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| Giovanni Marchiori Bust of Minerva before 1778 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Camillo Rusconi Bozzetto for portrait of Pope Gregory XIII ca. 1718 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
"Even though I am only a poor knight, I adorn my little study with a bust of John the Baptist at the age of about fourteen, sculpted in the round from Carrara marble by the hand of Donatello, which is very beautiful. Its quality is such, that, if one could find no other work by him, this alone would be sufficient to make him eternal and immortal in the eyes of the world. I adorn my study with a figure of Saint Jerome made of terracotta, but finished so as to imitate bronze, in three quarters relief and about a cubit high, which is by the hand of Alfonso di Ferrara. It could easily be compared with his most famous works. I adorn my study with a little board, and with two portrait panels, one of Saint Paul, the other of Saint John the Baptist, which are worked in lavoro d'intarsia by the hand of my venerable friend, Fra Damiano da Bergamo. All three panels are most excellent works. In my opinion, the good father excelled himself in the portrait of Saint John, showing the final and ultimate proof of everything he knew. Similarly, I adorn the room with an antique urn of alabaster, oriental, with some veins of chalcedony, which certainly does not yield precedence to any other alabaster vase which I have ever seen until the present hour, though I have seen many of them in Rome and elsewhere. I would continue to praise the objects in my study as their quality deserves but as they are my things, I would not wish anyone to think that, deluded by the feeling which one naturally has for one's own things, I had overstepped the bounds of Truth. I adorn the room with many other little things, which, because they are not of the same dignity and excellence of the others, I do not mention or refer to here. If by chance you were to ask me, which ornaments I would desire in my house above all others, I would reply without much pause for reflection, Arms and Books. The arms should be fine, fit for every test, by an excellent hand such as a good Italian or German master. I would wish them to be kept limpid, burnished, shining and polished, as the arms of a noble knight should be, and not rusty like those of a tipstaff or sergeant. I would wish the books to be those written by serious, mature and approved and prescribed authors, and I would want the books to be used and studied, and not so dusty that one could write on the boards with one's finger. For to have books, and not use them, is as good as not having them. And if by chance you were to ask me which item of furnishing or which ornament it would please me most to have in my house, I would immediately respond: a steel mirror. It would be one of the large and beautiful ones made by the German Giovanni della Barba, most excellent at making mathematical instruments such as solid spheres, globes, astrolabes and mirrors. I would hold it more dear, because it represents reality more than the others."
– from the chapter On the Suitable Decoration of Grand Interiors by Fra Sabba di Castiglione, published in his Ricordi at Venice in 1560, reprinted in English by Dora Thornton in The Scholar in his Study: Ownership and Experience in Renaissance Italy (Yale University Press, 1997)
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| Camillo Rusconi St John the Evangelist 1709 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Camillo Rusconi Bozzetto for equestrian statue of Peter the Great 1719-20 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Anonymous French sculptor Statuette of Lion-Tamer ca. 1750 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Anonymous French sculptor Statuette of Bear-Tamer ca. 1750 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Pierre Legros St Francis Xavier 1696-97 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Pierre Legros Pope Pius V Enthroned before 1717 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Pierre Legros Pope Gregory XV Enthroned before 1719 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Anonymous Italian sculptor Bozzetto for the Tomb of a Pope 17th century terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Pierre-Étienne Monnot Cybele ca. 1695 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Stefano Maderno Nicodemus with the body of Christ 1605 terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Antoine Coysevox Portrait-bust of Pierre Mignard, painter 1670s terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
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| Augustin Pajou Portrait-bust of Pierre Rousseau, architect 18th century terracotta Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |