Arria and Paetus at The Louvre, Paris

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Arria, wife of Paetus, took her own life by stabbing herself before handing the dagger to her husband with a calm expression saying "Paete, non dolet" ("Paetus, it does not hurt"). This famous act is a classic example of the virtues that characterized the historical genre. Paetus, a Roman senator, was sentenced to death in AD 42 for conspiring against Emperor Claudius. To give him courage, his wife Arria first stabbed herself and then handed the dagger to Paetus saying "Paete, non dolet" ("Paetus, it does not hurt"). This courageous act has been rarely depicted by Latin authors like Pliny the Younger, Martial, Tacitus, and Dio Cassius. The model of this famous sculpture was created by French sculptor Jean-Baptiste Théodon who worked in Rome for many years. He started sculpting the marble in 1685 but the task was later taken over by Pierre Lepautre in January 1691 due to Théodon's slow progress. The date inscribed on the marble (1691) is when Lepautre began working on it, which he completed in 1695. The sculpture was transported to France in 1715 and installed at the Château de Marly before being moved to the Tuileries Gardens in 1717 as a matching piece for Lepautre's Aeneas and Anchises (in the Louvre). It entered the Louvre in March 1989. This sculpture was not inspired by the famous antique group in the Ludovisi collection, which was known as Paetus and Arria from 1670. However, Théodon and Lepautre's work bears stylistic similarities to Roman 17th-century sculpture. The figure of Arria was likely inspired by Ercole Ferrata's Saint Agnes (1660) while Paetus resembles a figure in Algardi's The Meeting of Attila and Pope Leo (1646-63). The artist attempted to convey the meaning of Arria's heroic words by portraying her death as painless. Serene in the conviction that her noble sacrifice is not in vain, eyes clouding over, knees giving way, she points to the wound above her left breast, proffering the dagger to her husband with her other hand. The noble figure of Paetus leans tenderly toward her. His clothes are finely detailed: tunic with mantling, chlamys fastened with a fibula, buskins. The servant is beautifully portrayed, with a remarkable play of drapery, as she supports her mistress and looks sadly up at her face. A winged cupid with a sorrowful expression, sitting astride a dog (symbols of the couple's love and fidelity), is lifting a fold of Paetus' cloak, perhaps to hide from the tragic scene.