Romulus and Remus Given Shelter by Faustulus

The shepherd Faustulus carries the abandoned twins Romulus and Remus home to his wife, the she-wolf who suckled them still nearby, the future founders of Rome rescued in a warm, sunlit landscape. Pietro da Cortona, a leading master of the exuberant High Roman Baroque, paints the legend with golden color and easy, flowing movement. Now in the Louvre, it gives Rome's origin myth a tender domestic turn - not yet the warriors and the murder to come, but a foundling story of shelter and care, grandeur softened into pastoral.