SOURCE: Hoppe, Jody. “Illustrations in George Sandys' Translation of Ovid's Metamorphosis.” Soundings 20 (1989): 29-36.

In the following essay, Hoppe maintains that the illustrations included in Sandys's translations of Ovid's Metamorphoses were important not only for their artistry but also for exposing Baroque style to a larger audience.

Of bodies chang'd to other shapes I sing. Assist, you Gods (from you these changes spring And, from the Worlds first fabrick to these times, Deduced my never-discontinued Rymes. 

These are the opening lines of George Sandys' Ovid's Metamorphosis englished, mythologiz'd and represented in figures. Dating from the seventeenth century, this translation of the Latin classic has received much attention for its literary value, but almost none has been paid to the engraved plates that were chosen to accompany the text. Each plate depicts a variety of vignettes from different tales related in the book of Ovid which follows. The complexity of...