Charles I Insulted by Cromwell's Soldiers

Paul Delaroche's Charles I Insulted by Cromwell's Soldiers of 1836 depicts the English king under Parliamentary arrest being mocked by soldiers in a scene of deliberate humiliation calculated to break his royal dignity. The subject carried obvious resonance for French royalists under the Orléanist constitutional monarchy, and Delaroche's treatment of royal suffering at the hands of republican forces reflected the conservative Catholic sensibility that underlay his historical sentimentalism. The painting extends his treatment of English seventeenth-century history that included the Execution of Lady Jane Grey and the Children of Edward.

Delaroche contrasts the king's dignified composure with the soldiers' crude mockery, using his characteristic precise technique to render period costume and interiors. The dramatic sidelighting heightens the pathos of the royal prisoner's humiliation.