Image: The Bathos

Description: Tailpiece, or The Bathos etching with engraving, 1764, on laid paper. Plate 320 x 335 mm., Sheet 402 x 505 mm. Hogarth’s final drawing is known as “The Bathos” or “Finis.” This word “bathos” signifies the depths, or the bottom; also it is applied to the process of sinking from the sublime to the ridiculous. Hogarth’s pencil shows us a devastated and desiccated world in which all things have come to an end. In the shadow of a ruined tower, Father Time himself lies expiring, his scythe and his hour-glass broken. In the last puff of smoke from Time’s tobacco pipe, one discerns the word “Finis.” A cracked bell, a shattered crown, the discarded stock of an old musket, the tottering signpost of a tavern called “The Worlds End,” a bow unstrung, a map of the world burning, a gibbet falling, an empty purse, a proclamation of bankruptcy, the stump of a broom, a broken bottle – this litter lies about fallen Father Time. Overhead the moon wanes, and Phoebus and his horses lie dead in the clouds. What once was sublime has descended to the ridiculous; thus the world ends, “not with a bang but a whimper.” A month after he executed this famous tail-piece, Hogarth himself ceased to be.
Title: The Bathos
Credit: Lotsearch
Author: William Hogarth
Usage Terms: Public domain
License: Public domain
Attribution Required?: No