The life-size ancient but much restored marble statue known as the ''Barberini Faun'', ''Fauno Barberini'' or ''Drunken Satyr'' is now in the
Glyptothek
The Glyptothek () is a museum in Munich, Germany, which was commissioned by the Bavarian King Ludwig I of Bavaria, Ludwig I to house his collection of Ancient Greek art, Greek and Roman art, Roman sculptures (hence γλυπτο- ''glypto-'' "sculp ...
in
Munich, Germany
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...
. A
faun
The faun (, grc, φαῦνος, ''phaunos'', ) is a half-human and half-goat mythological creature appearing in Greek and Roman mythology.
Originally fauns of Roman mythology were spirits (genii) of rustic places, lesser versions of their c ...
is the Roman equivalent of a Greek
satyr
In Greek mythology, a satyr ( grc-gre, :wikt:σάτυρος, σάτυρος, sátyros, ), also known as a silenus or ''silenos'' ( grc-gre, :wikt:Σειληνός, σειληνός ), is a male List of nature deities, nature spirit with ears ...
. In
Greek mythology
A major branch of classical mythology, Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the Cosmogony, origin and Cosmology#Metaphysical co ...
, satyrs were human-like male woodland spirits with several animal features, often a goat-like tail, hooves, ears, or horns. Satyrs attended
Dionysus
In ancient Greek religion and myth, Dionysus (; grc, Διόνυσος ) is the god of the grape-harvest, winemaking, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, festivity, and theatre. The Romans ...
.
History
The sculpture was either carved by an unknown
Hellenistic
In Classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Mediterranean history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the emergence of the Roman Empire, as signified by the Battle of Actium in ...
sculptor of the
Pergamene school, in the late third or early second century BC or is a Roman copy of high quality, though its present form was given it by a series of restorers in Rome, ending with
Vincenzo Pacetti
Vincenzo Pacetti (1746–1820) was an Italian sculptor and restorer from Castel Bolognese, particularly active in collecting and freely restoring and completing classical sculptures such as the Barberini Faun (1799 – now in the Glyptothek, Mun ...
. The statue was found in the 1620s in the moat below the
Castel Sant'Angelo
The Mausoleum of Hadrian, usually known as Castel Sant'Angelo (; English: ''Castle of the Holy Angel''), is a towering cylindrical building in Parco Adriano, Rome, Italy. It was initially commissioned by the Roman Emperor Hadrian as a mausol ...
, Rome, which in Antiquity had been
Hadrian
Hadrian (; la, Caesar Trâiānus Hadriānus ; 24 January 76 – 10 July 138) was Roman emperor from 117 to 138. He was born in Italica (close to modern Santiponce in Spain), a Roman ''municipium'' founded by Italic settlers in Hispania B ...
’s Mausoleum. Work on the fortification was undertaken by the Barberini
Pope Urban VIII
Pope Urban VIII ( la, Urbanus VIII; it, Urbano VIII; baptised 5 April 1568 – 29 July 1644), born Maffeo Vincenzo Barberini, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 6 August 1623 to his death in July 1644. As po ...
in 1624. The sculpture made its first documented appearance in a receipt for its restoration, 6 June 1628, when it already belonged to the Pope's nephew,
Cardinal Francesco Barberini. When discovered, the statue was heavily damaged; the right leg, parts of both hands, and parts of the head were missing. The historian
Procopius
Procopius of Caesarea ( grc-gre, Προκόπιος ὁ Καισαρεύς ''Prokópios ho Kaisareús''; la, Procopius Caesariensis; – after 565) was a prominent late antique Greek scholar from Caesarea Maritima. Accompanying the Roman gener ...
recorded that during the
siege of Rome in 537 the defenders had hurled down upon the
Goths
The Goths ( got, 𐌲𐌿𐍄𐌸𐌹𐌿𐌳𐌰, translit=''Gutþiuda''; la, Gothi, grc-gre, Γότθοι, Gótthoi) were a Germanic people who played a major role in the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the emergence of medieval Europe ...
the statues adorning Hadrian's Mausoleum, and
Johann Winckelmann
Johann Joachim Winckelmann (; ; 9 December 17178 June 1768) was a German art historian and archaeologist. He was a pioneering Hellenist who first articulated the differences between Greek, Greco-Roman and Roman art. "The prophet and founding he ...
speculated that the place of discovery and the statue's condition suggested that it had been such a projectile.
