A FLORENTINE LARGE CASKET WITH ORSINI COAT OF ARMS, CIRCA 1440-1470 LARGE CASKET WITH ORSINI COAT OF ARMS, FLORENCE, CIRCA 1440-1447 In wood entirely decorated in gilded pastille, rectangular shaped structure surmounted by a hinged lid on the back; 42x51x31 cm Provenance Morotti-Leopardi family, Porto Recanati; Ponti Collection, Spello; Private collection Literature V. Sgarbi (ed.), Il tesoro d'Italia , exhibition cat., Milan 2015, pp. 248-249 n. 7; F. Traversi, Gesta e virtù. Il cofanetto rinascimentale, dai modelli eburnei ai pastiglie ferraresi del ducato estense, in P. Di Natale (ed.), Mirabila Estensi. Wunderkammer , exhibition cat., Ferrara 2024, pp. 29-30 fig. 8 The middle band is entirely decorated with florid vegetal festoons, under which an uninterrupted procession of angels playing music unfolds, according to a decorative repertoire clearly inspired by Donatello's antiquarian taste; the upper and lower bands are then bordered by multiple mouldings embellished with various decorative motifs of evident Renaissance taste. The lid, decorated with an engraved grating motif, shows on the front a pair of winged putti holding a garland, inside which are the Orsini family arms. Our box, which was exhibited in Milan in 2015 on the occasion of the exhibition The Treasure of Italy, was attributed on that occasion to the hand of Maso di Bartolomeo (Capannole Valdambra 1406 - Ragusa di Dalmazia 1456), an important Tuscan sculptor, architect and bronze foundryman, who collaborated with Donatello and Michelozzo, among others, on the creation of the external pulpit of Prato Cathedral. This attribution was recently taken up by Francesco Traversi on the occasion of the Ferrara exhibition Mirabilia Estensi, who, while considering the identification of the hand that made the coffin complex, states that 'a Florentine heritage marked by Ghiberti's and Donatello's cults is clearly discernible (appearing close to the Paduan episodes), revealing an interesting juncture regarding the production of later and/or contemporary coffins in the central-northern area'. Continuing the analysis, Traversi observes that 'the presence of the insignia of the Orsini, a powerful family mostly based in Lazio but with important possessions in other parts of the peninsula, and their interest in the typology of the object, invites us to question the relationship of the tablet caskets - traced back to workshops in Ferrara and kept in large numbers in Rome and neighbouring centres - with local families, and yet there is no shortage of possibilities to link this small 'sarcophagus' to the figure of Clerice Orsini of Monterotondo, the wife of Lorenzo the Magnificent (and mother of Leo X), perhaps as a gift from the Medici, a fact that would thus confine the casket within the chronological range 1467-1468, the two-year period in which the betrothal and proxy marriage agreements were established'.