A Harlot's Progress: Hogarth's First "Modern Moral Subject"

hello and welcome back to the channel if you're new here hi you are very welcome this is reading the past and I'm Dr Cat a couple of months ago we explored William hogarth's connected Prince Jin Lane and beer Street in that video which I will leave linked I offered to take a look at other works by Hogarth if people would be interested in that well lots of you got in touch to tell me that you were in fact interested in that there were also a number of requests for the various works that you wanted me to take a look at next and a harlot's progress was the one that I think I saw being recommended the most so that is what we're going to explore today without further Ado let's take a look at the cautionary tale of maul or Mary Hack about as Hogarth depicts it through his six prints [Music] in my previous video on hogar work I began by exploring that artist biography so if you haven't seen that video and you would like the additional context please do check it out briefly though hogar biographer David bindman describes the artist childhood as being beset by quote early misfortunes which he feels may have fueled his quote determination to rise in the world when Hogarth was in his mid 30s having already shaped an enviable reputation as both a portrait artist and as a creator of ccal paintings he set to work on the first of his quote modern moral subjects the first of these being a harlot's progress originally this was a set of six oil paintings completed in 1731 and sold to one William Beckford they were to be displayed at his Elizabethan Mansion of font Hill Abbey sadly the mansion and all its contents were lost in a fire in 1755 fortunately for us though hogar work lives on in the copper plate Engravings of this series that he himself issued the year after he had completed the original oil pain version it is therefore these Engravings that we will be using for our investigation today and so it's time for us to come to the beginning of the progress to the first of these six plates a country girl with a rose blooming at her bosom appears before us fresh of the York wagon outside the Bellin her white attire is simple a pack is tied around her arm scissors and a pin cushion hang beneath it it seemed this young lady has arrived in London with the intention to find employment as a seamstress that plan is about to be derailed a clergyman sitting asri his horse is engrossed in a letter addressed quote to the right Reverend father in God it is thought that this may be a letter of introduction which presumably brings with it the promise of promotion for this cleric some Scholars have suggested that this is supposed to be the Young lady's father and that he is allowing his own aspirations to come before the duty of protection that he owes to his daughter if not her actual father then his profession behoves him to act as a spiritual Father which he is not doing he is also failing to notice or minister to those other young ladies still packed inside that wagon dressed similarly to our young lady it has been noted by at least one commentator that these ladies look almost like Livestock on their way to Market this absentminded clergyman has also allowed the reign of his Mount to slacken he is not in control of it anymore thus his horse is busying itself consuming hay upon the ground in doing so it seems this horse has disrupted the balance of a stack of pots and pans those pots and pans now fall towards this animal's head is this another creature being endangered by the clergyman's destruction perhaps these falling pans can of course also be read as a portent of our young lady's own impending fall in the background raised up above we see a housewife engaged in domestic tasks in this case she is hanging out the laundry and seemingly emptying the chamber pots this image presents the life path that our young lady might otherwise have followed however as we can see she has already turned her back on that she turns instead towards the examining caress of a flamboyantly dressed board the black dots on her face signify to us that she is infected with the pox also known as syphilis It is believed that the real life counterpart of this fictional board was known as Mother Elizabeth Needum she ran a very exclusive brothel that was frequented by some particularly high ranking individuals in 1731 so the same year that Hogarth completed his oil paintings of this series mother nidom was convicted of running a disorderly house and so was sentenced to be placed in the Piller the crowd so pelted her while she was confined there that she would die of her injuries just a few days later this fictional board has been placed between our young lady and her belongings there is a trunk bearing the monogram MH her name being mul or Mary Hack about as Paul J Nicholson points out quote the fictional harlot in the series Mary or Maul hockabout is likely a composite creation based on a famous Harlot of the time Kate hack about and Daniel defo mole Flanders from 1722 who likewise had aspired to become a gentle woman before turning to Vice the name mul was also used colloquially in the 17th and 18th centuries to refer to harlots and Lawless women a dead goose sits in mole's basket is this a sign that her proverbial goose is about to be cooked perhaps after all due to her guess innocence she is about to be lured away from her intended path around this Goose's neck is a label addressed to quote my loving cousin in turn Street in London is this where mul was due to be were these people waiting for her in any case the board appears to have a customer waiting for mole Services already that eager man in the doorway with his hand deeply buried in his pocket is said to Bear a striking resemblance to one Colonel Francis charteris who was by all accounts a deeply unpleasant individual his behavior would earn him the nickname rape Master General the foring figure who appears to be attending upon Him is thought to be a representation of his trusty man John Gurley who was his own personal procurer and so the stage has now been set and in the next plates we will see what happens to mole as she has been LED away and astray in this manner in plate