A head of a putto

A photograph of a cartoon fragment by Raphael (c.1509-10) now in the British Museum, London (inv. no.Pp,1.76). The cartoon fragment was recognised by Ruland (1876), who catalogued the Raphael Collection, as being for the winged putto to the right of Poetry, one of the allegorical figures painted by Raphael in fresco in the vault of the Stanza della Segnatura in the Vatican. A photograph of the fresco can be found at RCIN 852628.

From 1508 until his death in 1520, Raphael undertook the decoration of a number of spaces in the Vatican Palace for, first, Pope Julius II and, later, Leo X. The first of these commissions was for what was probably the Pope's private library, known as the Stanza della Segnatura. The major aspects of the decorative scheme of the room are as follows: personifications of Poetry, Theology, Jurisprudence and Philosophy in roundels on the vault, with four narrative scenes known as the School of Athens, the Parnassus, the Disputa and the Three Cardinal Virtues on the walls below. In the Royal Collection  there is a preparatory drawing by Raphael for the allegorical figure of Poetry in the vault of the chamber (see RCIN 912734).