Aristomenes Mourning the Death of Socrates from the Bewitchment of Meroë (from Book 1 of Apuleius, "The Golden Ass")
Medium
brush and black and gray wash, heightened with white gouache, over graphite
Dimensions
image: 19.8 × 10.3 cm · sheet: 27.9 × 21.3 cm
Classification
Drawing
Department
Drawings
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Bequest of Muriel Butkin
Accession Number
2008.374
Rights
Public Domain
Tags
About this artwork
This scene represents the end of a complex episode from the Roman writer Apuleius's (2nd century ad) story The Golden Ass. Aristomenes narrates a tale to the book's main character, Lucius, about a friend named Socrates, whom he meets during his travels. After a disastrous affair with a witch named Meroë, Socrates dies from a wound she inflicts to his throat, and the scene shown here is the moment just after his death. Chaudet is mainly known as a sculptor, but he also designed a number of book i...