two mole is the established kept Mistress of a wealthy older man we see he has arrived while mole finds herself otherwise engaged in the background we see mole's maid sneaking her younger arguably more handsome lover out of the room that lover is in a state of undress with his stockings gathered at his ankles and we see he's clutching his sword which here is separate from its sheath a euphemistic sign of what these two have been up to to allow him to slip away mole creates a distraction by kicking over the ornate table in front of her this in turn causes the fine tea set upon it to fall to the floor and shatter in into pieces this then causes her pet monkey in its ornate lace cap to run away in fear at her side A West Indian servant boy who is carrying the kettle looks on in horror is this boy shock his almost visible outrage intended by Hogarth to be a sign of the real moral degradation in Britain a warning about how that degradation was received and perceived by those born outside of it the luxury of imported goods and people that fill this room simply cannot obscure the destructive behavior that is occurring at its Center to the side of this image is mole's Dressing Table upon it sits her mirror in which she can perform her acts of vain preining there is also a pot of cosmetics and a white mask is this telling us that the young visitor who we see sneaking away from mole's rooms took her out to enjoy the entertainments of a masquerade ball the large paintings on the wall depict scenes from the Old Testament on one side there is Jonah outside Neva on the other David is shown dancing before the Ark of the Covenant as for the little portraits we can see it is believed that these portray individuals who are believed to be atheists by their contemporaries men named Samuel Clark and Thomas wolston respectively this choice of artwork work has been attributed to mole's wealthy benefactor it is argued that his decision to decorate his lovers rooms with images from the Old Testament and with portraits of two denounced enemies of Christianity was due to his own Jewish faith as for mole we can see the Fabrics that she is now wearing are much finer than that of her gown from the first plate it now seems that she is wearing silks ribbons and Lace or perhaps that should be nearly wearing for her robe is undone one of her breasts is exposed we could also see on her forehead the appearance of those Telltale black spots a sign that syphilis has already made its Mark upon her whether due to her infection or to her split attention we learn by plate three that mole's wealthy lover has clearly cast her out we meet her now in considerably downgraded rooms her m bed is the only large piece of furniture now it is also her place of work of course there is no fine table here instead the tea is being served on a table that could double as a stool it looks like last night's supper bowl is sitting on the chair beside the bed across the room a chipped Bowl sits idle a stirer resting inside the triangle propped against it could be a sliver of unframed broken mirror a note to M hacker out peeps from the Open Drawer on the floor we see empty drinks containers at least one of which appears to have The Branding of a public house located on Drury Lane upon it broken and discarded clay tobacco pipes lay on the floor beside these vessels are we to infer from this that although mole appears to be clearly lacking in funds she is still spending or perhaps wasting her money on trips to the alhouse and the tobacconist her maid and servant have also been replaced now she is being attended by a woman who like mole is scarred by syphilis she Bears those same black spots and also appears to be missing the end of her nose there is a box on top of mole's bed which according to its label is the wig box of James Dalton it may be his jacket that is hanging on the back of that chair next the bed presumably he was one of Mo's lovers at this time James Dalton was a real person he was executed at tyburn for highway robbery on the 11th of May 1730 it has been suggested that the events in this plate are intended to depict a moment prior to Dalton's apprehension and that the cat who is at mole's feet is in fact indicating his hiding spot that this cat has therefore smelt a figurative rat this cat is also of course a replacement for the exotic pet monkey that was shown in the previous plate a further sign of the change in mole status and experiences now this cat is playful maybe innocent perhaps it's a reminder of what mole once was or even still is at her very core the unframed pictures we see on mole's wall are replacing the large Old Testament images and framed portraits in her old rooms these pictures depict in one case a man called Captain mck Heath the highw woman who features in John Gay's the beggar's Opera clearly we are being shown that mole has a type the other image is of the real clergyman Henry several who became Infamous due to his dissenting religious views and incend sermons this is perhaps a sign that Maul is continuing to reject the established Anglican Faith practices and perhaps this is why it appears that she's got an icon of the Virgin Mary on her wall just below that image of M Kei and perhaps that's also why a pastoral letter has been repurposed to wrap her butter it may also explain why a witch's hat and a collection of birch rods hang above her bed is she perhaps signaling her willingness to perform satanic Acts or are these simply props for some particular client's favorite roleplay or alternatively is this perhaps hogar way of reminding his viewer that sex work is the devil's work in his mind in this plate mul is once again not fully dressed we see her breast is again exposed there are black spots upon her cheek nevertheless she seems to meet the viewers gaze seductively as if she is still offering her Services we can also see that she is showing off a watch is it possible this is a gift from her lover Dalton if so does that mean that she is now culpable for handling stolen goods in any case we see that mole is about to be apprehended through her door we see a magistrate and his retinue entering they are here for business rather than pleasure the magistrate has been