Italian School, Early 17th Century

This drawing, and the one in the following lot, were once part of one of the many albums from the collection of Cassiano dal Pozzo (1588-1657), one of the most important Italian collectors and patrons of the 17th Century. Dal Pozzo had a great interest in Archaeology, History and Natural History and in order to record the richness of the natural world and human creativity he put together a large number of albums with drawings for his so-called Museo Cartaceo (Paper Museum). Besides buying drawings for these albums, dal Pozzo also commissioned artists such as Jacopo Ligozzi (1547-1627) and Vincenzo Leonardi (1588-1657) to contribute to them.

It is unclear who executed the present drawing, but it is very close to and must be by the same hand as a few other drawings of fish in the Museo Cartaceo, for example one described as a Cross between a Hake (Family Gadidae) and a Drum or Croaker (Family Sciaenidae) in a private collection (The Paper Museum of Cassiano dal Pozzo, exhib. cat., The British Museum, London, 1993, no. 95) and a Grayling (Thymallus thymallus) recently sold at auction (Bonham's, London, 3 December 2014, lot 7). It is by a different hand than the following lot.