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Costanzo da Ferrara

Mehmed II Riding [reverse], c. 1477/1480

West Building, Ground Floor — Gallery G16

Medium

bronze

Dimensions

overall (diameter): 12.34 cm (4 7/8 in.)
gross weight: 445.3 gr (0.982 lb.)
axis: 12:00

Credit Line

Samuel H. Kress Collection

Accession Number

1957.14.695.b

Artists / Makers

Costanzo da Ferrara (medalist) Neapolitan, c. 1450 - died after 1524

Image Use

This image is in the public domain.
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Inscription

around circumference: HIC BELLI FVLMEN POPVLOS PROSTRAVIT ET VRBES; lower center on tablet: CONST / ANTIVS F[ecit]

Provenance

Gustave Dreyfus [1837-1914], Paris; his heirs; purchased with the entire Dreyfus collection 9 July 1930 by (Duveen Brothers, Inc., London, New York, and Paris); sold 31 January 1944 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[1] gift 1957 to NGA.

[1] The Duveen Brothers Records document the firm’s sixteen year pursuit and eventual acquisition of the Dreyfus collection, which included paintings, sculptures, small bronzes, medals, and plaquettes. Bequeathed as part of his estate to Dreyfus’ widow and five children (a son and four daughters), who had differing opinions about its disposition, the collection was not sold until after his widow’s death in April 1929. Duveen did not wish to separate Dreyfus’ collection of small bronzes, medals, and plaquettes, and it was sold intact to the Kress Foundation for a price that was met by installment payments every three months. (Duveen Brothers Records, accession number 960015, Research Library, The Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles: reel 301, box 446, folders 3 and 4; reel 302, box 447, folders 1-6; reel 303, box 448, folders 1 and 2; reel 330, box 475, folder 4.) See also George Francis Hill’s discussion "A Note on Pedigrees" in his catalogue, The Gustave Dreyfus Collection: Renaissance Medals, Oxford, 1931: xii, which was commissioned by Duveen Brothers.

Associated Names

Dreyfus, Gustave
Duveen Brothers, Inc.
Kress Foundation, Samuel H.

Exhibition History

1953: Renaissance Portraits, Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts, 1953, no cat.

1991: Circa 1492: Art in the Age of Exploration, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1991-1992, no. 107, repro.

1994: The Currency of Fame: Portrait Medals of the Renaissance, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; The Frick Collection, New York; National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, 1994-1995, no. 21, repro.

2004: Byzantium: Faith and Power (1261-1557), The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2004, no. 322A, repro.

Bibliography

1982: Raby, Julian. "A Sultan of Paradox: Mehmed the Conqueror as a patron of the arts." Oxford Art Journal 5, no. 1 (1982): 3-8, fig. 1.

1987: Raby, Julian. "Pride and Prejudice: Mehmed the Conqueror and the Italian portrait medal," Studies in the History of Art 21 (1987): 176, 177 fig. 5, 178.

2003: Spinale, Susan Elizabeth. "The Portrait Medals of Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II (r. 1451-81)." Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, Cambridge, 2003: 123-135.

2006: Salomon, Xavier F. "Bellini and the East, Boston and London [review of the exhibition]." The Burlington Magazine 148, no. 1237 (April 2006): 301-302.

2007: Pollard, John Graham. Renaissance Medals. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. 2 vols. Washington, 2007: 1:no. 145, repro.

2008: Waddington, Raymond B. "Breaking News: Representing the Islamic Other on Renaissance Medals." The Medal 53 (Autumn 2008): 9, 11 fig. 3 (images of both obverse and reverse numbered fig. 3), 19 nn. 33-35.

2009: James, Carolyn, and F.W. Kent. "Margherita Cantelmo and Agostino Strozzi: Friendship's Gifts and a Portrait Medal by Costanzo da Ferrara." I Tatti Studes in the Italian Renaissance 12 (2009): 108-109, fig. 1.