Mantua, Ducal Palace, Gallery of the Months:
the Niche at the Eastern Extremity

The Eastern end of the gallery, which belongs to the original loggia designed by Giulio Romano, is divided into two large sectors by a stucco cornice: the upper lunette and the wall below. The lunette houses a circular stucco niche, which houses a recently placed plaster bust of a Roman emperor; originally the bust of a goddess, Diana or Venus, was placed here. Like the female bust of the opposite extremity, it passed to England with the sale of the Gonzaga assets to the Crown (1627) and was later dispersed. The entire lunette features a lush painted decoration with vegetal spirals and grotesque motifs on a white background.
The large exedra niche below is flanked by two pairs of reliefs. In the two upper sectors, two stuccoes can be seen: the relief on the left depicts Ops (Opi), goddess of the Earth and abundance, and Saturn in the act of devouring his children, separated by a clock (preparatory drawing by Giulio Romano in Oxford, Christ Church, inv. JBS 455). The relief on the right is a modern copy of the so-called "Dawn" (but for some an allegory of the four elements), a relief transferred in 1813 to Palazzo Te. The two lower sectors host two ancient marble reliefs: a "Silenus on a chariot pulled by goats" on the left and a "Silenus with maenads and satyrs" on the right, sculptures from the Augustan era. The interior of the niche, in the centre of which a door was opened to replace the original window, has three central stucco medallions: a Victory with a shield (left), Annona in the act of offering the horn of plenty to Ceres (centre), a probable Peace with cornucopia and olive branch (right). The left niche, now empty, housed a statue of Apollo; the relief above, in marble, depicts young gymnasts and is an imitation of an ancient one, which was realised in the early 16th century. The right niche, which originally housed a statue of Diana, today contains a female torso and is surmounted by a stucco relief composed of two parts: on the left is a "small mutilated figure in stucco", on the right is a cast of the “Philoctetes” by Tullio Lombardo sculpted for Isabella d'Este around 1522 and inserted here in 1989.