- Museum number
- Ff,2.104
- Description
-
Hercules, Minerva and Mars; seen almost from behind, approaching a building beyond at r
Pen and brown ink, with brown wash, over black chalk
- Production date
- 1545-1578
- Dimensions
-
Height: 382 millimetres
-
Width: 238 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- Watermark: Briquet 6291.
The Weld drawing mentioned by Gere and Pouncey is now in the Walker Art Gallery, see Brooke no. 44.
Lit.: J.A. Gere and P. Pouncey, 'Italian drawings in the BM, Artists working in Rome', London, 1983, no. 236; X. Brooke, in exhib. cat., Liverpool, Walker Art Gallery, and London, BM, 'Mantegna to Rubens, the Weld-Blundell Drawings Collection', under no. 44, p. 92.
Gere & Pouncey 1983
An identical composition is the principal feature of a house façade for which there is a complete study in the Weld Collection, Lulworth ('Facciate', pl. vi; 'Italian 16th Century Drawings from British Private Collections', Edinburgh, 1969, no. 73, pl. 16; Celio, fig. 21) inscribed with an old attribution to Raffaellino and identified as a "primo pensiero della facciata della Casa del Volterra A[rchitetto] posto vicino a'Casali in Campo Marzo": a statement which there seems no reason to doubt, whether or not it "was based on first-hand observation or merely derived from Baglione's description (p. 25f.) of a façade by Raffaellino "in Campo Marzo incontro a'Signori Casali nella facciata della casa di Francesco da Volterra famoso Architetto stanno diversi puttini molto ben coloriti, & assai gratiosi; & alcune historiette di chiaro, e scuro; e nel mezo evvi la Virtù, che tien per mano Hercole, e'l Genio, e vanno verso il Tempio dell'Eternità, a buonissimo fresco dipinta". The date of the commission was probably soon after 8 April 1573, when the house was let to Volterra (see 'II Vasari', viii (1936-7), p. 111).
An alternative treatment of the same three figures, showing them from the front, is known from a drawing at Lille which Popham was the first to recognise as by Raffaellino (Pluchart 173, as Arpino; Gernsheim 17995). A damaged copy*, apparently by Marco Marchetti as Dott. Forlani Tempesti was the first to suggest, is in the Uffizi (3885s, as Agostino Carracci; Gernsheim 4117; Gere, 'Uffizi Exh.', 1966, no. 88, fig. 58). In this version the woman in the centre wears, in addition to a plumed helmet, a corselet with a Gorgon mask and is thus certainly identifiable as Minerva. The gesture of her hands and arms in both versions indicates that she is leading forward the other figures, Hercules on one side and on the other a man in Roman armour who is presumably to be identified as Mars. Hercules seems to be striding willingly ahead, Mars to be displaying a certain reluctance; the subject could be explained as an allegory of Wisdom subduing Strength and - with rather more difficulty - Violence. The objects in the lower r.-hand corner of Ff ,2.104 are no doubt Mars's discarded weapons, a circular shield with a sword lying across it. Baglione's vaguer interpretation of the subject was no doubt suggested by the inscription "EVEXIT AD AETHERA VIRTVS" which occurs under the composition in the Weld drawing and was probably also on the façade itself.
Voss (p. 554) connected with the same project a drawing by Raffaellino of a similar subject, at Munich (2611: repr. Voss, 'Zeichnungen', p. 34; E. Panofsky, 'Herkules am Scheideweg', Leipzig, 1930, pl. lx, fig. 90; 'Italienische Zeichnungen 15-18 Jahrhundert: Staatliche Graphische Sammlung', Munich, 1967, no. 64, pl. 53). This drawing differs from Ff,2.104 in showing a man being urged by Minerva and Mercury away from Venus and Bacchus towards a temple on top of a high mountain. The man has none of the attributes of Hercules (the club and the lion-skin) but the composition is clearly a variation on the traditional 'Hercules at the Cross-Roads'. It is inspired by, or even derived directly from, Federico Zuccaro: what is in all essentials the same scene is represented in an oval cartouche in the border of a drawing by him at Hamburg (21516; Gernsheim 16999; BdH fig. 56), which is a preparatory design for the engraving by Cort, dated 1572, of the 'Calumny of Apelles' (BdH 219). A similar subject is represented by Federico in one of his frescoes in the Palazzo Zuccari in Rome, datable in the 1590s (Körte, pl. 11). Voss's suggestion that the Munich drawing is in some way connected with the Volterra façade may nevertheless be correct: though the temple on the mountain does not appear in Ff,2.104, in the Weld drawing it occupies an area immediately above the three figures but separated from them by a moulding.
A drawing in the Uffizi (817s; Gernsheim 40369; Gere, 'Uffizi Exh.', 1966, no. 85, pl. 57), traditionally attributed to Taddeo Zuccaro but more likely to be by Raffaellino, represents two men in Antique armour on either side of a third whom they appear to be encouraging towards some distant goal. This could be connected with the same project.
Of the figures studies on Ff,2.104 verso, two represent a figure (probably St Michael) trampling on a monster with a human head and body and a dragon's tail; the smaller sketch lower r. could be of St Sebastian bound to the tree.
Literature: Faldi, p. 330
* Most of the differences (e.g. in the head of Hercules) are due to restoration.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1799
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- Ff,2.104