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Charlotte Mason Picture Study Aid Peter Paul Rubens

The Fall of Phaeton

c. 1604-1605 (probably reworked 1606-1608)
oil on canvas
98.4 x 131.2 cm

National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.
Based on The Metamorphoses of Ovid (see below)
KEY TOPICS:

• Phaeton is the figure just right of lower center (the “charioteer”) falling backwards.

• In several spots, faint lines can be seen where Rubens reworked the image, painting over

1
some of the harnesses coming from the horses.
• From The Metamorphoses of Ovid, Book 2, Fable 2:

“But the omnipotent father, having called the Gods above to witness, and him, too, who had given

the chariot to Phaëton, that unless he gives assistance, all things will perish in direful ruin,

mounts aloft to the highest eminence, from which he is wont to spread the clouds over the
spacious earth; from which he moves his thunders, and hurls the brandished lightnings. But then,

he had neither clouds that he could draw over the earth, nor showers that he could pour down

from the sky. He thundered aloud, and darted the poised lightning from his right ear against the

charioteer, and at the same moment deprived him both of his life and his seat, and by his ruthless
fires restrained the flames. The horses are affrighted, and, making a bound in an opposite

direction, they shake the yoke from off their necks, and disengage themselves from the torn

harness. In one place lie the reins; in another, the axle-tree wrenched away from the pole; in

1 (National Gallery of Art)
2 (Riley)
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