Rebecca at the Well

Veronese and workshop · c. 1582/1588
National Gallery of Art, Washington

Veronese and his workshop in Venice painted this long canvas in the 1580s. It belongs to a group of Old Testament scenes that later hung in the collections of the Duke of Buckingham and of the Habsburg emperors.

Rebekah stands at the well in a pink silk skirt, while Abraham’s old servant turns to her with his hand out. A young man kneels to offer gold, and the heads of camels crowd in from both sides.

From the text

The camels made to kneel by the well in the evening (Genesis 24:11)

Rebekah coming out with her jar to draw water (Genesis 24:15)

A gold ring and two gold bracelets for her wrists (Genesis 24:22)

The artist’s own

Rebekah in the silk dress and pearls of a Venetian lady

A stone basin and copper pots, as at a Venetian well

A town of pale European buildings in the distance

Servants in bright Renaissance costume and red boots

Details

Rebekah

Fair-haired, in a pink skirt and white blouse, beside the well.

The old servant

Bearded, with a staff and an orange robe, he turns to her.

The gift

The old servant reaches for gold held out by a kneeling young man.

Camels

A camel driver with a stick tends the heads of the camels.

A distant town

Pale buildings beyond the trees at the right.

Veronese (Paolo Caliari) and Workshop, Venetian, 1528–1588. National Gallery of Art, Washington (Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1952.5.82) · Oil on canvas · NGA Open Access: "Images of these works are available free of charge for any use, commercial or non-commercial, under Creative Commons Zero (CC0)." (NGA open data: published_images.csv openaccess = 1)

The verses

Gen 24:10–11Then the servant took ten of his master’s camels and departed with all manner of good things from his master in hand. And he set out for Nahor’s hometown in Aram-naharaim. As evening approached, he made the camels kneel down near the well outside the town at the time when the women went out to draw water.

Gen 24:15–22Before the servant had finished praying, Rebekah came out with her jar on her shoulder. She was the daughter of Bethuel son of Milcah, the wife of Abraham’s brother Nahor. Now the girl was very beautiful, a virgin who had not had relations with any man. She went down to the spring, filled her jar, and came up again. So the servant ran to meet her and said, “Please let me have a little water from your jar.” “Drink, my lord,” she replied, and she quickly lowered her jar to her hands and gave him a drink. After she had given him a drink, she said, “I will also draw water for your camels, until they have had enough to drink.” And she quickly emptied her jar into the trough and ran back to the well to draw water, until she had drawn water for all his camels. Meanwhile, the man watched her silently to see whether or not the LORD had made his journey a success. And after the camels had finished drinking, he took out a gold ring weighing a beka, and two gold bracelets for her wrists weighing ten shekels.