Sine Cerere et Baccho Friget Venus [Without Ceres and Bacchus Venus Grows Cold]

Between 1597 and 1606, Jan Muller made a number of large-scale engravings after Bartholomeus Spranger, the court painter to Emperor Rudolf II. As in the present work all were mythological subjects with erotic themes or overtones, and Muller used a dynamic swelling and tapering line to capture the mannered poses and exaggerated musculature of Spranger’s subjects.



The subject is taken from The Eunuch, a comedy from 161 BCE by the Roman playwright Terrence. Its meaning is that without food and wine, love would grow cold and is illustrated by the presence of Ceres, the goddess of agriculture and Bacchus, the god of wine and fertility walking off, while Venus, the goddess of love stays behind with Cupid, warming themselves at a fire. The theme was a popular one in the late sixteenth century and particularly at Rudolf’s court, but the interpretation here is unusual. Usually Bacchus and Ceres have not already left Venus behind. The design is based on a painting from around 1600 by Spranger, now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (inv. no. Gemäldegalerie 2435), which was painted for Rudolf.