Deeds Not Words: Slashing the Rokeby Venus

Today, the celebrated nude by the Spanish painter Diego Velásquez, known as the Rokeby Venus, is one of the most popular paintings on display at the National Gallery. But the acquisition of the Venus was no easy task. Since 1809 its home and namesake had been Rokeby Park, a large Palladian house belonging to John Morritt, a good friend of the novelist Sir Walter Scott. Morritt would gleefully write to Scott of his efforts to rearrange his paintings to make room for ‘my fine picture of Venus’s backside’, finally deciding upon a position above the mantelpiece, where it raised the image ‘to a considerable height the ladies may avert their downcast eyes without difficulty and connoisseurs steal a glance without drawing said posterior into the company’.