Re: MR: Was Richard maligned?

[edh@ascc01.ascc.lucent.com (Alfredo el Bufon)]

Poster: edh@ascc01.ascc.lucent.com (Alfredo el Bufon)

> > Given the fact that portraits take a fair amount of time (as compared to
> > say, a photograph) and that they had to be comissioned and sat for, don't
> > you think it might be possible that Richard _chose_ not to have his
> > (alleged ;) deformities uncorrected by the artists brush?
>
> Entirely possible, perhaps, but by all accounts Richard was a very bonny
> fighter, and one does not successfully fight in a late fifteenth-century
> European style with a spinal deformity and a bad arm.  It is interesting
> to note that some portraits of Richard which survive have been
> over-painted (at some later date) to show a hunchback and other
> deformities.

This over-painting might be
1) The artist correcting the portrait after the subject was no
   longer around to compel a false image, or
2) A part of a Tudor propaganda campaign, or
3) Simply giving the public what they beleived to be true.

I am reminded of a posting from a birding mailing-list, from a birder
who lives near the famous Mision de San Juan Capistrano:

} [...] gift items like swallow statues a number of years ago
} were not selling because of the shape of the bird.... easterners
} balked at buying swallow memorabilia  and postcards that did not
} show a forked tailed bird.  Although barn swallows are in our area,
} it is the cliff swallow that the legend is based on.  That didn't stop
} the chamber of commerce and local stores.... the swallow they
} now depict on their signs is the Barn Swallow... and the swallow
} souvenirs show forked tails.


-- Alfredo
 
Alfredo el Bufon
Elvegast, Windmaster's Hill, Atlantia
edh@ascc01.ascc.lucent.com
______________________________________

Carpe dulcem diem -- Seize a nice day.

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