The Death of Achilles

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Maker


1577-1640

Title

The Death of Achilles

Date of Production

1630-35

Medium

oil on panel

Dimensions

Height: 107.1 cm (panel)
Width: 109.2 cm (panel)

Object Number

P.1978.PG.375

Mode of Acquisition

Count Antoine Seilern, bequest, 1978

Credit

Courtauld Gallery, London (Samuel Courtauld Trust)

Label Text

This painting is the design for the final scene in a series of tapestries devoted to the life of the ancient Greek warrior Achilles (another design is on the other side of this room). Peter Paul Rubens’s assistants used it to create a full-scale version - roughly ten times larger than this work - to guide the tapestry weavers. Guided by the god Apollo, the Trojan prince Paris shoots an arrow into Achilles’s vulnerable heel, mortally wounding him. The animals in the foreground mirror the warrior’s fate: the noble eagle is killed by the wily fox.

Provenance

Dreyfus sale, G. Petit, Paris, 29 May 1889.Vicomte de Lyrot, Paris.Guy Stein, Paris,from whom acquired by Seilern in 1937; Princes Gate Bequest 1978

Exhibition History

National Gallery (to be displayed with permanent collection), National Gallery, London, 01/09/1997-01/06/1998

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