Mars et Rhéa Silvia

Rubens painted this around 1617, and it was never meant to hang as a picture at all. It is a full-size design for a tapestry, the kind of large-scale commission his Antwerp workshop turned out like a business. That practical purpose leaves a clue in the image. Because a woven tapestry comes out as a mirror of its model, Mars wears his sword on the wrong side and the statue of the goddess holds her shield in the wrong hand. The story is the founding of Rome. Mars, the war god, steps down from a cloud toward the Vestal Rhea Silvia, led on by a small Cupid, and their sons will be Romulus and Remus. It has belonged to the princes of Liechtenstein since 1710.