Allegory of History (after Francisco Javier Ramos after Anton Raphael Mengs)
Domenico Cunego (Verona 1727 - Rome 1803)
Category
Art / Prints
Date
1782
Materials
Paper
Measurements
710 mm (H)560 mm (W)
Order this imageCollection
Kingston Lacy Estate, Dorset
NT 1252902
Summary
Print, Engraving, Allegory of History (after Francisco Javier Ramos after Anton Raphael Mengs) by Domenico Cunego (Verona 1727 - Rome 1803). Copied from the fresco, ceiling of the Camera dei Papiri, in the Vatican, by Mengs. In 1772, Pope Clement the Fourteenth (1705-74) gave the German artist Anton Raphael Mengs (1728-79) the task of decorating the ceiling in the Camera dei Papiri in the Vatican. This was the home of the Vatican collection of manuscripts. Clio, the muse of history is seated in the centre, writing in a book supported on the back of Saturn, the symbol of time. A genius is bringing scrolls to Clio, and the two-faced Roman god Janus is telling her what to write. One of Janus’s faces is looking back and the other forward in time. With his right hand, Janus is directing attention to the open door leading into the then recently founded museum, the Museo Pio Clementino in the Vatican. Fame hovers above.
Marks and inscriptions
Pio VI P.M.
Makers and roles
Domenico Cunego (Verona 1727 - Rome 1803), engraver (printmaker) after Francisco Javier Ramos (Madrid 1746 - Madrid 1817), original artist after Anton Raphael Mengs (Aussig 1728 – Rome 1779), artist