Medici lions

The Medici lions are a pair of

A similar Roman lion sculpture, of the 1st century AD, is known as the

The Villa Medici was inherited by the house of Lorraine in 1737, and in 1787^[3][10][11] the lions were moved to Florence, and since 1789^[10] they flank the steps to the Loggia dei Lanzi at the Piazza della Signoria.

The sculptures were replaced by copies at the Villa Medici when Napoleon relocated the French Academy in Rome to the villa in 1803.^[12] These copies were made by the French sculptor Augustin Pajou.^[11]

• 
  The original Medici lions at the Villa Medici (Giovanni Francesco Venturini 1691)
• 
  The current Medici Lions at the Villa Medici in Rome
• 
  Medici Lion by Augustin Pajou at the Villa Medici
• 
  The Medici coat of arms with five balls, above Loggia dei leoni

Copies

The original Medici lions (1598) have since 1789 stood in the Loggia dei Lanzi, Piazza della Signoria, Florence. There is a smaller bronze left-looking sculpture attributed to Italian sculptor Pietro da Barga^[13] and the same period.^[8] Later copies or replicas include (ordered by first year):

Spain

• Twelve sculptures in bronze by
  Royal Alcazar of Madrid
  (1651):
  • Four sculptures are now in the throne room ^[es] in the Royal Palace of Madrid (since 1764).^[14]
  • Eight sculptures are now in the Museo del Prado, of which four support the tabletop of Rodrigo Calderón.^[14][15]
• Sculptures in Colmenar marble at the Montforte Gardens ^[es], Valencia by José Bellver (circa 1860).^[16][17]
• Sculptures in marble at the Canalejas Park ^[es], Alicante (park created 1886).

Sweden

• Sculpture in bronze in the
  Royal Swedish Academy of Arts building, Stockholm (before 1735?).^[18]
• Sculpture in bronze at the Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm (1995).
• Sculpture in bronze in Nacka, Stockholm (1996).^[19][20]

Britain

• Sculptures in lead at Stowe House attributed to John Cheere (around 1755–779). Formerly placed at Stanley Park, Blackpool (1927–2013).^[21][22]
• Sculpture in the park of Kedleston Hall, carved by Joseph Wilton (around 1760–70).^[23][24]
• Two artificial stone versions are found in the garden of Osborne House (1845–1851), Isle of Wight.^[25]
• Sculptures at the Stanley Park, Blackpool (2013). These were produced, by Rupert Harris Conservation, using casts from the former sculptures which were returned, on loan, to Stowe house in 2013.^[26]

Russia and Ukraine

Versions in Saint Petersburg, Russia include:

• The Lion Cascade [Львиный каскад] in bronze at Peterhof Palace (1799–1801).
• Sculptures in marble at the
  Lobanov-Rostovsky Residence (constructed 1817–20).^[27][28]
• Sculptures in bronze at the staircase of the Mikhailovsky Palace (constructed 1819–25).^[29]
• Sculptures at the entrance of Yelagin Palace (completed 1822).
• The
  Admiralty embankment
  (1832).
• Sculptures at the pier on the western point of Yelagin Island (1926).^[30]

Versions in southern Russia and later Ukraine include:

• Sculptures in marble at the
  Odessa (now Ukraine
  , completed 1830).
• One pair of marble lion sculptures at the Voronstov Palace, Crimea (installed in 1848).^[31]
• Pair of lion sculptures at Starosinnyi Garden, Odessa (now Ukraine, unknown year).^[32]
• Lion sculpture at the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine Botanical Garden.^[33]

Italy

• Sculptures in marble by Augustin Pajou at the Villa Medici (1803).^[12]

Germany

• Four miniature versions surrounding the Akademie- or Löwenbrunnen in the
  palace garden (1807–1811), Stuttgart
  .
• Two gilded versions as part of the Lion Fountain in front of Glienicke Palace (1824–26), Berlin.
• Statues at the entrance of Schloss
  better source needed
  ]

Cuba

• Two versions outside the Cathedral de la Purisma Concepción in Cienfuegos (built 1833–69), Cuba.

United States

• The Florentine Lions in cast-iron in the Fairmount Park, Philadelphia (cast in 1849 at the Alexandroffsky Head Mechanical Works, St Petersburg, Russia for Andrew M. Eastwick, originally displayed at Bartram's Garden, 1851–1879, installed at west Fairmount Park in 1887).^[35]
• Medici Lions, at Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Bowdoin College, Maine. The Museum’s landmark Walker Art Building was commissioned for the College by Harriet and Sophia Walker in honor of their uncle, a Boston businessman who had supported the creation of the first small art gallery at Bowdoin in the mid-nineteenth century. Designed by Charles Follen McKim of McKim, Mead, & White, the building was completed in 1894 and is on the National Register of Historic Places.^[36][37]
• Stone sculptures, Mick and Mack, at McMicken Hall,
  The University of Cincinnati, Ohio (there since 1904). The pair of lions originally belonged to Jacob Hoffner, a wealthy Cincinnati landowner who bequeathed them to the University upon his death in 1891. They were transported to their current location in 1904.^[38]
• The pair of lions on the western end of the eponymous Bridge of Lions in St. Augustine, Florida (constructed 1925–1927, rebuilt 2011–2012).^[39]
• Sculpture in limestone at the Museum of Outdoor Arts, Colorado (founded 1981).^[40]

Estonia

• The Swedish lion in bronze in
  Royal Swedish Academy of Arts
  was re-erected in 2000.

Lithuania

• Sculptures of lions are in bronze at the staircase of the Vytautas the Great War Museum in Kaunas, Lithuania. They were donated by Lithuanian count Jonas Jurgis Tiškevičius (1917–1987) in 1938 from his Astravas Manor in Biržai suburb (decorative sculptures of lions that stood at the entrance to the manor were replaced with copies). Sculptures was made in Saint Petersburg's factory commissioned by Lithuanian count Jonas Tiškevčius in the middle of the 19th century.^[41]

France

• Several^[42] sculptures at the Terrasse des Orangers in Parc de Saint-Cloud, Hauts-de-Seine, Paris (of unknown origin).^[43]

Hungary

• Statues at
  better source needed
  ]

Close imitations

• Sweden:
  Royal Palace, Stockholm
  (1700–1704).
• United Kingdom: Sculptures in bronze at the Queen's Gate entrance to Royal Victoria Park in Bath (1818–1819).^[45]
• Belgium: Lion of Waterloo in iron,^{[citation needed]} by Jean-François Van Geel in Waterloo (1826).
• India:
  Fitzgerald Bridge statue in Pune, India
  (1866).
• Spain: The
  Congress of Deputies, Madrid, Cast in 1865, installed 1872.^[46]
• Finland: Parolan Leijona (Finnish for The Lion of Parola) on a four-meter-high (13 ft) pedestal in Hattula. Erected in 1868 to commemorate the 1863 visit by Alexander II of Russia.^[47]
• Barbados: The Lion at Gun Hill carved from a single piece of coral stone in 1868 by Captain Henry John Wilkinson, who was stationed there. It is situated southeast and below the Gun Hill Signal Station, overlooking the St. George Valley.^{[48] [49]}