Four Roman Empresses:
Portrait of Aelia Paetina (fl. early 1st century AD),
inscribed upper right: ÆMILIA. CLAVDIO. VXOR. 5; and
Portrait of Livia Drusilla (59 BC – 29 AD),
inscribed upper left: LIVIA. DRVSILLA. OCTAVIANO. VXOR. 2; and
Portrait of Aemilia Lepida (1st century), wife of Galba,
inscribed upper left: LEPIDA. GALBA. VXOR. 7; and
Portrait of Flavia Domitilla Major (died before 69 AD),
inscribed upper left: POMPEA. SABINA. OTTONE. VXOR. 8,
oil on canvas, each 143 x 115.5 cm, framed, a set of four (4)

Provenance:
Collection of Luisa María Narváez y Macías, Duchess of Valencia (1912–1983), Palacio de los Águila, Avila;
with Luis Codosero, Madrid, 1984;
Private collection, Madrid

The present paintings relate to Titian’s celebrated series of Roman emperors, created in 1536–40 for the so-called ‘Camerino dei Cesari’ in the appartement of Duke Federico II Gonzaga in the Palazzo Ducale, Mantua. Twelve further paintings of the emperors’ wives were subsequently created to match the paintings of the emperors, which are known today primarily from engravings by Aegidius Sadeler from 1622. The originals of the engravings are not clearly documented. There is no original artist named on the prints of the women (unlike the acknowledgement to Titian on those of the men). But documents suggest that these figures ultimately relate to a set of imperatrici (empresses) painted between 1586 and 1587 by Teodoro Ghisi and Pietro Facchetti to complement Titian’s Caesars – and to be installed in their own room, somewhere in the Ducal palace (see R. Berzaghi, Decorazioni in Palazzo Ducale da Guglielmo a Vincenzo II, in: R. Morselli, Gonzaga: la Celeste Galeria, Le raccolte, exhibition catalogue, Milan 2002, p. 615–616; S. L’Occaso, Teodoro Ghisi [1536 ca. – 1601], un manierista ‘internazionale’ a Mantova, in: Bulletin de l’Association des Historiens de l’Art Italien, no. 15–16/2009–2010, p. 146). How this room was laid out, even where it was in the Ducal palace, and what happened to the paintings is largely a matter of speculation. The creation of a second series of empresses, in which the painters Francesco Borgani, Stefano Sanvito, Giovanni Bahuet e Ippolito Andreasi collaborated, is documented in 1588 (see op. cit. Berzaghi, 2002, p. 615).

In 1628, the Gonzaga collection, including Titian’s paintings, was sold to Charles I of England, but Charles’ royal collection was subsequently dissolved and auctioned off under the English Commonwealth. After the sale in 1651, the Titian portraits entered the collection of Philip IV of Spain, where they were exhibited in the Alcázar in Madrid and destroyed by a fire in 1734.

The women in the present works are shown half-length in different ages, in profile, three-quarter face or full face, from the side or more from the front and with many different arrangements of drapery. The dignified poses with elaborate hairstyles resemble the opulent allegorical figures of the late sixteenth century. The present paintings do not appear to be based on Sadeler’s engravings, as they show differences in the background and in some of the details and the inscriptions do not correspond to the sitters in the engravings.