Table, with floor mosaic fragment as a top depicting cupids harvesting grapes

Roman art

This table, in gilt wood, has straight, fluted legs decorated with green bands with applied ornament and a green breccia top inlaid with a mosaic with an ancient fragment in the middle. It was made as part of the renovation of the Palazzina and its furnishings, commissioned by Marcantonio Borghese during the period between 1775 and 1790, designed and headed by the architect Antonio Asprucci.

Object details

Commentary

This mosaic fragment was inserted into the marble top of a small table, adapted for this use with large white tesserae and floral frames to the sides. The table was almost certainly made during the Neoclassical redecoration of the residence commissioned by Prince Marcantonio IV and headed by the architect Antonio Asprucci (González-Palacios 1993, pp. 232–243).

The table, in the Louis XV style, has a green breccia top with a stone mosaic insert, edged with metal wire with a cord and rosette motif. The top, in golden yellow with green decorative motifs in the shape of stylised leaves on the two sides and four roundels in the corners, is inlaid with an ancient mosaic of cupids harvesting grapes, shaped on the two sides.  On the front, it has a green band with applied rosettes, spirals and festoons, an upper border with a Spitzenstab motif (upside-down triangular leaves) and a lower border with a fusarole pattern. The section of the straight, fluted legs above the feet is decorated with lanceolate leaves.

Scholars have put forward the names of various mosaicists for the insertion of the ancient mosaic fragment into the tabletop. One is Carlo Lecchini, who had made tabletops with unearthed fragments of mosaics in 1775; according to Palacios (1994), some of the tables of this type in the museum were probably made by Lecchini. Pompeo Savini was another mosaicist who contributed to spreading the use of ancient and all’antica mosaic (L. Ferrara, ‘Pompeo Savini, Vencesalo Peter e il mobile neoclassico Romano’, in Palatino no. 3, 1968). Since it is known that Savini was in close contact with the Borghese milieu (he created a mosaic copy of the Borghese relief of the Hours now in the Louvre, and he created many mosaics after designs by Venceslao Peter), S. Staccioli (1971) suggested that he might have made the table in Room X. However, comparing it with two tabletops securely attributed to Savini, now in the National Museum, Warsaw, they seem to have been made differently. Staccioli also suggested an associate of Savini or an artist working in his circle, such as Paolo Tozzi, who worked in the Villa in 1780. Since the table was almost certainly made during the Neoclassical renovation of the Palazzina, it is possible that it was created, like many pieces of furniture and other furnishings, based on a design by Asprucci.

Paola Berardi

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This mosaic fragment was inserted into the top of a small marble table, adapted for this use with large white tesserae and floral frames to the sides. The table was almost certainly made during the Neoclassical redecoration of the residence commissioned by the prince Marcantonio IV and led by the architect Antonio Asprucci (González-Palacios 1993, pp. 232–243).

The ancient part of the mosaic depicts two nude, winged putti harvesting grapes. The one on the left is balancing a basket full of grapes on his head with both hands. The one on the right turns towards him and encourages him with his outstretched right arm, while his left hand holds a smaller basket near the tub. There is a bare tree trunk in the background and, in the foreground, a rock. This subject was especially popular in the Roman world, especially in private contexts, for its evocation of blissful well-being. The stylised rendering of the two figures, with some of the features and parts of the body described by simply placing tesserae next to each other, is also found in a few mosaics with the same subject from the fourth century CE. There is a detailed grape harvest scene on the ceiling of the mausoleum of Santa Costanza in Via Nomentana, while scenes of growing, harvesting and pressing grapes decorate the floors of a few rooms next to the oval portico of the Villa Romana del Casale in Piazza Armerina.

Giulia Ciccarello