STORIE D'ARTE

JOSEPH WERNER (1637 Bern 1710)
Apollo and the Cumaean Sibyl
Oil on copper. 18.5 × 13.4 cm.
Estimate: CHF 30 000 / 50 000
Auction: 23 September 2023
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This charming small-format painting depicts a scene not often represented in art: Apollo and the Cumaean Sibyl. The Sibyls were women with a special gift for predicting the future, associated with various temples in the ancient world. The Cumaean Sibyl’s temple was that of Apollo, near Naples. Ovid, in his ‘Metamorphoses’, recounts how the god himself approached her, desiring to take her virginity, in exchange for which he would grant her any wish.

‘I pointed to a heap of dust collected there, and foolishly replied, “As many birthdays must be given to me as there are particles of sand”. For I forgot to wish them days of changeless youth. He gave long life and offered youth besides, if I would grant his wish. This I refused…’ Apollo granted the Sibyl’s literal wish, to live for a thousand years, but as she became older, her body diminished in size and became so small that she had to be placed in a glass jar. Eventually her physical envelope disappeared altogether, only her voice remained.

Michelangelo. The Cumaean Sibyl, 1508–1512.
© Sixtine Chapel, Vatican Museums

Domenicho Zampieri (Domenichino)
The Cumaean Sibyl, 1622.
© Capitoline Museums, Rome

The Sibyl of Cumae is also known for conducting Aeneas through a cave towards the underworld to speak with his dead father, Anchises, as related in Virgil’s ‘Aeneid’. The area west of Naples is sometimes known as the ‘Campi Flegrei’, or ‘fiery fields’ because of its volcanic activity, and the many caves there were sometimes perceived as the gates of hell. She is best known for appearing to the last king of Rome, Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, as an old woman who offered to sell him nine books which she said contained all of the Sibylline prophecies. The King refused, not believing her, and finding the price she asked exorbitant. The Sibyl then burned three of the books in front of the King and asked for the same price for the remaining six. Again he refused, upon which she burned three more. At this point the King began wondering whether he had acted too hastily, and consulted his advisors, who informed him that what the Sibyl was offering was actually priceless and that he would do well to obtain the remaining books at any price. Once the King paid what the Sibyl demanded, she disappeared. The three books with her prophecies were kept in the Temple of Jupiter on Capitoline Hill in Rome for over four hundred years, and consulted in times of need, until they were destroyed in a fire in the 80s BCE.

The present painting is from a series of works illustrating scenes from the ‘Metamorphoses’ painted by Joseph Werner during his stay in Rome in the 1660s. The Cumaean Sibyl would have been well-known to Werner’s public, as she was the subject of many paintings by Renaissance artists, including Michelangelo, Raphael, Guercino and Domenichino. The reason for this is in his ‘Eclogue 4’, Virgil attributed a prophecy to the Sibyl about a child to be born who would become divine and rule the world. Later, this was taken by the Emperor Constantine, Saint Augustine and others to be a prophecy about Jesus Christ. It is interesting that Werner chose a lesser-known event from the Sibyl’s legend, but one that would change her destiny, as she hopefully holds out a handful of sand to the implacable deity.

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Guercino
The Cumaean Sibyl with a Putto, 1651
© National Gallery, London