Tomb on a Base, with a Recumbent Male Figure on a Sarcophagus Above

The drawing appears to be the design for, or a copy of, a tomb placed against a wall. The male figure reclines on top of a raised sarcophagus, head resting on a pillow, hands crossed at his waist, and eyes closed as if asleep. The classical decorative motifs, such as the sphinxes supporting the candelabra, the lion paw-feet of the sarcophagus, the plaque on the sarcophagus, the ram’s heads and swags, and the pose of the figure all suggest a date in the second half of the fifteenth century for the design.

Pietro Paolo da Todi, the artist to whom the drawing is assigned in the inscription, was, along with Niccolò della Guardia, credited by Vasari with having worked on the tombs of Pius II and Pius III, both once in St. Peter’s and now in Sant’Andrea della Valle in Rome.¹ This information is spurious, however, since Pietro Paolo da Todi died well before Pius II (1464) and was not even a sculptor but a goldsmith.²

Footnotes:

1. Vasari 1878-85, 2: 649-50.
2. Menestò 1973, 17.