“The Death of Virginia”
Neoclassical School, 19th Century
Oil on canvas
This painting is a 19th-century copy of The Death of Virginia, a powerful composition rooted in the Neoclassical tradition.
The subject, drawn from Livy’s Roman history, portrays one of antiquity’s most tragic episodes: the death of Virginia, daughter of the centurion Virginius, who kills her to save her from enslavement by the tyrant Appius Claudius, a Decemvir.
The composition echoes the influence of Jacques-Louis David and his followers, with its classical clarity, moral gravity, and theatrical intensity.
In the visual culture of the late 18th and 19th centuries, the story of Virginia came to symbolize republican virtue, resistance to tyranny, and the primacy of civic duty over personal loss.
