An Apology for Absence Some Reflections on Carpaccio’s Dream of Saint Ursula

In the cycle of the Legend of St Ursula, The Dream is a famous and mysterious work by Carpaccio. The questions it raises have led to various hypotheses. We focus on several rarely-considered points, based on a rigorous examination of the work, on some biblical texts and on Augustine. These observations lead us to conclude that there is a point of convergence here, namely absence, which is stated or implicit everywhere in the text and around which the whole work is organised.