01 Work, The art of War, Francesco Hayez's The Destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem, with Footnotes

Francesco Hayez

Detail; The Destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem, c. 1867

Oil on canvas

183 x 282 cm

Venice, Accademia di Belle Arti

After the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 586 BCE, the Jews of the Kingdom of Judea went into exile. In 538 BCE during the reign of Cyrus the Great, the Jews returned to Jerusalem and were able to build the Second Temple on the site of the original one that had been destroyed. Secular accounts place the completion of the Second Temple in approximately 516 BCE but some Jewish sources date the completion much later in 350 BCE. Herod the Great rebuilt the Temple in 20-18 BCE. The Jews led a revolt and occupied Jerusalem in 66 CE initiating the first Roman-Jewish war. In 70 CE the Romans reclaimed Jerusalem and destroyed the Second Temple with only a portion of the western wall remaining (though recent archeological discoveries date portions of the wall to later periods). The Western Wall remains a sacred site for Jews. More on The Destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem

The painter began the work in 1860 and finished it in 1867, when the painting was exhibited in Brera to critical acclaim. The visually striking composition depicts the destruction of the temple at the very moment the carnage is at its height, the building already engulfed in flames and the destructive fury at its climax. The scene tells the story of the dramatic plight of the Jewish people deprived of freedom and, as had already happened with Verdi’s Nabucco, the painting became a metaphor for the injustices suffered by Italians and stood for the values of the Risorgimento. More on this painting

Francesco Hayez (10 February 1791 – 21 December 1882) was an Italian painter, the leading artist of Romanticism in mid-19th-century Milan, renowned for his grand historical paintings, political allegories and exceptionally fine portraits.

Hayez came from a relatively poor family from Venice. He was brought up by his mother's sister, who had married a well-off shipowner and collector of art. From childhood he showed a predisposition for drawing, so his uncle apprenticed him to an art restorer. Later he became a student of the painter Francesco Maggiotto with whom he continued his studies for three years. He was admitted to the painting course of the New Academy of Fine Arts in 1806. In 1809 he won a competition from the Academy of Venice for one year of study at the Accademia di San Luca in Rome. He remained in Rome until 1814, then moved to Naples where he was commissioned by Joachim Murat to paint a major work depicting Ulysses at the court of Alcinous. In the mid-1830s he attended the "Salotto Maffei" salon in Milan.

Francesco Hayez lived long and was prolific. His output spanned both historic paintings, and Neoclassic style grand themes, either from biblical or classical literature. He also painted scenes from theatrical presentations of his day. More Francesco Hayez

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