Painting date: 1883
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 117 x 202 cm
Location: Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia

Flavius Honorius (born 384, died 423) was Roman Emperor in the West from 393 to 423, a period when much of the Western Empire was overrun by invading tribes and Rome was captured and plundered by the Visigoths. Honorius was one of the weakest of the Roman emperors, and Waterhouse shows him engrossed not in affairs of the empire, but instead with feeding his favourite pet pigeons.