Cape

1875 - 1900

  • Titles Cape (Descriptive)
  • Medium silk
  • Dimensions Overall: 24 1/2 x 36 in. (62.2 x 91.4 cm)
  • Credit Line Gift of Helen Benedict Byrd in honor of Martha Milner Benedict, 1986.1025
  • Work Type cape
  • Classification Costume

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Bust in profile left in uniform with the Order of the Black Eagle, with ermine mantle.
Large, deep polychrome majolica charger, or plate, in the istoriato style, in the middle with a scene in shades of blue, orange, green, and brown of Julius Caesar in Roman garb with cloak surrounded by Roman townspeople distributing and receiving wine and food within a courtyard defined by architectural structures and columns, probably based on a drawing by Taddeo Zuccaro (1529-66), the border decorated with grotesques on a whitened ground incorporating fantastic birds, part-human creatures, scrolls, stylized urns, and medallions imitating engraved gems, at the top the coat-of-arms of the Petrocchini family of Montelparo, Italy, the outer edge decorated in a modified egg-and-dart pattern; the reverse with a series of bright yellow bands and painted with the inscription SON FATTI DONI AL POPVLO ROMAO
Round dark blue jasper cameo with white relief of Venus and Cupid, set in gold metal as a pendant with chain necklace
Large, heavy vase with a bulbous body resting on a small round foot, the neck cinched in the middle with a flared lip, with two long, curving, snake handles, each comprised of two separate snakes, below the handles on either side are bearded male masks, the foot is painted a dark brown color with a band of mustard yellow and a like band on the stem below the body of the vase, the neck with similar yellow bands and a green ground designed to look like marble, the snake handles are yellow with brown details; the body of the vase is elaborately painted in the round in shades of brown, green, blue, purple, yellow and white, with on one side the image of the Evangelist Luke and on the other of the Evangelist John, both adapted with slight color variations from the frescoes by Domenichino (Domenico Zampieri, Italian 1581-1641) in the Church of Sant’ Andrea della Valle in Rome, Italy, on the sides below the masks are images of angels in flight.