Door Knocker with Neptune and Two Lions

- Object belonging
- One's own
- Category
- Bronze sculpture
- City
- Rome
- Location
- Museo Nazionale del Palazzo di Venezia
- Specific location
- Room 16
- Inventory
- PV 09310
- Material and technique
- Bronze with high relief, natural dark patina, traces of opaque black lacquer
- Author
- Niccolò Roccatagliata (studio?)
- Dating
- Late 16th century (?)
- Dimensions
- 38 x 26 x 9 cm.
- Origin
- Barsanti Collection (1934)
- Image copyright
- SSPSAE e per il Polo Museale della città di Roma
Short description
Santangelo believed that this bronze was a variant of the knocker depicting Neptune and the Seahorses, variously attributed to either Alessandro Vittoria, his studio or an anonymous Venetian artist at the end of the 16th century. In the Palazzo Venezia version, a pair of frightful lions takes the place of the seahorses, placed either side of Neptune. The lions appear incongruous, though, next to the sea god and do not appear in other versions. Neptune’s body appears young and slightly built, in contrast to his aged facial appearance, characterized by a long, wavy beard and flowing hair. The beard has been carefully worked, in a style similar to that of Niccolò Roccatagliata and his son Stefano Nicolini, evident in the modelling of Jesus’ aged followers in the relief depicting the Allegory of the Redemption (1636) in the church of San Moisè in Venice. In this work, Roccatagliata arranges the eighteen old followers around Christ’s tomb, which is supported by a crowd of cherubs.
Pietro Cannata
Bibliography
L. Pollak, Raccolta Alfredo Barsanti (Trecento-Settecento), catalogue of the collection, Bergamo 1922, no. 83, p. 122, pl. XXXVII; A. Santangelo, Museo di Palazzo Venezia. Catalogo delle sculture, Rome 1954, p. 45, fig. 35