Coadestone Bust of Caracalla indented Coade Lambeth 1792

 

I have posted these images and notes for two reasons -

Firstly - I have had an abiding interest in the products from Mrs Coades manufactury in Lambeth for many years - I bought my first piece of Coade in 1979 a Laughing Philosopher keystone from dealer extraordinaire Paul Farnham.

The Caracalla is mentioned in the Langford's sale catalogue of May 1762 of the contents of the Roubiliac workshops at St Martin's Lane

The second reason for posting is the use of this particular form or a varient of it by Roubiliac.

Apart from a plaster bust of Cromwell at the Royal Academy the use of this type of socle or variants in the 18th century is unique to Roubiliac.

I have written about the subject of these socles and its variants several times -

They appear to have been derived from a pair of busts in the Fitzwilliam Museum of the Marble importers, the brothers Christopher (c. 1737 - 1810) and Edward Chapman Bird (1715 - 92) by Giovanni Antonio Cybei (1706 - 1784).

see my essay on the marble workshops and wharfs at Westminster see -

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2025/09/the-suppliers-of-stone-and-marble-at.html

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For much more on the Roubiliac late type socles see 

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2025/05/marble-bust-of-laocoon.html

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2025/12/monument-to-francis-hooper-from.html

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2025/12/the-roubiliac-type-socle-some-mor.html

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A version by Cavaceppi is at the Getty Museum.

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Caracalla and Townley.

Drawing attributed to the Scottish Artist John Brown.

Image courtesy British Museum

The Tomasso Brothers Marble Bust of Laocoon. 

Two busts, one of plaster and the other in marble of Laocoon were included in the Roubiliac posthumous sale. 

The Roubiliac Sale Catalogue - 12 May 1762 and the following 3 Days contains Lot 48, 3rd Day - Plaster Bust Laocoon. Lot 72, 4th Day – Marble Laocoon.

This bust of Laocoon with the distinctive socle was the bust that first led me investigate the later type of Roubiliac socle and to the discovery of  at least 16 busts by or attributable to Roubiliac using this type of socle

Roubiliac, uses the same socle on at least 16 different busts known to be from his workshop, as those socles on the four unsigned busts of Laocoon, Milo of Croton, the Anima Dannata (the Damned Soul) after Bernini and a man depicted as the Good Roman Emperor Trajan at Goodwood House.

 At this point in the researches it is difficult to gauge when he first used this form of socle - possibly as early as 1746 (perhaps that on the Mary Okeover bust?) but more likely in the 1750's.

4 of the busts drawn by Joseph Nollekens at the Roubiliac posthumous sale use this type of socle. These drawings are now in the Harris Museum at Preston, Lancs (see the illustrations below).

 I can only find two other uses of this form of Socle by Joseph Wilton - the 1757 marble bust of Lord Chersterfield and a plaster bust of Oliver Cromwell at the Royal Academy.

 

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_1777-0620-1