The largest and most important of the artist's four exhibits at the Old Water-Colour Society in 1864, The Merciful Knight seemed to Georgiana Burne-Jones "to sum up and seal the ten years that had passed since Edward first went to Oxford." 1 Its dense, crusty technique and essentially two- dimensional compositional structure carry echoes of Rossettis chivalric watercolours, and there is an additional debt to Rossettis Arthurian image of Sir Galahad, in both the illus- tration to Edward Moxon's 1857 edition of Tennyson's Poems and its subsequent reworking as a watercolour, Sir Galahad at the Ruined Chapel (1859; Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery). 2 To these Pre-Raphaelite credentials, however, are added a sub- tlety of colour and confident handling of chiaroscuro which were products of Burne-Jones's increasing knowledge and absorption of Italian Renaissance art. The subject, too, is of Italian origin. The work was first exhibited under the quotation which appears on the frame (whose outer element appears to be of later date). This text comes from The Broadstone of Honour, a collection of stories on the theme of Christian chivalry first published in 1822, and likened by its author, the antiquarian Kenelm Digby, to "the symbolical wanderings of the ancient knights." Not surpris- ingly, it was one of Burne-Jones's favourite books, which he kept by his bedside throughout his life. 3 In the particular tale of the eleventh-century Florentine knight St. John Gualbert, a wooden figure of Christ in a wayside shrine miraculously embraces the knight, in recognition of a deed of mercy per- formed on Good Friday Despite its obvious symbolism, such an obscure story was bound to be lost on a contemporary audience; even Frederic Stephens, a staunch supporter of the Pre-Raphaelite cause, considered it a "strange half-mystical picture." 4 The overt historicism of this and The Annunciation ( u The Flower of God") (cat. no. 27) guaranteed hostile criticism in the art press, the reactionary Art Journal deriding the figure of the knight, "[who] seems to shake in his clattering armour," and judging that "such ultra manifestations of medievalism, however well meant, must tend inevitably, though of course unconsciously, to bring ridicule upon truths which we all desire to hold in veneration."^ That work of this kind was not welcome on the Old Water-Colour Society's walls, alongside traditional land- scape and genre pictures, is confirmed by the artist's recollec- tion that his fellow members "were furious with me for sending it, and let me see that they were. They would be talk- ing together when I turned up and let drop remarks about it of a hostile nature for me to overhear." 6 Three preparatory studies in pencil (all in the Tate Gallery, London) show the development of the composition, in which a central altar is eliminated in favour of the obliquely illuminat- ed platform and the knight given a suit of armour similar to the one worn by the king in the Adoration triptych (cat. no. 10). 7 Edward Burne- Jones. Study for The Merciful Knight, ca. 1863. Pencil, 10 x 6 in. (25.4 x 15.2 cm). Tate Gallery, London In the middle ground, the artist relieves the stark tension of the miraculous event by introducing a rose trellis, akin to the motif previously used in The Backgammon Players (cat. no. 17). The marigolds in the foreground came from the "town-gar- den" in Russell Square, close to the Burne-Joneses' house opposite the British Museum. 8 1. Memorials, vol. 1, p. 262. 2. Art Services International 1995-96, no. 50. 3. "But there was a kind of book that he reserved for himself and never liked any one to read to him — The Broad Stone of Honour and Mores Catholici are instances: they were kept in his own room, close to his hand, and often dipped into in wakeful nights or early mornings. 'Sillyish books both/ he once said, 'but I cant help it, I like them" {Memorials, vol. 2, p. 56). 4. Athenaeum, June 1864, p. 618. 5. Art Journal, June 1864, p. 170. 6. Lago 19 81, p. 107. 7. Tate Gallery 1993, nos. 22-24; two are reproduced in Art Services International 1995-96, figs. 69, 70. The Tate Gallery also has nude stud- ies for the figure of the knight. 8. Memorials, vol. 1, pp. 261-62.
Signed and dated on ribbon bottom right EDWARD BURNE JONES 1863 Fitwilliam work list "1863 i painted the Merciful Knight - this Mr Leathart has." Lettered on inner part of frame "Of a Knight who forgave his enemy when he might have destroyed him and how the image of Christ kissed him in token that his acts had pleased God" A study for the landscape background is in a private collection Cumbria. The model for the knight was Ciamelli and organ grinder who also appears The Nativity Triptych, King Rene's Honeymoon and Sir Tristram.
Other examples include The merciful knight, which has lost its original outer frame but retains its inscribed giltwood mount set with sunflower roundels, and the triptych of The Nativity in Oxford, set in simple flat ‘early Netherlandish’ frames, hinged together and decorated minimally with engraved lines, like Merlin & Nimuë [12]. The Frame Blog
This is arguably Burne-Jones's most important early work. In the memorial biography of her husband, Georgiana Burne-Jones stated that it seemed: 'to sum up and seal the ten years that had passed since Edward first went to Oxford'. In terms of design, technique and expression, the picture demonstrates that Burne-Jones had reached a new and more personal style. It remained Burne-Jones's own favourite among his early works and in 1894 he tried to borrow it to make a large oil version.The subject is taken from the life of the Florentine knight St John Gualberto, founder of the Valombrosan Order in 1039, who was miraculously embraced by a wooden figure of Christ while praying at a wayside shrine after forgiving the murder of his kinsman. This obscure legend was unlikely to be familiar to a wide audience and this further enhanced its mystical and intensely poetic quality. Incidentally, the marigolds in the foreground came from the 'town garden' in Russell Square, close to Burne-Jones's house opposite the British Museum.