Belagio wordt door zijn paard gebeten en sterft zoals voorspeld door H. Antonius 1598

Antonio Tempesta created this engraving, "Belagio wordt door zijn paard gebeten en sterft zoals voorspeld door H. Antonius," capturing a dramatic scene of death foretold. The central motif here is the horse, an animal often associated with nobility, power, and virility. Yet, here, it becomes an instrument of fate. Consider how the horse, a symbol of vitality, transforms into a harbinger of death. We see echoes of this duality throughout art history, where animals embody both life-affirming and destructive forces. Think of the Minotaur, a creature of myth, half-man, half-bull, embodying primal urges and chaos. Here the horse acts as an agent of destiny; a brutal twist, where power turns on its master. Such dramatic irony highlights how cultural symbols often contain their own contradictions. We can read this as a symbol of power, whose fate is ultimately controlled by subconscious processes.