German or Netherlandish, 17th century

Private collection, United Kingdom

The present bronze appears to be based on 17th-century depictions of the famed Indian elephant known as Don Diego, who was brought to Portugal in the early 1620s and subsequently toured throughout Europe. Viewers in Spain, England, France, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria and Italy were mesmerised by the exotic creature, and the elephant's appearance inspired countless depictions in art, including Nicolas Poussin's painting of Hannibal Crossing the Alps from circa 1630. The present elephant's pose and general characteristics correspond closely to the print showing Don Diego by Wenceslas Hollar (British Museum, inv. no. 1870,0625.55), which however was based on an earlier depiction of an elephant by Gerard van Groeningen from 1563. Other comparable likenesses of Don Diego illustrated in Rice, op. cit., share the present elephant's narrow ears and heavily folded skin.

RELATED LITERATURE

L. Rice, 'Poussin's Elephant', in Renaissance Quarterly, vol. LXX, no. 2, 2017, pp. 548-593