Museum Collections

This mantel clock, once owned by the Livingston family, represents the allegory of Venus and Adonis. It depicts the goddess of love in a swan-pulled chariot gazing at her lover, and with her son Cupid nearby. A similar clock, thought to have belonged to Napoleon Bonaparte’s mother, is at the emperor’s home, Malmaison, located outside of Paris. Livingston’s relationship to the Napoleonic court was often strained during his time there as the United States Minister. Yet, the Chancellor cautiously admired the French, writing to his sister Alida in 1802 that "Pleasure is in short the only pursuit of the gay world here."