View source for Et in Arcadia ego (Poussin)

{{Short description|Painting by Nicolas Poussin}}
{{About|the painting by Nicolas Poussin|the painting by Guercino|Et in Arcadia ego (Guercino)|the Star Trek episode|Et in Arcadia Ego (Star Trek: Picard)}}
{{Infobox artwork
| image_file = Nicolas Poussin - Et in Arcadia ego (deuxième version).jpg
| image_size = 400px
| title = Et in Arcadia ego
| other_title_1 = Les Bergers d'Arcadie
| artist = [[Nicolas Poussin]]
| year = 1637–1638
| medium = oil on canvas
| height_metric = 85
| width_metric = 121
| height_imperial = 34.25
| width_imperial = 47.24
| metric_unit = cm
| imperial_unit = in
| museum = [[Musée du Louvre]] 
| city = [[Paris]]
}}

'''''Et in Arcadia ego''''' (also known as '''''Les bergers d'Arcadie''''' or '''''The Arcadian Shepherds''''')<ref>Braider, Christopher, ''Refiguring the Real: Picture and Modernity in Word and Image, 1400–1700'', p. 292, 2015, Princeton University Press, {{ISBN|1400872758|978-1400872756}}</ref> is a 1637–38 [[painting]] by Classical painter [[Nicolas Poussin]]. It depicts a [[pastoral]] scene with idealized [[Shepherd|shepherds]] from [[classical antiquity]], and a woman, possibly a shepherdess, gathered around an austere [[tomb]] that includes the Latin inscription "Et in Arcadia ego", which is translated to "Even in [[Arcadia (utopia)|Arcadia]], there am I"; "Also in Arcadia am I"; or "I too was in Arcadia". Poussin also painted another version of the subject in 1627 under the same title.

The 1630s version is held in the [[Musée du Louvre]], Paris, while the 1627 version is held at [[Chatsworth House]], England. An earlier treatment of the theme was painted by [[Guercino]] {{Circa|1618}}–1622, also titled ''[[Et in Arcadia ego (Guercino)|Et in Arcadia ego]]''.

==Inspiration==
{{more citations needed|section|date=June 2020}}
[[Image:Et-in-Arcadia-ego.jpg|thumb|[[Et in Arcadia ego (Guercino)|Guercino's version]] of the subject ({{Circa|1618}}–1622)]]
A tomb with a memorial inscription (to [[Daphnis]]) amid the idyllic settings of [[Arcadia (region)|Arcadia]] is first described in [[Virgil]]'s ''[[Eclogues]]'' [[Eclogue 5|V]] 42 ff. Virgil took the idealized Sicilian rustics included in the ''Idylls'' of [[Theocritus]] and set them in the primitive Greek region of Arcadia (see Eclogues [[Eclogue 7|VII]] and [[Eclogue 10|X]]). The idea was taken up anew in the circle of [[Lorenzo de' Medici]] in the 1460s and 1470s, during the [[Florentine Renaissance]].

In his pastoral work ''Arcadia'' (1504), [[Jacopo Sannazaro]] fixed the Early Modern perception of Arcadia as a lost world of [[idyll]]ic bliss, remembered in regretful dirges. The first pictorial representation of the familiar ''memento mori'' theme, which was popularized in 16th-century Venice, now made more concrete and vivid by the inscription <small>ET IN ARCADIA EGO</small>, is [[Et in Arcadia ego (Guercino)|Guercino]]'s version, painted between 1618 and 1622. (It is held in the [[Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica]], Rome.) The inscription gains force from the prominent presence of a [[Skull (mythology)|skull]] in the foreground, beneath which the words are carved.

==1627 version==
{{more citations needed|section|date=June 2020}}
[[Image:Poussin1627.jpg|thumb|[[Nicolas Poussin|Poussin's]] 1627 version of the ''Et in Arcadia ego'', in [[Chatsworth House]], depicting a different tomb with the same inscription]]
Poussin's own first version of the painting (now in [[Chatsworth House]]) was probably commissioned as a reworking of Guercino's version. It is in a more [[Baroque]] style than the later version, and is characteristic of Poussin's early work. In the Chatsworth painting, the shepherds are discovering the half-hidden and overgrown tomb, and are reading the inscription with curious expressions. The woman, standing at the left, is posed in sexually suggestive fashion, very different from her austere counterpart in the later version, which is based on a statue from antiquity known as the ''Cesi Juno''.<ref>{{cite book |last=Barker |first=Emma |editor-last1=Perry |editor-first1=Gill |editor-last2=Cunningham |editor-first2=Colin |title=Academies, Museums and Canons of Art |publisher=Yale University Press |date=1999 |chapter=Chapter 2: The History of the Bloggs Family |isbn=978-0300077438}}</ref> The later version has a far more geometric composition and the figures are much more contemplative.

