print
- Museum number
- 1851,0208.169
- Description
-
Lycurgus consigning laws to the Spartans and Numa Pompilius to the Romans; people in classical costume taking texts from the hand of a man standing on the right and seen from behind; on the left, another man standing and seen from behind. c.1540/50
Etching
- Production date
- 1540-1550
- Dimensions
-
Height: 197 millimetres (trimmed)
-
Width: 257 millimetres
- Curator's comments
- Damaged and restored in bottom right part. A rare print, with only one other surviving impression, which is in Paris (Bibliothèque nationale de France, BA-1 (16e; Caldara)). It shows one of the six episodes painted immediately above the first row of windows on the façade of the Palazzo Milesi in Rome. These were painted by Polidoro and Maturino di Firenze in 1526–27. The decoration of the Palazzo Milesi, which was highly praised by Vasari, was copied by countless draughtsmen and printmakers throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (Vasari, 1550 and 1558, ed. 1966–87, vol. IV (text), pp. 463–64). The present scene is thought to represent Lycurgus of Sparta and the Roman Numa Pompilius, the legendary lawgivers whom Plutarch paired in his 'Parallel Lives'. Jenkins 2017.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1851
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1851,0208.169
