Medieval ,
Canterbury, 1150s Medieval depictions are sometimes found in
illuminated manuscripts and other media. The incident was regarded as a
typological precursor of the
Annunciation, and sometimes paired with it. This probably accounts for it being represented as a faded fresco on the rear wall in the
" Annunciation" by Jan van Eyck in the
National Gallery of Art, Washington. It might also be regarded as prefiguring "the reception of Christ by the community of the faithful," the
Resurrection of Jesus, and the escape from the
Massacre of the Innocents by the
Flight into Egypt. The princess was often seen allegorically as representing the Church, or earlier, the
Gentile Church. Alternatively, Moses might be a type for
Saint Peter, and so by extension the Pope or
Papacy. Cycles with the life of Moses were not common, but where they exist, they may be with this subject if they have more than four scenes. The fourth century
Brescia Casket includes it among its 4 or 5 relief scenes from the Life of Moses, and there is thought to have been a depiction (now lost) in the mosaics of
Santa Maria Maggiore. There is a 12th-century cycle in
stained glass in the
Basilica of Saint-Denis which includes it. Cycles are most often paired with one of the "
Life of Christ", as later in the
Sistine Chapel, where the scheme of paired cycles was intended to evoke the oldest Christian art. There are several short cycles in luxury manuscripts of the
Bible Moralisée and related types, some of which give the story more than one image. ,
Amiens Cathedral The depiction in the 12th-century English
Eadwine Psalter has a naked female swimmer in the water, holding the empty ark with one hand, while a clothed female with her feet in the water holds out the baby to the princess, who reclines on a bed or litter. This is part of some 11 scenes of the life of Moses. This may relate to the Jewish visual traditions covered below. The artist of a French Romanesque capital has enjoyed himself showing the infant Moses threatened by
crocodiles and perhaps hippos, as often shown in
classical depictions of the Nile landscape. This sporadic treatment anticipates modern
Biblical criticism: "The cameo of the birth of Moses does not fit the reality of the Nile, where crocodiles would make it dangerous to send a babe in a basket onto the water or even to bathe by the shore: even if the poor were forced to take the risk, no princess would." File:Vitraux Saint-Denis 190110 10.jpg|12th-century glass,
Saint-Denis File:Chapiteau de St-Nectaire - Moïse sauvé des eaux.jpg|French Romanesque capital, aware of the
classical tradition of the Nilotic landscape File:Yokébed BnF Latin 4915 fol. 35.jpg|Moses being "exposed," very much in an "ark," 15th-century miniature File:Bible historiale - BL Royal 18 D IX f109 (Moïse sauvé des eaux) (cropped).jpg|The casting-off in the foreground, combined with the finding at rear, 15th-century.
Renaissance onwards , 1647 (the "Pointel" version),
Louvre. Men hunt hippos from a boat behind. The walls of the
Sistine Chapel had
facing paired cycles of the lives of Christ and Moses in large frescos, and a "Finding" by
Pietro Perugino began the Moses sequence on the altar wall until it was destroyed in the 1530s to make space for
The Last Judgment by
Michelangelo, along with a "Nativity of Jesus". Perugino's
Moses Leaving for Egypt now begins the cycle. Independent pictures of the subject became increasingly popular in the Renaissance and Baroque periods, when the combination of several elegantly dressed and graceful ladies with a waterside landscape or classical architectural background made it attractive to artists and patrons. For
Venice the story had a particular resonance with the early history of the city. These paintings were for homes and palaces, sometimes for foundling hospitals. , c. 1570,
Louvre In addition,
child abandonment remained a significant social issue in the period, with
foundling hospitals,
orphanages specifically for abandoned children, a common focus of charitable activity by the rich. The seal of the London
Foundling Hospital showed the scene. The artist
Francis Hayman gave them his painting of the subject, where it hung next to
William Hogarth's painting of a slightly later episode of the young Moses and the princess. A depiction by
Charles de La Fosse was one of a pair of biblical subjects commissioned in 1701 for the
billiards room at the
Palace of Versailles, paired with "
Eliezer and
Rebecca"; possibly the idea was to encourage those winning bets on the game to give their winnings to charity. The 17th century saw the height of popularity for the subject, with
Poussin painting it at least three times, as well as several versions of "The Exposition of Moses". It has been suggested that the birth in 1638 of the future
Louis XIV, whose parents had been childless for 23 years, may have been a factor in the interest of French artists. The poet
Antoine Girard de Saint-Amant wrote an
epic poem, "Moyse sauvé" between about 1638 and 1653. , 1545,
Brera, Milan, 175 × 345 cm As well as the Catholic countries, there were also several versions in
Dutch Golden Age painting, where the
