Miravan Breaking Open the Tomb of his Ancestors

Joseph Wright of Derby painted Miravan Breaking Open the Tomb of His Ancestors around 1772, depicting an episode from Mary Wortley Montagu's Letters about an Oriental prince who, promised fabulous treasure in his ancestors' tomb, finds only a skull and the moral inscription 'Thus have we all been: Thus shalt thou be.' The subject was a perfect vehicle for Wright's combination of tenebrism — the tomb lit by a single torch — with philosophical content about the vanity of worldly treasure. The torchlit skeleton within the opened tomb brings Wright's scientific interest in mortality together with the period's Romantic fascination with death, ruins, and the transience of material accumulation.

Wright stages the scene as a burst of golden light from the opened tomb, illuminating the terrified faces of the tomb-breakers. The dramatic chiaroscuro and the contrast between warm interior glow and surrounding darkness exemplify Wright's nocturnal mastery.