Calumny of Apelles

The fresco of the Marriage of Alexander and Roxana (fig. 89), painted by Sodoma for Agostino Chigi’s bedchamber in the Villa Farnesina in Rome, is based on Lucian’s description of a painting by Apelles that celebrated this episode in the life of his patron Alexander the Great. Distantly based on a drawing by Raphael, the work was fairly certainly completed to coincide with Chigi’s marriage on 28 August 1519, under pressure from Pope Leo X, to his Venetian mistress, Francesca Ordeaschi …

It is commonly assumed that Raphael was the first artist to realize the potential of prints as a means to propagate his artistic fame, and that Marcantonio Raimondi, by agreeing to engrave prints after Raphael’s works, became the first reproductive printmaker. There can be little doubt that Raphael and Marcantonio worked together, and that the prints the latter produced as a result of this collaboration were instrumental in spreading Raphael’s designs across Italy and the rest of Europe. What is …