Italian School, 17th century

Cassiano dal Pozzo;
from whose heirs purchased by Pope Clement XI, 1703;
his nephew, Alessandro Albani, 1714;
from whom purchased by King George III, 1762;
by descent to King George V, Royal Library, Windsor Castle;
sold in the 1920s, through Mendelson, Tottenham Court Road, London

London, The British Museum, The Paper Museum of Cassiano dal Pozzo, 1993, no. 131 (A Goose Barnacle)

Aldrovandi MS 48;
E. Baldini & D. Freedberg, Citrus: The Paper Museum of Cassiano dal Pozzo. Series B: Natural History, London 1997, no. 87

These drawings are not not only aesthetically pleasing but provide a fascinating insight into the history of collecting.  The drawings once belonged to the most revered art patron of the 17^th Century, Cassiano dal Pozzo (1588-1657).  Cassiano was a distinguished patron and collector and his thirst for knowledge in the field of antiquities and natural history led to an ambitious project that he described as his Museo Cartaceo or Paper Museum.  Together with his younger brother, Carlo Antonio they built an immense collection of paintings, books, medals and drawings.  Cassiano commissioned young artists to make copies of all aspects of Roman Civilization and also collected drawings, like the present works, recording every aspect of the natural world. 

This image of a Twin Lemon is the only surviving drawing in the corpus of Cassiano dal Pozzo's natural history drawings that is executed solely in black chalk.