Italian, Veronese, 'The Justice of Trajan', probably about 1475-1500
Cassone Panels with Scenes from the Life of Trajan
These two panels once adorned a cassone, a large decorated chest. Cassoni were prestigious and expensive items of furniture, and they often showed scenes from classical poetry or history; battles and moral stories were especially popular. A number of surviving late fifteenth-century cassoni from Verona depict the tale shown here, the so-called Justice of Trajan.
The extravagant frames with their paired dolphins are nineteenth-century replacements for the original pastiglia (raised decoration made from liquid plaster) frames. They were probably very similar to those on a large chest in the Detroit Institute of Arts, the front of which has two panels in decorative pastiglia frames on either side of a central panel, also in pastiglia, with a coat of arms. This seems to have been a popular arrangement in late fifteenth-century Verona, and our panels were presumably originally arranged in the same way.
These two panels came from a piece of painted furniture, an important art form in Renaissance Italy. They once adorned a cassone, a large chest decorated with narrative scenes, like Story of David Panels from a Pair of Cassoni (?) and Two Cassone Panels with the Rape of the Sabines.
Cassoni were prestigious and expensive items of furniture. They were normally placed in the man’s camera (‘chamber’), a room used for sleeping and entertainment. They often showed scenes from classical poetry or history; battles and moral stories were especially popular. A number of surviving late fifteenth-century cassoni from Verona depict the tale shown here, the so-called Justice of Trajan.
Eighteenth-century inscriptions on the back of these panels, written in Venice by ‘Signaroli’ (probably the painter Giambettino Cignaroli), attribute the two pictures to Vittore Carpaccio. This attribution is untenable, and they were probably painted in the workshop of Domenico Morone in about 1470–80.
Because of their position on chests, cassone panels were often damaged through use. These ones are in good condition for this type of object. The extravagant frames with their paired dolphins are nineteenth-century replacements for the original pastiglia frames. They were probably very similar to those on a large chest also from Morone’s workshop now in the Detroit Institute of Arts. The Detroit chest has two panels in decorative pastiglia frames on the front, on either side of a central panel, also in pastiglia, with a coat of arms. This seems to have been a popular arrangement in late fifteenth-century Verona, and our panels were presumably originally arranged in the same way.
