Martin Weinberger

A Sixteenth-Century Restorer

The relief of The Dying Meleager (Fig. 1) in the Roman Court of the Metropolitan Museum1 offers hardly any particular problems to the student of classical archaeology. The same scene with small variations is frequently found on Roman sarcophagi2 of the second century A.D. However, the fact that almost the entire upper part was obviously added by a skillful restorer of the Renaissance makes this relief an object of considerable interest to the student of that period.3

A Bronze Bust by Hans Multscher

The bust of a female saint formerly in the Pierpont Morgan, now in the Frick Collection (Figs. 1 and 2)1 was attributed to Veit Stoss by Bode in his catalogue of the Morgan bronzes.2 This amazing attribution evidently was not based on any stylistic consideration, but on the assumption that the work had been found in a village near Cracow. The present attribution in the Frick Collection—“Netherlandish, fifteenth century”—seems justified by a certain similarity to dinanderies: the bust was used as a reliquary3 and might therefore be regarded as a utensil like the aquamaniles of Flemish and North German workmanship. The metal is of a light color, between yellowish brown and green; it is not, however, the brass used for dinanderies, but the light bronze of the bell foundries. If there is thus no reason why the bust should be connected with the Low Countries on technical grounds, its style offers even less reason for such an attribution. Indeed, the well-rounded outline and forceful plasticity of the bust, as ...