Abraham interceding with God for the preservation of Sodom and Gomorrah (Abraham priant le Seigneur d'épargner Sodome et Gomorrhe)

Etching with a Biblical scene of the Genesis, illustrating the passage in which Abraham receives three visitors, who carry the message of Sarah's pregnancy, and his prayers for Sodom. The composition, as is common in many of Delaune's Biblical scenes, illustrates simultaneously several distinct episodes from history: on the left, Abraham kneels in prayer in front of the Lord, who is illustrated floating on a cloud diagonally above him, interceding for the preservation of Sodom (Genesis 18:18-32); to the right, on a second plane, Abraham sits at the entrance to his tent (represented here as a wooden house), in the middle of the day, illustrating the first verse of the chapter (Genesis 18:1); on the background, in a pasture between the tent and the view of the towns, Abraham kneels at the view of three angels (Genesis 18:2). This subject on the background had already been represented by Delaune in a 1561 etching, in a similar way.




The scene is part of a set of 36 prints illustrating the history of the Genesis, all with an inscription in Latin under the picture, summarizing the passage of the Bible that is subject of the picture. The succession of episodes in this set is somewhat chaotic, as only three plates illustrate the history of Creation, while six are consecrated to the history of Adam and Eve, and with striking breaks in the narration. The existence of more complete sets of drawings by Delaune on the same subject suggest that he might have intended more plates to illustrate the history of the Genesis in a more thorough manner, although the prints are yet to be found. Many of these prints represent, simultaneously, two or more episodes separated in time, following the 16th century tradition, inherited from the Middle Ages. Most of them are also inspired on the engravings by Bernard Salomon, created to illustrate the "Quadrins historiques de la Bible" (Historical Biblical Scenes) by Claude Paradin, first published in Lyon in 1553.