Les oies sacrées sauvent le Capitole

This work, circulated as a color lithograph after a now-lost painting by Henri-Paul Motte, is titled “The Sacred Geese Save the Capitol.” It depicts the legendary episode in which Juno’s sacred geese are said to have warned the Roman defenders while the Gauls attempted to climb the heights of the Capitoline Hill during the sack of Rome, traditionally dated to 390 BC. The composition emphasizes the attackers’ nocturnal ascent, the dramatic tension of the scene, and the providential dimension attributed to the intervention of the sacred animals. Dated 1883, the image belongs to nineteenth-century history painting and historicizing illustration, attentive to Rome’s foundational narratives and to heroic episodes transmitted by ancient tradition.