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Date : between 1511 and 1512
Sizes : 81 cm x 108 cm
Material : Oil painting on wood
Acquisition : Purchase (1824)
| Item 14 on 18
Italian Painting
Painting (Portrait)
Area related
Rome (Italy)
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| Description |  |
Pope Julius wore a beard from 1511-12 as a sign of mourning at having lost the city of Bologna. Papal cross-keys and tiaras, originally intended for the background, now show through the drapery. The acorns on the throne were an emblem of the Pope's family, the della Rovere. Though considered by contemporaries to be one of the artist's greatest portraits, it was not recognized as Raphael's original until 1970.
The painter and biographer Giorgio Vasari (1511 - 1574) wrote of Raphael's early years in Rome: "And at this time... he also made a portrait of Pope Julius in a picture in oi ls, so true and so lifelike, that the portrait caused all who saw it to tremble as if it had been the living man himself". The painting seems to have been displayed in the Roman Church of Santa Maria del Popolo which had been redecorated at the expense of the della Rovere family.
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