In the background we see Poseidon, the capricious wayward and revengeful God of the sea. He once created the horse to impress his childhood lover Demeter. Now he plays with his four-in-hand lover Demeter. The inhabitants of Rhodes prepare an annual sacrificial ceremony: each year they drown the four most beautiful horses to make the sun appear again. The action goes entirely beyond Amphitrite, which we see in the foreground. Amphitrite, a sea- nymph and the wife of Poseidon, is drowned in deep thoughts. She drowns as it were in her own thoughts, which is depicted with the rising water.