Daniel in the Lions' Den
The original, as its museum records it
Every line above is reproduced from the holding institution’s own catalogue entry, which is linked. Where their title, date or attribution differs from ours, theirs is the one printed here.
The file this print is made from
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About this painting
The only light in the den falls through a narrow opening above his head, and Daniel turns his face into it, the one thread to the world outside the pit. He sits, legs crossed, hands clasped at his chest, not fighting the lions but praying among them.
Rachel Pollack notes the story was read as a prefiguration of the Resurrection, which makes that opening the mouth of a tomb and the skull below it the alternative. No church patron is documented; Rubens traded the canvas to the diplomat Dudley Carleton around 1618, for antique sculpture from his collection.
Sources: National Gallery of Art, Washington, Rubens, 'Daniel in the Lions' Den', object description. · National Gallery of Art, Washington, Rubens, 'Daniel in the Lions' Den', provenance. · Rachel Aviva Pollack, "Peter Paul Rubens' Daniel in the Lions' Den: Its Sources and Its Political Significance," M.A. thesis, University of Maryland, 2015 · Rachel Aviva Pollack, "Peter Paul Rubens' Daniel in the Lions' Den" (thesis, University of Maryland).
My God hath sent his angel, and hath shut up the mouths of the lions, and they have not hurt me: forasmuch as before him justice hath been found in me: yea, and before thee, O king, I have done no offence.
Daniel 6:22 · Douay-Rheims (Challoner), from the project’s own corpus at data/bible_drc.js
Printed on demand. Public-domain masterwork, reproduced from a 7,633 px master of the original. The whole image is printed — never cropped to fit the sheet — so every sheet carries an archival margin, and the dimensions and resolution listed above are the ones you receive.