Ink and watercolour on paper. verso: graphite on paper
Tate Britain
Tate Collection
Works with images
Works on display
General Collection
Art Fund
Illustrations to Dante’s ‘Divine Comedy’
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/william-blake-39" aria-label="More by William Blake" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">William Blake</a>
Serpent Attacking Buoso Donati A Man with a Transparent Hood  over his Head
Purchased with the assistance of a special grant from the National Gallery and donations from the Art Fund, Lord Duveen and others, and presented through the Art Fund 1919
actions: expressive
actions: postures and motions
actions: processes and functions
adults
animals: actions
animals: fantastic
animals: reptiles
attacking
characters
crime and punishment
Dante
Dante, ‘Divine Comedy: Inferno’
emotions and human qualities
emotions, concepts and ideas
fire
group
groups
hand / hands raised
Hell
Hell
horror
Judaeo-Christian imagery
landscape
literature (not Shakespeare)
literature and fiction
looking / watching
male
man
mythical, religious, fictional
natural phenomena
nudes
people
places
recoiling
religion and belief
rocky
serpent
smoke
snake
standing
thief
transformation
universal concepts
Virgil
work and occupations
<p>Blake was inspired by the poet Dante, learning Italian to read his work. He made 102 watercolours illustrating Dante’s poem <span>The Divine Comedy</span>. The poem imagines the author’s spiritual journey through hell, purgatory and finally, paradise. Blake mostly depicted hell and its torments, such as the punishment depicted here. In a stark and stormy landscape, a thief is attacked by another in the guise of a serpent. The two are locked in eternal struggle, transforming between human and serpent forms. The blue and grey tones of the thief’s body suggest his human life draining away into coldness.</p><p><em>Gallery label, June 2024</em></p>
paper unique ink watercolour graphite
8 July 2002 – 1 October 2003
2003-10-01
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2002-07-08
William Blake Body and Soul
Collection based display
8 July 2002 – 16 March 2003
2003-03-16
8 July 2002 – 16 March 2003
2003-03-16
2002-07-08
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2002-07-08
Body and Soul
Collection based display
24 November 2003 – 22 November 2004
2004-11-22
10 November 2003
2003-11-10
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2003-11-24
William Blake the Painter at Work
Collection based display
1 November 2011 – 21 October 2012
2012-10-21
1 November 2011 – 19 February 2012
2012-02-19
2011-11-01
State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts (Moscow, Russia)
3 July 2012 – 21 October 2012
2012-10-21
2012-07-03
Fundació “la Caixa” (Madrid, Spain)
2011-11-01
Blake Exhibition
Loan-out
11 September 2019 – 2 February 2020
2020-02-02
11 September 2019 – 2 February 2020
2020-02-02
2019-09-11
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2019-09-11
William Blake: The Artist
Exhibition
24 June 2024
24 June 2024
2024-06-24
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2024-06-24
Blake
Collection based display
The Serpent Attacking Buoso Donati. Verso: A Man with a Transparent Hood (?) over his Head
support: 372 × 527 mm
Purchased with the assistance of a special grant from the National Gallery and donations from the <a href="/search?gid=999999968" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Art Fund</a>, Lord Duveen and others, and presented through the <a href="/search?gid=999999968" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Art Fund</a> 1919
<div><p><span>Blake was inspired by the poet Dante, learning Italian to read his work. He made 102 watercolours illustrating Dante’s poem </span><i>The Divine Comedy</i><span>. The poem imagines the author’s spiritual journey through hell, purgatory and finally, paradise. Blake mostly depicted hell and its torments, such as the punishment depicted here. In a stark and stormy landscape, a thief is attacked by another in the guise of a serpent. The two are locked in eternal struggle, transforming between human and serpent forms. The blue and grey tones of the thief’s body suggest his human life draining away into coldness.</span></p></div>
Display caption
2024-06-06T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
<p><a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-the-serpent-attacking-buoso-donati-verso-a-man-with-a-transparent-hood-over-his-head-n03361" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N03361</span></a> <b>The Serpent Attacking Buoso Donati</b> 1824–7 (recto)
<br/><b>Sketch of a Man with a Transparent Hood</b> (?) <b>over his Head</b> 1824–7 (verso) [<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-the-circle-of-the-lustful-francesca-da-rimini-the-whirlwind-of-lovers-a00005" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>A00005</span></a>-<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-dante-striking-against-bocca-degli-abati-a00011" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>A00011</span></a>; <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-dante-and-virgil-penetrating-the-forest-n03351" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N03351</span></a>-<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-dante-in-the-empyrean-drinking-at-the-river-of-light-n03370" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N03370</span></a>; <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-the-circle-of-the-lustful-francesca-da-rimini-the-whirlwind-of-lovers-t01950" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>T01950</span></a>-<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-dante-striking-against-bocca-degli-abati-t01956" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>T01956</span></a>; complete]
<br/></p>
<p>N 03361 / B 812 <i>53</i>
<br/>Recto: pen and watercolour; verso: pencil, approx. 55×25 (2 1/8×1); on paper 372×527 (14 11/16×20 3/4)
<br/>Inscribed ‘HELL Canto 25’ in ink b.r. and, on reverse in pencil, ‘72’ t.l., ‘N39 next at p.69’ t.c. turned through a right-angle and again in centre, and ‘HELL Canto 23’ b.r.
