Stone Henge

This image depicts the famous ruins of Stonehenge, but does so in a unique way. A line-engraving of J.M.W Turner’s Stone Henge, it is an image that simultaneously adheres to notions of the Romantic picturesque and undermines the expectations of the artistic technique made popular by Gilpin. Not simply a scene of the idyllic picturesque, the sublime is invoked by the fantastic landscape—the vast spaces, rolling clouds, and lightning—and is enhanced by the fearful and dire presence of the unknown.

In the immediate foreground of the picture plane is a herd of sheep. The sheep are reclining on the ground in manner that suggests that they have either been struck dead or are sleeping. Only several of the sheep are upright. To the left of the herd, guarded by a starkly pale dog standing in an aggressive pose, is a sleeping figure, presumably a shepherd. Just left of the center of the canvas stands Stonehenge. The center of the circle of stones is illuminated by what appears to be a lightning bolt; this dramatic ray is intersected on both sides by shafts of light which break through the heavy clouds rolling across the sky.

Stonehenge has existed for thousands of years; it has become a symbol of permanence and an indication of eras past that humans in the present cannot comprehend. In the Romantic era, the scholar William Stukeley conjectured that it was constructed “not long after Cambyses’ invasion of Egypt,”, which was about 525 B.C. (W. Stukeley, Stonehenge 66; P. Briant, Cyrus to Alexander 55). The image, with its vast sky and shadowed ground, suggests the expanses outside its boundaries, and the monument itself conveys its lengthy but inaccessible history.

Stone Henge combines the picturesque and the sublime, both important aspects of Romantic art. The detail in the image, the carefully arranged stones and sheep, and the various textures of the scene are all picturesque traits. The sublime aspect comes mainly from the immense age of Stonehenge: its mere presence indicates ages of time that cannot possibly be included in a single image. In an age shaped by the rationalism of the Enlightenment, a mysterious structure with no obvious function fascinated Romantic thinkers, especially as they considered the possibility of miracles: one might see an image of Stonehenge and wonder what phenomena the ancient druids could have experienced (W. Stukeley, Stonehenge 5).

Robert Wallis was a talented landscape engraver known for his reproductions of J.M.W. Turner’s illustrations (A. McConnell, “Wallis, Robert” Oxford DNB). The fascination and awe that is evoked by the remnants of Stonehenge is consistent with the general allure of ruins in the Romantic era. This particular site was shrouded in mystery, and Turner’s work, as well as Wallis’s reproduction of it, demonstrates the popular interest in this type of aesthetic. While the original purpose of Stonehenge is still unclear, the remains prompt the viewer to imagine its history, creating an eerie, sublime feeling of wonder induced by a lack of full comprehension. William Gilpin himself stated that Stonehenge “appeared astonishing beyond conception. A train of wandering ideas immediately crowded into the mind. Who brought these huge masses of rock together? Whence were they brought?” (W. Gilpin, Theories 77). Wallis’s engraving work was essential to enabling a wider audience to view Turner’s depiction and spur further fascination concerning ruinous sites.

At the same time, however, Robert Wallis’s line-engraving of J.M.W Turner’s Stone Henge can be viewed as an image that simultaneously adheres to notions of the Romantic picturesque and undermines the expectations of the artistic technique made popular by Gilpin. While many other landscape and travel painters were striving to bring foreign locales to a domestic English audience, Wallis, after Turner, seems to be doing the exact opposite; instead of familiarizing the exotic, Wallis de-familiarizes the famous ruins, adding a touch of the mystical with what appear to be bolts of lightning and herds of sheep immobilized or struck dead with fright. Here the ruins are not only presented as picturesque or sublime, but also as a reminder of Britain’s pagan past. Wallis is de-familiarizing a national space perhaps with the intention of making it exotic and sublime to pique the interest of local tourists.

Stonehenge is plate No. 27 in Picturesque Views of England and Wales.