Paris court

The painting by Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472-1553), an artist of the Northern Renaissance, is based on the story of how the Trojan prince Paris chooses the most beautiful of the goddesses. However, the artist was not based on Greek myth, but on its processing, presented in the novel "The History of the Destruction of Troy" by Guido del Colonna. This 13th-century Italian writer Paris has a royal son who, lost in the forest, fell asleep under a tree and saw in a dream three beautiful goddesses - Hera, Athena and Aphrodite, and the god Hermes, who suggested that he execute his judgment and hand the apple to the winner.

At Cranach, Paris is depicted as a knight in armor, in front of whom are three goddesses, naked, with flexible bodies. The shade of courtesy, which is carried in all the works of the master, is expressed here as the very interpretation of the plot - the knight and the ladies, and the gestures of the characters. Cranach's usual bright cold colors and carefully painted details give the canvas a decorative look.