Old World Wonders donates two 15th century bronze Italian plaquettes to the Ashmolean, UK

Old World Wonders donates two 15th century bronze Italian plaquettes to the Ashmolean, UK

In honor of the publication of Jeremy Warren’s magisterial catalogs of the Ashmolean Museum’s sculpture collection (Vol. 3 dedicated exclusively to the subject of plaquettes), the gallerists of Old World Wonders donate two additional plaquettes to the museum’s collection: a relief of Ulysses, Diomede and the Palladium and a relief featuring a Head of Pan.

The donation of the Ulysses, Diomede and the Palladium plaquette is of particular importance due to its scarcity and also because the museum owns the original sardonyx intaglio from which it was cast. The gem is of Roman origin dating to the 1st century AD and features a Greek inscription, ΦΗΛΙΞ ΕΠΟΙΕΙ ΚΑΛΠΟΥΡΝΙΟΥ ΣΕΟΥΕΡΟΥ, revealing its antique creator and original owner: a Greek artist named Felix, active in Rome, and the gem’s commissioner, Calpurnius Severus. It is this reference to the engraver’s name that has inspired the gem’s popular identity as the Gemma Felix or “Felix Gem.” Its scene depicts Diomedes escaping from Troy with the stolen statue of Athena while greeted by Odysseus who has recently slain a Trojan guard or priest, indicated only by the presence of the maimed guard’s feet beneath him.

During the Renaissance the gem was probably owned by Ludovico Trevisan, an important collector of antiquities who had probably acquired it from the estate of Niccolo Niccoli in 1437. Sometime after 1451 another collector, Pietro Barbo (the future Pope Paul II), must have acquired the Felix Gem from Trevisan. It appears in Barbo’s 1457 inventory, prized as the most valuable gem in his collection. Following Barbo’s death in 1471, the gem was acquired by Cardinal Francesco Gonzaga whose posthumous inventory likewise records it in 1483. During the first half of the 17th century the valuable Mantuan collections of the Gonzaga were sold off predominately to English royalty. King Charles I was offered the collection of Mantuan gems but perceived their price as too high. They were instead acquired by Lord Arundel (Thomas Howard). After a series of later transactions following Lord Arundel’s death, the gem eventually arrived in the Duke of Marlborough’s (George Spencer’s) collection and today resides at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, UK (Inv. AN 1966.19081).

The origin of the six known plaquette casts of the Felix Gem, inclusive of the present example, probably derive from the private foundry established by Barbo at the Palace of San Marco (Palazzo Venezia) in Rome where his efforts at renovating the structure began in 1455. It has been suggested that Barbo himself may have been responsible for the casts of the Felix Gem given their amateur casting quality. Barbo’s zealous love for the reproduction of antique glyptics in bronze makes the idea a possibility, himself being a major catalyst for the popularity of small bronze reliefs in the early Italian Renaissance.

Before the gallery’s acquisition of the plaquette it formerly belonged to the illustrious collection Sylvia Adams and before her, to the famous 19th century Italian art dealer, Stefano Bardini.

The Head of Pan plaquette is donated in-mind to replace a rather diminished cast already in the Ashmolean collections. The gallerists of Old World Wonders were responsible for an in-depth study on the plaquette, rediscovering what is possibly the original Renaissance rock crystal from which it derived and discussing the complex history of the relief whose meaning altered over time and whose effigy was also once sketched by a young Michelangelo in Florence. The complete study can be found here:

https://renbronze.com/2017/07/17/head-of-pan-lorenzo-michelangelo-attila-and-a-lost-plaquette-prototype/

February 2020

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