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Classical subjects are unusual in Woolner’s ouevre. This work, obviously influenced by classical Greek sculpture, was originally conceived in marble as the front panel for a triptych that depicted scenes from The Iliad that decorated the plinth supporting the bust of William Ewert Gladstone and was intended as a reference to his noted Homeric scholarship. Gladstone, a Greek scholar who had read classics at Oxford, published his Studies on Homer and the Homeric Age This work, obviously influenced by classical Greek sculpture, was originally conceived in marble as the front panel for a triptych that depicted scenes from The Iliad. in 1858. The Gladstone bust was commissioned in 1863 and Woolner completed the model in clay on August 31st of that year. The marble bust was carved some time afterward. The bust on a plinth decorated with the Iliad reliefs, which a group of subscribers presented to Oxford University in 1866, was originally placed in the Bodleian Library; it is now in the Ashmolean Museum.

The plaster version of the Iliad triptych.

Achilles Shouting from the Trenches, which formed the front panel of the triptych, was the most successful of the three. It features a muscular naked Achilles shouting with his right arm raised with Pallas Athena behind him holding a spear in her left hand and a shield in her right. The marble reliefs were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1868 (no. 1027) and received favourable comments on the triptych from his former P.R.B. brothers William Michael Rossetti and Frederic George Stephens. Rossetti commented: “Reliefs from the Iliad…Here are three subjects executed on a small scale, with a singular amount of original force…Pallas and Achilles at the Trenches, where the hero shouts to the Greeks a superhuman cry, while Pallas overshadows him with her aegis, is a most vigourous and admirable composition; indeed, but for its small size, one would be minded to call it the finest thing Mr. Woolner has yet exhibited” (27). Stephens writing in The Athenaeum stated: “The pedestal of his bust of Mr. Gladstone, for the Bodleian Gallery, Oxford, will be enriched by three Homeric bas-reliefs, of which casts appear here (1027). The composition and learned execution of these works deserve the applause of all students. The vigour of the invention which is displayed in Pallas and Achilles at the Trenches before Troy, where the naked son of Thetis shouted, and awed the Trojans from their victory, needs no comment from us, further than in indicating that these are among the few noble examples of sculpture in this gathering” (769).

Left: The marble version of Achilles Shouting from the Trenches.Courtesy of the Royal Academy. Right: A cast of the bronze version in a wooden frame. Private collection. [Click on images to enlarge them.]

Woolner carved a marble version of Achilles Shouting from the Trenches which he exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1876 (no. 1417) and was subsequently deposited by him there as his Diploma Work. Woolner later carved a second marble version for his patron Charles Jenner, now at Christchurch Mansion, Ipswich. Bronze casts of this relief appear occasionally on the market and examples have sold at Christie’s, London, on February 19, 2003, lot 142 and November 23, 2005, lot 168 and at Sotheby’s, London, on April 27, 2001, lot 163. A group in plaster of the triptych series The Iliad sold at Sotheby’s, London on December 12, 2003, lot 231. — Dennis T. Lanigan

Bibliography

Rossetti, William Michael. Notes on the Royal Academy Exhibition1868. London: John Camden Hotten, Part I, 1868.

Stephens, Frederic George. “Fine Arts. Royal Academy.” The Athenaeum. No. 2118 (May 30, 1868): 768-69.

Woolner, Amy. Thomas Woolner, R. A.: Sculptor and Poet. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1917, facing p. 157.

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Last modified 2 May 2021