page_title: Diana and Her Companions
section_title: Critical commentary
hierarchical_section_title: Diana and Her Companions / Critical commentary
caption_attribution_description: English: The Spinario or Thorn-Puller is a Greek bronze of the 1st century BC after classical and hellenistic models. Formerly in the Lateran; now in the Musei Capitolini as a gift of Sixtus IV, 1471
context_page_description: Diana and Her Companions is a painting by Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer completed in the early to mid-1650s, now at the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague. Although the exact year is unknown, the work may be the earliest painting of the artist still extant, with some art historians placing it before Christ in the House of Martha and Mary and some after.
  The painting's solemn mood is unusual for a scene depicting the goddess Diana, and the nymph washing the central figure's feet has captured the attention of critics and historians, both for her activity and contemporary clothing. Rather than directly illustrating one of the dramatic moments in well-known episodes from myths about Diana, the scene shows a woman and her attendants quietly at her toilette. The theme of a woman in a private, reflective moment would grow stronger in Vermeer's paintings as his career progressed.
  Nothing of the work's history before the mid-19th century is known, and the painting was not widely accepted as one of Vermeer's until the early 20th century, when its similarities with Mary and Martha were noticed.
context_section_description: The painting has an "overwhelming sense of solemnity more associated with Christian than with mythological traditions", according to Wheelock. The work may combine the Christian symbolism of foot-washing as purification with the allusions to chastity and purity invoked by Diana's modest dress and the white cloth and brass basin at her feet. The companion holding her own foot strongly resembles the ancient Spinario statue, a figure in a nearly identical pose, who is removing a thorn from the bottom of his foot. The thorn is a Christian symbol of the grief and trials of Jesus or of the suffering in this world.
  Foot washing is also a Christian symbol of humility and the nearness of death, and "the dignity with which Diana's companion performs her service recalls mary Magdalene washing Christ's feet with her tears", according to Wheelock. (Christ also kneeled before his disciples and washed their feet at the Last Supper.) Selena Cant believes Vermeer's contemporaries would have immediately drawn the association of foot-washing with the idea of Jesus washing feet. "[T]his maidservant steals the scene", according to Cant, who points out the "unusual brown-bronze bodice" worn by the servant.
  According to Wheelock, the painting "has [...] no obvious literary source". As a depiction of Diana, the painting is notable in part for what it does not depict—neither Actaeon catching sight of Diana and her nymphs bathing nor the actual moment when Callisto's pregnancy is revealed, both popular themes in mannerist painting in the early 17th century. Nor does the artist show Diana's hot temper or her harsh reactions to those episodes. The goddess's ability as a huntress is not signalled by dead game or bows and arrows. Even the dog is depicted as a gentle animal, not like the fast hounds normally seen in paintings of Diana.
  Ovid's Metamorphoses mentions that just before discovering Callisto's pregnancy, Diana washed her feet and then she and her attendants disrobed. Walter Liedtke points out that the nymph standing somewhat apart from the group, with her hands clenched in front of her abdomen, perhaps in contrast with the nymph showing devotion and fidelity by washing feet, may be Callisto. This scene would then illustrate part of that myth narrative, Liedtke asserts, although Wheelock states that the episode seems unrelated to the mood of the painting.
  The painting, according to Liedtke, "shows the artist already addressing his usual theme, women in private moments, and the complications of desire" as well as "the ability to sympathetically describe the private lives of women," and, while not as "profound" as Rembrandt's Bathsheba, Vermeer's work is "remarkable for its tenderness and sincerity", Liedtke believes. He notes that the painting shows the artist's aptitude for learning from the example of other artists and for observing light and color.
caption: The Spinario
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