Hercules on Horseback

Hercules is here identified by a club (his signature weapon), lion-skin cloak, and muscular appearance. He is large in proportion to his horse, emphasizing his physical strength. One of Hercules's best-known labors was his defeat of the Nemean lion. Here he slips his fingers into the mouth of the leonine trophy that he wears, a reference to illustrations of this episode that show Hercules besting his feline foe by prying apart the beast's jaws. Equestrian depictions of Hercules were unique to the Este family — rulers of Ferrara, Modena, and Reggio — and this statuette was likely produced for Duke Ercole I d'Este, who promoted his association with his mythological namesake. The imagery of Hercules on Horseback is connected to Ercole's wedding to the princess of Naples or to a springtime festival during which Ercole rode throughout Ferrara in costume, bringing flowering branches to the city's most beautiful women.