Oil on canvas - 40" x 30"
Leander was a youth of Abydus, a town on the Hellespont, and Hero was a Priestess of Aphrodite in Sestus on the opposite shore.  Every night Leander swam across to her, guided by Hero’s flaming torch.  One very stormy night the brand was extinguished by the wind and Leander , losing his way was drowned.  His body washed up on the rocks and Hero, finding it, flung herself into the sea and was herself drowned.