[Antiquities of the Vatican Museums.] Varneck, Karl, German draughtsman (fl. 1828). Disegne delle statue, busti e altri framenti antichi qui si trove nel Museo Pio-Clementino e Chiaromonti.

€ 4,500.00

Beautifully illustrated catalogue of important antiquities from the collections of the Museo Pio-Clementino and the Galleria Chiaramonti, the first two museums of classical antiquities within the Vatican museums. The title-page includes three mounted drawings: portrait busts of Popes Clement XIII and Pius VII and a personification of Rome from the collection.

The Museo Pio-Clementino had been founded by Clement XIV in 1771 as a public museum of antiquities; the Galleria Chiaramonti followed in 1806 and was specifically dedicated to smaller antique works in marble. A reference to J. J. Winckelmann's seminal "Geschichte der Kunst des Althertums" on the title-page may explain why Varneck chose to include the portrait of Clement XIII, as it was he who appointed Winckelmann as his Prefect of Antiquities in 1763 and Wickelmann's ideas were central to the organization of the Papal collections of antiquities by his successor Giovanni Battista Visconti.

The catalogue itself consists of 286 numbered entries, all but three illustrated with Varneck's detailed pen drawings mounted on the recto of each leaf. Many of the drawings are labelled in French with references to the catalogue of the Museo Pio-Clementino that was established by G. B. Visconti and his son and successor Ennio Quirino Visconti between 1782 and 1808. The catalogue entries proper are written in Italian and provide the title, measurements, often information as to provenance, and references to the Visconti catalogues and, in some cases, the writings of Winckelmann. The numbering does not follow the Visconti catalogues but rather is based on subjects and types of sculpture with two principal sections for mythological and profane statuary, subdivided by subjects such as specific deities, heroes, emperors, and types (free-standing statues, busts, and reliefs). Among the most famous pieces in the catalogue are the Apollo Belvedere (no. 49), Ganymede and the Eagle (no. 77), the Belvedere Torso (no. 105), the Laocoon (no. 136), and the Old Fisherman (no. 193).

The otherwise unknown Carlo (Karl) Varneck or Warneck was certainly a German artist or architect studying or living in Rome.

Binding fragile and rubbed.