Hares, a tortoise, a crocodile, frogs, quails, a hedgehog, butterflies, dragonflies and parakeets by a pool, with flowers, strawberries and a river in the distance

We are grateful to Professor Nicola Spinosa and to Dr. John T. Spike for independently confirming the attribution to Porpora on the basis of photographs. We are also grateful to Dott.ssa Ludovica Trezzani for pointing out that the composition of the present painting repeats that of a work commissioned in 1692 by Flavio Chigi (see La Natura Morta in Italia, Milan, 1989, II, fig. 869). Dott.ssa Trezzani has suggested that the present work may be an enlarged version of the composition based on cartoni.