Ferrarese School, 16th Century

Serge Nazarieff.

The subject is taken from Ovid's Metamorphoses (4:665-739). Andromeda was the beautiful daughter of the King of Ethiopia Cepheus and his Queen Cassiopeia. She was left chained to a rock after Poseidon who had become enraged by Cassiopeia boasting that she was more beautiful than the Nereids, sent a sea monster to terrorise the kingdom until Andromeda was offered as a sacrifice. She was rescued by Perseus on his return from slaying the Gorgon Medusa, whose head he used to turn the monster to stone. Freeing the princess he then married her.