Blank and Empty Series: Oliver Cromwell's House

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And so it came to pass under the vengeful gaze of the restored Charles II  that the nicely-buried Oliver Cromwell was dug up from his monarchial pit, brought to the light, and then hanged, and once twice-dead, was beheaded.  To make matters worse for Cromwell, his body was tossed into “a deep pit under the gallows” and his head displayed on a spike at Westminster Hall.  I guess that his eyes at that point would’ve been happy to see some more comfortable dirt. 

 

I’m just relating that story as part of the impression I got from this 1824 woodcut of Cromwell’s house at Whitehall.  It is an odd, forbidding scene:  walled, dark, and with several uncomfortable characters, it feels cold and empty, as empty-looking as a house could be. Perhaps that is a butcher with a slab of meat, and a dry-goods hawker with a wagon-full o fgoods, and a pair of drinkey buddies.  Maybe not--but whatever they're doing and whomever they are, its just a little David-Lynch-odd.