A strong, determined woman is pushing a reluctant youth into a chariot on the left. This is Aurora, goddess of the dawn, who has fallen in love with a mortal, the hunter Cephalus. He resists her advances, for he is already in love with Procris, daughter of the king of Athens.This is one of two large drawings made in connection with the ceiling decoration of the Gallery in the Palazzo Farnese in Rome, which was begun in 1597. The other drawing, A Woman borne off by a Sea God (?), is also in the National Gallery's collection. The project, centred around the classical theme of the loves of the gods, was largely designed and executed by Annibale Carracci, with the assistance of his older brother Agostino. These large sheets represent the final stage of the preparatory drawings -- the full-scale cartoons from which images were transferred onto the ceiling.