems that rise, rank over rank, above its placid breast. The time is late in harvest; sheaves stand ready for the garner, the trees are not without a tinge of autumn red. Here is the real sentiment of the picture, and that is a grand landscape which expresses so much. Our deliberate conviction is, that if Mr. Hughes had been content with the nobly pathetic expression of the landscape which he painted with a perfect sense of its beauty and poetry, the picture would, as a landscape, have worthily stood side by side with Mr. Millais's Autumn Leaves, figures and all. We cannot imagine a much higher position. Although painted after the chef-d'oeuvre of the Royal Academician, Mr. Hughes's picture is independent in sentiment, and, if not so fine in colour, it is more carefully studied and more solid. But the man in bronze-coloured armour and a crimson robe spoils the whole, for there is little spontaneity in his expression of face, or in the hands he feigns to press together in earnest prayer: there is hypocrisy in the lips, shamming in the shallow eyes. We are sure Mr. Hughes intended no such anti-climax as this; indeed, it may not be perceived by other eyes than ours, but we suspect that he has been led away unconsciously, for no one is happier in expression than Mr. Hughes, by the acting of his model. The esquires bear the chief performer all in a heap, very uncomfortably, and we do not feel sure they could support him in such a posture; a page attends, with the sun-emblazoned shield. Throughout, there seems a want of harmony between the figures and the landscape. The execution, however, lack nothing of homogeneity; the colour is rich and true, the tone is powerful, wealthy, and faithful: this is really one of the most powerful qualities of the work. The sentiment of the landscape overpowers the rest, and makes it look hollow [374].
Bibliography
Gibson, Robin. "Arthur Hughes. Arthurian and Related Subjects of the Early 1860's." The Burlington Magazine CXII (July 1970): 451-56.
MacDonald, George. The Seaboard Parish. Vol. II of 3 volumes. London: Tinsley Brothers, 1868. See Chapter XII, "The Studio."
Parris, Leslie. The Pre-Raphaelites. London: Tate Gallery Publications/Penguin Books, 1984, cat. 110. 187.
Roberts, Len. Arthur Hughes His Life and Works. Woodbridge, Suffolk: Antique Collectors' Club, 1997, cat. 43, 145-46 and cat. 43.6. 146-47.
Staley, Allen. The Pre-Raphaelite Landscape. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973.
Stephens, Frederic George: "Fine Art Gossip." The Athenaeum No. 1692 (31 March 1860).
_____. "The Private Collections of England. No. III – Gosforth House – Tynemouth." The Athenaeum No. 2395 (20 September 1873): 372-75.
Treuherz, Julian. The Pre-Raphaelites. Stockholm: Nationalmuseum, 2009, cat. 33.
Triggs, Kathy. The Knight of the Sun – A Note. North Wind X (1991): 19-21.
Created 14 September 2004
Commentary added 7 March 2025