Landscape with Apollo and Mercury
by CLAUDE LORRAIN, Oil on canvas, 74,5 x 110,5 cm
Apollo was sent by his father Jupiter to serve king Admetus as a shepherd, a punishment for killing the Cyclopes, Jupiter’s armourers. This pastoral Apollo sits under a tree and is playing his lyre while sheep browse in a meadow. He is also a herdsman watching over cattle somewhat inattentively, since Mercury succeeds in stealing them unobserved.