Marforio

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Marforio

The Marforio is one of the six so-called “speaking” statues in Rome . As with the others, pasquinades , insults or mockery, were published on him in the 15th and 16th centuries . Most of the mocking verses, written in dialogue form, were directed against the unacceptable behavior of the rulers: the statues thus communicated with each other to a certain extent.

The Marforio is an ancient marble statue of a lying, bearded river god . In the past, the lack of any attributes often left him portraying Jupiter , Neptune or the river Tiber . Already in the antiquarian book prospettiche romane (1496–1498) of the “Prospettivo Milanesi” (presumably the Milanese painter Bramantino ) the statue is referred to as a river god. The humanist and antiquarian Andrea Fulvio took this up in 1527: In the dedication of his book to Pope Leo X , he describes the image as a river god lying on a rock. The sculptor Roger Bescapè added the figure of Oceanus to the interpretation of the statue in 1594 .

The origin of its name is uncertain. When it was discovered, it still had a granite basin with the inscription mare in foro . The name could also come from the area where it was found, the Forum Martis . It is also possible to name it after the Marioli family (also Marfuoli); the family owned the Mamertine dungeon , in front of which the Marforio stood until 1588. We also find an explanation for the name Marforio in Andrea Fulvio: In his opinion, it is a corruption of the word "Nar Fluvius". As the largest tributary of the Tiber, today's river Nera bore this name ( Antiquitates Urbis , Rome 1527).

The Marforio has been one of Rome's sights since the 12th century. Poggio Bracciolini described him as a surviving statue of antiquity. In the early 16th century it stood on the forum near the Arch of Septimius Severus , where the authors mentioned also saw it. Marten van Heemskerck's pictorial work was studied and drawn at this location (Berlin Sketchbook II, plate 125, Berlin, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin - Prussian cultural property, Kupferstichkabinett - collection of drawings and prints, inventory no. 79 D 2). Pope Sixtus V had the statue moved to Piazza di San Marco in 1588 and to Piazza del Campidoglio in 1594. There she adorned a fountain made by Giacomo della Porta and designed by Michelangelo on the wall of the Church of Santa Maria in Aracoeli with a view of the Palazzo dei Conservatori . The last time the Marforio was moved to the inner courtyard of the Palazzo Nuovo on the Capitol (part of the Capitoline Museums ), where it is still located today, on the instructions of Pope Innocent X, in 1644 .

A copper engraving by Antonio Lafrery from 1550 (in the collection of engravings Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae ) shows him in his “function” as a “speaking statue” : Here a poem is added to the lying statue, which gives information about the legend of “Marforius”.

Copper engraving from the second volume of the Teutsche Academie, Nuremberg 1679

See also

  • Pasquino , another talking statue from Rome

literature

  • C. Rendina: Pasquino statua parlante. In: ROMA ieri, oggi, domani. No. 20, February 1990.
  • Phyllis Pray Bober, Ruth Rubinstein: Renaissance Artists and Antique Sculpture. A Handbook of Sources. 2., revised. Output. London / Turnhout 2010, ISBN 978-1-905375-60-8 .
  • Anna Schreurs-Morét: The river god Marforius. On the afterlife of an ancient sculpture in the German 17th century. In: Imitatio - Aemulatio - Superatio, ed. v. Ulrike Kern and Marlen Schneider, Merzhausen 2019, pp. 37–64.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ PP Bober, R. Rubinstein: Renaissance Artists and Antique Sculpture. 2010, No. 64, p. 110.
  2. ^ PP Bober, R. Rubinstein: Renaissance Artists and Antique Sculpture. 2010, no.64. River God Marforio
  3. ↑ C. Rendina: Pasquino statua parlante. In: ROMA ieri, oggi, domani. No. 20, February 1990.
  4. ^ PP Bober, R. Rubinstein: Renaissance Artists and Antique Sculpture. 2010, no.64. River God Marforio
  5. ^ PP Bober, R. Rubinstein: Renaissance Artists and Antique Sculpture. 2010, No. 64, p. 111, Fig.64b)
  6. ^ According to Giovanni Baglione, 1642, p. 61.
  7. ^ A b P. P. Bober, R. Rubinstein: Renaissance Artists and Antique Sculpture. 2010, No. 64, p. 111.
  8. ↑ (in German translation of the 17th century in the Teutsche Academie by Joachim von Sandrart: "Dis is a noble man from ancient Rome / who was born in form / as one looks at him / with such a beard / and also in Such clothes-kind. He would also be so tall from his youth / also always went so naked and so bare / he ate and drank nothing / but he got old / his age will be thirteen hundred soon. He has / the happiness and unhappiness this¶ earth / respected never only defends a Heller. In water / air / in the wind and on the¶ field / he always remained / completely without a roof and¶ tent. He / as I understand from him / suffered no pain on his teeth / also otherwise no¶ pain / quiet / serious / fresh / was always his¶ nature / even without wrong of a few words only / also otherwise comfortably do a lot of other things. But he was not allowed to rest: because some of the wicked rogue-Rottihn so cut up / made to shame and mockery. In Rome he is and will remain well known: there he will be Marforius called. ", cf. http://ta.sandrart.net/-text-887 )

Coordinates: 41 ° 53 ′ 37.4 "  N , 12 ° 28 ′ 59.7"  E