Czartoryski Museum in the context of "Pommel (saddle)"

The Lady with an Ermine is a portrait painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci. Dated to c. 1489–1491, the work is painted in oils on a panel of walnut wood. Its subject is Cecilia Gallerani, a mistress of Ludovico Sforza ("Il Moro"), Duke of Milan; Leonardo was painter to the Sforza court in Milan at the time of its execution. It is the second of only four surviving portraits of women painted by Leonardo, the others being Ginevra de' Benci, La Belle Ferronnière and the Mona Lisa.

Lady with an Ermine is now housed at the Czartoryski Museum in Kraków, and is one of Poland's national treasures. It is part of the Princes Czartoryski Collection, which was sold for €100 million (5% of the estimated market value of the entire collection) on 29 December 2016 to the Polish government by Princes Czartoryski Foundation, represented by Adam Karol Czartoryski, the last direct descendant of Izabela Czartoryska Flemming and Adam George Czartoryski, who brought the painting to Poland from Italy in 1798.

A saddle is a supportive structure for a rider of an animal, fastened to an animal's back by a girth. The most common type is equestrian. However, specialized saddles have been created for oxen, camels and other animals. The trade of making saddles is saddlery.

It is not known precisely when riders first began to use some sort of padding or protection, but a blanket attached by some form of surcingle or girth was probably the first "saddle", followed later by more elaborate padded designs. The solid saddle tree was a later invention, and though early stirrup designs predated the invention of the solid tree, the paired stirrup, which attached to the tree, was the last element of the saddle to reach the basic form that is still used today. Present-day saddles come in a wide variety of styles, each designed for a specific equestrianism discipline, and require careful fit to both the rider and the horse. Proper saddle care can extend the useful life of a saddle, often for decades. The saddle was a crucial step in the increased use of domesticated animals, during the Classical Era.

Princes Czartoryski Foundation was established by Prince Adam Karol Czartoryski in 1991 to administer the Czartoryski Museum under the auspices of the National Museum in Kraków, Poland.

Through 2016, the Princes Czartoryski Foundation was the controlling entity of the collections. The Foundation, however, now exists in name only: on 29 December 2016, its founder and president, Prince Adam Karol Czartoryski, sold for 100 million euro to the Polish Government, all the Foundation's buildings (arsenal, monastery, museum, and library), with all their contents, valued at some 3 billion euros.

Prince Adam Karol Czartoryski (Polish: [ˈadam ˈkarɔl t͡ʂartɔˈrɨskʲi]; Spanish: Adán Carlos, IPA: [aˈðaŋ ˈkaɾlos t͡ʃaɾtoˈriski] born 2 January 1940) is a Polish and Spanish aristocrat who is head of the Polish-Lithuanian House of Czartoryski. He is related to both the Spanish royal family (House of Borbón-Anjou) and to France's House of Orléans. In 2016, he sold the family art collection held in the Czartoryski Museum to the Polish state for approximately €100 million.

Elżbieta "Izabela" Dorota Czartoryska (née Flemming; 31 March 1745 – 15 July 1835) was a Polish princess, writer, art collector, and prominent figure in the Polish Enlightenment. She was the wife of Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski and a member of the influential Familia political party. She is also known for having founded Poland's first museum, the Czartoryski Museum, now located in Kraków.