The Ambassadors of Agamemnon in the tent of Achilles

The Ambassadors of Agamemnon in the tent of Achilles is an 1801 painting by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, produced for the Prix de Rome competition. It is now in the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris.

It shows an episode from Homer's Iliad, in which Achilles refuses to listen to the envoys sent by Agamemnon to convince him back into the Trojan War. It was intended as a demonstration of Ingres' mastery of the human figure in classical history painting - Odysseus is shown in a red cloak derived from a sculpture by Pseudo-Phidias.

The painting is in the neo-classical style and belongs to the school of Jacques-Louis David, in whose studio Ingres had trained. It also shows new influences from John Flaxman, whose work had just had its first Parisian exhibition.

Bibliography

Daniel Ternois, Ingres, Paris, Fernand Nathan, 1980 (ISBN 2-09-284-557-8)

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres

History and classical paintings	The Ambassadors of Agamemnon in the tent of Achilles (1801) Bonaparte, First Consul (1804) Oedipus and the Sphinx (1808) The Valpinçon Bather (1808) Jupiter and Thetis (1811) Romulus' Victory Over Acron (1812) Grande Odalisque (1814) The Death of Leonardo da Vinci (1818) Roger Freeing Angelica (1819) The Source (c 1820) The Dauphin's Entry Into Paris (1821) The Vow of Louis XIII (1824) The Apotheosis of Homer (1827) The Martyrdom of Saint Symphorian (1834) The Illness of Antiochus (1840) Odalisque with Slave (1842) Joan of Arc at the Coronation of Charles VII (1854) The Turkish Bath (1863)

Portraits	Mademoiselle Caroline Rivière (1806) Napoleon I on his Imperial Throne (1806) Portrait of Monsieur Bertin (1832) Portrait of Baronne de Rothschild (1848) Madame Moitessier (1844-56)

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