Old Testament subject was considered unobjectionable, orphanages were run by boards of "regents" drawn from the local wealthy, and the story of Moses was also given contemporary political significance. A painting of the subject shown on the wall behind "
The Astronomer" by
Vermeer may represent knowledge and science, as Moses was "learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians." A painting by
Bonifazio de' Pitati of 1545 was perhaps the first large and elaborate treatment of the subject to concentrate on a larger courtly group, entirely using carefully depicted contemporary costumes; he painted at least one smaller similar version of the subject. Bonifazio painted a number of biblical subjects as "modern aristocratic reality", which was already an established pictorial mode in Venice. This is essentially a large aristocratic picnic, complete with musicians, dwarves, many dogs and a monkey, and strolling lovers, where the baby represents an object of polite curiosity. A
Niccolò dell'Abbate from c. 1570, now in the Louvre, represents a more classical treatment, with the same "classical" costumes and atmosphere as his mythological subjects. This is closely followed by several compositions by
Veronese, using the modern dress of his day. , 1580s,
Dijon. The paintings of Veronese and others, especially Venetians, offered some of the attractions of subjects from pagan mythology but with a subject with a Christian context. Veronese had been called before the Inquisition in 1573 for the improper depiction of the
Last Supper as an extravagant festivity mainly in modern dress, which he renamed "
The Feast in the House of Levi." Since the "Finding" indeed called for a party of lavishly dressed court ladies and their attendants, it avoided such objections. Veronese's costumes, contemporary when he painted them in the 1570s and 580s, became established as a sort of standard, and wseveraland repeated in new compositions by a umber of Venetian painters in the 18th century, during a "Veronese revival." The famous painting by
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo in the
National Gallery of Scotland dates from the 1730s or 1740s, but avoids the fashion of that period and bases its costumes on a Veronese now in
Dresden, but in Venice until 1747; another Tiepolo now in the
National Gallery of Victoria uses the style of Veronese even more thoroughly. ,
National Gallery of Scotland, probably 1730s, now 202 × 342 cm
Nicolas Poussin was attracted both to subjects from the life of Moses and history subjects with an Egyptian setting. His figures wore the 17th-century idea of ancient dress, and the cityscapes in the distant background include
pyramids and
obelisks, where previously most artists, for example, Veronese, had not attempted to represent a specifically Egyptian setting. An exception is NiccolincludesAbbate, whose broadly painted cityscape include several prominent triangular elements, although some might be gable-ends. Palm trees are also sometimes seen; European artists, even in the north, had been used to depicting these from painting the "Miracle of the Palm" on the
Flight into Egypt in particular. For good measure the main three versions by Poussin all include a Roman-style
Nilus, the god or personification of the Nile, reclining with a
cornucopia, in two of them in company with a
sphinx, which follows a specific classical statue in the Vatican. His 1647 version for the banker Pointel (now Louvre) includes a
hippopotamus hunt on the river in the background, adapted from the Roman
Nile mosaic of Palestrina. In a discussion at the
Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture in 1688, the painting was criticised for two breaches of artistic decorum: the princess' skin was too dark, and the pagan god was inappropriate in a biblical subject. Both details were corrected in a version in
tapestry, though the sphinx survived. Poussin's treatments show awareness of much of the scholarly interest in Moses in terms of what we now call
comparative religion. After that, attempts at an authentic Egyptian setting were irregular until the start of the 19th century, with the advent of modern
Egyptology, and in art, the development of
Orientalism. By the late 19th century, exotic decor was often dominant, and several depictions concentrated on the ladies of the court, naked but for carefully researched jewellery. The reed beds in the Bible are often given prominence. The extensive history of the scene in the cinema began in 1905, the year after Sir
Lawrence Alma-Tadema finished his painting, with the "Finding" the opening scene in a 5-minute biographical film by the French company
Pathé. ; Orientalist depictions File:Frederick Goodall - The Finding of Moses.jpg|
The Finding of Moses by
Frederick Goodall, 1885 File:Edwin Long 002.jpg|
Edwin Long, 1886 File:Tissot Pharaoh's Daughter Has Moses Brought to Her.jpg|
James Tissot, 1896–1902,
gouache File:Moses - Alta-Tadema.jpg|
The Finding of Moses by Alma-Tadema, 1904 File:Delaroche Discovery of Moses.jpg|A painting by
Paul Delaroche, before 1857, was much reproduced in prints and book illustrations ==Jewish art and traditions==