A Pope, possibly Leo XI
probably Italian School
Category
Art / Sculpture
Date
c. 1700 - c. 1750
Materials
Walnut
Measurements
600 x 348 x 135 mm
Place of origin
Italy
Order this imageCollection
Anglesey Abbey, Cambridgeshire
NT 514498
Summary
Walnut, bust of a Pope, Italian School, c. 1700-50. A portrait bust of a Pope, wearing a mantum (cope) with a richly carved embroidered hem of scrolling foliage, the mantum fastened across the chest with a band carved with a rosette, a tassel suspending from it in a ‘v’ shape to the cincture. The Pope crowned with a triregnum or papal tiara, a beehive-shaped headpiece adorned with three tiers of crowns and surmounted by an orb. Two tasselled lappets hang from the back of the tiara, the proper right lappet brought forward to rest over the proper right shoulder. The image of the Pope is highly stylised and might represent Pope Leo XI (Alessandro Ottaviano de' Medici, 1535-1605), who was Pope for just a few weeks, from 1 to 27 April 1605, and whose portraits show him heavily bearded and with long drooping moustaches. The bust is similar to but much larger than NT 514554, a bust of man wearing a papal tiara and a two-barred, archiepiscopal cross. The bust is varnished and roughly hollowed out at the back. Mounted on a half-octagonal socle.
Provenance
Bequeathed to the National Trust by Huttleston Rogers Broughton, 1st Lord Fairhaven (1896-1966) with the house and the rest of the contents.
Credit line
Anglesey Abbey, The Fairhaven Collection (The National Trust)
Makers and roles
probably Italian School, sculptor