After Rosso?

Etching by Léonard Limosin, 20.2 x 18.5 (Zerner).  At the left edge, just above the center: Limosin’s coat-of-arms.

Fig.E.96 (Paris)

Zerner, 1969, L.L.7.

COLLECTION: Paris, AA 1 Rés.

LITERATURE:

Demartial, 1912, 19, 21, 23, Fig. 5.

Kusenberg, 1931, 115, 119, 208, n. 312, mentioned that two men at the left are copied from two in Rosso’s Caritas Romana (Cimon and Pero), the stucco relief beneath the Cleobis and Biton in the Gallery of Francis I.

Adhémar, 1938, 2-3, no. 7.

Verdier, 1967, 175, on Limosin’s coat-of-arms.

Antoinelle Fay, in EdF, 1972, 291, no. 356.  Baratte, 1993, 22, 25.

 

The figures mentioned by Kusenberg (see above), but three instead of two, are related to Rosso’s relief (Fig.P.22, V S c); they are, however, more closely related to the figures in the anonymous engraving dated 1542 of this scene (Fig.E.143, I).  Limosin could also have known Rosso’s lost drawing from which this print would seem to have been made.  Should Limosin’s print be based on a lost drawing by Rosso of this entire scene, then one would have to assume that Rosso re-used his own figures, which is not an impossibility.

Although not specifically related in any of its details to Donatello’s reliefs, the etching does remind one of his Christ before Pilate and Caiphas of the North Pulpit in San Lorenzo in Florence, which somewhat encourages one to see Limosin’s print as dependent on a lost drawing by Rosso.

ENAMEL: Limosin.  Écouen, Château, Musée national de la Renaissance, Cl 904D (Fig.E.96, Enamel).  Oval, 34 x 26.

LITERATURE: Du Sommerard, 1883, 363, no. 4620.  Demartial, 1912, 23, Fig. 6, 25.

The enamel is in the same direction as the print and follows it closely, although the scene is slightly enlarged on all sides with added figures and details to accommodate it to the oval format.  Elsewhere other details have been changed and added.  The figure seen from the back at the far right wears a garment over his torso and boots in the enamel.