identified as Sir John gonson who according to sha shees green was quote a type of the perenial Harlot prosecutors whose righteousness is only equaled by their compulsiveness gon will achieve his end we next see mole in plate 4 as an inmate in Bridewell prison her new keeper is her Jailer who looks on Cain in hand perhaps an echo to those swatches that hung above mole's bed in the previous image this Jailer is threatening mole with being clapped in a leg iron while she beats hemp with her fellow inmates many of these inmates are also female at least one appears to have those black spots upon her forehead and so are we to infer that they are also sex workers M's labors will once again be a profit for other namely for the water of this prison we see that consistent slacking in these labors will result in a spell in the stocks as the unfortunate who is behind mole is shown to be discovering further off there is also a whipping post which Bears the warning quote the wages of idleness a oneeyed woman stands between mole and the inmate in the stocks she may be this jailer's wife we see her plucking at mole's fine clothing as if to mock her the male inmate beside mole is also fairly welld dressed it seems he's been permitted to bring his dog with him a torn playing card lays between dog and man which may indicate that it was gambling that brought him to Bridewell some have instead suggested that the presence of this panting dog in front of this man is supposed to signify that he was one of mole's customers as dogs were by hogarth's time often used as signifiers of licentiousness and sexual arousal whether through the effects of gambling or sex work this prison now has two more bodies to exploit through forc Labor Mo servant we can see has accompanied her is she also an inmate if so is that then a sign that she did more than simply wait upon her mistress that instead she must also have undertaken some criminal dealings like molded beneath this maid servant's ragged clothes we see she's pulling up some fine albeit patched stocking and that she is wearing fashionable highly decorated shoes are these Goods that she has acquired even stolen from Maul we see her looking over her shoulder at Maul smiling are we being shown her approval at the way mul is being treated is she enjoying her suffering or is this instead a sign that her syphilis has now entered its final turer stage that it has now begun to affect the functioning of her brain however serious the maid's Affliction might be we will soon see that mole is worse off we find her in plate five propped up in her maid's arms wrapped in sweating blankets and seemingly dosed with Mercury in an attempt a file attempt to cure her this treatment was based upon the medical understanding of the time the belief that inducing excessive sweating and salivation could rid a person of syphilis through this treatment mul appears as though she has already been wrapped in her winding sheets in her shroud as if she is ready for her death and her subsequent burial M's lodgings are now even more run down there are cracks in the ceiling and plaster has fallen from the walls a small broken mirror is one of the few adornments to be hanging in this space by her door two Physicians appear to be arguing presumably over how mole should be treated both men want the Acclaim of finding the cure for the dreaded syph mole is simply a test subject for their ideas her suffering is nothing to them in their Pursuit Of Fame and self-promotion one of them the darkhead fellow has been identified as Dr Richard Rock who was known for creating an alleged cural that was described as the quote famous antiv venial Grand specific pill a note likely a prescription bearing Dr Rock's name sits on a round container across the room this note is held in place by a teacup next to which a clay tobacco pipe sits unfortunately for mole it seems highly unlikely that she will be able to hold that pipe between her own teeth now as a collection of them are depicted lying on top of Dr Rock's paper after all tooth loss was a common side effect of the Mercury cure the other physician who is present is thought to be Dr Jean misba the creator of a rival venial disease cure both of these men would likely be thought of and recognized as quacks indeed Henry Fielding would saiz melar in his 1732 play called the mock doctor once again in this scene we see a table has been knocked over this time though it has actually managed to hit the ground this is a sign perhaps that mole's own fall is now complete her dishes lay smashed upon the floor next to a packet for an anod or painkilling necklace this was yet another supposed cure for Syphilis that simply could not offer the results that it promised whatever money mo has left it seems that she is spending it away in her desperation for a cure and in her naive belief in the promises of quacks necklaces like this anod one we see here were also a suggested cure for teething pain in little children and so perhaps then this necklace was instead purchased for mole's little son or it was something for them both to share this little boy is shown here to be a well-fed child indeed he oblivious to his mother's plight is placed beside the Hearth he is ministering to a joint of meat that is being roasted beside that roasting joint a pot is boiling away presumably this will be his next meal he looks healthy robust even if it does seem that he is beset by lice is it possible that the packaging for this necklace is a sign that in spite of these outward appearances this little boy is in fact suffering nonetheless with congenital syphilis another woman who may be mle's land lady is shown rifling through her trunk of belongings it is the same trunk from that very first plate monogrammed with the letters MH this woman has pulled out the witch's hat some fine shoes and a black masquerading mask perhaps an ominous replacement for the white mask we saw on the dressing table in the second plate in this series perhaps it has now become a death mask instead a fan has been pushed through the eyeh holes of this mask alternatively this woman may be a nurse or even someone who has been sent for to prepare mole's body for burial and so it may be that she is