Telemachus, Believing that His Father, Ulysses, Is Dead, Searches for Him in the Underworld, from The Adventures of Telemachus, Book 18

Telemachus, Believing that His Father, Ulysses, Is Dead, Searches for Him in the Underworld, from The Adventures of Telemachus, Book 18 — Bartolomeo Pinelli. 1808.

Medium: Pen and black ink, with brush and brown and gray wash, over traces of black chalk on ivory laid paper, laid down on board. Dimensions: Sight: 48 × 59 cm (18 15/16 × 23 1/4 in.); Overall: 55.6 × 66.7 cm (21 15/16 × 26 5/16 in.).

Collection record: Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago. Museum connection according to this source; current display unverified.

In the last scene illustrated by Pinelli (book 18, of a total of 24), Telemachus steps onto the shores of Hades, land of the dead, after being ferried across the River Styx by Charon (seen in the background). Under Minerva’s protection, Telemachus has accomplished the feat granted to no mortal of descending to the underworld by entering the sulfurous cavern near the southern Italian city of Acherontia. In Hades, spirits of the dead and creatures of the night surround him. In search of his father Ulysses’s spirit, Telemachus will discover that he is still alive.

Description: © Art Institute of Chicago, original record, CC BY 4.0. HTML formatting removed; wording retained. Other artwork metadata: CC0.

Source: official collection record. Metadata selected and normalized by Artline from the source export, accessed 10 September 2026; no museum endorsement. Reproduction rights are separate.