A visitor to Vatican City had a hilarious experience when he found the subject of a Raphael masterpiece had an uncanny resemblance to Hollywood hardman Sylvester Stallone. The Cardinal and Theological Virtues is a 1511 fresco adorning one of the Raphael Rooms at the Vatican. It depicts Pope Gregory IX approving the Vatical Decretals – with a spitting image of Stallone looking on. Harvard student Anthony Zonfrell, 20, who was on holiday in Italy with his family, spotted the hilarious doppelganger. “My cousin had told us about how she had seen it when she went, so we were on the lookout. As soon as we saw the painting, we knew it was him. My whole family thought it was hilarious. It could actually be a portrait of Stallone,” the Daily Mail quoted him as saying. It is thought Raphael, who lived from 1483 until 1520, only sketched the outline of the fresco, with team member Lorenzo Lotto carrying out the ‘Stallone’ paintwork.When Anthony, who is from Massachusetts, returned from his holiday he uploaded the photograph to community website Reddit. Incredibly, the image was viewed more than 700,000 times – becoming the website’s most popular page.
