Hercules of the Forum Boarium

The model of this drawing is the Hercules of the Forum Boarium, a larger-than-life statue in gilded bronze, discovered at the end of the fifteenth century on the Forum Boarium in Rome. Soon after it was taken to the Palazzo dei Conservatori, where it remains. Gossart drew the sculpture when it was placed on a high pedestal at the right side of the courtyard, as recorded in a drawing by Maerten van Heemskerck.