A scene from the story about the virtuous Roman Lucretia (as told by Livy), oil on panel, 49.5 x 72 cm, framed

Provenance:
Belgian private collection.

Liliane Huillet believes that the present painting is an autograph work by Jan Pieter Brueghel, a son of Jan Brueghel the Younger. She compares it to a signed painting of Vertumnus and Pomona, which had once figured in the collection of the margraves and grand dukes of Baden and appeared on the art marked in 1996. Before this discovery, Jan Pieter Brueghel had exclusively been known as a painter of still lifes in the tradition of his family. Jan Pieter became a master of the Guild of Saint Luke in Antwerp in 1645/46. In later years he lived in Liège and is documented to have been in Venice in 1664.

The picture describes the moment when the virtuous Lucretia wards off the lecherous Sextus Tarquinius. The drama of the scene is augmented by the animals, which the painter has rendered with great virtuosity and all of which have a symbolic meaning. The monkey stands for infidelity, whereas the salamander and the snake represent the poison destroying marriage; the leopard and the goat are embodiments of untamed lust, while the lion signifies male violence.