Francesco Fanelli, the Florentine sculptor, is known to have worked in Genoa, where he was recorded in 1609-10. In 1610 Fanelli reputedly travelled to England, where he remained until 1642. In England, Fanelli was in the employment of Henry, Prince of Wales, and thence also of Charles I, for whom he is recorded to have designed a fountain at Hampton Court. In 1642 Fanelli left England for Paris, and he died in 1665.
At present his only signed work is a bronze portrait bust of Charles II as Prince of Wales at Walbeck, dated 1640 and made for the Earl of Newcastle. Besides his sensitive portraiture, many examples of which remain at present unrecorded, Fanelli appears to have specialised in small scale and darkly patinated bronzes, primarily of equestrian subjects.
Fanelli's spirited group of Cupid borne on a galloping steed is recorded twice. Van der Doort included the model in his list of the sculptures in the Cabinet Room at Whitehall: "Item in brasse blackt over a little running horse - Cupid sitting on and another of 6½ ...". Vertue also listed several sculptures by Fanelli at Welbeck: "...a Cupid on horseback ...". The first Royal description appears to include a second figure and this may relate to the presence of a dog, as in the present bronze. A 'Cupid on Horseback' is in the Victoria and Albert Museum, but differs from the present examples in several details. Principally, there is no barking dog, the tail lies flat against the horse's legs and the horse's head is turned firmly to the right. The present version is a more active and Baroque oeuvre; the flying tails of the horse and lion pelt add further movement, while the horse leaps higher to accommodate the dog below. The whole stands as a vigorous and charming cabinet bronze, a fine Caroline amalgam of naturalism and mythology.