Oedipus1.0016_SalvatorRosa

Salvator Rosa, 1615-1673, "The Rescue of the Infant Oedipus", etching with drypoint (1663), 2 states. Bartsch no. 8; Royal Academy of Arts, object no. 03/4647. Prints also owned by Metropolitan Museum of Art

Salvator Rosa's 17th century depiction of this moment is the earliest graphic adaptation of the Oedipus myth in Reid's OGCMA; all earlier items are literary or dramatic.And the next listed graphic adaptation in Reid is Henry Fuseli's 1768 drawing "Oedipus Answers the Riddle of the Sphinx"(OedipusSphinx1.0002).

The image at right is a detail of a larger scene. The focal point of the graphic narrative is the moment the well meaning woodsman subverts Fate and save the life of an exposed infant. Who wouldn't have done this?

The caption in Latin is addressed to "Giulio Martinello, my dearest friend: Oedipus here, with his feet upturned to the stars, teaches that any person enters his own fate. — Salvator Rosa designed, painted, and carved this." Oedipus hic fixis, versisque ad sidera plantis Edocet ad sortem quemlibet ire suam. Salvator Rosa inv[enit] pinx[it] scul[psit].

Bibliography:
Bartsch, Adam. 1920-1922. Le peintre graveur. Würzburg. vol. 20, p. 163, no. 8.

Wallace, Richard W. 1979. The Etchings of Salvator Rosa. Princeton. No. 116.