Éowyn Standing Her Ground Before the Fellbeast's Jaws — Print & Oil Painting

We are behind her, which changes everything. The face is turned away, the blonde hair is gathered and pinned, and all we are given of her is a back: a green surcoat over mail, a round wooden shield held out on the left arm, a sword low in the right hand, and both legs driven wide into a deep lunge. Refusing the face makes the picture about the ground she is holding rather than about her courage.

The animal comes in on the diagonal from the upper right and it is the most reptilian version of the creature in the whole set. The neck is thick and plated, the head is a wedge armoured in overlapping scutes with a fringe of horns behind the jaw, and the mouth is wide open on a red tongue and a double row of teeth. It is aimed straight down the line of her shield.

The rider is almost lost in his own wing. He sits far up at the top left with both arms raised and a spiked flail held above the crowned helm, and the near wing sweeps behind him in a long tan membrane lit orange along its leading edge. His pose and hers are the same pose, mirrored: both of them are winding up.

The ground is a wide field of dry ochre grass, brushed in long horizontal strokes that all run the same way, and behind it the air goes to a pale flat grey with the faintest suggestion of tiered walls and a spire dissolved in it. The city is present only as a rumour, which keeps the fight from acquiring an audience.

Part of our Lord of the Rings collection, next to the same confrontation seen from the front and the rider with his sword up rather than his flail.