The meaning of the term "Pre-Raphaelite" (1848-2024)

This thesis investigates the “Pre-Raphaelite” moniker, charting its use and evolution of meaning from 1848 to the present day, exploring its important role as a defining feature in how the Pre-Raphaelite movement and its artworks were historically received and interpreted.
When it was originally conceived by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, the moniker served as both a name and a manifesto that was known only to them and their most intimate associates. However, once the moniker became known by the public, it came to represent both a rallying call to a new generation of artists and a threat to the artistic establishment and their framing of artistic progress and periodisation. In the nineteenth century, the term “Pre-Raphaelite” absorbed various interpretations and applications – from describing a particular painting technique and approach, to becoming a by-word for a certain formulation of female beauty and features such as red hair and a melancholy expression. This range of meanings attached to the moniker – some based in art and others based in sensory emotion and experience – has meant that “Pre-Raphaelite” has come to possess a longevity and intermedial application beyond that of any other art group. This thesis represents a reckoning for Pre-Raphaelite scholarship which has failed to adequately grasp the sensitivity and impact of the moniker, as well as a reckoning for art history more generally, which has traditionally maligned Pre-Raphaelitism as a quaint Victorian art movement without wider significance.