Mercury Entering Herse's Room After Changing Agraulos to Stone, from Ovid, Metamorphoses, Book II

The engraving shows Mercury entering a lavish bedchamber where Herse lies partially draped. In the right background, the figure of Envy infects Herse's sister Agraulos, who is subsequently seen as a stone statue in a doorway. A small dog sits on the floor in the foreground near a vase of flowers, contrasting with the dramatic divine intervention occurring around the bed.

This work illustrates a scene from Ovid's Metamorphoses, a text that served as a primary source for Renaissance allegorical and alchemical thought. Mercury (Hermes) serves here as both a mythological protagonist and a symbol of the transformative 'mercurial' power central to Hermetic philosophy and the alchemical process.