Polycrates and the Fisherman

This painting and its companion piece recount the story of the Greek king Polycrates, as told by the ancient historian Herodotus. Polycrates, ruler of the island of Samos, worried that he was tempting fate with his great prosperity. He tried to introduce some counterbalancing misfortune into his life by throwing a precious signet ring into the sea, but it was swallowed by a large fish and returned to the king by a fisherman, the episode shown here. Polycrates’s good fortune came to an end when he was entrapped by Oroetus of Sardis and put to death, the event illustrated in Polycrates’ Crucifixion.