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Longfellow House - Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site has a large museum collection consisting of thousands of objects, many of which are not regularly displayed in the house's furnished exhibit rooms. Every month, an object will be featured on this page, providing a look at an unusual piece from the collection.
The dresses, hair styles and hair ornament worn by one of the women depicted here identify them both as being Italian, and specifically from the region including Rome. They are portrayed as being in the act of dancing the saltarello, a dance that involved a specific jumping or leaping step and derives its name from “saltare”, the Italian word meaning to jump. Although the dance seems to have originated hundreds of years before, by the 19th century it had become a traditional folk dance, and in particular one that was often performed in Rome during its annual Carnival celebration. Etched into the terracotta on the front of the sculpture’s base is “Pinelli f Roma 1833”. The piece was made by Bartolomeo Pinelli, a Italian artist. Pinelli was closely associated with the poor Trastevere neighborhood of Rome where he was born in 1781, and where he died in 1835. He was known for his printmaking, drawing, watercolor work, and sculpture. His favored subjects were the common people of Rome and scenes of their everyday lives. Pinelli’s work became sought after as souvenirs by English tourists on the Grand Tour of Europe during the early 1800s. Despite this measure of popularity Pinelli never achieved prosperity, and was perhaps known by friends and admirers for his poverty as much as for his art. This piece was acquired by Thomas Gold Appleton, brother-in-law to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Appleton was a well-known collector of art, and in his younger days had been an aspiring artist himself. During his first trip to Europe in 1833-1834 he stayed in Rome during the waning days of the Carnival celebration, and likely witnessed scenes such as the one portrayed in this sculpture. He also met the artist in March of 1834, writing in a journal “To-day we visited Pinelli. I have had a desire to make his acquaintance, as he is an original. We found him modeling some of his famous terra-cotta groups, and it was delightful to watch the stroke of his stick. He is a perfect master of Roman character, and every dash he made was happy, bringing out some new expression. His manner is artificially brusque but his genius is marked.” This is quite likely the occasion on which Appleton purchased the work shown above. The sculpture remained in Appleton’s possession until his death in 1884. It is visible in a photograph, taken that same year, of the library in his home on Commonwealth Avenue in Boston. Appleton’s estate inventory reveals that the piece was given to his niece, Alice Longfellow, who kept it in one of the second-floor bedrooms of her family’s Cambridge home on Brattle Street. |
Last updated: February 28, 2025