represented Hercules strangling Antaeus: this was intended for the principal Fountain in the Harden of Castello, which is a Villa of the Duke’s, but having made the mould, either because of his ill fortune, or that the metal had been burnt, or for some other cause, he could not succeed in the bronze casting, although he twice attempted it.
Vincenzio then resolved no longer to subject his labours to the caprices of that malicious Fortune; he therefore began to work in marble, and in a short time completed two figures in the same block of stone: these represent Honour and Deceit, the latter fallen beneath the feet of the former.[1] This he completed with so much care, that while looking at it you think the artist can never have done anything but handle the mallet and chisels through his life lopg; the head of Honour, which is exceedingly beautiful, has waving hair which is so finely worked that it looks exactly as does that of Nature; and Vincenzio has also displayed profound knowledge of the nude form in this group, which is now in the Court of the house belonging to the Signor Sforza Almeni in the Via de’ Servi.
At Fiesole, Vincenzio executed various decorations for the same Signore Sforza, in his gardens that is to say, and around certain fountains. He subsequently produced numerous bassi-rilievi; these, which are in marble and bronze, and were considered very beautiful, are, for the most part, in possession of the Signor Duke: in that branch of sculpture Vincenzio is perhaps not inferior to any other master. This artist furthermore cast the grated doors of the chapel lately made in the Palace for the new apartments painted by Giorgio Vasari, and with them a work in basso-rilievo, which serves to close a cabinet in which the Duke keeps writings of importance; he also executed another, which represents Moses raising the Serpent in the Wilderness; this last is about a braccio and a half high, by two and a half broad. By order of Duke Cosimo, Danti then executed the Door of the Sacristy in the Deanery of Prato, with a marble
- ↑ This group, which is now in the Boboli Gardens, represents a youth with “an old man, tied hands and feet, whom he seems about to carry by means of a girth across his shoulder, as a peasant carries a lamb to market,” observes an Italian commentator. He adds that, “To discover that the group represents Honour and Deceit, we must first be told that they do so.”
