Erato

Object belonging

One's own

Category

Bronze sculpture

City

Rome

Location

Museo Nazionale del Palazzo di Venezia

Specific location

Store

Inventory

PV 09217/395

Material and technique

Bronze, natural dark patina; full casting, base fused together with the statue

Author

Francesco Righetti (1749-1819) and Luigi Righetti (1780-1852)

Dimensions

35 x 18.4 x 8 cm.

Origin

Tower-Wurts Collection (1933)

Image copyright

SSPSAE e per il Polo Museale della città di Roma

Short description

This bronze statue is a copy of the massive marble Erato that is now conserved in the Vatican Museum. The latter was found in 1774 during the excavation of Cassius’s villa in Tivoli and was hailed as a Roman copy of a Hellenistic original, forming part of a larger group known as Apollo, Leader of the Muses, and other Muses. The earliest reference to the bronze depicting Apollo and the Nine Muses dates to 1786, when Luigi Righetti sent the Parnassus to the Tsaritsa in Russia, a work that stood on a "marble mountain" with metallic decoration upon a green marble pedestal; the gift also included the group of statues from Tivoli. In 1803, these bronzes with Apollo and the Nine Muses were fused to create four Table Ornaments for the Reggia di Capodimonte in Naples, upon which both Luigi Righetti’s name, and that of his father Francesco, appear.

Pietro Cannata

Bibliography

Unpublished