Artwork Information

The story of Pomona and Vertumnus (or Vertomnus) is described in Ovid's Metamorphoses 14:623-697 and 765-771). So complete was the goddess Pomona's devotion to her orchards and gardens that she spurned the many suitors who courted her. Vertumnus, the god of changing seasons, fell in love with her, and to be nearer to her, disguised himself as a labourer in her garden. When this failed to attract her attention, he disguised himself as an old woman, and told her about a parable of marriage in which the grape vine and the elm tree had a relationship of interdependency (both are seen in the background). Only when he revealed himself as a young and beautiful god did Pomona fall in love with him and agree to share her gardens with him in marriage. In Sanraedam's engraving she is shown holding a pruning knife, the abundant produce from her garden laid out before her.