Homer's Women

Penelope and Odysseus

Nigel Bruce

• 1 min read
Penelope and Odysseus
Honoré Daumier: "Ulysses and Penelope” in The National Gallery - Alexandros Soutzos Museum, Athens

The drawing above is Honoré Daumier's satirical take on Penelope and Odysseus reunited in the matrimonial bed (1842), from the series Histoire ancienne. It reminds me of this version from Milos circa 450 BC, which Daumier had probably seen.

Plaque de Milo "Pénélope et Ulysse" - Musée du Louvre

This (cropped) drawing below is just as honest about how the couple may have actually looked in late middle age. It's by Paul Charles Delaroche for an opera by Gabriel Fauré - Pénélope - staged in Paris in 1913.

Bibliothèque nationale de France

A more conventional, if unusual, view is below - a Mannerist style painting by Francesco Primaticcio around 1560.

Primaticcio-Penelope-Odysseus
Toledo Museum of Art