<br/>Watermarked ‘WE’
<br/>Purchased with the assistance of a special grant from the National Gallery and donations from the National Art-Collections Fund, Lord Duveen and others, and presented through the National Art-Collections Fund 1919
<br/>PROVENANCE As for <span>N03351</span>
<br/>EXHIBITED RA 1893 (14); Tate Gallery (41 xi), Manchester (48 xi), Nottingham (42 xvi) and Edinburgh (65) 1913–14; Paris and Vienna 1937 (22); Tate Gallery 1947 (58)
<br/>LITERATURE Rossetti 1863, p.219 no.101z<sup>1</sup>, and 1880, p.231 no.123z<sup>1</sup>; Roe 1953, pp.109–10 no.53, recto repr.; Klonsky 1980, p.149, recto repr. pl.56, verso p.21; Butlin 1981, p.572 no.812 <i>53</i>, verso pl.105b; Gizzi 1983, p.134 recto repr., and repr. in colour p.63; Fuller in <i>Art History</i>
1988, pp.369–70. <i>Also repr.: Mizue</i>, no.882, 1978, 9, p.36, recto only in colour
<br/></p>
<p>This is an illustration to <i>Inferno</i> XXV, 79–93, a scene in the seventh trench, that of the thieves, of the eighth circle. Francesco de' Cavalcanti, in the guise of a serpent, bites Buoso Donati with the result that Buoso turns into a serpent while Cavalcanti reverts to his human form; Puccio Sciancato looks on. The completion of the process of transformation shown in this <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/w/watercolour" title="Glossary definition for 'Watercolour'"><span>watercolour</span></a> is shown in the next work in this series, ‘Buoso Donati Transformed into a Serpent; Francesco de’ Cavalcanti Retransformed from a Serpent into a Man’, now in the Fogg Art Museum (Butlin 1981, no.812 <i>54</i>, repr. Roe 1953, pl.54, Klonsky 1980, pl.57 and Gizzi 1983, p.135).
<br/>
<br/>This is one of the designs <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/e/engraving" title="Glossary definition for 'Engraving'"><span>engraved</span></a> by Blake (repr. Roe 1953, pl.53 E, Bindman 1978, pl.651 and Klonsky 1980, pl.107); see also <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-the-serpent-attacking-buoso-donati-a00009" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>A00009</span></a>.
<br/>
<br/>The small but clearly defined <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/d/drawing" title="Glossary definition for 'Drawing'"><span>drawing</span></a> on the back (lower right with the page held horizontally) shows the head and shoulders of a man in profile, his head in some kind of transparent hood or bubble, possibly in the process of being transformed into a serpent though no exact parallels can be found among the Dante drawings. There is no similarity to the hooded hypocrites of Canto XXIII as might be supposed from the reference to that Canto on the <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/r/recto-verso" title="Glossary definition for 'Recto / Verso'"><span>verso</span></a> (see <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/blake-the-hypocrites-with-caiaphas-verso-sketch-of-a-stooping-figure-n03359" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N03359</span></a>).</p>
<p>
<br/><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Martin Butlin, <i>William Blake 1757-1827</i>, Tate Gallery Collections, V, London 1990
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-10-05T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
actions: expressive actions: postures and motions actions: processes and functions adults animals: actions animals: fantastic animals: reptiles attacking characters crime and punishment Dante Dante, ‘Divine Comedy: Inferno’ emotions and human qualities emotions, concepts and ideas fire group groups hand / hands raised Hell Hell horror Judaeo-Christian imagery landscape literature and fiction literature (not Shakespeare) looking / watching male man mythical, religious, fictional natural phenomena nudes people places recoiling religion and belief rocky serpent smoke snake standing thief transformation universal concepts Virgil work and occupations