It was traditionally asserted that Cardinal Maffeo
Barberini
The House of Barberini are a family of the Italian nobility that rose to prominence in 17th century Rome. Their influence peaked with the election of Cardinal Maffeo Barberini to the papal throne in 1623, as Pope Urban VIII. Their urban palace ...
commissioned
Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Gian Lorenzo (or Gianlorenzo) Bernini (, , ; Italian Giovanni Lorenzo; 7 December 159828 November 1680) was an Italian sculptor and architect. While a major figure in the world of architecture, he was more prominently the leading sculptor of his ...
to restore the statue, "but there is no evidence for the tradition that Bernini was in any way involved with the statue," Francis Haskell and Nicholas Penny observed in 1981, after reviewing the documentation and literature. Restorations, at first in stucco, were remade in 1679 by
Giuseppe Giorgetti
Giuseppe Giorgetti (documented 1668–82) was an Italian sculptor in Rome who worked first under his older brother Antonio Giorgetti and took over his workshop after Antonio died in late 1669. He then also became the principal sculptor for th ...
and
Lorenzo Ottoni
Lorenzo Ottoni, also known as Lorenzo Ottone or Lorenzone, (1658–1736) was an Italian sculptor who was commissioned by the papacy and various noble houses of Renaissance Italy.
Life
Ottoni was born in Rome in 1658 and spent the majority of h ...
, who enabled the antique left leg to be reaffixed and provided the elaborate supporting structure that is illustrated in Paolo Alessandro Maffei's ''Raccolta di statue'' (1704); in the eighteenth century the right leg was again restored in marble, and once more by Pacetti in 1799. (The sculpture is shown today without the restored hanging left arm.)
These restorations of the ''Barberini Faun'' may have enhanced the sexual aspect of the statue. Because of this, the statue has acquired a reputation as an example of erotic art. Nudity in Greek art was nothing new; however, the blatant sexuality of this work makes it most interesting to twentieth-century eyes. His wantonly spread legs focus attention on his genitals. Not all viewers have found the ''Faun'' so indecorous: the ''Barberini Faun'' was reproduced on a
Nymphenburg porcelain
The Nymphenburg Porcelain Manufactory (German: ''Porzellan Manufaktur Nymphenburg'') is located at the ''Nördliche Schloßrondell'' in one of the ''Cavalier Houses'' in front of the Nymphenburg Palace in Munich, Germany, and since its establi ...
service in the 1830s.
The statue was housed in the
Palazzo Barberini
The Palazzo Barberini ( en, Barberini Palace) is a 17th-century palace in Rome, facing the Piazza Barberini in Rione Trevi. Today, it houses the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica, the main national collection of older paintings in Rome.
History
...
, Rome, until it was sold in 1799 to the sculptor and restorer Vincenzo Pacetti; Pacetti offered it to various English and French clients, including
Lucien Bonaparte
Lucien Bonaparte, 1st Prince of Canino and Musignano (born Luciano Buonaparte; 21 May 1775 – 29 June 1840), was French politician and diplomat of the French Revolution and the Consulate. He served as Minister of the Interior from 1799 to 1800 ...
. The Barberini brought suit to annul the sale and eventually sold the ''Faun'', after much public competition and a ban on its exportation, strongly supported by the antiquarian
Carlo Fea
Carlo Fea (4 June 1753 - 18 March 1836) was an Italian archaeologist.
Biography
Born at Pigna, in Liguria, Fea studied law in Rome, receiving the degree of doctor of laws from the university of La Sapienza, but archaeology gradually attrac ...
and by
Antonio Canova
Antonio Canova (; 1 November 1757 – 13 October 1822) was an Italian Neoclassical sculptor, famous for his marble sculptures. Often regarded as the greatest of the Neoclassical artists,. his sculpture was inspired by the Baroque and the cl ...
