He sits on the step and raises his hand as he speaks.
Bible in art · Acts
Peter in the House of Cornelius
Gustave Doré · 1866 (designs for La Sainte Bible, Tours); this printing 1873–1874
National Library of Poland, Warsaw
Doré drew this quiet meeting for «La Sainte Bible» of 1866, and an engraver cut it in wood, signing in script at the lower right. Like the other plates, it was soon reprinted in many countries.
Under a striped awning, sunlight slants across a pale wall into a courtyard. Peter sits on the steps, curly-headed, raising his hand as he talks. Around him the household listens: a tall veiled woman and a young man stand in the light, old men and women sit on the steps, and a grey-bearded elder leans against the wall.
From the text
- “Cornelius was expecting them and had called together his relatives and close friends” (Acts 10:24)
- “he went inside and found many people gathered together” (Acts 10:27)
- “God has shown me that I should not call any man impure or unclean.” (Acts 10:28)
The artist’s own
- No one in Roman armor, though Cornelius was a centurion (Acts 10:1)
- A courtyard with an awning and sunlight on the wall
Details
Peter
In the light
A veiled woman and a young man stand and listen.
The awning
A striped cloth is stretched over the courtyard.
On the steps
A woman in a headscarf sits on the bottom step.
Gustave Doré, French, 1832–1883. National Library of Poland (Biblioteka Narodowa), Warsaw — «Pismo Święte Starego i Nowego Testamentu», vol. 2, Warsaw: M. Glücksberg, 1874 (acc. 75.267 A) · Wood engraving after Gustave Doré’s design · National Library of Poland (Polona): the record of the volume gives the licence «Domena Publiczna» (Public Domain), «copyrightProtected»: false; the scan was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by the library itself («Polona Upload», GLAM-Wiki partnership: “This file was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons as part of a GLAM-Wiki partnership between the National Library of Poland and Wikimedia Polska”), linking its Polona record.