The Nile

Elegantiores statuae antiquae in varii romanorum palatiis asservatae (Apud Natalem Barbiellini, Rome 1776), Plate 17

The Nile, like its pendant, the Tiber, was found at the site of the sanctuary of Isis and Serapis, between Santa Maria sopra Minerva and Santo Stefano del Cacco in the Campus Martius. By 1523, this sculpture had been installed as a fountain the Cortile del Belvedere. But, in the 1770s, it was moved to the Museo Pio-Clementino, where it was displayed in a room named after it. Thus the Nile became one of the best known ancient works of art in Rome, frequently visited by tourists and reproduced in a number of publications. In this print we see a popular representation of this sculpture in which several putti surround and clamber over the river god. Other contemporary prints, however, focused solely on the Nile, omitting its fragmentary companions. The putti were only fully restored In 1774 by Gaspare Sibilla, who was commissioned by Pope Clement XIV for this job. According to Pliny the Elder, the sixteen putti depicted with the Nile in this statuary type symbolize the sixteen cubits by which the river could rise in the rainy season.