Penelope with the bow of Ulysses
1841-44RCIN 71423
The faithful Penelope, wife of Odysseus, King of Ithaca, awaits the contest that concludes Homer’s Odyssey. Whichever of her suitors can bend her absent husband’s bow and shoot an arrow through a set of rings shall win her hand. Odysseus himself appears, dressed in rags, to win the contest. The hound, Argus, is the first to recognise his master.
Commissioned by Queen Victoria in 1841
No. 81