File:Drawing, sketch-book (BM 1898,1123.3.15).jpg

Height: 248 millimetres

Width: 184 millimetres (each page)

All the groups on this opening derive from statues in the Belvedere Courtyard in the Vatican. On the left-hand page is the River Nile (Bober-Rubinstein 1986, no. 67, p. 104; http://www.theoi.com/Gallery/S36.1.html ) apparently found in 1513 on the same site of where the Tiber was found a year earlier, that is in Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome. According to Scaglietti the posture of the River God (as that of the Tiber on the left-hand page of f. 1898,1123.3.17) has been mutuated by Aspertini for the figure of the Madonna in the Madonna and Child with Saint Joseph in Bologna, Galleria Fondantico (see Faietti-Scaglietti 1995, p. 193, under cat. dip. 46). On the right-hand page the Apollo Belvedere (www.census.de, ID 15028 and see the following image with restorations http://www.artchive.com/artchive/G/greek/belvedere_apollo.jpg.html), which seems to have been drawn after Montorsoli's restoration of 1532-33 (of this opinion Bober-Rubinstein 1986, no. 28, p. 72 and Faietti-Scaglietti 1995, pp. 70 and 76, n.113; Bober in 1957, pp. 14 and 59 had expressed a different opinion). It needs to be added though that Aspertini seems to record in this sketch-book most sculptures from the courtyard (see 1898,1123.3.17, 1898,1123.3.19, left-hand page of 1898,1123.3.43 and 1898,1123.3.44), but not the Torso and the Tigri, transferred there between 1532 and 1535. According to Agosti, followed by Faietti, this would suggest that his recordings were prior to these dates (see Faietti-Scaglietti 1995 pp. 70, 76, n.112 and Settis et al., 'La colonna Traiana', Turin, 1988, p. 573). On the other hand, if Aspertini drew the Apollo after Montorsoli's restoration and the Laocoon (see 1898.1123.3.17) before the latter's intervention, we could use the period between September 1532 and June 1533 as a terminus post quem for the production of this sketch-book, as we know that was the period spent by Montorsoli in Rome together with Michelangelo (see L. Rebaudo, "Il braccio mancante. I restauri del Laocoonte (1506-1957)", Trieste 2007, pp. 44-6 and also introduction under 1898.1123.3.1). On the far right is the Venus Felix and Amor, in the courtyard since 1509 (Bober-Rubinstein 1986, no. 16, pp. 61-2 and Bober 1957, p. 60; see www.census.de, ID 16167 ).

Lit.: P.P. Bober, 'Drawings after the Antique by Amico Aspertini. Sketchbooks in the British Museum', London, 1957, f. 14v-15, pp. 14, 59; P.P. Bober-R. Rubinstein, 'Renaissance Artists and Antique Sculpture', New York, 1986, under nos. 16, 28 and 67; M. Faietti- D. Scaglietti Kelescian , 'Amico Aspertini', Modena, 1995, pp. 70, 76, n.112; A. Nesselrath, 'Das Fossombroner Skizzenbuch', London, 1993, p. 209.