« Veronese's Allegories of Love: Scorn | Main | Veronese's Allegory of Love: Jealousy »
July 24, 2008
Veronese's Allegories of Love: Respect
I wouldn't call it respect but restraint. A naked woman sleeping in a drunken stupor - note the half empty jar of wine - isn't respectful, she is easy. Eros as sexual temptation, once again rather than love, is quite graphically represented here as he holds the phallic sword and points at the woman's vagina with his arrow. An older man, certainly wisdom, pulls the main character away from the sleeping woman and the meaning of the allegory is further reinforced by a scene of the Continence of Scipio painted on the ceiling of the archway. Scipio, the roman general, having conquered Carthago Nova and being offered a beautiful captive shows his clemency and sexual restraint by giving her back to her fiancée.
Posted by claudia