Peter Paul Rubens, 'A Roman Triumph', about 1630

Columns and alcoves of classical Roman buildings tower over the crowd of people who sit on a grass bank. They are enjoying the spectacle of a flamboyant procession being led by three young women, Vestal Virgins who hold baskets of flowers and have pearls in their hair as a symbol of their chastity.

The tall figure of a pontifex, or priest, in brilliant red robes and with a laurel wreath is the focus of the picture; almost hidden in the shadows behind him is a soothsayer in a black veil. A brawny farmhand controls a restless bull while an androgynous figure in white leads a sacrificial cow, its horns covered in gold. A young man with long curls holds two sheep also intended for sacrifice, almost oblivious to the trumpeters and pipers around him who blow their instruments with ferocious enthusiasm. At the rear of the procession is a line of four African elephants, their riders armed with sharp prods. Behind them, balanced precariously at shoulder height among a forest of flaming torches, a man lights a taper from a flame.

Rubens based his image on two of Andrea Mantegna’s series of nine monumental paintings, The Triumphs of Caesar, one of the great works of the Italian Renaissance. They were commissioned in the late fifteenth century for the ruling Gonzaga family of Mantua. Together, the paintings show Julius Caesar in his chariot returning from his military campaigns. He is surrounded by soldiers, musicians, slaves and animals, and the spoils of war.

Although on a much smaller scale than Mantegna’s gigantic pictures, there are similarities: the figure leading the cow in the foreground and the man lighting the taper here closely resemble figures in Mantegna’s work. But Rubens’s painting packs in more dynamic energy and excitement. Although there is no all-conquering Caesar, Rubens’s flames flare with real intensity and the image swirls with movement. The elephants in both pictures are crowned with golden baskets of fruit, but Rubens has included one with its trunk raised high in triumph.

The Triumphs were in Mantua during Rubens’s stay at the Gonzaga court around 1600–08. He undoubtedly saw them there and, finding them exciting and inspirational, acquired painted copies after the canvases. Mantegna’s paintings were bought by King Charles I of England in 1629. Charles – in the manner of other monarchs at the time – liked to see himself as a modern Caesar. Precisely when Mantegna’s paintings arrived in England is unknown, though they are presumed to have left Italy by October 1630 and were displayed in Hampton Court Palace soon after their arrival. Rubens travelled to London in 1629, and returned to Antwerp in April 1630 after his stay at the English court. This means that he had already left when the paintings arrived in the capital. Despite this, the anticipation of the arrival of the Triumphs must have been rife at the court and may have re-invigorated Rubens’s interest in them. The artist painted his Roman Triumph about 1630, likely after his return to Antwerp. The style of his painting accords with this later date. It is likely that Rubens worked at his picture spasmodically over several years, experimenting and making amendments for his own interest and pleasure, as it was still in his possession when he died.