Lesson

The Course of Empire by Thomas Cole

I'm sorry there was one more painting, it should be between the 1st and the 3rd
Not much of a source but here en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Course_of_Empire

there's a larger version of pic related there

Thanks but i already managed to put a file together with the paintings and information its really brutal to see the progression of greed and war

Do you have anything else interesting

I really wish all 5 painting were from the same angle.

That's too vague, to some people everything historical is interesting

You should really just lurk.

ok well I'm interested in anything new I'm clueless so show me anything and ill find joy so i"m gonna lurk it out for a bit like you say

You can see how they link up, though. The background cliff with the rock on it in the center of the first picture and in the left background of the second picture is shown in the last three pictures as well, facing away in the far right background. They settled in that little bay.

Oh I know, but still.

It seems odd some of the paintings are from the same angles, but not all.

I guess I would have liked it to be a bit more clever with the angles, or just be the same.

One of the most compelling candidates for a historical King Arthur is this guy.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riothamus

As the Roman empire collapsed and the imperial legions drained away, the romano-britons and romano-gauls remained, tried to fight the invaders and retreated to Wales, Cornwall and Brittany, these cultures would persist as independent political entities into the middle ages and were all connected. It is feasible that the Romano-Britons assisted in defending Gaul from the Visigoths, or possibly he was just from Brittany.

Obviously much of the legend is embellished and I have to accept the possibility the entire thing is a complete fabrication and not some hazy memory of the Roman empire passed through the generations, though it is difficult to ignore the similarities.

Camelot and Camulodonum

Avallon and Avalon

Riothamus kind of sounds like Arthur

a betrayal led to this death

I think it's because the first two paintings are supposed to be about the environment around the city. If you really really like them you can also check out explorethomascole.org/tour/items/63/words

Here's what the artist said about the first painting(though Wikipedia has a more simplified explanation).

"... And to this state our western world is fast approaching; but nature is still predominant, and there are those who regret that with the improvements of cultivation the sublimity of the wilderness should pass away: for those scenes of solitude from which the hand of nature has never been lifted, affect the mind with a more deep toned emotion than aught which the hand of man has touched. Amid them the consequent associations are of God the creator—they are his undefiled works, and the mind is cast into the contemplation of eternal things. "

and his words on the second painting are all about the environment still, even as the people are starting to tame it

"The spring has come at last; we have had a few days the most celestial: the gentlest temperature, the purest air, sunshine without burning & breezes without chilliness, skies cloudless but soft. The mountains have taken their pearly hue & the streams leap & glitter as though some crystal mountain thawed beneath the sun; the bosomy hills heaving amid white & rosy blossoms blush in the light of day. The air is full of fragrance & music. O that this could endure & no poison of the mind fall into the cup!"