==Interpretation==
{{Expand section|date=August 2023}}
The literal translation of "Et in Arcadia Ego" is "Even in Arcadia, there am I". Poussin's earliest biographer, [[Giovanni Pietro Bellori]], understood the 'I' of the phrase to refer to [[Personifications of death|Death]], thus making the painting a ''[[memento mori]]'', reminding the viewer that even in the blissful utopia of [[Arcadia (utopia)|Arcadia]], death still exists.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bellori |first=Giovan Pietro |title=Le Vite}}</ref> Another biographer, [[André Félibien]], interpreted the 'I' to refer to the occupant of the tomb, but still took the overall meaning of the painting to be a reminder that death is present even in idyllic Arcadia.<ref>{{cite book|last=Félibien |first=André |title=Entretiens |page=379}}</ref>

The most important difference between the two versions is that in the latter version, one of the two shepherds recognizes the shadow of his companion on the tomb and circumscribes the silhouette with his finger. According to an ancient tradition (see [[Pliny the Elder]], ''[[Natural History (Pliny)|Natural History]]'' XXXV 5, 15), this is the moment in which the art of painting is first discovered. Thus, the shepherd's shadow is the first image in art history. But the shadow on the tomb is also a symbol of death (in the first version symbolized by a skull on the top of the tomb). The meaning of this highly intricate composition seems to be that, from prehistory onward, the discovery of art has been the creative response of humankind to the shocking fact of mortality. Thus, death’s claim to rule even Arcadia is challenged by art (symbolized by the beautifully dressed maiden), who must insist that she was discovered in Arcadia too, and that she is the legitimate ruler everywhere, whilst death only usurps its power.<ref>Cf. Becht-Jördens, Gereon; Wehmeier, Peter M. (2003). ''Picasso und die christliche Ikonographie''. Dietrich Reimer Verlag, Berlin. pp. 181–209</ref>

The vagueness of the phrase is the subject of a famous essay by the [[art historian]] [[Erwin Panofsky]], who suggested that, compared to Poussin's 1627 version, this second version shifted the focus from a warning about the inevitability of death to a contemplation of the past and a sense of nostalgia. In the course of this re-interpretation of his own composition by Poussin himself the meaning of the inscription changed. Notwithstanding the rules of Latin grammar, according to which ''et'' should be conjuncted with ''Arcadia'', not with ''ego'', in Panofsky’s view, the speaker now is no longer death, but the dead, who, speaking to the viewer from the tomb, reminds him that he himself once was enjoying his happy life in Arcadia. This new meaning of the second version prepared the way for the translation "Auch ich war in Arkadien (geboren)" ("I, too, was born in Arcadia") given by [[Johann Gottfried Herder|Herder]], [[Friedrich Schiller|Schiller]] and [[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe|Goethe]]. The sentence now comes out of the viewer’s mouth, which means that he, like every human being, once was born in Arcadia.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Panofsky |first1=Erwin |title=Meaning in the Visual Arts |date=1955 |publisher=Doubleday Anchor Books |pages=295–320 |chapter=Et in Arcadia Ego: Poussin and the Elegiac Tradition}}</ref>

==Sculpted versions==
[[Image:Shugborough arcadia.jpg|thumb|The Shugborough relief, adapted from an engraving of Poussin's second version]]

This undated, mid-eighteenth-century marble bas-relief is part of the Shepherds Monument, a garden feature at [[Shugborough House]], Staffordshire, England. Beneath it is the cryptic [[Shugborough inscription]], as yet undeciphered.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.shugborough.org.uk/AcademyShepherdsMon-169 |title=The Shepherd's Monument |publisher=Shugborough |access-date=2011-07-26}}</ref> The reversed composition suggests that it was copied from an [[engraving]], the compositions of which are commonly reversed because direct copies to the plate produce mirror images on printing.

