The Battle of the Taro

In 1578 Duke Guglielmo Gonzaga commissioned from Tintoretto a run of eight large canvases for the ducal palace in Mantua, a painted family record of Gonzaga men winning their battles. This one goes back to 1495, when Francesco II Gonzaga led the army of an Italian league against the French king Charles VIII, whose troops were retreating from Italy, by the river Taro near Fornovo. You can pick Francesco out on the left, giving orders, and the banner behind his head carries his emblem, the sun, so that it reads almost like a halo. The battle was short and bloody, and the museum points out that neither side really won it, although both claimed the victory. The eight canvases left Mantua long ago and now hang together in Munich.