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Lot Essay
The three Punic Wars, fought on land and sea from 264 to 146 BC between the Rome and Carthage, caused a constant shifting of power over the Mediterranean region. Terrible battles and outstanding acts of heroism, narrated by contemporaries and historians, inspired countless Roman and Renaissance works of art.
The present, very rare engraving by the French painter, sculptor, medalist and trained goldsmith Pierre Woeiriot, depicts a little-known episode from the end of the third and final Punic War, which saw the Roman Empire victorious. According to the Greek historian Polybius, the general of the Carthaginian forces, Hasdrubal, surrendered to the Roman forces during the Siege of Carthage in 146 BC after an arduous defense. Hasdrubal’s life was spared by the Roman general and proconsul Scipio Aemilianus (the adopted grandson of Scipio Africanus) and his freedom granted on condition of his army’s surrender and the destruction of the city of Carthage. Hasdrubal's wife, whose name is not recorded, cursed her husband and - to save the honour of her family and the people of Carthage - threw herself and her children into the flames of a burning temple.
Pierre Woeiriot had travelled to Italy, but returned to France around 1555, where he worked primarily in Lyon. A copy or a heavily reworked second state of the print was later published by Philippe Thomassin, a French publisher active in Italy.
The present, very rare engraving by the French painter, sculptor, medalist and trained goldsmith Pierre Woeiriot, depicts a little-known episode from the end of the third and final Punic War, which saw the Roman Empire victorious. According to the Greek historian Polybius, the general of the Carthaginian forces, Hasdrubal, surrendered to the Roman forces during the Siege of Carthage in 146 BC after an arduous defense. Hasdrubal’s life was spared by the Roman general and proconsul Scipio Aemilianus (the adopted grandson of Scipio Africanus) and his freedom granted on condition of his army’s surrender and the destruction of the city of Carthage. Hasdrubal's wife, whose name is not recorded, cursed her husband and - to save the honour of her family and the people of Carthage - threw herself and her children into the flames of a burning temple.
Pierre Woeiriot had travelled to Italy, but returned to France around 1555, where he worked primarily in Lyon. A copy or a heavily reworked second state of the print was later published by Philippe Thomassin, a French publisher active in Italy.