ROSSI, Giovanni Antonio de' - b. 1517 Milano, d. ~1575 Roma

Italian medallist and gem-engraver. Beginning his career in Milan, he moved to Venice in the early 1540s and to Rome in 1546, to work for the papal mint. On stylistic grounds a medal of Pope Julius III (1550-55) is attributed to de Rossi, but his first signed medal is of Pope Marcellus II (1555). From 1557 to 1560 de Rossi resided in Florence, and in 1557 he accepted a commission to carve a large cameo showing Cosimo I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, and his Family (Florence, Palazzo Pitti), from a preliminary drawing (Oxford, Christ Church) attributed to Vasari; the cameo admirably displays de Rossi’s technical brilliance.

In 1560 he returned to Rome, and in 1561 he became warden of the papal mint, a position he retained until his death. In this post he produced not only papal medals but a medal of St Carlo Borromeo, Archbishop of Milan.

Cosimo I de' Medici and his Family

The cameo shows Cosimo I de’ Medici (1519-1574), then Duke of Florence, his wife, Eleonor of Toledo (1519-1562), and their sons, Francesco (1541-1587), Ferdinando (1549-1609), Giovanni (1543-1562), Garzia (1547-1562) and the young Pietro (1554-1604), not yet at the height of his mother’s waist, playing with the golden fleece. The family group is surmounted by an allegorical Fame, winged and blowing his trumpet.