Fair Rosamund

Fair Rosamund, painted in 1916 and one of Waterhouse's final major canvases, takes as its subject Rosamund Clifford, the mistress of King Henry II of England. Rosamund — whose name means 'rose of the world' — was said to have been hidden by Henry in a labyrinthine bower at Woodstock to protect her from Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine's jealousy. She became a subject of medieval ballad, sixteenth-century drama, and Victorian poetry, standing as an image of beautiful, imperilled femininity. Thomas Deloney's ballad and later Victorian treatments of her story gave her a romantic legend in which beauty, love, and political danger were intertwined. Waterhouse's choice of the rose-bower subject in 1916 connects Rosamund's story to the rose-garden imagery he had explored throughout his career.

By 1916 Waterhouse's technique was at its most freely handled, and a late rose-bower composition demonstrates this mature fluency particularly clearly. The roses are painted with rapid, assured strokes, the figure integrated into the floral abundance with minimal rigid delineation. The palette emphasises the warm reds and pinks of the roses against the figure's cooler dress tones.