Note 62 — PASQUIN AND MARFORIO.
Reading edition
The description of these two famous statues is not correctly given in the text. The statue called Marforio is the figure of a recumbent river god of colossal proportions, found near the arch of Septimius Severus. When the museum of the capitol was completed, the Pope moved the figure into the court-yard; there it is still to be seen. He also wished to move that of Pasquin, but the Duke de Braschi refused to allow it; and it still stands on its pedestal, at the angle of the Braschi Palace, in the small square that takes the name of Piazza del Pasquino from that circumstance. It is much mutilated, but is the ruin of a very fine work; Bernini expressed great admiration for it. It is considered by Count Maffei to represent Ajax supporting Menelaus. The torso of the latter figure only is left, the arms of the former are broken away; but enough remains of both to conjecture what the original might have been in design. The pose of both figures is similar to the fine group known as Ajax and Telamon, in the Loggia of the Pitti Palace at Florence.