Full title | The Massacre of the Innocents |
---|---|
Artist | Gerolamo Mocetto |
Artist dates | about 1458 - 1531 |
Series | The Massacre of the Innocents |
Date made | about 1500-25 |
Medium and support | Oil on canvas, presumably transferred from wood |
Dimensions | 67.9 x 44.5 cm |
Acquisition credit | Bought, 1888 |
Inventory number | NG1240 |
Location | Not on display |
Collection | Main Collection |
The scene shows the violent biblical episode in which King Herod orders a massacre of all children under the age of two in an attempt to kill the newborn Christ, believing him to be a threat to his rule. This panel was once joined with the other painting by Mocetto in our collection, forming the left-hand part of the composition.
A number of the poses here are copied directly from engravings by the painter and printmaker Mantegna, who, like Mocetto, was working in the Veneto. The kneeling soldier who is about to plunge his dagger into an infant comes from Mocetto’s engraving The killing of the Sow (British Museum, London). The figure in this engraving is naked and about to ritually sacrifice a pig, which he holds steady by the ear.
The scene shows the violent biblical episode in which King Herod orders a massacre of all children under the age of two in an attempt to kill the newborn Christ, believing him to be a threat to his rule.
A soldier kneels, about to plunge his dagger into the infant lying on its back. Mocetto took this pose from one of his own engravings, The killing of the Sow (British Museum, London), which shows the figure naked and about to ritually sacrifice a pig; he holds it steady by the ear. Nearby a woman raises her arms in horror at the sight of her dead children, their bodies piled up before her. Her pose is copied from the figure of a woman mourning Christ in The Entombment, an engraving by Mantegna (Albertina, Vienna). Another woman tries to protect her child from the soldier in green who has already grabbed its arm; her head and turban are copied from another female mourner in The Entombment. The position of the two children at the woman’s feet is an exact copy of the two sleeping children in Mantegna’s engraving of Bacchanal with a Wine Vat (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York). The references show Mocetto’s knowledge and admiration of Mantegna’s work, as well as the idea that the ‘massacre of the innocents’, as the slaughter is known, prefigured Christ’s own violent execution.
This panel was once joined with another painting in our collection, and formed the left-hand part of the composition. Both pictures feature a variety of architectural features inspired by classical buildings, a setting popularised by Mantegna. This one shows a lofty marble archway, indented with niches which dwarf the figures. The arcade that runs along the right edge of the picture is topped by a balustrade of slender round columns – this appears to continue in the other half of the composition, where it runs along to top of the image.
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The Massacre of the Innocents
When Herod, King of Judea, found out about the birth of Jesus, who was being called ‘the king of the Jews’, he ordered the killing of all children under the age of two, an event known as the ‘massacre of the innocents’ (Matthew 2: 16).
These two pictures once formed a continuous image, but it was cut up before entering the National Gallery’s collection. The picture showing Herod overseeing the slaughter was originally to the right. The architecture – for example, the balustrade – continues from one scene to the next but the alignment is not seamless, suggesting that both paintings were cut down at the inside edge.
Paintings by Mocetto are quite rare; he is better known as an engraver. He has placed his signature on the pedestal supporting the column of Herod’s palace: HEROL/EMO / MOCETO / P.[INXIT] (‘Gerolamo Mocetto painted this’).
When Herod, King of Judea, found out about the birth of Jesus, who was being called ‘the king of the Jews’, he ordered the killing of all children under the age of two, an event known as the ‘massacre of the innocents’ (Matthew 2:16).
These two pictures once formed a continuous image, but it was cut up before entering our collection. The painting showing Herod overseeing the slaughter was originally to the right of The Massacre of the Innocents. The architecture – for example, the balustrade – continues from one scene to the next but the alignment is not seamless, suggesting that both paintings were cut down at the inside edge.
Paintings by Mocetto are quite rare; he is better known as an engraver. When the pictures were purchased by the National Gallery in 1888, they were considered particularly worthwhile because they are signed on the pedestal that supports the column of Herod’s palace: HEROL/EMO / MOCETO / P.[INXIT] (‘Gerolamo Mocetto painted this’). The Gallery’s director, who made the purchases, valued them because Mocetto was working in the Veneto at around the same time as Giovanni Bellini, the most famous Venetian painter of the Early Renaissance. The panels however show a very close affinity to the work of Bellini’s friend and rival, Mantegna; Mocetto even copied certain figures from Mantegna’s engravings.
In the eighteenth century, the pictures belonged to the British consul at Venice, John Strange. They were also included in a well-known eighteenth-century book on art history by Seroux d'Agincourt, a French art historian.


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