Apollo standing at left shooting a python with an arrow, above to the left are the muses and at right on a cloud Cupid approaching Apollo, from "Story of Apollo and Daphne"

Apollo standing at left shooting a python with an arrow, above to the left are the muses and at right on a cloud Cupid approaching Apollo, from "Story of Apollo and Daphne"

Master of the Die

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

According to Ovid (Metamorphoses 1.253-444), Jupiter destroyed the violent race that arose from the blood of the Giants with a universal flood. When the waters receded, the monstrous Python emerged and was slain by Apollo, as seen in the foreground of this engraving. In the background, Apollo, in the pride of his victory, mocks Cupid (the Greek Eros) for attempting to wield the bow, a weapon unsuited to his diminutive stature. To the left, Cupid exacts his revenge, aiming at Apollo's heart the golden arrow that inflicts love. Cupid has already shot the nymph Daphne-seen in the distance leading the life of a virgin huntress-but with a lead-tipped arrow that has made her hostile to love.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Apollo standing at left shooting a python with an arrow, above to the left are the muses and at right on a cloud Cupid approaching Apollo, from "Story of Apollo and Daphne"Apollo standing at left shooting a python with an arrow, above to the left are the muses and at right on a cloud Cupid approaching Apollo, from "Story of Apollo and Daphne"Apollo standing at left shooting a python with an arrow, above to the left are the muses and at right on a cloud Cupid approaching Apollo, from "Story of Apollo and Daphne"Apollo standing at left shooting a python with an arrow, above to the left are the muses and at right on a cloud Cupid approaching Apollo, from "Story of Apollo and Daphne"Apollo standing at left shooting a python with an arrow, above to the left are the muses and at right on a cloud Cupid approaching Apollo, from "Story of Apollo and Daphne"

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.