Unchanged by any teller — how the centuries since have seen Daphne.
The gallery
Apollo and Daphne (marble, Galleria Borghese, Rome)
Gian Lorenzo Bernini, 1622–1625
Bernini's Baroque marble catches Ovid's instant of change — bark closing over Daphne's flesh as Apollo's hand still grasps what is already becoming laurel. The Thessalian nymph of Peneus, not the Arcadian huntress of the Ladon, is the figure the poets crown with Apollo's tree.
In music & on stage
In play
WORK · 1622–1625READ MORE ↗
Apollo and Daphne
Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Bernini's marble in the Galleria Borghese freezes the metamorphosis mid-stride — bark racing up Daphne's body as Apollo reaches.
WORK · —READ MORE ↗
Daphne
Daphne endures as the laurel of poetry itself — the nymph who became the crown Apollo still wears.