A scene from a bas-relief

A photograph of a drawing by Pietro Testa now in the Royal Library, Windsor (RCIN 908716) which depicts a scene from a bas-relief of a partial sarcophagus now in Palazzo Mattei di Giove, Rome. This drawing, which used to be in the collection of Cassiano dal Pozzo, was attributed by Ruland (1876) to Pietro Santi Bartoli.

Until the early seventeenth century the sarcophagus probably stood at St John Lateran, Rome but between 1613 and 1616 it was acquired by Asdrubale Mattei and sawn up. The front was restored and immured at the third landing of the main staircase of Palazzo Mattei di Giove, where it still is today.

The subject of the sarcophagus was interpreted by Ruland (1876) as the Emperor Gallienus conducted to the conquest of Asia and by Bartsch as "le Guerrier et la Femme endormie". This subject was rarely chosen for sarcophagi and it actually represents the Roman myth of the seduction by Mars, god of war, of Rhea Silvia, a Vestal virgin, who then gave birth to the twins Romulus and Remus, founders of the city of Rome.