Eight Child Bacchants with a He-Goat (‘Children’s Bacchanal’)

Entry

This Children’s Bacchanal is probably the best-known, most prolifically copied and highly discussed representation in the oeuvre of François du Quesnoy (1597-1643), the famed Flemish sculptor active in Rome. At first glance, the scene appears rather enigmatic, showing eight putti attempting to block the path of a he-goat by chasing him away with branches, a grotesque mascaron, and in the case of one putto, by making a grimace. The theme can be traced back to a classical Roman source: the second book of Virgil’s Georgics, which deals with the cultivation of young grapevines. Virgil cautions that one must protect the vulnerable young shoots of the grape against the voracity of livestock, and specifically that of sharp-toothed goats and he-goats. In these written passages, the author introduces a play on words involving the Latin term tener, which can mean either ‘soft, fragile’ or ‘young baby, young shoot’. In the present relief-carved version of the scene, Du Quesnoy has visualized this wordplay in the form of small plump putti, rendered with an extraordinary softness in sculpted marble.⁷ In the given context, these soft-skinned infants (teneri) function as small Bacchoi, helpers and followers of the wine god Bacchus. One of them – the standing boy making a grimace – even wears a wreath of ivy in his hair. The diminutive bacchants are responsible for harvesting the grapes threatened by the he-goat. As such, Du Quesnoy’s scene refers to the age-old mythological enmity between goats and wine grapes – a theme repeatedly described and depicted in antiquity. In the end, the he-goat shall pay for his indulgence by penalty of death, when slaughtered for sacrifice during a ceremony traditionally held on an altar dedicated to Bacchus.

Scenes comparable to that of the present marble relief are found on Roman sarcophagi.⁸ One example that was certainly in Du Quesnoy’s close proximity is a classical sarcophagus relief held in the collection of one of his earliest patrons, Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani.⁹ The Roman relief displays a number of motifs identical to those found on Du Quesnoy’s marble: jocular, naked children playing among baskets of fruit, as well as a grotesque faun’s mask – possibly a Roman larva, but more likely a so-called oscilla, which Virgil describes as an object hung in a tree that, when moved by the wind, served to scare off goats. In the sixteenth century, the theme of child bacchants appearing together with a goat was a favourite of medallists and engravers, e.g. the printmaker known as Master of the Die, whose works were based on inventions of Raphael.¹⁰ Du Quesnoy also became involved in this tradition, as did the French painter Nicolas Poussin. Both artists – good friends who shared a passion for a pure form of classicism (la gran maniera greca) – began to explore the theme of child bacchants with the he-goat circa 1626. Two of Poussin’s paintings from this period feature putti riding a goat or attempting to harness the animal to a small triumphal car.¹¹

The specific motif of the seated putto holding a larva or oscilla before his face – occurring both in Du Quesnoy’s relief and Poussin’s painting – can also be traced back to a tradition with antique roots. The motif enjoyed renewed interest in the fifteenth century, and in the eighteenth century, it became a highly cherished theme.¹² The finest example in fact comes from Du Quesnoy’s direct environs: an antique Roman statue of a putto holding up a mascaron while extending his arm through its open mouth, restored circa 1627-1628 by Alessandro Algardi, a fellow sculptor in Rome.¹³ Masked putti are representative of the child-like and somewhat comical notion that, hidden behind the oversized mask, a child might be capable of scaring off a much larger animal or person.¹⁴ For the pose of his seated marble putto, Du Quesnoy turned to Titian’s renowned Adoration of Venus, then preserved at the Villa Ludovisi in Rome and a painting valued above all for its lively rendering of precocious little Erotes. In their biographies on Du Quesnoy, both Bellori and Passeri write explicitly of how, after having studied this painting, the sculptor transformed Titian’s painted putti into figures modelled in clay: ‘Titian expressed admirably putti of a more tender age and surpassed all others in delicacy. François fell in love with them and translated them into various groups in mezzo-relievo, and together with Nicolas Poussin, modelled them in clay.’¹⁵ Inspired by Titian, but also possibly putti on antique sarcophagi,¹⁶ Du Quesnoy introduced his own innovative putto type in sculpture known as the putto moderno, which earned him both the praise of his contemporaries and the moniker fattore dei putti.¹⁷

