Named after the red lead pigment used to outline them, these illustrate luxury manuscript books. Examples from around 400 CE through accounts of the Crusades, to Aesop’s fables in 1530.
Testard
The story of Hypermnestra’s faithfulness to her husband, her trial for not murdering him, and what happened to her sisters, the Danaides.
First wife of Jason of the Golden Fleece, abandoned when he went off on his quest and married Medea. He came to a sticky end, though.
First wife of Paris, Prince of Troy, abandoned so he could seduce Helen. When Paris needed her to heal him, she refused then was filled with remorse.
After Achilles slaughtered the rest of her family, Briseis becomes his enslaved concubine. While he’s angry, she remains devoted to him until his death.
When Edward Burne-Jones was invited to remove his painting from exhibition, it wasn’t so much the male genitals in the centre, but the scandal surrounding its model.
Odysseus had been away from his home, wife Penelope and son Telemachus for over 20 years. What would she have written to him?
Queen Penelope and their son Telemachus were awaiting the return of Odysseus, whose ships ended up off the island of the Cyclops.
Achilles acquires himself a concubine, as does his commander Agamemnon. When the latter is forced to return his, and takes Briseis from Achilles, there’s trouble.
Paintings by Botticelli, Raphael, Velázquez, Gerard ter Borch, and Vermeer, including an unusual Madonna in which the Virgin Mary is writing the Magnificat.
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