Saint Sebastian Tended by Saint Irene (Hendrick ter Brugghen) in the Diocletianic Persecution, has the soldier Sebastian shot by archers as punishment for his treason. Looking for his body to bury, Irene found Saint Sebastian tied to a tree and miraculously alive, then nursed him back to health. Rather than painting the scene of Sebastian being shot with arrows, in the midst of his attempted execution, Ter Brugghen chooses to show the moments afterwards where Irene and her maid untie him from the tree. Some attribute this narrative shift to the emergence of the plague within Utrecht in the 1620s: several artists desiring a subject saved from agony, turn
Bay of Arrows islands. Columbus described in his log the land as being exceedingly beautiful with lush forests and deep waters. He painted a picture of the natives as both a strong and meek people. They all walked around naked without any shame and ranged from dark tan to white in color. Columbus described each group he met as being the handsomest he has found. The Bay of Arrows is the inlet in the Samaná Peninsula where in his first voyage to the Americas the admiral had the last of these encounters with the natives, which differently from the previous ones, turned sour.