This is something I wrote for my FB page a few years ago. I remembered it as I’ve been drafting a blog post that references the “Scapegoat” painting mentioned, so I’m posting it here as well, edited and updated, so I can link to it from my blog.
Often when I browse through the British Mandate archives, I come across documents which, although totally unrelated to my subject matter, fascinate me, educate me, and often amuse me. Here’s a case from a file about the PWD (Public Works Department) and the construction of roads in Jerusalem, such as Hebron road—which is what I was looking into. Three short letters tell a story that has elements of art history (William Holman Hunt), social history/ethnography (Palestinians picnicking on the feast of a saint) and quintessential British… sarcasm!
The English painter William Holman Hunt (1827-1910) was “one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. His paintings were notable for their great attention to detail, vivid colour, and elaborate symbolism.”1 In the mid-1850s, he visited Palestine and it seems that he painted some of his important works, like the “Scapegoat”, in a spot opposite Mar (Saint) Elias monastery, on the side of the Jerusalem-Bethlehem Road.
He later had a house built in Jerusalem, at 64 Street of the Prophets where he lived intermittently for several years, according to his wife until 1902.
After his death, his wife went to Jerusalem in 1922 and had a stone bench made for that spot as a memorial to her husband. It is covered in inscriptions in English, Greek, Arabic, and Hebrew.
In English, it reads: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul. And thy neighbor as thyself. This seat is placed here in memory of William Holman-Hunt, painter in Jerusalem 1854-1902, by his wife Edith, with the permission of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate, Jerusalem." From what I can tell, the Greek is the same. Apparently the Arabic and Hebrew are biblical verses.
Mar Elias, a Greek Orthodox monastery situated south of Jerusalem on a hill overlooking Bethlehem, by Hebron Road (see how I got here?), dates back to the sixth century, and has been destroyed and rebuilt many times. On 2 August, the feast of the saint, celebrations are held on the grounds, with the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem making an appearance on his way to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. And so it must have been in 1944.
On 22 August 1944, an irate and, dare I say, snooty Englishman wrote a letter to the Palestine Post under the pseudonym Oxonian (hence my calling him snooty). He had stopped by the memorial on one of his walks and found it in a state that filled him with “indignation and disgust”. The bench, or seat as he calls it, was covered with dirt, its back splashed with asphalt, and debris in various forms was all around. Mr Oxonian put the blame squarely on the PWD and their nearby works, basing his accusations on the testimony of a watchman who saw PWD workmen using the bench. He demanded that immediate steps be taken to restore the memorial and that the “barbarous malefactors” of the PWD be punished.
The letter was published in the Palestine Post on 25 Aug 1944. It was read, it seems, by the Acting Director of the PWD who that same afternoon went to investigate in situ. The following day he wrote to the District Engineer of Jerusalem asking that the latter’s department clean the asphalt on the back as well as the “mellon seeds and the like” from the seat of the bench. He noted the poor structural condition of the bench which would be unlikely to hold up to time, and closed with: “Scribblers have been writing on the seat in English but not P.W.D. barbarians I imagine.”
The Jerusalem District Engineer replied on 30 August:
— begin
1. The parties responsible for the “desecration to the memory of the great artist and saintly Christian” were actually miscellaneous picnickers who assemble annually early in August under, around and even up the olive trees to celebrate the feast of Mar Elias, and the splashes of asphalt on the back of the seat arrived there via the feet of youngsters who had previously carefully trampled in asphalt that had leaked out on the ground some distance away. The crowd also contributed the melon seeds and usual picnickers rubbish.
2. The barbarous malefactors are not in the employ of the P.W.D.
3. The P.W.D. watchman stated to “Oxonian” that P.W.D. men were working near by, but did not state that these men had been using the seat for their convenience etc.
4. I should like to meet “Oxonian”.
— end
The recipient wrote next to point 4: “So should I”.
There is also a handwritten note at the bottom about Oxonian which, as far as I can make out, reads: “If you did not see ‘OXONIAN’S’ effusion at fol. 132 you will be interested. He’s annoyed …” It’s signed SYDNEYENSIS which at least in one sense refers to a type of predatory and venomous snail! Or perhaps the name was Sydney… If anyone can make better sense of the handwriting, please drop a comment.
In any case, I found this exchange amongts sarcastic Britons quite entertaining.
~o~
The story concludes a few decades later. In a 2023 article2 titled “The History and Mystery of William Holman Hunt’s House in Jerusalem”, the authors report that in November 2019 Hunt’s bench disappeared “without the city administrators knowing what happened to it.” ✼
Wikipedia
The Journal of Pre-Raphaeliste Studies, Vol. 32 (Spring 2023)