The Trusty Servant is an emblematic figure in a painting at Winchester College and the name of the college's alumni magazine.
The wall-painting called The Trusty Servant was painted by John Hoskins in 1579.[1] It was reworked by William Cave in 1809, giving the painting now on display there.[2] It hangs outside the kitchen of Winchester College in Hampshire, England.
The American author Arthur Cleveland Coxe (1818-1896) described "the time-honoured Hircocervus, or picture of 'the Trusty-servant,' which hangs near the kitchen, and which emblematically sets forth those virtues in domestics, of which we Americans know nothing. It is a figure, part man, part porker, part deer, and part donkey; with a padlock on his mouth, and various other symbols in his hands and about his person, the whole signifying a most valuable character."[3]
The painting of The Trusty Servant had a didactic function: it is accompanied by allegorical verses that associate the servant's various animal parts with distinctive virtues that the students of Winchester College were meant to follow.[4]
In 2014 Winchester College commissioned a medal by Old Wykehamist Anthony Smith to be awarded to staff in recognition of "Long And Loyal Service". The medal features a relief sculpture of The Trusty Servant as it appears in the painting.[7]
The Trusty Servant is the name of the Winchester College alumni magazine.[8]
There is a Trusty Servant Inn at Minstead in the New Forest.[9]