Friar Pedro Shoots El Maragato as His Horse Runs Off

CC0 Public Domain Designation

c. 1806

Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (Spanish, 1746–1828)

In the summer of 1806 in Spain, on the run after a prison escape, the dreaded bandit El Maragato overtook a family in their home and held them hostage. Among the family members was Pedro de Zaldivia, a lay Franciscan brother who stopped by the house to beg for alms. The humble monk ended up turning the tables on his captor, seizing El Maragato’s riﬂe and shooting him in the thigh to subdue him before he could grab another gun from his horse. The story of the heroic friar swept through Spain, not only via reports in newspapers and pamphlets but also in ballads and prints.

Although at the time Francisco Goya was chief painter to the Spanish king, he was interested in the range of human experience, including current events, and the tale of Zaldivia and El Maragato evidently captured his imagination. This small, lively painting belongs to a series of six at the Art Institute, which, like a modern-day comic strip, dramatically illustrates the story. The climactic scene here presents the bandit’s degrading and humorous downfall. As in all the panels, Goya’s broad, quick brushwork dispenses with unnecessary detail to pinpoint the essential drama of the moment.

This narrative series stands in marked contrast to the portraits of royalty and nobility that make up much of Goya’s painted works. His other small-format paintings similarly treat traditional pastimes, superstitions, and scenes from daily life with a popular realism that is oft en darkly comic in tone. Goya may have created the El Maragato series for his own amusement rather than as a commission, since they were still listed among his possessions in an 1812 inventory.

Status: On View, Gallery 220
Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Artist: Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes
Title: Friar Pedro Shoots El Maragato as His Horse Runs Off
Place: Spain (Artist's nationality:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1801–1811
Medium: Oil on panel
Dimensions: 29.2 × 38.5 cm (11 1/2 × 15 5/8 in.); Framed: 41.3 × 51.4 × 6.4 cm (16 1/4 × 20 1/4 × 2 1/2 in.)
Credit Line: Mr. and Mrs. Martin A. Ryerson Collection
Reference Number: 1933.1075
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/16362/manifest.json

Zeferino Araujo Sánchez, Goya (Madrid, 1895), p. 100, no. 95.
Paul Lafond, Goya (Paris, 1902), p. 110, no. 68.
V. von Loga, Francisco Goya, 1903, p. 215, no. 485, pl. 31.
Albert Frederick Calvert, Goya, 1908, pp. 152–153, no. 24–29.
Hugh Stokes, Francisco Goya (New York, 1914), p. 351, no. 501–506.
A. de Beruete y Moret, Goya: Composiciones y Figuras, vol. 2 (Madrid, 1917), no. 158-163.
L. Estarico, Francisco Goya, trans. R. West, 1924, pp. 65, 177, no. 597, pl. 185–190.
A. P. McMahon, “Spanish Painting: Greco to Goya,” The Arts 13 (1928), pp. 183 (ill.).
X. Desparmet Fitz-Gerald, L’Oeuvre Peint de Goya,Catalogue Raisonné vol. 1 (Paris, 1928-1950), no. 219, pl. 170.
The Art Institute of Chicago Bulletin 27, 1 (1933), p. 10.
Daniel Catton Rich, “Five Centuries of Early Painting in Chicago,” Pantheon 12 (July-December 1933), pp. 93, 381.
“America Sees First Big Goya Exhibition,” Art Digest 8 (April 15, 1934), p. 6 (ill.).
J. Gudiol, Goya (New York, 1941), p. 88, (ill.) 78-83.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Masterpiece of the Month (June 1940), pp. 127, 128.
R. Hilton, Margato y El Ocaso del Bandalerismo Espanol (New York, 1946), pp. 1–10 (ill.).
Eleanor Sherman Font, “Goya’s Source for the Maragato Series,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts (November 1958), pp. 289, 291 (ill.).
The Art Institute of Chicago, Paintings in The Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Picture Collection (Chicago, 1961), p. 201, 102 (ill.).
Rodolfo Pallucchini, “L’Art Institute di Chicago,” L’Illustrazione del Medico 33, 218 (February 1966), pp. 12, 14, fig. 6.
Pierre Gassier and Juliet Wilson, The Life and Complete Work of Francisco Goya (New York, 1971), pp. 156 (ill.), 374, 381, no. 868.
Nigel Glendinning, Goya and His Critics (London, 1977), pp. 219,
John D. Morse, Paintings in North America: Over 3000 Masterpieces by 50 Great Artists (New York, 1979), p. 144.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Master Paintings in The Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago, 1988), p. 45 (ill.).
Jeannine Baticle, Goya d’or et de sang (Paris, 1994), p. 95.
Janis Tomlinson, Francisco Goya y Lucientes 1746-1828 (London, 1994), p. 173, fig. 136.
Robert Hughes, Goya (New York, 2003), p. 226 (ill.).
Marilyne Assante di Panzillo. “Figures du Crime Romantique: Brigand, Femmes Fatales, et Sorcières”, Crime & Châtiment, Exh. cat. (Musée d’Orsay, 2010), p. 126, ill. 127, cat. 68.
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Goya: Order and Disorder, October 12, 2014-January 19, 2015, cat. 186 (ill.).
James Rondeau, ed., Paintings at the Art Institute of Chicago: Highlights of the collection (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2025), 54 (ill.).

