c. 1725

Tapestry showing the Marriage of Psyche

Sets of tapestries depicting mythological subjects were produced in Brussels in the early eighteenth century in competition with weavings offered by major French manufactories located in Aubusson, Beauvais, and Paris. This tapestry is from a series representing the story of the beautiful maiden Psyche and her lover Cupid, based on a tale by the second century A.D. writer Apuleius. Retellings of this story by the French authors Jean de La Fontaine and Molière made it popular in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Psyche and Cupid sit at the head of the table, surrounded by the Olympian gods.