The Medici lions are a pair of marble sculptures of lions: one of which is Roman, dating to the 2nd century AD, and the other a 16th-century pendant. Both were by 1598[1] placed at the Villa Medici, Rome. Since 1789 they have been displayed at the Loggia dei Lanzi in Florence. The sculptures depict standing male lions with a sphere or ball under one paw, looking to the side.
This article is about the sculptures of lions with spheres. For the heraldic symbol of Florence, see Marzocco.
Copies of the Medici lions have been made and publicly installed in over 30 other locations, and smaller versions made in a variety of media; Medici lion has become the term for the type.
A similar Roman lion sculpture, of the 1st century AD, is known as the Albani lion, and is now in the Louvre. Here, the stone used for the ball is different from the basalt body. Both may derive from a Hellenistic original.[2]
History
A pair of lions were required by Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, who had acquired the Villa Medici in 1576, to serve as majestic ornaments for the villa's garden staircase, the Loggia dei leoni. The first lion originates from a 2nd-century[3] marble that was first mentioned in 1594, by the sculptor Flaminio Vacca,[4] by which time it was already in the collection of Ferdinando;[5] Vacca reported that it had been found in the via Prenestina, outside Porta San Lorenzo. According to Vacca, the lion had been a relief, which was carved free of its background and reworked by "Giovanni Sciarano" or Giovanni di Scherano Fancelli, of whom little is now known.[6]
The second was made and signed[7] by Vacca, also in marble, as a pendant to the ancient sculpture at a date variously reported as between 1594 and 1598[3] or between 1570 and 1590.[8][9] The pair were in place at the Loggia dei Leoni in 1598[1] The pendant was made from a capital that had come from the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus.[9]
The Villa Medici was inherited by the house of Lorraine in 1737, and in 1787[3][10][11] the lions were moved to Florence, and since 1789[10] they flank the steps to the Loggia dei Lanzi at the Piazza della Signoria.
The sculptures were replaced by copies at the Villa Medici when Napoleon relocated the French Academy in Rome to the villa in 1803.[12] These copies were made by the French sculptor Augustin Pajou.[11]
The Medici coat of arms with five balls, above Loggia dei leoni
Copies
The original Medici lions (1598) have since 1789 stood in the Loggia dei Lanzi, Piazza della Signoria, Florence. There is a smaller bronze left-looking sculpture attributed to Italian sculptor Pietro da Barga[13] and the same period.[8] Later copies or replicas include (ordered by first year):
Spain
Twelve sculptures in bronze by Matteo Bonucelli da Lucca, commissioned in Rome by Velázquez for the Room of Mirrors at the Royal Alcazar of Madrid (1651):
Four sculptures are now in the throne room[es] in the Royal Palace of Madrid (since 1764).[14]
Eight sculptures are now in the Museo del Prado, of which four support the tabletop of Rodrigo Calderón.[14][15]
Sculptures in Colmenar marble at the Montforte Gardens[es], Valencia by José Bellver (circa 1860).[16][17]
Sculptures in marble at the Canalejas Park[es], Alicante (park created 1886).
Sweden
Sculpture in bronze in the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts building, Stockholm (before 1735?).[18]
Sculpture in bronze at the Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm (1995).
Sculpture in bronze in Nacka, Stockholm (1996).[19][20]
Britain
Sculptures in lead at Stowe House attributed to John Cheere (around 1755–779). Formerly placed at Stanley Park, Blackpool (1927–2013).[21][22]
Two artificial stone versions are found in the garden of Osborne House (1845–1851), Isle of Wight.[25]
Sculptures at the Stanley Park, Blackpool (2013). These were produced, by Rupert Harris Conservation, using casts from the former sculptures which were returned, on loan, to Stowe house in 2013.[26]
Four miniature versions surrounding the Akademie- or Löwenbrunnen in the palace garden (1807–1811), Stuttgart.
Two gilded versions as part of the Lion Fountain in front of Glienicke Palace (1824–26), Berlin.
Statues at the entrance of Schloss Monrepos, Ludwigsburg (of unknown origin).[34][bettersourceneeded]
Cuba
Two versions outside the Cathedral de la Purisma Concepción in Cienfuegos (built 1833–69), Cuba.
United States
The Florentine Lions in cast-iron in the Fairmount Park, Philadelphia (cast in 1849 at the Alexandroffsky Head Mechanical Works, St Petersburg, Russia for Andrew M. Eastwick, originally displayed at Bartram's Garden, 1851–1879, installed at west Fairmount Park in 1887).[35]
Medici Lions, at Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Bowdoin College, Maine. The Museum’s landmark Walker Art Building was commissioned for the College by Harriet and Sophia Walker in honor of their uncle, a Boston businessman who had supported the creation of the first small art gallery at Bowdoin in the mid-nineteenth century. Designed by Charles Follen McKim of McKim, Mead, & White, the building was completed in 1894 and is on the National Register of Historic Places.[36][37]
Stone sculptures, Mick and Mack, at McMicken Hall, The University of Cincinnati, Ohio (there since 1904). The pair of lions originally belonged to Jacob Hoffner, a wealthy Cincinnati landowner who bequeathed them to the University upon his death in 1891. They were transported to their current location in 1904.[38]
The pair of lions on the western end of the eponymous Bridge of Lions in St. Augustine, Florida (constructed 1925–1927, rebuilt 2011–2012).[39]
The Swedish lion in bronze in Narva, Estonia. A version of one of the Slottslejonen was first erected in 1936 but destroyed 1944 during the German occupation. A sized-down copy of the Medici Lion in the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts was re-erected in 2000.