The distinction between Du Quesnoy’s putto and the traditional putto antico of antiquity and the Renaissance lies in proportion and size. As the sculptor’s pupil and biographer Boselli remarked in his treatise on sculpture: not to be confused with toddlers, Du Quesnoy’s modern putti are instead pudgy, innocent babies, with extraordinarily large heads, round bellies and fleshy baby fat on their arms and legs. In real life, such creatures would be incapable of undertaking tasks of any complexity, but with Du Quesnoy– in imitation of Titian – the collective endeavour of driving off a goat falls well within the children’s grasp. Boselli admits that in doing so, the sculptor breaks both with decorum and the scene’s representation of reality. From his standpoint, however, this break is acceptable: their plumpness, innocence and behaviour these babies to more adequately express the concept of tenerezza (softness) as a means to stir and lighten the heart of the beholder.¹⁸ Boselli’s ‘intuitive’ observations are in fact supported by findings obtained from twentieth-century ethology, including research conducted by Konrad Lorenz.¹⁹ The softening of the stone from which these putti were sculpted even gave Bellori cause to observe that Du Quesnoy’s scenes ‘looked much more like milk than of stone’ (sembrando essi più tosto di latte che di macigno).²⁰ Yet the sculptor also managed to maintain a balance, so that his children still possessed a certain nobleness despite their roundish corporeal forms, a quality which many of his followers were less successful in achieving.²¹ Colantuono observed that this concetto of softness encountered in the work of Titian, Poussin and Du Quesnoy also coincided with the flourishing interest in the lyrical expression of ‘soft’ sentimentality in Italian poetry of the same period, particularly in the work of Poussin’s close friend Giambattista Marino (1569-1625).²² Both this poetic sentimentality and the softness of Du Quesnoy’s putti may therefore be interpreted as expressions of a universal idea of softness.²³

A substantially larger version of the composition exists in marble, a relief unanimously accepted as an autograph work in the art historical literature (Rome, Doria Pamphilj, measurements 62.5 x 87.5 cm; excluding the integrally carved frame, 56 x 81 cm). This marble indeed displays the same high quality and sensitive finishing associated with Du Quesnoy, in spite of the highly abraded, damaged surface due to years of exposure in the open air. This relief also has its own integrally carved marble frame. Also known is a small-scale version (material unknown, but probably identical in size to the present work) held at the Palazzo Rondinini on the Roman Via del Corso up until the early nineteenth century. This work might very well have come directly from the artist himself, as Du Quesnoy was commissioned to restore an antique fragment of a faun for Alessandro Rondinini (d. 1639) in around 1630-35. Also known are numerous copies and variants executed in bronze,²⁴ marble,²⁵ terracotta²⁶ and ivory.²⁷ While none are autograph works, they may possibly have been derived from an autograph terracotta or plaster,²⁸ as suggested by the following entry in the sale catalogue for the collection of the French painter Coypel in January 1753: ‘A bas-relief in bronze perfectly well repaired, and executed after the model in terracotta by François Flamand in the cabinet of M. le baron de Thiers, and which depicts children playing with a goat, one of which covers the face with a mask for the purpose of frightening off his comrades: it is 7-and-a-half inches high by 13 inches wide’.²⁹ The original terracotta model in the possession of Baron de Thiers is today unknown. The copies and imitations of the present relief often vary in size and composition. Invariably, these sculptures are stylistically weaker and finished with less refinement than Du Quesnoy’s autograph works. Most closely approaching the Amsterdam marble in dimensions and detailing are four bronzes,³⁰ which, judging by their identical form, are undoubtedly casts of plasters taken from the present relief or a preliminary study modelled in terracotta. These reliefs are nevertheless several centimetres smaller than the marble, with the composition more compacted on the right. Most also lack the sharpness of the original, a consequence of making casts of casts, resulting in a loss of detail and an increasingly diminished size due to repeated shrinkage. This indicates these works were cast relatively late, possibly in the eighteenth or nineteenth century.

