To Commemorate the Pazzi Conspiracy, 1478

Bertoldo di Giovanni

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Obverse: Medals of rulers were thought inappropriate in republican Florence. This piece commemorates the 1478 attack in Florence Cathedral on the Medici, first citizens but not rulers of the city. To make it acceptable, it flouts the rules of medals by combining portrait and narrative on both sides. This side, labeled ‘Public grief’, shows the head and, below, the murder of Giuliano de’ Medici, Lorenzo’s younger brother. Reverse: Modeled and cast in 1478, immediately after Lorenzo de’ Medici survived a murderous attack in Florence Cathedral, this medal renders the events of the day timeless and heroic by giving them a classicizing character. Though both Lorenzo’s features and, below, the choir of the Cathedral are clearly recognizable, the sitter is given classical draperies while the protagonists are depicted nude.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art