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Wikimedia Commons · Public domain · Hover to magnify, click for fullscreen
Original fileafter Hendrick Goltzius
The left panel shows Titus Manlius Torquatus from behind on a muscular horse, wearing the golden chain or 'torque' he won from a Gaulish giant. The right panel depicts Marcus Curtius on a rearing horse, illustrating his legendary leap into a chasm to save the Roman Republic. The figures are characterized by the heavy musculature and dramatic, twisting poses typical of the late 16th-century Dutch style.
These figures were reclaimed by Renaissance humanists and Neo-Stoics as archetypes of 'Virtus' (civic virtue) and 'Constantia' (steadfastness). In the context of the Northern Renaissance, these Roman exemplars served as moral allegories for the triumph of the disciplined soul over adversity and the sacrifice of the individual for the collective good.
Justus Lipsius
Lipsius was the primary philosopher of Neo-Stoicism, a movement that profoundly influenced the Haarlem Mannerists' depictions of Roman heroic virtue.
Cicero, De Officiis
This classical text served as the primary source for the ethical interpretation of Roman heroes as models of moral duty in the Renaissance.
Object
Engraving
allegory
Digital Source
Wikimedia Commons · Public domain
Art UK
Public domain
1200 × 656 px
b4efa86c32029fa84ad490bfbba42160f0cbb756
July 5, 2020
March 23, 2026
Linked Data
AI AI-cataloged fields generated by gemini-3-flash-preview on April 1, 2026. Getty identifiers are AI-inferred and may require verification.