<P> Paintings of the subject began in the 18th century . That by Charles Meynier, which was exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1795, is now lost . However, a study for the painting has recently been discovered and shows Androcles as a nearly naked warrior brandishing his sword in the stadium while the lion lies on the ground and is, following the account of Aulus Gellius, "gently licking his feet". There are also studies for an unachieved painting by American artist Henry Ossawa Tanner dating from his student years in 1885 - 6 . They include a lion licking its paw and a kneeling and grey - bearded Androcles . At mid-century in 1856 comes "Androcles and the Lion" by the English artist Alexander Davis Cooper (1820--95). There a young man in Arab dress looks towards the viewer as he walks across a desert landscape with his hand in the lion's mane . </P> <P> In the 20th century, Jean - Léon Gérôme depicted Androcles in a painting tentatively dated 1902 and now in the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes (Buenos Aires). There Androcles is sitting cross-legged on the floor of the cave as he draws the thorn from the lion's paw while it roars in agony . Briton Riviere's 1908 painting of him standing to perform the same task is in the Auckland Art Gallery . Another approach was to show the earlier incident of Androcles surprised in the cave by the lion's entrance . This was the subject chosen by Vassily Rotschev (d. 1803) soon after returning to Russia from training in Rome . It was also the choice of the Chinese painter Xu Beihong . His "Slave and Lion" dates from a stay in Berlin during the early 1920s and shows the lion entering the mouth of a cave while Androcles cowers against the wall . </P> <P> Androcles also became a sculptural subject . Jan Pieter van Baurscheit the Elder's sandstone statue, executed between 1700 and 1725, is now at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and shows a triumphant figure bestriding a very small lion that rears up to look at him . Its frisky behaviour brings to mind Aulus Gellius' description of the lion "wagging his tail in a mild and caressing way, after the manner and fashion of fawning dogs". In 1751 the English monumental sculptor Henry Cheere created two white marble chimneypieces showing the slave bending over the lion's paw to draw out the thorn . One is in the Saloon at West Wycombe Park and the other is now in the Lady Lever Art Gallery . A continental example by Jean - Baptiste Stouf was sculpted in 1789 and is now only known through the modern bronze reproduction at the Ashmolean Museum . Formerly it was in the Louvre and showed Androcles tending the lion's paw . </P> <P> In the 19th century Androcles became a subject for French table ornaments . One from 1820 shows him sword in hand in the arena as the lion crouches at his feet, while another from 1825 has him tending the injured paw . About 1898, Jean - Léon Gérôme, who was soon to paint that scene too, produced a sculpture of Androcles leading the lion about on his tour of the Roman taverns . Titled Le Mendiant (the beggar), it is made of bronze gilt and shows the former slave standing with one hand on the lion's mane and a begging bowl at his feet . On its stand is the inscription Date obolum Androcli (spare a penny for Androclus). In the 20th century the American sculptor Frederick Charles Shrady incorporated the theme of removing the thorn from the paw into a modernistic design . </P>

Who removed the thorn from the lion's paw