Monumental Furietti Centaurs in Bronze, 1950, Set of 2

Furietti Centaurs in Pair - Bronze Statues, reduction of the originals (known as the Older Centaur and the Younger Centaur, or the Older Centaur and the Younger Centaur when treated separately), a pair of grey-black marble Hellenistic or Roman sculptures of centaurs based on Hellenistic models. One is a mature, bearded centaur, with a pained expression, and the other is a smiling young centaur with his arm raised. The amorini who once rode the backs of these centaurs are absent, these being the most prominent examples of a group of sculptures varying the motif. The sculptures were found together in Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli by Monsignor Giuseppe Alessandro Furietti in December 1736; they were the highlight of his collection of antiquities, which he refused to give to Pope Benedict XIV, at the cost of a cardinal's hat. Furietti was eventually created a cardinal priest, by Pope Clement XIII in the consistory of 24 September 1759. After the cardinal's death, his heirs sold the centaurs and Furietti's mosaic of four drinking doves for 14,000 scudi, and they have been in the Capitoline Museum ever since. The centaur is a creature from Greek mythology with the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse. In many Greek myths, centaurs are regarded as being as wild as untamed horses. Centaurs may be best explained as the creation of a folk tale in which they were wild mountain dwellers and wild spirits of the forests. In early art, they were depicted as human beings in front, with the body and hind legs of a horse attached to the back; later, they were men only up to the waist.