Gian Lorenzo Bernini created an unprecedented masterpiece for Cardinal Scipione Borghese depicting the chaste nymph Daphne being turned into a laurel tree, pursued in vain by Apollo god of light.
         This life-size marble sculpture, begun by Bernini at the age of twenty-four and executed between 1622 and 1625, has always been housed in the Cardinal's villa.  Anyone entering the room where it stood, first saw Apollo from behind, then the fleeing nymph appeared in the process of metamorphosis: bark covers most of her body, but according to Ovid's lines, Apollo's hand can still feel her heart beating beneath it.Thus the scene ends by Daphne being transformed into a laurel tree to escape her divine aggressor.