According to Ovid, the marriage of Hippodamia to Pirithous sparked a mythical battle between their kinsmen, the lapiths and the centaurs. This theme appealed to artists as symbolising the battle between the passions and the intellect. Tegeo echoed the classicism of the Bolognese School in this painting, regarded as his finest neoclassical composition. It belonged to the Prince of Anglona, the second director of the Prado