Cupid and Psyche, c.1816

After Unidentified Roman sculptor

RA Collection: Art

The princess Psyche was so beautiful that Venus became jealous. She sent her son Cupid to make her fall in love with a hideous monster but instead Cupid fell in love with her himself.

This is a cast of a marble 'Cupid and Psyche', which was discovered near the church of S. Balbina on the Aventine Hill, Rome in 1749. The original statue is thought to be a Roman version of a late Hellenistic Greek original from the 2nd or 1st centuries BC.

In the 18th century this group was much admired as it was seen as the epitome of youthful love. It was widely reproduced often on a small scale such as Wedgwood's