Charger with Marcus Curtius plunging into the chasm

Painter of the Milan Marsyas

National Gallery of Art

This circular earthenware plate is painted with a landscape scene showing a man on horseback in the center flanked by a group of about a dozen men to the left and ten boys and men to the right. The white horse faces our right as it rears up on its back legs and looks down at a dark chasm in the earth beneath its front legs. The man astride the horse has pale skin and light brown hair, and he holds a sword as he looks back to the crowd to our left. Everyone in the crowd also has pale skin. Most of the people wear vibrant, royal and sky blue and pumpkin orange, with a few touches of butter yellow, turquoise, and purple. Both groups are situated in front of sandstone-colored columns and pediments, which flank the scene. A cluster of buildings rises along a ridge in the middle distance to the left of center, and more structures are built along a riverbank to our right. The river weaves away from us to blue mountains in the deep distance.