VaticanMuseums RaffaelOrnaments

This decorative wall painting features a delicate 'all'antica' style with a central smoking urn flanked by a winged griffin and a lioness. Insects, birds, and floral garlands are suspended from thin architectural lines, while a lower border includes profile silhouettes and the Latin word 'PAX' (Peace). These whimsical and hybrid forms are characteristic of the grotesque style rediscovered in ancient Roman ruins during the Renaissance.

The rediscovery of 'grotesques' in Nero's Domus Aurea provided Renaissance artists like Raphael with a visual language for the 'hieroglyphic' and the fantastical. This style was often interpreted by Neoplatonic thinkers as a way to represent the fluid, metamorphic nature of the soul and the hidden, interconnected mysteries of the natural world.