Six Persons Standing, Watching a Serpent

Most of Giambattista Tiepolo’s etchings have no known basis in literature or history. They are capprichi, imaginary, often whimsical, subjects. Here six people, men and women, young and old, seem to be involved with some sort of magical act. An inscrutable owl is perched on an ancient altar or sarcophagus from which smoke rises as a snake writhes on the ground. A herm in the form of a satyr—seemingly drunk and wearing a laurel wreath around its neck—presides of the scene. What are we to make of it?... Anything we want to.