Queens in the Barge, 1857

Queens in the Barge 1857, ink and pencil, by Arthur Hughes (1832-1915).

This is Arthur Hughes’ preparatory drawing for his mural in the Oxford Union. The centre and right sketches depict five young female figures, four of whom are crowned. The two to the left of the group have been cut from a separate sheet of paper. They are gathered about the body of Arthur, whose head and body have been removed from the sketch. The aperture of the Union window is lightly sketched above the lower right figure who kneels with her face hidden in her hands. The top left sketch is a study of drapery; a female torso with arms raised as if in prayer, clothed in flowing robes.

The finished mural in the Oxford Union depicts the Death of Arthur showing him borne away across the moonlit lake. Arthur Hughes described it thus; 'The Passing of Arthur; the mystic sword being returned to the lake, much as Tennyson gives it, with the King being laid in the barge tended by queens, and Bedevere at edge in the foreground, he having just cast the sword to be caught in a hand thrust up from lake in mid-distance.' (letter to Gleeson White quoted in Roberts; Catalogue Raisonné p143)