Calumny of Apelles (Botticelli)

The Calumny of Apelles

Artist	Sandro Botticelli
Year	1494
Type	Tempera on panel
Dimensions	62 cm × 91 cm (24 in × 36 in)
Location	Uffizi, Florence

For Rossini's famous aria La calunnia è un venticello, see The Barber of Seville.

The Calumny of Apelles is a tempera painting by Italian Renaissance painter Sandro Botticelli. Based on the description of a painting by Apelles, the work was completed in approximately 1494. It is on display in the Uffizi in Florence.

Theme

Detail of the painting.

In The Calumny of Apelles, Botticelli drew on the description of a painting by Apelles, a Greek painter of the Hellenistic Period. Though Apelles' works have not survived, Lucian recorded details of one in his On Calumny:

On the right of it sits Midas with very large ears, extending his hand to Slander while she is still at some distance from him. Near him, on one side, stand two women—Ignorance and Suspicion. On the other side, Slander is coming up, a woman beautiful beyond measure, but full of malignant passion and excitement, evincing as she does fury and wrath by carrying in her left hand a blazing torch and with the other dragging by the hair a young man who stretches out his hands to heaven and calls the gods to witness his innocence. She is conducted by a pale ugly man who has piercing eye and looks as if he had wasted away in long illness; he represents envy. There are two women in attendance to Slander, one is Fraud and the other Conspiracy. They are followed by a woman dressed in deep mourning, with black clothes all in tatters—she is Repentance. At all events, she is turning back with tears in her eyes and casting a stealthy glance, full of shame, at Truth, who is slowly approaching.^[1]^[2]

Botticelli reproduced this quite closely, down to the donkey ears of the seated man, into which the women that flank him speak. A richly gowned Slander (or Calumny), with her hair being dressed by her attendants, is being led by her slender, robed companion. The man she is dragging, nearly nude and with his ankles crossed as if to be crucified, raises his hands in prayer. The woman behind him turns her head to regard the stately pale nude pointing to the heavens.

Without description of the setting, Botticelli has presented a throne room elaborately decorated with sculptures and reliefs of Classical heroes and battle scenes.

History

An apocryphal story is connected to the painting. Rudolph Altrocchi, in 1921, relates that Apelles had himself been slandered, accused by a rival of helping Theodotus of Aetolia to foster revolt in Tyre.^[3] (Altrocchi assures readers that the story cannot be true, as Apelles had been long dead before the revolt of which he is accused.) Ptolemy was on the verge of executing Apelles for the deed, so the story goes, when a friend revealed the truth and the slanderer himself was sold into slavery. Nevertheless, Apelles expressed his resentment for Ptolemy and the peril in which he found himself in his painting.

The story of Apelles' painting became popular in Renaissance Italy, and Botticelli was neither the first nor last Italian Renaissance artist to depict it.^[4] This work, completed in 1494,^[5] was the last secular painting he would produce.^[6] It may have been undertaken as a commission of the Florentian banker who oversaw the Papal Mint.^[7] It is often assumed that Botticelli had a specific slandered individual in mind, perhaps even himself,^[7] as an anonymous person had accused him of sodomy.^[8]

Notes

↑ Altrocchi (1921), pp. 454, 456-457; quoting translation by A.M.Harmon.
↑ White (1872), pp. 113;
↑ Altrocchi (1921), p. 455.
↑ Altrocchi (1921), p. 470 and see Girolamo Mocetto.
↑ Altrocchi (1921), p. 454.
↑ Deimling (2000), p. 72.
1 2 Capretti (2002), 27.
↑ Malaguzzi (2004), p. 106.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Calumny of Apelles (Botticelli).

References

Altrocchi, Rudolph (1921). "The Calumny of Appelles". In Modern Language Association of America. Publications of the Modern Language Association of America 36. The Association. Retrieved 30 June 2010.
Capretti, Elena (1 January 2002). Botticelli. Giunti Editore Firenze Italy. ISBN 978-88-09-21433-0. Retrieved 30 June 2010.
Deimling, Barbara (1 May 2000). Sandro Botticelli, 1444/45-1510. Taschen. ISBN 978-3-8228-5992-6. Retrieved 30 June 2010.
Malaguzzi, Silvia (2004). Botticelli. Giunti Editore Firenze Italy. ISBN 978-88-09-03677-2. Retrieved 30 June 2010.
White, C.A. (1872). The Student's Mythology. W.J. Widdleton.
Massing, Jean Michel (1990). Du texte à l'image: la Calomnie d'Apelle et son iconographie. Presses universitaires de Strasbourg. ISBN 2-86820-212-8.

Botticelli

Works	Madonna and Child with an Angel Madonna and Child with an Angel Madonna della Loggia The Virgin and Child with Two Angels and the Young St. John the Baptist The Annunciation The Virgin and Child, St. John and an Angel Madonna and Child Adoration of the Magi Portrait of a Young Man Madonna in Glory with Seraphim Madonna of the Sea Madonna of the Rosegarden (Madonna del Roseto) Madonna and Child and Two Angels Portrait of Smeralda Brandini Fortitude Madonna and Child with Six Saints (Sant'Ambrogio Altarpiece) Virgin and Child with an Angel The Return of Judith to Bethulia The Discovery of the Murder of Holofernes Adoration of the Magi Portrait of a Young Woman Adoration of the Magi St. Sebastian Portrait of a Man with a Medal of Cosimo the Elder Portrait of Giuliano de' Medici Madonna and Child Catherine of Alexandria Nativity Portrait of Giuliano de' Medici The Birth of Christ Madonna and Child with Eight Angels St. Augustine Madonna of the Magnificat (Madonna del Magnificat) Madonna of the Book (Madonna del Libro) Portrait of a Young Woman Portrait of a Young Woman Annunciation St. Sixtus II Adoration of the Magi Primavera Pallas and the Centaur Venus and Mars Portrait of a Young Man Portrait of a Young Man The Story of Nastagio degli Onesti Venus and the Three Graces Presenting Gifts to a Young Woman A Young Man Being Introduced to the Seven Liberal Arts The Virgin and Child Enthroned (Bardi Altarpiece) The Birth of Venus Annunciation Madonna Adoring the Child with Five Angels Madonna of the Pomegranate (Madonna della Melagrana) The Virgin and Child with Four Angels and Six Saints (Pala di San Barnaba) Vision of St. Augustine Christ in the Sepulchre Salome with the Head of St. John the Baptist Extraction of St. Ignatius' Heart Cestello Annunciation The Virgin Adoring the Child Lamentation over the Dead Christ Portrait of a Man San Marco Altarpiece St. Augustine in His Cell Madonna and Child and the Young St John the Baptist Portrait of Lorenzo di Ser Piero Lorenzi Virgin and Child with the Infant St. John the Baptist Holy Trinity (Pala delle Convertite) The Virgin and Child with Three Angels (Madonna del Padiglione) Calumny of Apelles Lamentation over the Dead Christ with Saints Last Communion of St. Jerome Portrait of Dante The Story of Virginia The Story of Lucretia Crucifixion Christ Crowned with Thorns Transfiguration, St Jerome, St Augustine Judith Leaving the Tent of Holofernes Agony in the Garden The Mystical Nativity Baptism of St. Zenobius and His Appointment as Bishop Three Miracles of St. Zenobius Three Miracles of St. Zenobius Last Miracle and the Death of St. Zenobius

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