Rosamond the Fair
Fate Spinning the Thread of Time (alt. title)
Macomber, Mary Lizzie, American artist, 1861-1916
1915
oil on canvas
Acquisition Fund, 2003

Boston painter Mary Macomber was known for her decorative and allegorical panels painted in a Pre-Raphaelite style. Rosamond the Fair, secret mistress of England’s King Henry II, was hidden in the center of a maze-formed bower. When Henry’s wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine found Rosamond in the maze in 1176, the Queen gave her a choice of how to die: by poison or dagger: Rosamond drank the poison. The red yarn in Rosamond’s hand refers to the path through the maze to her bower.

As Fate Spinning the Thread of Time, this painting reads as an allegorical figure who represents the determination of the length of each person’s life. Length of a life is represented by a single strand of thread indicating its beginning, duration and end. In Greek mythology those characters who determine life span are known as the three Fates. In this painting, Macomber collapsed the three figures into one beautiful maid, Fate, who holds the thread of life between her hands.