New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Spanish Painting, 1928, cat. 7–12, ill.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Century of Progress Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture, June 1–November 1, 1933, cat. 166-d.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Century of Progress Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture, June 1–November 1, 1934, cat. 69-d.
M. Knoedler & Co., New York, Loan Exhibition of Paintings by Goya, April 9-April 21, 1934, cat. 16 (ill.).
Columbus, Ohio, Gallery of Fine Arts, Exhibition of Spanish Art, 1936.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Goya, 1941, pp. 46–49, cat. 75 (ill.)
The Toledo Museum of Art, Spanish Painting, March 16-April 27, 1941, pp. 136–137, cat. 94 (ill.).
New York, Wildenstein & Co., A Loan Exhibition of Goya, For the Benefit of the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, November 9–December 16, 1950, cat. 33.
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The Hague, Mauritshuis, Goya, July 4–September 13, 1970; traveled to Paris, Palais du Louvre, September 25–December 7, 1970, cat. 34 (ill.).
Madrid, Museo del Prado, Goya: Truth and Fantasy. The Small Paintings, November 15, 1994-February 27, 1994, cat. 88; London, Royal Academy of Arts, March 18-June 12, 1994; Art Institute of Chicago, July 16-October 16, 1994.
Paris, France, Musée d’Orsay, Crime and Punishment, March 15- June 27, 2010, cat. 68.
Frankfurt, Stadel Museum, Schwarze Romantik, von Goya bis Max Ernst, September 25, 2014-January 20, 2013; Paris, Musée d’Orsay, L’Ange du bizarre. Le romanticisme noir de Goya a Max Ernst, March 4-June 9, 2013.
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Goya: Order and Disorder, October 12, 2014-January 19, 2015, cat. 186 (ill.).

One of a series of six small paintings in an inventory of Goya’s collection, Madrid, taken in 1812 for the division of property between the artist and his son Javier following the death of the artist’s wife; the group of small paintings marked X8 being allotted to the son: “Seis quadros del Maragato señalados con el número ocho, en 700 [reales]” (the inventory mark has been removed from the painting and is no longer visible) [see Gassier and Wilson 1971]; presumably Javier Goya after 1812. Lafitte collection, Madrid; sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, March 7, 1861, bought in together with other paintings from the series for 590 francs [see Hippolyte Mireur, Dictionnaire des ventes (Paris, 1914), vol. 3, p. 360 and Despartment Fitz-Gerald 1928-1950]. Julius Böhler, Munich by 1911; sold to Martin Ryerson (died 1932), Chicago in May 1911 [see purchase receipt dated May 13, 1911]; bequeathed to the Art Institute, 1933.

Gassier and Wilson GW 868

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Friar Pedro Shoots El Maragato as His Horse Runs Off

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