Bacchus and Ariadne

Italian sculptor Giuseppe Boschi based this work on the restored ancient Roman sculpture then kept at Marbury Hall in England but now in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. The Roman god Bacchus, ruler of wine and the harvest, made the mortal woman Ariadne an immortal when he married her. It is possible that this sculpture presents the couple during a moment of post-marital bliss. However, it is also likely that Bacchus is shown with one of his female attendants, a bacchante. The crown of vines and fur pelt mantle (neither preserved in the antique sculpture fragments) associate her with the wilderness—a link that clashes with Ariadne’s story. Enlightenment artists well-versed in classical mythology could complicate or entirely reconfigure subject matter with subtle alterations in form.