David

This David started out as someone else's statue. In March 1623 Cardinal Alessandro Peretti Montalto, a wealthy nephew of an earlier pope, ordered a David from Bernini for his villa. In June the cardinal died unexpectedly, and Cardinal Scipione Borghese stepped in and took over the commission. Bernini was already carving Apollo and Daphne for Scipione, and he put it aside to do this. The David was done in about seven months. You can find the new owner in the marble. The harp lying at David's feet ends in an eagle's head, one of the Borghese family's heraldic emblems. Beside it lies the armour King Saul had offered him, dropped so he can move freely. Earlier Davids by Donatello and Michelangelo mostly stand still. This one is caught winding up to throw, lips pressed together, and his target, the giant Goliath, is somewhere behind you. When the statue first went on show in the villa, it stood so that visitors met it head-on.