What distinguishes the Amsterdam relief from all of the above-cited works is its astonishingly high quality, and more so in light of the small scale. With Du Quesnoy’s characteristic softening of the contours and surface – perhaps best described as a sfumato in sculpture – the relief acquires the qualities of an ivory work carved in marble. The children’s hair and goat’s hide are carved with a freedom and virtuosity far surpassing the mechanical and expressionless facture of the various copies. The result is a painterly quality – an impressionism avant la lettre – observable in the present relief, but also consistently encountered in Du Quesnoy’s larger-scale works, e.g. the putti adorning the tomb monuments in the Santa Maria dell’Anima in Rome or the hair on his monumental St Susanna.³¹

The disparity in quality between the Amsterdam piece and the copies known today is best illustrated when examining the execution of the goat’s animal hide. On the bronzes, this detail consists of a striped surface, as if to delineate each individual strand of hair. On the marble, by contrast, the surface texture of the goat’s hide is effectively achieved by simple means of a few tufts of hair. One encounters a similar technique on the larger relief of the same scene in the Galeria Doria Pamphilj in Rome, e.g. the manner in which visible drill holes articulate the texture of the goat’s hide in an effort to create depth. Another positive deviation from most copies are the open-carved mouth and eyes of the mask in front of the seated putti’s face, visually allowing him to peer through the openings. The fastidious treatment of even the smallest detail likewise points to an autograph work. The mask on the larger marble relief is damaged, but one can still see the mouth in this case was also originally open-carved.

Surprisingly, despite the wide popularity of the Children’s Bacchanal in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, no small-scale relief by Du Quesnoy himself was known to exist prior to the discovery of the present marble relief. It was Bellori who stated that Du Quesnoy’s composition was initially modelled in plaster or clay (creta). Well informed in virtually every other matter, the sculptor’s biographer was clearly mistaken on this point: he himself also mentions that the very same work served as the model for a sculpture executed in porphyry, made by the Italian sculptor Tomaso Fedeli (1598-1658) for Cardinal Francesco Barberini and subsequently presented to King Philip IV of Spain.³² In reality, the porphyry-carved relief in question – preserved to the present day in Spain – concerns another important work by Du Quesnoy, The Battle between Eros and Anteros, and is in no way connected to his Children’s Bacchanal.³³ The earliest documented mention of the Children’s Bacchanal occurs in 1641, as recorded in a travel journal kept by the English sculptor Nicholas Stone Junior (grandson of the Amsterdam municipal sculptor Hendrick de Keyser). In Rome, Stone purchased various compositions cast in wax and plaster directly from the sculptor himself, as meticulously recorded in his notebook, which even mentions in what box each work was packed for transport back to England. In the month of November 1641, Stone’s notebook includes an entry listed under ‘Particulers in the box marked N’, concerning an object he describes as: ‘First one bassa-releiua of children playing with a goate [...] all of Sr Francisco’.³⁴ Artus Quellinus I (1609-1668), who spent several years working in Du Quesnoy’s studio in Rome, is also very likely to have returned to Flanders with a number of his teacher’s works. Listed among the estate possessions of Quellinus’s own brother (and heir), Erasmus Quellinus, were forty-three casts and modelled studies by ‘Francisco de Cannoy’, including a ‘bas-relief, red wax, cast’ (bacereleeff, roode wasch, gegoten).³⁵ Additionally, the painter Joachim von Sandrart (1606-1688), who worked for Vincenzo Giustiniani in Rome and circulated in Du Quesnoy’s immediate environs in the years 1629-35, possessed eleven sculptures by or after il Fiammingo, including ‘various bas-reliefs’ (unterschiedlichen Basse-relieven), all executed in Rome in marble, clay, plaster and bronze.³⁶ Lastly, Rubens’s letter to the sculptor, in which the painter thanks him for sending several plasters of his children’s figures, also conveys Du Quesnoy’s famed reputation in the north.³⁷

