signed with initials and dated 'SS/1882' and inscribed 'DAPHNIS'
pencil and coloured chalks
15 5/8 x ll 7/8 in. (39.8 x 30.3cm.)
Daphnis was a Sicilian shepherd, the son of Mercury by a local nymph. He was educated by Pan and the Muses, and is said to have invented pastoral poetry. later perfected by Theocritus and Virgil.
Solomon was one of the most brilliant members of die Pre-Rapluclite circle in the late 1850's and the 1860's:, but his career collapsed in 1873 when he was arrested for homosexual offences. The present drawing, which post-dates this disaster. is in his more homoerotic vein; compare the young man in the drawing of Socrates and his Agathodaemon in the Victoria and Albert Museum (repr. Simon Reynolds, The Vision of Simeon Solomon, 1984. p1.37).
The figure of Daphnis no doubt appealed to Solomon because according to some accounts Mercury was not the father of the Young shepherd but his lover. The name Daphnis derives from the fact that the youth was exposed at birth in a laurel grove, the Greek word for laurel being 'daphne. Solomon refers to this by introducing laurel leaves behind the head in his drawing.
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