GIAMBOLOGNA
(b. 1529, Douai, d. 1608, Firenze)

Cosimo I as Augustus

1585
Marble
Courtyard, Uffizi, Florence

In 1564 Vincenzo Danti began the Medici coat of arms with allegories of Equity and Rigour and a commanding portrait of Cosimo I for the entrance of Vasari's Uffizi. The svelte reclining allegories are still in place, but the large seated allegorical portrait of Cosimo I that was to have topped the group ended up as a fountain in the Boboli Gardens. Danti's second attempt, the standing, strongly idealized portrait of Cosimo I as Augustus, must have been carved in the early 1570s and was replaced about 10 years later by the present much more straightforward portrait by Giambologna.




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