Recto Euclid instructing his Pupils

This metalpoint and ink drawing on paper shows two distinct groups of figures in quick, expressive lines. The main grouping features Euclid (traditionally identified with the features of the architect Bramante) surrounded by pupils who lean in with expressions of varying comprehension. This is a preliminary study for the lower right foreground of Raphael's famous 'School of Athens' fresco.

Euclid represents the Liberal Art of Geometry, which was essential to the Renaissance Neoplatonic understanding of the 'sacred geometry' underlying the structure of the universe. Within the philosophical tradition, geometry was seen as a bridge between the mutable physical world and the eternal, divine realm of forms.