Prince Albert bought this picture and Apollo and Diana in the same year. He framed them almost identically and hung them with others by Cranach and his contemporaries in the Page's Waiting Room at Osborne. Lucretia was blackmailed and raped by Sextus Tarquinius. Shamed by her loss of honor, she stabbed herself. Lucretia, the virtuous wife of a nobleman, was blackmailed and raped by Sextus Tarquinius. Shamed by the loss of her honor, Lucretia informed her father and husband before stabbing herself (Ovid, Fasti, II, 725-852; Livy, History of Rome, I, 57-9). Her suicide prompted a rebellion which resulted in the foundation of the Roman republic. ...Of all the secular subjects, this was the one Cranach painted most frequently. Nearly 40 versions are recorded; many of them are half-length with a view through a window to a landscape, as here, or full-length; some show Lucretia completely nude, and in some she is paired with Venus to embody two kinds of love. Lucretia’s patrician status is displayed by her rich clothes and jewellery, though a fur-lined robe was also worn by Venetian courtesans. As in other versions, she is contemplating the act of suicide, but her dagger has not drawn any blood. In Lucretia Cranach combines the brutal death of a chaste and virtuous heroine with erotic sensuality. Cranach’s figural type is both sophisticated and This painting is close to a more detailed version dated 1529 (University of Houston Foundation) which is a similar size (73.0 x 53.0 cm). In both paintings the mountainous landscape has the same building jutting out from a rocky outcrop, also found in a landscape fragment (c.1525-30, private collection) and clearly part of the workshop repertoire. Cranach was praised in his own time for being able to paint speedily. He developed a highly efficient system of delegation while maintaining a remarkably high standard of quality with workshop participation, as here. The inclusion of his winged serpent device was not a sign that he had personally painted a picture, but it was a guarantee of high quality. (https://www.royalcollection.org.uk/collection/400050/lucretia)