Lot Essay
The subject of the present relief is Mucius Scaevola, the Roman hero who entered the camp of the Etruscan King Lars Porsena with the intention of assassinating him, but mistook his secretary for the King and killed him. To show his defiance and lack of fear, he plunged his right hand into a fire burning on an altar until it was consumed. The King spared his life, and thereafter he was known as Scaevola (left-handed).
The present relief has traditionally been thought to be an Italian production of the 16th century, mainly on account of the elaborate contrapposto of the figure's poses. However, these kinds of swaying attitudes are also found in sculpture that was created in the first half of the 18th century in the triangle formed by Prague, Dresden, and Vienna. The finely detailed surface of the relief is hard to compare with more monumental works in the round, but the facial types in particular suggest that it may have been carved by a sculptor in the immediate circle of Mathias Braun von Braun (for whom, see Poche, op. cit., passim). Braun, who was born in the Tyrol in 1684, and trained in Italy, was particularly associated with Count Anton Sporck on his return to Innsbruck. In 1710 he settled in Prague, where he executed statues for the Charles Bridge, not to mention various churches and palaces. Such was Braun's success that he was also active in Dresden and at the court of the Emperor Charles VI in Vienna.
The present relief has traditionally been thought to be an Italian production of the 16th century, mainly on account of the elaborate contrapposto of the figure's poses. However, these kinds of swaying attitudes are also found in sculpture that was created in the first half of the 18th century in the triangle formed by Prague, Dresden, and Vienna. The finely detailed surface of the relief is hard to compare with more monumental works in the round, but the facial types in particular suggest that it may have been carved by a sculptor in the immediate circle of Mathias Braun von Braun (for whom, see Poche, op. cit., passim). Braun, who was born in the Tyrol in 1684, and trained in Italy, was particularly associated with Count Anton Sporck on his return to Innsbruck. In 1710 he settled in Prague, where he executed statues for the Charles Bridge, not to mention various churches and palaces. Such was Braun's success that he was also active in Dresden and at the court of the Emperor Charles VI in Vienna.