Big rough stones fall from the sky.
Bible in art · Joshua
The Hailstones on the Amorites
Gustave Doré · 1866 (designs for La Sainte Bible, Tours); this printing 1873–1874
National Library of Poland, Warsaw
This is one of Doré’s most violent battle plates. Instead of hail he drew large, sharp-edged stones falling from the clouds, each cut by the engraver as a solid dark block against the bright sky.
Amorite riders on camels and horses flee toward us, raising their arms against the stones. Men and animals have fallen to the ground at the front; a camel collapses at the left. Dust rises where the stones strike, and a shield lies on the ground.
From the text
- “the LORD cast down on them large hailstones from the sky” (Joshua 10:11)
- They fled “along the descent from Beth-horon to Azekah” (Joshua 10:11)
- More died from the hailstones than by the swords of the Israelites (Joshua 10:11)
The artist’s own
- Hailstones shown as rough rocks
- Riders on camels with rich harness, from Doré’s picture of Eastern armies
Details
The stones
A fleeing rider
A rider on a camel raises his arm as he flees.
A fallen camel
A camel collapses in the foreground.
The shield
A round shield falls beside the riders.
Gustave Doré, French, 1832–1883. National Library of Poland (Biblioteka Narodowa), Warsaw — «Pismo Święte Starego i Nowego Testamentu», vol. 1, Warsaw: M. Glücksberg, 1873 (acc. 75.267 A), tabl. 49 · Wood engraving after Gustave Doré’s design · National Library of Poland (Polona): the record of the volume gives the licence «Domena Publiczna» (Public Domain), «copyrightProtected»: false; the scan was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by the library itself («Polona Upload», GLAM-Wiki partnership: “This file was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons as part of a GLAM-Wiki partnership between the National Library of Poland and Wikimedia Polska”), linking its Polona record.