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Modern Italy
Journal of Modern Italian Studies
RIVISTA DI STUDI ITALIANI
Anno XVII , n° 1, Giugno 1999 ( Note e Rassegne ) pag. 377-380
GOAT'S MILK FOR INFANT GODS.
LORENZO BERNINI'S INFANT BACCHUS
MISTAKEN FOR THE YOUNG JUPITER
SUSANNE LÜCKE-DAVID
Munich
One of the highlights in the last retrospective of Gianlorenzo
Bernini's works1 was a little marble group, most likely the first opus of the sculptor, datable ca. 16152: two little boys, who
seem to have just left their cradles, lean against a goat lying on the ground and turning its head towards one of the children. The latter one, kneeling on the ground with his left leg, is about to milk the animal, the other one drinks the milk, overflowing from a shallow cup in his left hand. Without paying attention, he nonchalantly lifts the tail of the goat with his right hand thus giving way to the left hand of his companion that supports the goat's udder. A genre scene representing an everyday
episode in the life of a pastoral people? The young child enjoying the milk tells a different story. The animal-like features of his face, the pointed ears, his legs of a goat and
the trace of a tail above his coccyx lead us unmistakably into the realm of myth: his appearance corresponds exactly to the iconography of the Greek satyr. [...]
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