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Lot Essay
Henry Warren was famous for his large and detailed watercolours of elaborate and fanciful Oriental subjects inspired by David Roberts (fig 1). When he exhibited this watercolour at the New Society of Painters in Watercolours, during his tenancy as President, he described it as follows:
“They are supposed to have made their usual halt at a place called the Birket Hall el Hadj, or Lake of the Pilgrims, a few miles from Cairo, where their friends come out to meet them.
In the centre a lady in the Shibreeyeh, borne on a camel’s back, is recognised by two of her friends. Below them on the foreground, a woman in grief for the loss of her husband – intelligence of whose death has been communicated to her – is surrounded by his effects, his gun, sword, pipe-stem, articles of clothing and segadeh, or a prayer carpet, which have been given up to her. To the left a water-seller is vending cooling drinks. Above, in the road, under the garden walls of the village, travellers are conducted by their servants and friends, accompanied by musicians. On the right a wife embraces her husband, whom she finds sinking under sickness and exhaustion from the fatigues of the journey. Asses, saddled in the manner peculiar to the country, are in waiting, for those, who usually at this point of their journey, change the mode of travelling from the uneasy and fatiguing pace of the camel. Above is the principal Sheyek or leader of the caravan, surrounded by his friends and attended by soldiers. His tent is already pitched behind the date trees. The gaudily caparisoned camel, bearing the ornamented case for the sacred books, is near him.” (Henry Warren, Fourteenth Exhibition of the New Society of Painters in Watercolours, London, 1848, p. 7, no. 99)
When exhibited, The Return of the Pilgrims was received with great acclaim, being described as graceful and picturesque, with journalists noting that 'Mr. Henry Warren's predilection for Oriental presentment, knowledge of the subject, and diligence in detail, have never been more conspicuous than in his Return of the Pilgrims from Mecca'. (The Athenaeum Journal of Literature, Science, and the Fine Arts, London, 1848, p. 418).
“They are supposed to have made their usual halt at a place called the Birket Hall el Hadj, or Lake of the Pilgrims, a few miles from Cairo, where their friends come out to meet them.
In the centre a lady in the Shibreeyeh, borne on a camel’s back, is recognised by two of her friends. Below them on the foreground, a woman in grief for the loss of her husband – intelligence of whose death has been communicated to her – is surrounded by his effects, his gun, sword, pipe-stem, articles of clothing and segadeh, or a prayer carpet, which have been given up to her. To the left a water-seller is vending cooling drinks. Above, in the road, under the garden walls of the village, travellers are conducted by their servants and friends, accompanied by musicians. On the right a wife embraces her husband, whom she finds sinking under sickness and exhaustion from the fatigues of the journey. Asses, saddled in the manner peculiar to the country, are in waiting, for those, who usually at this point of their journey, change the mode of travelling from the uneasy and fatiguing pace of the camel. Above is the principal Sheyek or leader of the caravan, surrounded by his friends and attended by soldiers. His tent is already pitched behind the date trees. The gaudily caparisoned camel, bearing the ornamented case for the sacred books, is near him.” (Henry Warren, Fourteenth Exhibition of the New Society of Painters in Watercolours, London, 1848, p. 7, no. 99)
When exhibited, The Return of the Pilgrims was received with great acclaim, being described as graceful and picturesque, with journalists noting that 'Mr. Henry Warren's predilection for Oriental presentment, knowledge of the subject, and diligence in detail, have never been more conspicuous than in his Return of the Pilgrims from Mecca'. (The Athenaeum Journal of Literature, Science, and the Fine Arts, London, 1848, p. 418).