Public domain
Cupid and a Dying Maiden
From the collection of Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
Cupid has shot an arrow into the heart of a young woman and looks on in shock as she dies. A doctor feels her pulse and holds a bottle of liquid in his hand. In the background, a table with a loving couple, of whom the man has an arrow, which was fired at death, in his back. Death scratches his skull in surprise because the struck man does not fall dead but is in love. The text accompanying the print reveals that the bundles of arrows from Cupid and Death have been swapped, causing the young woman to die and the old man to fall in love.
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam’s own descriptionCredit lineCupido en een stervende maagd. 1637. Crispijn van den Queborn. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. Public domain.