The rape of the Sabines

Mimicking a carved bas relief, this engraving depicts a well-known, harrowing and semi-mythological episode in early Roman history by the prominent Rome-based printmaker Cherubino Alberti (1552-1615), after drawings by Polidoro da Caravaggio (1499-c. 1543). It is a reverse copy of the more familiar engraving and is mounted in the so-called King George IV album of Old Master prints, acquired by the Dominion Museum in 1910.

Polidoro was a pupil of Raphael, and is not to be confused with the better known and later Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio.

Dr Mark Stocker   Curator, Historical International Art           March 2017