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| Roman Empire Jason in Colchis (Medea and Jason with the Golden Fleece at right) AD 150-180 marble sarcophagus relief Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna |
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| Cassiano dal Pozzo Paper Museum, Rome Medea in Corinth (after a Roman Sarcophagus formerly in Palazzo Borghese, Rome - now in the Louvre) ca. 1650 drawing British Museum |
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| Master of the Die Wedding of Jason and Creusa (at left, Medea taking her Children) ca. 1530-60 engraving Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| Giulio Bonasone Story of Jason and Medea (after a Roman Sarcophagus now in the Palazzo Ducale, Mantua) before 1576 engraving Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
from The Metamorphoses
As a tiny spark that is hidden under a pile of ashes
is fanned and fed once again by the wind and grows to recover
its earlier strength, so the love you might have supposed was dwindling
and dying away flared up when she saw young Jason before her.
That shining morning it chanced that the son of Aeson was looking
more handsome than ever. Medea could hardly be blamed for her passion.
Her gazing eyes were fixed on his face, as though she had never
seen it before. 'It must be a god who is standing there,'
she thought in her madness, unable to turn her body away.
But when the stranger began to speak and, suddenly gripping
her right hand, begged in the humblest of tones for her help and promised
to maker her his wife, Medea burst into tears and replied:
'I see what I'm doing; so if I am cheated, I cannot blame ignorance,
only my love. You shall owe your life to the help that I give you.
Be sure that you keep your promise!' He swore by the rites of the threefold
goddess and all the power which haunted that sacred wood;
he swore by his future father's father, the all-seeing sun god,
by all the successes he hoped for and all the dangers he feared.
Medea believed him. At once she gave him some magical herbs,
then explained how to use them; and Jason returned to his tents with a light heart.
– Ovid (8 AD), translated by David Raeburn (2004)
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| Attic Greece Hydria - Medea boiling a Ram in a large Lebes on a Tripod with Jason attending ca. 480-470 BC painted terracotta British Museum |
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| Ercole de' Roberti Jason and Medea with the Argonauts leaving Colchis with the Golden Fleece ca. 1480 oil and tempera on panel Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
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| Master I.B. Jason and Medea ca. 1525-30 engraving Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Heinrich Aldegrever Medea presenting a Statue of an Armed Man to Jason 1529 engraving Harvard Art Museums |
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| Hans Kels the Younger Jason and Medea 1537 oak relief-carving on token for board game Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna |
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| René Boyvin after Léonard Thiry The Meeting of Medea and Jason 1563 engraving Los Angeles County Museum of Art |
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| René Boyvin after Léonard Thiry Medea embarking with Jason 1563 engraving Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| René Boyvin after Léonard Thiry Medea sacrificing a Lamb at the Temple of Hebes and Hecate 1563 engraving Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| René Boyvin after Léonard Thiry Medea pouring a Magical Potion over Jason's Body 1563 engraving Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| René Boyvin after Léonard Thiry The Children of Medea and Jason presenting a Box to Creusa 1563 engraving Princeton University Art Museum |
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| René Boyvin after Léonard Thiry Medea killing her Children 1563 engraving Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| Pietro Santi-Bartoli after a fresco in the Raphael Loggia at the Vatican Flight of Medea etching before 1700 Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam |