Artwork · 19th century · Goya

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Friar Pedro Shoots El Maragato as His Horse Runs Off

Goyac. 1806Oil on panel29.2 × 38.5 cm

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At a glance

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A friar fires a stolen rifle at a bandit while the bandit's horse bolts away.
Francisco Goya painted it in oil on a small wooden panel around 1806.
It is one scene from a six-part series that tells a true crime story that gripped Spain in 1806.

Reading the picture

4 places to look closer

Tap a number on the painting to jump to its note, or a close-up to see that spot in the whole picture.

Start with the friar's face. His head is bent low and his cheek is pressed against the stock as he glares down the barrel. The flash at the gun's lock is just a few strokes of red and yellow. You can almost hear the bang in those quick marks.
Now zoom in on the gray horse in the middle. Its body is rubbed in with broad, fast strokes, and the reins and mane are only a few thin lines. It looks as if it is moving too fast for your eye to catch. The bandit never got the chance to reach the second gun he kept on this horse.
The bandit on the right has his back to us. His arms fly wide and the fingers of his right hand are spread stiff. The bottom of his shirt is torn into white rags, and his breeches are a bright mustard yellow. The feared outlaw suddenly looks clumsy and helpless.
Look at the friar's waist. A knotted white cord hangs there, next to a rosary ending in a small cross. That knotted cord is the belt worn by Franciscan friars. Drop down to the lower left and you will find his bare foot in a strapped sandal.

When it was painted

In 1806 Goya was sixty. He had been chief painter to the Spanish king since 1799, and a serious illness more than a decade earlier had left him deaf. That summer, all of Spain was talking about a bandit.

His real name was Pedro Piñero, but everyone knew him as El Maragato. He had been sentenced to death, then sent instead to forced labor at the naval arsenal in Cartagena, but he escaped and spent two months on the run, stealing food, guns, and money. Then he forced his way into a house and held the people there hostage. Among them was a Franciscan lay brother, Pedro de Zaldivia, who had stopped by to beg for alms.

On June 10 the friar turned the tables. He seized the bandit's gun, shot him in the thigh, and captured him. Newspapers, pamphlets, ballads, and prints spread the story across the country. El Maragato was taken to Madrid and executed.

Goya told the whole story in six small panels. The first shows the bandit aiming his gun at the friar, and the last shows the friar tying up the fallen bandit with a rope. The hand that painted kings and duchesses was now laying out a true crime tale, frame by frame, like a modern comic strip.

The six panels stayed with Goya for years. They were listed in the inventory of his property drawn up in 1812, after the death of his wife, Josefa Bayeu, and then passed to his son Javier. That is why the Art Institute of Chicago thinks he may have painted them for his own enjoyment rather than on commission. All six later belonged to the Chicago collector Martin A. Ryerson and came to the museum together in 1933.

Look at the picture again. This is the fifth of the six scenes. In the next one, the bandit is lying on the ground with a rope around him.

The painter

Goya

1746–1828

All paintings by Goya →

More by the same painter

Condesa de Altamira and Her Daughter, María Agustina1787–88

Manuel Osorio Manrique de Zuñiga (1784–1792)1787–88

Seated Giantby 1818 (possibly 1814–18)

Questions to think about

Look for itFollow the shadows under the two men. How close are they really standing to each other?
Why?Why do you think Goya painted the people clearly but left the horse as a quick, blurry sketch?
What about you?This crime spread through ballads and cheap prints. When a real crime goes viral as videos and memes today, what should we be careful about?

Same period