Erato

Angelo Maccagnino, also known as Angeli da Siena, painted this Erato — the Muse of love poetry — as part of what appears to have been a series of the Nine Muses, probably for a secular humanist commission in Ferrara or Siena in the 1460s–70s. Cycles of the Muses were a popular form of secular decoration in Italian Renaissance courts, connecting the patron's cultural ambitions to classical antiquity. Erato, identifiable by her lyre or cithara, presides over erotic and wedding poetry in the classical tradition. Maccagnino's Sienese training is visible in the graceful linearity of his female figure.

Maccagnino employs tempera with the delicate linearity of the Sienese tradition — sinuous contours, carefully rendered drapery patterns, and a palette that favours soft, harmonious colours over dramatic contrasts. The Muse's attribute is rendered with decorative precision. The figure's pose and the spatial setting reflect awareness of Ferrarese Renaissance innovations in the treatment of the standing female figure.