This was pretty amazing.
The four bronze angels were commissioned in 1524 from the Florentine sculptor Benedetto da Rovezzano as
part of a magnificent tomb in the Renaissance
style, reflecting Cardinal Wolsey’s wealth and statesmanship. The angels, each measuring around a metre in height, were created between 1524 and 1529 - a period in which
Henry VIII was seeking to annul
his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. Wolsey's inability to persuade the Pope to annul the marriage led to
his fall from power and he died in 1530. Along with the rest of Wolsey’s possessions, most of the tomb (including the angels) was appropriated by
Henry VIII who intended to use it for himself.
Benedetto was commissioned to
complete the tomb for the
King, however
Henry VIII did not see the tomb finished. Each of
Henry VIII's three children expressed their intention to
complete the memorial posthumously, but failed to do so. Elizabeth I moved the parts of the tomb to Windsor in 1565, where they stayed until 1645-6. During the Civil War elements of the tomb were sold to raise funds and until recently only the black
stone chest, later used for Admiral Lord
Nelson’s monument in the crypt of St Paul’s Cathedral, and four bronze candlesticks, now at St Bavo Cathedral in Ghent, were thought to have survived.
The existence of the angels remained unknown until two of them appeared in an
auction in 1994, unillustrated and catalogued simply as being ‘in
Italian Renaissance
style’. They were acquired by a Parisian art dealer and later the
Italian scholar Francesco Caglioti convincingly attributed them to Benedetto. In 2008 the remaining pair of angels was discovered at Harrowden Hall, a country house in Northamptonshire, now owned by the Wellingborough Golf Club, where all four angels once stood on top of the gateposts.
Benedetto da Rovezzano (1474-1554) was a
contemporary of Michelangelo and was described by Giorgio Vasari as '…among our most excellent craftsmen.' One of
his early commissions, in 1508, was to finish Michelangelo’s bronze
sculpture of David (now lost), indicating
his metalworking skills were much in demand. He worked in
England between 1519 and 1543 where
his pre-eminent
patron became Cardinal Wolsey.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAahox9ils4
