Bardolph, from "Twelve Characters from Shakespeare"
John Hamilton Mortimer British
Subject William Shakespeare British
Not on view
Mortimer admired Salvator Rosa, absorbed aspects of his dramatic style, and sought British equivalents for his subjects. This etching comes from a series that Mortimer devoted to leading Shakespearean characters, based on drawings exhibited at the Society of Artists in 1775. Merging the seventeenth-century genres of the character head and tête d'expression (expressive head), Mortimer's designs also incorporate elements of history painting to convey the Bard's inventive range. This is one of three comic subjects in the group, representing Bardolph, a low-life companion of Prince Hal and follower of Falstaff in Henry IV, parts I and II. The "meteors" and "exhalations" mentioned in the text engraved below the image are not natural phenomena but facial marks Bardolph attributes to a fight, that the prince ascribes to drunkeness. Working in monochrome, Mortimer left such flaws to our imagination and instead emphasized the character's mishapen nose.
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