Lithuania
Sculptures of lions are in bronze at the staircase of the Vytautas the Great War Museum in Kaunas, Lithuania. They were donated by Lithuanian count Jonas Jurgis Tiškevičius (1917–1987) in 1938 from his Astravas Manor in Biržai suburb (decorative sculptures of lions that stood at the entrance to the manor were replaced with copies). Sculptures was made in Saint Petersburg's factory commissioned by Lithuanian count Jonas Tiškevčius in the middle of the 19th century.[41]
France
Several[42] sculptures at the Terrasse des Orangers in Parc de Saint-Cloud, Hauts-de-Seine, Paris (of unknown origin).[43]
Hungary
Statues at Pétervására, Hungary (of unknown origin).[44][bettersourceneeded]
Close imitations
Sweden: Slottslejonen[sv] (Swedish for The Palace Lions) in bronze, by Bernard Foucquet at the Royal Palace, Stockholm (1700–1704).
United Kingdom: Sculptures in bronze at the Queen's Gate entrance to Royal Victoria Park in Bath (1818–1819).[45]
Belgium: Lion of Waterloo in iron,[citation needed] by Jean-François Van Geel in Waterloo (1826).
India: Fitzgerald Bridge statue in Pune, India (1866).
Spain: The Leones del Congreso: Daoiz y Velarde[es] in bronze at the Congress of Deputies, Madrid, Cast in 1865, installed 1872.[46]
Finland: Parolan Leijona (Finnish for The Lion of Parola) on a four-meter-high (13ft) pedestal in Hattula. Erected in 1868 to commemorate the 1863 visit by Alexander II of Russia.[47]
Barbados: The Lion at Gun Hill carved from a single piece of coral stone in 1868 by Captain Henry John Wilkinson, who was stationed there. It is situated southeast and below the Gun Hill Signal Station, over-looking the St. George Valley.[48][49]
In popular culture
Downsized copies of the Medici lions are on display in the garden of the Corleone family estate in The Godfather (1972).
Draper, James David; Pajou, Augustin; Scherf, Guilhem; Louvre, Musée du; N.Y.), Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York (16 March 1998). Augustin Pajou: royal sculptor, 1730-1809. Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN9780810965188 – via Google Books.
Zharikov, N. L. (1983–1986). "Vorontsovsky dvorets, 1830–1846". Monuments of urban development and architecture in the UkSSR (in Russian). Vol.1–4. Kyiv: Budivel'nyk. p.301. LCCN84179019.
"Lion's Den Museum of Outdoors Arts". 26 September 2008. Archived from the original on 26 September 2008. Retrieved 16 November 2016.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
Renovated in 2007 to include the ball under the paw. Produced around 1818, they were commissioned by Charles Geary Esq, for inclusion in the new Masonic Hall in York Street, Bath, which was opened on 23 September 1819 with great ceremony, by the Grand Master of England, HEH the Duke of Sussex, attended by 800 to 1000 Freemasons in full regalia. 'The Historic Guide to Bath 1864' records the event and details "the master's chair stood on a throne of black and white marble, supported by lions, their feet resting on balls." The elaborate building immediately ran into financial trouble and soon closed. In 1842, Geary, having secured the debts and in order to pay them off, sold the hall to the Society of Friends, in whose care it remains, and the elaborate contents (known as 'The Bath Furniture') to Loyal Lodge No 251, Barnstable, Devon, where they also remain to this day. The lions, however, did not make the trip, legend suggesting there was no cart available to transport them. They were, therefore, presented to the city and the same 'The Historic Guide to Bath 1864' later records "At the side entrances, over the Queen's Gate, leading to the Royal Avenue are Bronzed Lions, presented by Mr. Geary." They were restored in 2007.[citation needed]
Dr. Edward Cecil Harris, MBE, PHD, FSA, Director Emeritus, National Museum of Bermuda (September 2017). The Sphinx of Inverurie(PDF). National Museum of Bermuda Press. pp.19–21. ISBN978-0-947481-03-2. Retrieved 28 December 2021.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
References
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Medici lions.
Michel Hochmann: Villa Medici, il sogno di un Cardinale – Collezioni e artisti di Ferdinando de' Medici, De Luca, 1999, p.208–11, nos. 37–40, illus. pp.209–11
Roberto Manescalchi Il Marzocco / The lion of Florence. In collaborazione con Maria Carchio, Alessandro del Meglio, English summary by Gianna Crescioli. Grafica European Center of Fine Arts e Assessorato allo sport e tempo libero, Valorizzazioni tradizioni fiorentine, Toponomastica, Relazioni internazionale e gemellaggi del comune di Firenze, novembre, 2005.
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