The ''Sleeping Cupid'' is a now-lost sculpture created by Renaissance artist
Michelangelo
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (6March 147518February 1564), known mononymously as Michelangelo, was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. Born in the Republic of Florence, his work was inspir ...
, which he artificially aged to make it look like an antique on the advice of
Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco in order to sell for a higher price. It was this sculpture which first brought him to the attention of patrons in
Rome
Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...
.
Creation
Michelangelo began working on his sleeping
cupid
In classical mythology, Cupid ( , meaning "passionate desire") is the god of desire, erotic love, attraction and affection. He is often portrayed as the son of the love goddess Venus and the god of war Mars. He is also known as Amor (Latin: ...
in 1495, in
Florence, Italy
Florence ( ; ) is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany. It is also the most populated city in Tuscany, with 362,353 inhabitants, and 989,460 in its metropolitan province as of 2025.
Florence was a centre of medieval European t ...
. Michelangelo never said why he carved a sculpture of a cupid, but it is known that he studied a sculpture in the
Medici Gardens that contained a sleeping cupid.
, the Italian Painter, described Michelangelo's work as "a god of love, aged six or seven years old and asleep".
Description
Michelangelo created the sculpture and then passed it onto a dealer, Baldassare del Milanese. Eventually the sleeping cupid was bought by
Cardinal Riario of San Giorgio; controversy arose when he discovered the statue was falsely aged and demanded his money back. However, Michelangelo was permitted to keep his share of the money.
When Michelangelo offered to take the sculpture back from Baldassare when he learned how much money he made off of selling it, Baldassare refused, saying, "he would rather break it into a hundred pieces; he had bought the child, and it was his property".
The ''Sleeping Cupid'' was a significant work in establishing the reputation of the young Michelangelo, who was 21 at the time. The sculpture was later donated by
Cesare Borgia
Cesare Borgia (13 September 1475 – 12 March 1507) was a Cardinal (Catholic Church)#Cardinal_deacons, cardinal deacon and later an Italians, Italian ''condottieri, condottiero''. He was the illegitimate son of Pope Alexander VI of the Aragonese ...
to
Isabella d'Este, and was probably collected by
Charles I of England
Charles I (19 November 1600 – 30 January 1649) was King of Kingdom of England, England, Kingdom of Scotland, Scotland, and Kingdom of Ireland, Ireland from 27 March 1625 until Execution of Charles I, his execution in 1649.
Charles was born ...
when all the
Gonzaga collections were bought and taken to
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
in the seventeenth century.
It was previously impossible to attempt to identify Michelangelo's cupid, until Paul Norton's proposal that Michelangelo's work may be in the ''Album of Busts and Statues in Whitehall.''
This led to one of the cupids on the album to be thought to be Michelangelo's lost cupid, as the description matches quite well. But it is still unknown if this is the exact one Michelangelo created, as there is no record of the statue after the original sale.
Destruction
In 1698, the ''Sleeping Cupid'' was most likely destroyed in the great fire in the
Palace of Whitehall
The Palace of Whitehall – also spelled White Hall – at Westminster was the main residence of the English monarchs from 1530 until 1698, when most of its structures, with the notable exception of Inigo Jones's Banqueting House of 1622, ...
,
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
along with many other fine works of art.
It is unknown what happened to the sculpture.
See also
*
List of works by Michelangelo
The following is a list of works of painting, sculpture and architecture by the Italian Renaissance artist Michelangelo. Lost works are included, but not commissions that Michelangelo never made. Michelangelo also left many drawings, sketches, an ...
References
Sculptures by Michelangelo
Lost sculptures
Sculpture forgeries
1496 sculptures
Sculptures of Cupid
Gonzaga art collection
European sculpture
Michelangelo
Cesare Borgia
Charles I of England
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