— to
Ludwig, Crown Prince of Bavaria. Ludwig had planned a special room in the Glyptothek designed by the architect
Leo von Klenze
Leo von Klenze (Franz Karl Leopold von Klenze; 29 February 1784, Buchladen (Bockelah / Bocla) near Schladen – 26 January 1864, Munich) was a German neoclassicist architect, painter and writer. Court architect of Bavarian King Ludwig I, Leo ...
before the purchase was even finalized, and it was in place by 1827. The Glyptothek opened in 1830 to house Ludwig's sculpture collection.
Copies
A marble copy was sculpted by
Edmé Bouchardon
Edmé Bouchardon (; 29 May 169827 July 1762) was a French sculptor best known for his neoclassical statues in the gardens of the Palace of Versailles, his medals, his equestrian statue of Louis XV of France for the Place de la Concorde (destroy ...
at the
French Academy in Rome
The French Academy in Rome (french: Académie de France à Rome) is an Academy located in the Villa Medici, within the Villa Borghese, on the Pincio (Pincian Hill) in Rome, Italy.
History
The Academy was founded at the Palazzo Capranica in ...
in 1726 (''illustration, right''). Cardinal Barberini desired a plaster cast of it to keep with the antique original. Bouchardon's ''Barberini Faun'' arrived in France in 1732, greatly admired. In 1775 the
duc de Chartres bought it for his elaborate garden plan at
Parc Monceau
Parc Monceau () is a public park situated in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France, at the junction of Boulevard de Courcelles, Rue de Prony and Rue Georges Berger. At the main entrance is a rotunda. The park covers an area of 8.2 hectares (20 ...
. It is now in the
Louvre Museum
The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...
.
A copy by sculptor Eugène-Louis Lequesne was given to France in 1846. It is now located in the
École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts
The Beaux-Arts de Paris is a French ''grande école'' whose primary mission is to provide high-level arts education and training. This is classical and historical School of Fine Arts in France. The art school, which is part of the Paris Science ...
.
A gilded copy is included among many other replicas of classical sculptures that adorn the grand cascade that descends from the back of
Peter the Great
Peter I ( – ), most commonly known as Peter the Great,) or Pyotr Alekséyevich ( rus, Пётр Алексе́евич, p=ˈpʲɵtr ɐlʲɪˈksʲejɪvʲɪtɕ, , group=pron was a Russian monarch who ruled the Tsardom of Russia from t ...
's summer palace,
Peterhof, outside of
St. Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
,
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...
.
See also
*
Portland Vase
The Portland Vase is a Roman cameo glass vase, which is dated to between AD 1 and AD 25, though low BC dates have some scholarly support. It is the best known piece of Roman cameo glass and has served as an inspiration to many glass and porcelain ...
and
Apollo Barberini
The Apollo Barberini is a 1st–2nd-century Roman sculpture of Apollo Citharoedus. It is a probable copy of the sculpture of Apollo Citharoedus (possibly by Scopas and perhaps from the sanctuary of Apollo at Rhamnus, in Attica) that was the cult ...
, also collected by the Barberini
*
List of works by Gian Lorenzo Bernini
The following is a list of works of sculpture, architecture, and painting by the Italian Baroque artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Gian Lorenzo (or Gianlorenzo) Bernini (, , ; Italian Giovanni Lorenzo; 7 December 159828 November 1680) was an Italian ...
Notes
References
*
Francis Haskell
Francis James Herbert Haskell, (7 April 1928 – 18 January 2000) was an English art historian, whose writings placed emphasis on the social history of art. He wrote one of the first and most influential patronage studies, ''Patrons and Painte ...
and Nicholas Penny, 1991. ''Taste and the Antique: The Lure of Classical Sculpture 1500-1900'' (Yale University Press). Cat. no. 33, pp 202–05.
External links
{{Commons-inline
Faun
The faun (, grc, φαῦνος, ''phaunos'', ) is a half-human and half-goat mythological creature appearing in Greek and Roman mythology.
Originally fauns of Roman mythology were spirits (genii) of rustic places, lesser versions of their c ...
Pergamene sculpture
Roman copies of 3rd-century BC Greek sculptures
Ancient Greek erotic art
Archaeological discoveries in Italy
Nude sculptures