The Tiber

Elegantiores statuae antiquae in varii romanorum palatiis asservatae (Apud Natalem Barbiellini, Rome 1776), Plate 21

Like the Nile, the Tiber, too, was found in the early sixteenth century in anarea of the Campus Martius where the Dominican friars were engaged in a vast building program. By 1523, the Tiber was also installed as a fountain in the Cortile del Belvdere, where it stayed until it was moved to the Museo Pio-Clementino in the 1770s. For early modern viewers, the Tiber was most noteworthy for its great size and its excellent state of its preservation. The unscathed head and cornucopia were described as a miraculous survival, given that most antiquities were unearthed with missing hands, heads, and feet. From the moment of their discovery and absorption into the papal art collection, the Tiber and the Nile were highly-esteemed works of art, frequently drawn and engraved by artists, and included in major collections of prints after ancient sculpture. Under the Treaty of Tolentino (1797), this statue was ceded to France. In 1811, both the Tiber and the Nile were displayed in the Musée Napóleon in Paris. After Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo, the Nile was returned to Rome, while the Tiber remained in Paris, where it is now part of the Louvre's collection of classical antiquities.