Phaedria and Cymochles
Artist: William Etty (British, 1787–1849)
Date: ca. 1830
Medium: Oil on panel
Collection: Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton, New Jersey, United States
Description
"Along the shore, as swift as glance of eye, A little gondelay, bedecked trim With boughs and arbours woven cunningly, That like a little forest seemed outwardly . . . And therein sate a ladye fresh and fayre . . ."
~ Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, Book II Canto VI (1596)
The above passage from Spenser's epic poem representing the twelve moral virtues served as Etty's inspiration for this painting. While searching for the protagonist of Book II-sir Guyon, the personification of Temperance-the knight Cymochles is lured by the temptress Phaedria onto her boat.