Niobe Turned to Stone

Niobe's pride gives way to a grief so absolute that she becomes stone. The chapter describes her boast that her many children make her superior to Latona, followed by the deaths inflicted by Apollo and Diana. The engraving spreads the catastrophe across a crowded landscape beneath the celestial archers.

The commentary reads petrification as an image of grief that renders a person motionless and speechless, and relates the story to a weeping rock at Mount Sipylus. Those interpretations deepen the scene beyond its violence: the final transformation is the terrible stillness left after loss.

Historical context is adapted from the accompanying commentary by Antoine de La Barre de Beaumarchais. Its interpretations reflect the period in which the book was published.

This edition follows plate 46 in Le Temple des Muses. The complete historical page and its explanatory text remain available in the source record. Source attribution: Bernard Picart and other engravers, Le Temple des Muses (1749 edition). Museum date: 1749 (publication). Source medium: Engraving, inner pictorial scene. Source portfolio: Le Temple des Muses, plate 46.

The inner illustration has been straightened and extracted from its surrounding engraved frame, caption and paper. The comparison shows that extracted engraving beside Surrealium's contemporary colour interpretation.

Surrealium's contemporary AI-assisted colour interpretation takes this print as its starting point. The colours are interpretive choices made for this edition.

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