L’Archange Raphaël et Tobie

This is early Titian, painted in Venice around 1512, when he was still in his twenties and making his name. The subject comes from the Book of Tobit: the boy Tobias is sent on a long and risky journey to collect a family debt, and walks beside the archangel Raphael, who has come disguised as an ordinary traveller to keep him safe. Tobias carries the fish whose organs will later cure his father's blindness, and a small dog trots along at their feet. In Venice, a city that sent its young men off on trading voyages, the guardian-angel theme had a real hold, and pictures like this were often paid for as prayers for a traveller's safe return. It now hangs in the Accademia, the city's great gallery.