In 1832 another relief was sculpted as part of the monument marking Poussin's tomb in Rome, on which it appears beneath a bust of the artist.<ref>[http://www.duepassinelmistero.com/_borders/POUSSIN_3.jpg Nicolas Poussin bust]</ref> In the words of art historian Richard Verdi, it appears as if the shepherds are contemplating "their own author's death."<ref>Warwick, G. & Scott, K., [http://assets.cambridge.org/052164/0040/sample/0521640040WSC00.pdf ''Commemorating Poussin: Reception and Interpretation of the Artist''], [[Cambridge University Press]], 1999. Cf. "Introduction: Commemorating Poussin" by Katie Scott, p. 9. "As Richard Verdi has noted, this change of context resulted in Poussin's shepherds being led to contemplate their own author's death, and invited the viewer to ponder the monument with the same solemnity and poignancy with which the shepherds brood on Death's incursion into Arcadia."
* Also cf. Verdi, Richard, "Poussin's giants: from romanticism to surrealism", in this collection.</ref>

==See also==
* [[List of paintings by Nicolas Poussin]]
* [[Et in Arcadia ego (Guercino)|''Et in Arcadia ego'' (Guercino)]]

==Notes==
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==References==
* {{Cite book |first=Reinhard |last=Brandt |author-link=Reinhard Brandt |year=2000 |title=Philosophie in Bildern |publisher=DuMont Buchverlag, Köln |isbn=3-7701-5293-X |pages=265–282 |language=de}}
* {{Cite book | first = Cormac | last = Mccarthy | author-link = Cormac McCarthy | year = 1985 | title = Blood Meridian, or, the Evening Redness in the West | publisher = Random house | isbn = 0-394-54482-X | page=131}} {{Why|reason=please explain relevance of this reference|date=May 2025}}
* {{Cite book | first = Erwin | last = Panofsky | author-link = Erwin Panofsky | year = 1955 | title = Meaning in the Visual Arts | publisher = University of Chicago Press  | isbn = 0-226-64551-7}}

==Further reading==
* {{Cite book |last1=Becht-Jördens |first1=Gereon |last2=Wehmeier |first2=Peter M. |year=2003 |title=Picasso und die christliche Ikonographie |publisher=Dietrich Reimer Verlag, Berlin |isbn=3-496-01272-2 |pages=181–209 |language=de}}
* {{Cite journal |last1=Panofsky |first1=Erwin |last2=Panofsky |first2=Gerda |date=1968 |title=The «Tomb in Arcady» at the «Fin-De-Siècle» |url=https://edoc.hu-berlin.de/handle/18452/8296 |journal=Wallraf-Richartz-Jahrbuch |volume=30 |pages=287–304 |issn=0083-7105 |jstor=24655959}}
* {{Cite book |last=Snell |first=Bruno |url=https://archive.org/details/discoveryofmindg00sneluoft |title=The Discovery of the Mind: The Greek Origins of European Thought |publisher=Blackwell |year=1953 |location=Oxford |pages=281–309 |translator-last=Rosenmeyer |translator-first=T. G. |chapter=Arcadia: the Discovery of a Spiritual Landscape}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Verdi |first=Richard |date=1979 |title=On the Critical Fortunes - And Misfortunes - Of Poussin's 'Arcadia' |url= |journal=[[The Burlington Magazine]] |volume=121 |issue=911 |pages=95–107 |issn=0007-6287 |jstor=879536}}

==External links==
{{commons category}}
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20110807051036/http://arcadia.ceid.upatras.gr/arkadia/engversion/culture/clasarcadia/etinarc.html Marc Wiesmann, "Classical Arcadia"]
*[https://www.scribd.com/doc/297555365/S-Hamblett-Time-Truth-Poussin-s-Arcadian-Tomb S. Hamblett: Time, Truth & Poussin`s Arcadian Tomb]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20120828061304/http://www.galleriaborghese.it/barberini/it/arcadia.htm Guercino's painting illustrated at the official Galleria Barberini website] (text in Italian)
* {{ws|[[s:Poems of Felicia Hemans in The Court Magazine Volume IV 1834/"And I Too in Arcadia!"|"And I Too in Arcadia!"]]}} is a poetic response, as 'Summer Song No.6', by [[Felicia Hemans]] in The Court Magazine Volume IV 1834, page 25.

{{Nicolas Poussin}}
{{Death and mortality in art}}

[[Category:Ancient Arcadia]]
[[Category:Ancient Greece in art and culture]]
[[Category:Greek mythology studies]]
[[Category:Iconography]]
[[Category:Latin mottos]]
[[Category:Paintings about death]]
[[Category:Paintings by Nicolas Poussin]]
[[Category:Paintings in the Louvre by French artists]]
[[Category:Priory of Sion hoax]]