Paris and the three Godesses. Venus and Cupid

Sketch sheet with several sketches for a Venus sculpture and a sketch for Paris’ judgement and various inscriptions. When the Trojan prince Paris was to decide which of the goddesses was most beautiful they each offered him a reward. Juno would give him the command over Asia, Minerva offered him fame as a warrior, while Venus promised him the world’s fairest woman, the Greek King Menelaus’ wife Helena. Venus was given the golden apple and when Paris abducted Helena to Troy it was the beginning of the Greek-Trojan War, described by Homer in the Iliad. Thorvaldsen, however, never executed a relief for this motif.