Almost certainly studies from one of the Medici Lions, two sculptures which were at the Villa Medici, Rome from about 1600 to 1787. They were commissioned by Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, to adorn the villa's garden staircase, the Loggia dei Leoni. One originated from a 2nd century BC marble relief which was reworked by Giovanni di Scherano Fancelli in 1598 and it is this that Wilson recorded. The second, also in marble, was executed as a pendant to the ancient sculpture, probably between 1594 and 1598, by Flaminio Vacca. The lions were later moved to Florence and since 1789, have flanked the steps to the Loggia dei Lanzi in the Piazza della Signoria. They were replaced by copies at the Villa Medici when Napoleon relocated the French Academy in Rome to the villa in 1803.
An alternative model for Wilson's drawings was proposed by Ford as the Piraeus Lion, displayed since 1687 outside the Arsenale in Venice as a symbol of the city's patron saint, Saint Mark. Seized from the Piraeus, harbour of ancient Athens, by Francesco Morosini, the Venetian naval commander, during a war against the Ottoman Empire, the white marble statue was an object of admiration since it stood, and stands, about 3 metres high and was defaced in the second half of the 11th century by Scandinavians, who carved two lengthy runic inscriptions on its shoulder and flanks.