Du Quesnoy’s renown outside Italy, and particularly in his native Flanders, is greatly attributable to casts of this kind made from his models. Following his death in 1643, the sculptor’s brother, Hiëronymus du Quesnoy, transported all of the remaining models to the Netherlands, giving an additional impulse to the further dissemination of Du Quesnoy’s inventions.³⁸ From the mid-seventeenth century on, the influence of the sculptor’s compositions can clearly be discerned in Dutch, Flemish and French painting. At the same time, plaster reproductions of Du Quesnoy’s models were being made on a regular basis. Zacharias von Uffenbach’s travel journal provides a detailed account of his visit to the home of the Amsterdam art collector Ten Kate on 19 March 1711. Works noted include both numerous casts made from De Quesnoy’s models but also original sculptures. Von Uffenbach goes on to mention that these casts were made by a local plaster founder on the Kalverstraat in Amsterdam: ‘In the morning, we went to Mr. Lambert Tenkaaten, a Mennonite. [...] He first showed us a beautiful collection of bas-reliefs, casts, small and large sculptures [...]. The majority of small sculptures and bas-reliefs in Mr. Tenkaaten’s possession are by Canoi [= François du Quesnoy] made by the plaster founder in Calverstraet. Of these he has a large number, all very sharp and good. [...] He also showed us countless modelled original works by Canoi and by Francis [= Francis van Bossuit], exceptional among these was a very large bas-relief by Canoi’.³⁹

Michael Sweerts’s painting The Embroiderer from circa 1648-50 demonstrates the exceptional value Du Quesnoy’s Children’s Bacchanal held for painters.⁴⁰ Seated left in a painter’s workshop is a woman embroidering. Amassed on the floor beside her is a large, carefully arranged pile of plaster casts, consisting mainly of heads and torsos made after classical sculptures. Prominently displayed in the middle is the Children’s Bacchanal, also evidently executed in plaster. Its form – a recessed scene with a flat edge – is identical to the Amsterdam marble relief. Not much later, Gerard Dou in Leiden began incorporating Du Quesnoy’s compositions in his paintings. The Children’s Bacchanal appears in Dou’s Doctor (1653, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna), Violin Player (1653, Collection of the Prince of Liechtenstein, Vaduz), Trumpet Player (c. 1660-65, Musée du Louvre, Paris) and other works.⁴¹ The correspondence between the Rijksmuseum marble and these painted representations by Dou and his contemporaries extends to the smallest detail. When comparing passages such as tree trunks and the treatment of the goat’s hide, it becomes apparent that the marble still possesses every detail otherwise lost in most of the later plaster casts. It therefore comes as no surprise that the four bronze versions cited above bear no trace of the original detailing.⁴² At the start of his career, Du Quesnoy relied on plaster casts to broaden and reinforce his international reputation as an adherent of pure classicism in sculpture (la gran maniera greca) and a sculptor of fleshy bambini and scherzi. None of these very earliest plasters have survived to the present day.

The composition of the Children’s Bacchanal became increasingly popular among Leiden ‘fine painters’ of the generation succeeding Dou. In France and Flanders, renewed interest arose in the eighteenth century with artists like Desportes, Boilly and Marten Jozef Geeraerts, but also Chardin, who reproduced the scene three times as a painted trompe l’oeil in 1732. A painted trompe l’oeil variant by Piat-Joseph Sauvage (1744-1818) even shows the casting joins of the plaster relief.⁴³ An early daguerreotype made by Alphonse Giroux in 1839, preserved at the Biblioteca Comunale in Imola, also demonstrates the composition’s enduring popularity: visible at the top in mirror image (as with all daguerreotypes) is Du Quesnoy’s relief in plaster.⁴⁴

Frits Scholten, 2025