Portraits in the Characters of the Muses in the Temple of Apollo explained

Portraits in the Characters of the Muses in the Temple of Apollo
Artist:	Richard Samuel
Year:	1778
Type:	Oil on canvas, portrait
Metric Unit:	cm
Imperial Unit:	in
Museum:	National Portrait Gallery
City:	London

Portraits in the Characters of the Muses in the Temple of Apollo is a 1778 painting by the English artist Richard Samuel.^[1] It depicts nine prominent British literary and artistic women as Muses in the Temple of Apollo and is also known as The Nine Living Muses of Great Britain.^[2] It was exhibited at the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition in 1779.^[3]

The women depicted were noted intellectuals associated with the Blue Stockings Society. Those portrayed are (left to right, standing) Elizabeth Carter, Anna Laetitia Barbauld, Elizabeth Ann Linley, Hannah More and Charlotte Lennox and (left to right, seated) Angelica Kauffman, Catharine Macaulay, Elizabeth Montagu and Elizabeth Griffith. It is now in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery, having been purchased in 1972.^[4]

Bibliography

• Eger, Elizabeth (ed.) Bluestockings Displayed. Cambridge University Press, 2013.
• Nussbaum, Felicity. Rival Queens: Actresses, Performance, and the Eighteenth-Century British Theater. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2011.

Notes and References

1. Eger p.124
2. Nussbaum p.274
3. https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw00328/Portraits-in-the-Characters-of-the-Muses-in-the-Temple-of-Apollo#:~:text=This%20portrait,the%20Characters%20of%20the%20Muses%27.
4. https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw00328/Portraits-in-the-Characters-of-the-Muses-in-the-Temple-of-Apollo#:~:text=This%20portrait,the%20Characters%20of%20the%20Muses%27.