Daniel Saving Susanna, the Judgment of Daniel, and the Execution of the Elders
Master of Apollo and Daphne·c. 1500
Historical Context
This companion cassone panel completes the Story of Susanna with the dramatic climax: Daniel's intervention, his exposure of the elders' perjury, and their execution. The Master of Apollo and Daphne, an anonymous Florentine painter, produced narrative panels in the tradition of Apollonio di Giovanni. The two Susanna panels would have decorated opposite sides of a cassone, providing a complete moral narrative of virtue vindicated and corruption punished.
Technical Analysis
The tempera-on-panel painting continues the bright palette and narrative format of its companion, with the trial scene and execution arranged in clear, legible episodes. The architectural settings provide spatial organization for the multi-figure narrative.
Provenance
Trotti and Company, Paris, by 1915 [see Paul Schubring, 1915, p. 301]; sold by the Ehrich Galleries, New York, to Martin A. Ryerson (d. 1932), Chicago, 1917 [entry in Ryerson’s notebook, April 24, 1917, see Ryerson Papers, Archives, The Art Institute of Chicago; receipt of payment dated May 8, 1917 in curatorial file]; on loan to the Art Institute of Chicago from 1917; bequeathed to the Art Institute, 1933.
