Virginia Being Murdered by her Father Virginius

From the Getty Museum record

The Roman maiden Virginia was killed suddenly by her father to secure her freedom from a lecherous official named Appius Claudius. Appius had devised a complicated plan to enslave Virginia to him while her father was outside Rome. A corrupt judge ruled against the maiden’s claims of freedom, and Virginius, arriving just in time and dreading the future his daughter would inevitably face, asked for a moment alone with her. Walking to the market outside the courtroom, the father grabbed a butcher knife and stabbed his daughter, announcing that he was restoring her liberty in the only way he could. In the image, he plunges a dagger into her heart, impassively watched by several onlookers.