Apollo killing Coronis

Baudous, Robert Willemsz. de (born 1574-1575, died after 1656)

Goltzius, Hendrick (1558-1617) (after a work of)

Item type:

print

Date of creation:

ca. 1590

Height:

17.7 cm  (7 in.)

Width:

25.5 cm  (10 1/16 in.)

Technique / Medium:

engraving, on paper

Place of creation:

Nederland

Additional titles

Description

Apollo is running toward Coronis and kills her with an arrow. He is holding the bow in his outstretched left arm, and his right arm has released the string. He has long wavy hair that blows behind his head and is nude except for a quiver of arrows on his back and a long flowing cloak draped over his right shoulder covering his right thigh that billows behind him. The white raven, which brought Apollo news of Coronis's infidelity, flies toward Apollo with wings outstretched in the center of the scene. Apollo's lyre lies at the ground next to his right foot. Coronis is sitting on the ground with an arrow in the center of her naked breast. She is wearing a dress that covers the lower part of her body from just under her breasts to her ankles. Her arms are outstretched to both sides, and she is gazing up at the white raven. Her right leg is folded under her, and her left leg is extended to her left side. In the center background, Coronis is attended by mourners as she burns on her funeral pyre whose smoke curls up into the sky. In the far right background, Coronis lies dead as her unborn son Aesclepius is rescued by a goatherd. In the left background behind Coronis is a path leading to a small town. The scene is set among trees with a mountain range in the far background. There is an inscription at the bottom: "Fama malum pernix, tu Thumbice indice corvo / In tam dilectam tela cruena iacis / Interit illa quidens formosa Coronis, et albas / Inter aeres non est iam tibi corve locus." The print is numbered 14 in the lower left corner.

Iconclass

92B3242
Apollo shoots Coronis
92B3241
a white crow sees Coronis' infidelity and tells Apollo about it

Instruments [MIMO Code] (notes)

Lyre [3501]

RIdIM images

Image URLs

image link 1

Bibliographic references

Bartsch, Adam von. Le peintre graveur (Vienna: J.V. Degen, 1802) v. 3, 107, no. 14.

Barryte, Bernard. Myth, allegory, and faith: The Kirk Edward Long Collection of Mannerist Prints (Stanford, CA: Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts, Stanford University, 2015) app. 481.

Notes

Provenance: Ducs d'Arenberg (L.567).

RIdIM record id

5450