A PHILOSOPHER

This figure of a ragged old man has close similarities with two bronzes in Budapest and known in numerous other casts (see L. Larsson, European bronzes 1450-1700, Stockholm, 1992, pp. 46-7), that Eve Szomodis-Eszlary argued were cast after models by Pierre Legros the Elder. She based this on comparisons with the statue of Aesop by Legros from the garden of Versailles. The bronze models are identified as the philosphers Aesop, Diogenes and Thales and the present figure is likely from the same series.