Lot and his Daughters

In this narrative Lot’s wife is turned into a pillar of salt for looking back, while the daughters later become the mothers of the Moabite and Ammonite peoples.

The painting illustrates the biblical episode of Lot and his daughters, a scene drawn from Genesis in which Lot flees the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah with his two daughters. In this narrative Lot’s wife is turned into a pillar of salt for looking back, while the daughters later become the mothers of the Moabite and Ammonite peoples. Mengs arranges the figures in a tight composition that emphasizes the tension between divine judgment and human survival, using the gesture and gaze of the daughters to underscore their role as both protectors and agents of continuation.

The work belongs to the religious art genre, reflecting the moral and theological themes common in 18th‑century European painting.

The iconography combines traditional biblical storytelling with a Rococo sensibility, highlighting the delicate rendering of the daughters’ clothing and the subtle interplay of light on their faces. Symbolically, the piece can be read as a meditation on obedience, divine retribution, and the fragile nature of familial loyalty in the face of catastrophe. Its presence in the collection of the Statens Museum for Kunst underscores its significance within the museum’s holdings of European religious paintings.