Lorenzo Lotti, also known as Lorenzetto, (Florence 1490–1541 Rome), Jonah and the whale [detail], Chigi Chapel, Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome
The head of the statue was inspired by the Farnese Antinous. The great Swedish Romantic writer, Viktor Rydberg in his Roman Days (1877) recorded - or simply invented - an allegedly Roman tradition about the origin of the statue. As the story goes a man was wandering among the ruins of Hadrian's Villa in Tivoli when the spirit of Hadrian appeared before him saying that his soul would not be able to rest until the good name of Antinous is cleared. The man bore the message to Raphael who was working on the Chigi Chapel, and he decided to christen Antinous and celebrate his beauty by immortalizing him as Prophet Jonah who also chose watery death to save a ship like Antinous, and came to see the light again. As Rydberg concluded: "So was the heathen allegory knit with the Christian, and Jonah, under the pencil of Raphael became, not the aged, long-bearded prophet, clothed in a mantle, but the youthfully fair, nude pagan Antinous, now free from all pain, and rejoicing that life has vanquished death." (Wikipedia)
