Portrait of a Man holding a Letter ('L'Avvocato'), Giovanni Battista Moroni (1570)
This portrait has long been known as ‘L’Avvocato‘, meaning the lawyer or counsel in Italian. The sitter’s air of well-paid theatricality and his supercilious regard, as though he is summing up evidence, may have suggested this title. It might also derive from a misreading of the folded letter in his hand which is addressed ’Al Magº Sig Julii‘ (’to the most worshipful Lord Giulio or Giuliano').
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