Lejonbacken
Lion Slope
Medici Lions
Stockholm Sweden
2012

Lejonbacken (Swedish: "Lion Slope") is a system of ramps leading up to the northern entrance of the Royal Palace in Stockholm, Sweden. They were built during the 1780s named after the pair of sculpted Medici lions prominently exposed on the stone railings of the ramps.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lejonbacken

Models for the bronze lions were completed in 1700 by the French sculptor Bernard Foucquet the Younger (1640-after 1711). Foucquet used stone lions at the Villa Medici in Rome as prototypes for the commission, while the Crown had to melt sculptures taken from Kronborg Castle in Denmark to assemble the required amount of bronze.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medici_lions

The Medici lions are a pair of marble sculptures of lions: one of which is Roman, dating to the 2nd century AD, and the other a 16th-century pendant. Both were by 1598 placed at the Villa Medici, Rome. Since 1789 they have been displayed at the Loggia dei Lanzi in Florence. The sculptures depict standing male lions with a sphere or ball under one paw, looking to the side.

Copies of the Medici lions have been made and publicly installed in over 30 other locations, and smaller versions made in a variety of media; Medici lion has become the term for the type.


A similar Roman lion sculpture, of the 1st century AD, is known as the Albani lion, and is now in the Louvre. Here, the stone used for the ball is different from the basalt body. Both may derive from a Hellenistic original.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_Palace

Stockholm Palace or the Royal Palace is the official residence and major royal palace of the Swedish monarch. Stockholm Palace is on Stadsholmen, in Gamla stan in the capital, Stockholm. It neighbours the Riksdag building.