Alegoria da castidade

Lotto made this small panel around 1505, when he was a young painter working in Treviso, north of Venice. It was probably never meant to hang on its own. In those years a fine portrait often came with a painted cover that slid over it, and Lotto painted just such a lid for the local bishop, Bernardo de' Rossi. This panel likely served the same private purpose for another sitter. A young woman sits on a grassy bank while a winged putto drops small white flowers into her lap. Off in one corner a satyr tips a jar of wine into his mouth, a female satyr watching from the other side. Scholars still argue over exactly what she stands for, from a plain figure of chastity to Petrarch's beloved Laura.