The Woman Taken in Adultery

This 1724 Woman Taken in Adultery in the Royal Collection depicts Christ's defense of the woman threatened with stoning — 'Let him without sin cast the first stone' — one of the most morally resonant scenes in the Gospels. Ricci's treatment presents the encounter with his characteristic compositional skill, organizing the crowd's varied reactions to Christ's challenge within the same dramatic spatial arrangement he brought to all his crowd subjects. The Royal Collection's substantial Ricci holdings, assembled through his English stay and subsequent purchases, make it one of the most important institutional repositories of his work outside Italy.

The dramatic confrontation between Christ, the accusers, and the accused woman is rendered with Ricci's characteristic compositional fluency and warm palette, the figures arranged with theatrical clarity.