Two running athletes, after bronze figures from the Villa dei Papiri, Herculaneum
Sabatino de Angelis (b.1838)
Category
Art / Sculpture
Date
c. 1880 - 1900
Materials
Bronze
Measurements
44.5 x 27 x 12.2 cm
Place of origin
Naples
Order this imageCollection
Ickworth, Suffolk
NT 850845
Summary
Sculpture, bronze; a pair of running athletes; Sabatino de Angelis foundry, after antique bronze figures; Italy, Naples, c. 1880-1900. Two near identical figures of running athletes, reductions of bronze figures discovered in the Villa dei Papiri in the Roman town of Herculaneum, buried by the eruption of Vesuvius in A.D. 79. The first discoveries from the cities buried under ash from the volcano were made at Herculaneum in the mid-eighteenth century, including the figures of the running athletes, brought to light in 1754. The pair of bronzes at Ickworth, reduced size copies of the originals, were cast in the foundry of Sabatino de Angelis. He was one of the best of a number of Neapolitan sculptors in the later nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, who set up bronze foundries to meet the demand for copies of famous antiquities, especially but not only those discovered in Pompeii and Herculaneum. The two runners must have been acquired in order to furnish the Pompeian Room in the West Corridor at Ickworth, completed in 1879.
Full description
A pair of figures of running athletes, reductions of bronze statues from Herculaneum. In each figure the young man is depicted naked and bent forward, with his weight on his left leg, his right hand partly raised, left arm and hand by his side. Both men have vigorously curled hair and partly-silvered eyes. Each figure mounted on a separately cast rectangular bronze base, stamped as a product of the foundry of Sabatino de Angelis. The figures are small reproductions of a pair of all but identical medium-sized bronze figures that were discovered at Herculaneum in July 1754, in a room of the so-called Villa dei Papiri. The figures are known as the ‘Statues of the Runners’ (‘Statue di corridori’) and seem to depict athletes engaged in a race. The original bronze figures, which have eyes made from stone and bone inlays, are today in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale in Naples (Invs. 5626-27; Lapatin 2019, pp. 170-71, nos. 18-19). They are Roman copies of a lost Hellenic sculpture from the fourth or third century B.C., which perhaps depicted a victor in the celebrated Panhellenic Games. The most recent research has suggested that one of the two figures was cast from the other. The foundry operated in Naples by Sabatino de Angelis (1838-c. 1915) was established in 1840, presumably by his father. Sabatino de Angelis and Son became, along with the Chiurazzi and Giorgio Sommer, one of the most successful and best-known of the several Neapolitan foundries that operated in the city from the second half of the nineteenth century. They were established to capitalize on the huge international demand in the later nineteenth century for high-quality copies of antiquities from Herculaneum, Pompeii, Rome and elsewhere, after the Italian government had in 1860 agreed to allow the making of copies of objects in the museum in Naples. All three foundries published catalogues of the products they offered, the 1900 catalogue from Sabatino de Angelis proudly proclaiming on its cover that the firm supplied casts to various European royal houses, as well as leading museums in London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Boston, Chicago, New York and elsewhere. In the 1870s, Sabatino de Angelis also entered into a joint venture with the rival Chiurazzi foundry, forming the Fonderie Artistiche Riunite, the main purpose of which was to cater for the burgeoning American market. It also published a catalogue in 1910, largely based on the 1900 de Angelis catalogue, suggesting that it was this foundry that provided the majority of the models for the joint venture. It certainly appears to be the case that de Angelis was especially highly regarded internationally, the American curator Edward Robinson writing in 1892 that Sabatino de Angelis was ‘by far the best of the numerous Neapolitan copyists, his talent and feeling for his line of work being rare in any generation.’ (Edward Robinson, ‘Casts for the Metropolitan Museum of New York’, American Architect and Building News, 37 no. 872, 10 September 1892, pp. 166-68, p. 167). Another De Angelis cast at Ickworth depicts a bronze figure of a youth variously known as Dionysus (Bacchus) or Narcissus (NT 850842). The Runners were standard items in the catalogues of the main Naples foundries. They appear in the 1900 Sabatino de Angelis catalogue and then the catalogue published in 1910 for the combined Chiurazzi and De Angelis foundries. Both catalogues offered the models in the original size, with a height of 118 cms., whilst in the 1900 catalogue two smaller sizes were also offered, 46 and 27 cms. In 1910 the same range of sizes was offered plus an additional one, 54 cms. height. In both catalogues the figures were offered in two alternative patinations, ‘Herculaneum’ and ‘Modern’. The Ickworth figures, which are the 46 cm. size, would seem to have been given the darker ‘Herculaneum’ patination. They must have been acquired in order to furnish the Pompeian Room in the West Corridor at Ickworth, completed in 1879. The Runners have continued to this day to be greatly admired by visitors to the Museo Nazionale in Naples. In a memorable scene in Roberto Rossellini’s 1954 film Viaggio in Italia, Ingrid Bergmann finds herself intrigued by these remarkable sculptures (Lapatin 2019, p. 3. Fig. 1.3). Jeremy Warren July 2025
Provenance
Part of the Bristol Collection. Acquired by the National Trust in 1956 under the auspices of the National Land Fund, later the National Heritage Memorial Fund.
Marks and inscriptions
'Londeria Artistica, Tuio de Angelis [ampersand] Fils, Napoli'
Makers and roles
Sabatino de Angelis (b.1838) , founder
References
Sabatino 1900: Catalogue illustré de Sab. De Angelis et fils, Naples, Naples 1900, pp. 30-31, nos. 5626-27. Chiurazzi and De Angelis 1910: Fonderie Artistiche Riunite. J. Chiurazzi & Fils – S. De Angelis & Fils. Bronzes, Marbres, Argenterie, Naples 1910, pp. 72-73, nos. 5626 & 5627. Lapatin 2019 : Kenneth Lapatin, ed., Buried by Vesuvius. The Villa dei Papiri at Herculaneum, exh. cat., J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles 2019.