ALBION ROSE

Victoria & Albert Museum

Pencil Drawing 

ca. 1780

Legend: Albion rose from where he labourd at the Mill with Slaves
National Gallery
The Dance of Albion
Engraving
c. 1803/1810

British Museum
Large Book of Designs
Albion Rose
Color Engraving, 1794-96

Blake used Albion as a symbol for all of mankind and particularly of the people with whom he was best acquainted: the British. The body of the individual was extrapolated and superimposed onto one human body which was inclusive of all humanity. Being the image created by God in reflection of His own image, Albion was perfect and complete.

Artist as he was, Blake pictured Albion in his vitality. He invented his image as an engraving in 1780 revised it after 1803. He color printed it between 1794 and 1796.

The Tate Gallery book William Blake on page 242 includes this statement:
"The emergence of this image of British liberty as a giant form was the outcome of Blake's desire to create an Albion for his own times but also rooted in ancient mythology."

Annotations to Berkley's Siris, (E 663) 

"Harmony [&] Proportion are Qualities & Not Things The
Harmony & Proportion of a Horse are not the same with those of a
Bull Every Thing has its 
own Harmony & Proportion Two Inferior Qualities in it For its
Reality is Its Imaginative Form" 

Four Zoas, Night VII, Page 98 [90], (E 370) 

"Los drew them forth out of the deeps planting his right foot firm
Upon the Iron crag of Urizen thence springing up aloft
Into the heavens of Enitharmon in a mighty circle

And first he drew a line upon the walls of shining heaven    
And Enitharmon tincturd it with beams of blushing love
It remaind permanent a lovely form inspird divinely human
Dividing into just proportions Los unwearied labourd
The immortal lines upon the heavens till with sighs of love
Sweet Enitharmon mild Entrancd breathd forth upon the wind   
The spectrous dead Weeping the Spectres viewd the immortal works
Of Los Assimilating to those forms Embodied & Lovely
In youth & beauty in the arms of Enitharmon mild reposing"

Inscriptions, WB inv 1780, (E 671) 

     "Albion rose from where he labourd at the Mill with Slaves
     Giving himself for the Nations he danc'd the dance of Eternal Death"

Four Zoas, Night IX, Page 134, (E 402) 

"Let the slave grinding at the mill run out into the field
Let him look up into the heavens & laugh in the bright air
Let the inchaind soul shut up in darkness & in sighing           
Whose face has never seen a smile in thirty weary years
Rise & look out   his chains are loose his dungeon doors are open" 

Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man:  

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