searching for a tire to dress mole in in Readiness for the grave but is seemingly failing to find anything suitable so far the items we see hanging by the door are debated perhaps they are candles they could however also be a representation of prophylactic sheathes that were thought at the time to be capable of preventing pregnancy and or venial disease they were apparently reusable washed between wearers and left to dry slightly above these items we see a perforated Passover cake which seems to have been repurposed as a fly trap is this perhaps a sign that mle's early Jewish benit factor is still supporting her in some way now it is also a stark reminder that the biblical promise of preservation the one that was realized and that is celebrated at Passover is not something that would be seen or replicated in Mo's case in the sixth and final plate we do not see mole only her partially open coffin the plate affixed to the coffin lid states that M hack about died on the 2nd of September 1731 one aged 23 a clergyman sits beside this coffin fondling the woman who is next to him he is so distracted by her and by what he's doing to her that his drink spills in a most suggestive manner into his lap just as we saw with the Churchman in the very first plate another cleric's attention has also become distracted from mole once again at a moment of real spiritual need as for this cleric's female companion a black spot is visible beneath her eye she looks out seductively at the viewer in a manner that's reminiscent of mole's gaze in the third plate this lady holds a sprig in her hand possibly a sprig of U or of Rosemary both of which were used at funerals as it was thought that they would see off infection additionally Rosemary was connected to remembrance of course however these sprigs or Twigs might also Link in a viewer's mind to the branches that were seen hanging on mole's wall above her bed in the third plate mole's maid appears to be the only one in this room to be genuinely mourning mole's passing nevertheless even she is using the coffin almost as a makeshift bar upon which she sets her flagen and cup there are two women who appear to be Weeping heartily at the back of the room but the presence of the cup at one of their lips might hint that alcohol is fueling their tears more than actual sorrow there is another Weeping Woman set off to the side of the room but closer inspection shows that it's not mole's loss that she Grieves instead she is sorrowfully seeking and receiving her companion sympathy regarding some problem that she has with her finger behind them another lady marked with a black spot upon her forehead completely ignores the coffin in favor of her own reflection and her desire to rearrange her appearance one woman is shown leaning in to mole's open coffin is she looking at her as a warning of her own potential fate or is she instead checking to see if there is anything worth stealing within even the Undertaker is distracted for his attentions have fully turned to the woman whose glove we can see he is fiddling with the black spots of infection Mark her face too she seems to sigh dramatically as if utterly struck by grief all the while she is picking the Undertaker's pocket for his handkerchief a woman who is seated towards the very front of the image is weeping extravagantly it may be that she is mol's boor distressed at the loss of the income caused by this death alternatively she may like some of the other mourners simply be experiencing the effects of the non Brandy on the floor by her side in front of this bottle we see a glass with a chipped bottom as we have seen throughout this series cracked and broken items are symbolic of the fall of the figure depict this is however not the only breakage depicted here the window has also been smashed there appears to be some object placed within the break whether this was a poor attempt to stop up the gap or perhaps we are seeing this window being broken through some projectile being deliberately thrown from the outside in either case I think it is debatable in the center of this image sits M's little son he is very finely dressed he is distracted playing with his spinning top and seems to be unaffected by his mother's death and unaware of the dangerous uncertainty of his future now on the back wall hangs a simple hat perhaps a reminder of mole's country Origins and beside that hat there is an armorial Shield the images that have been replicated in this Shield are three forets that have been stopped up with spigots this is intended to be a euphemism an innuendo which connects to the manner in which Maul and many of the ladies in this room earned their living and also potentially the manner in which they would contract the conditions that could end their lives after all that is what happened in the case of mole hack about and so we have now come to the end of our exploration of the six plates of a harlot's progress a couple of years after these images were completed Hogarth put his finishing touches to another series another progress this time it would be a R's progress made up of eight images this time rather than six a R's progress would transcend the frankly extraordinary success of a harlot's progress so maybe that should be the next Hogarth work that I cover so what do you think of William Hog's first modern moral subject of a harlot's progress did any of these plates stand out to you in particular indeed did any detail within any of these plates catch your attention do you think that I should take a look at a rake's progress soon as always I'm looking forward to reading your conversations in the comment section underneath this video I'd also love it if you could pop an emoji or a social glyph in the comments too because that will boost the engagement and the more engaged video gets the more YouTube shares it out and that will will help to grow our community as we've been talking about artists William Hogarth perhaps we should pick something paintery Emoji wise this time I look forward to seeing what you choose you can also find me Elsewhere on social media I'll leave links to the place you can find me on the internet in my description 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