These two tapestries in the Charles Jairus Martin Memorial Collection are
remarkably fine examples of Renaissance tapestry weaving in Italy and
Flanders during the XVI century. The Dante tapestry was woven about the
middle of the century in Florence at the Medici atelier—the
Arazzeria-Medici—founded by Cosimo I in 1537. It bears in the selvage the
mark of the Florentine manufactory and of the master weaver, John Rost,
who with another Fleming, Nicholas Karcher, conducted (from 1546) the work
of the Arazzeria. His mark, in the lower left-hand corner of the
tapestry, is a punning device, a roast of meat upon a spit. The tapestry
was woven for some member of the Salviati family, whose arms appear in the
upper border. The design has been attributed on evidence of style to
Francesco Rossi de’ Salviati (1510-1563), who, with Bronzino and other
well-known artists of the High Renaissance, provided many cartoons for the
Medici weavers. The scene represented is taken from the opening canto of
Dante’s Divine Comedy; Virgil, the type of Human Philosophy, sent to guide
the poet through Hell and Purgatory, appears to Dante who has lost his way
in “the wood of error,” where he is menaced by three symbolical animals,
the panther, the lion and the she-wolf, who would prevent him from
ascending the “Holy Hill.” The border designs in the grotesque style are
particularly interesting and typical of Renaissance ornament. The
tapestry is unusually large, measuring 16 ft. 7 in. in height by 15 ft. 4
in. in width. Italian tapestries of the High Renaissance are not common;
the Dante tapestry, formerly in the J. P. Morgan Collection, is far and
away the most important example of its kind in the country.
[Joseph Ruler Over Egypt, Tapestry. Brussels, Second Quarter of XVI
Century]
Joseph Ruler Over Egypt, Tapestry. Brussels, Second Quarter of XVI
Century
The extraordinary success which attended the weaving at Brussels in the
early part of the XVI century of the tapestries from Raphael’s famous
cartoons brought the Italian Renaissance style into great favor among the
tapestry weavers of Flanders. Evidence of this is clear in our tapestry
from a set illustrating the history of Joseph. Behind the seated woman in
the foreground stands a lady in the rich costume of the XVI century; it is
not improbable that this is the portrait of some noblewoman at whose
expense the tapestries were woven. In the lower left-hand corner of the
border occurs the Brussels mark, a red shield with a capital letter “B” on
either side. From 1528 on, the Brussels weavers were required by law to
add the mark of the city, together with their own mark, to all tapestries
of more than six ells. The weaver’s monogram, at the right in the lower
border of our tapestry, as not yet been identified. The tapestry dates
from about the second quarter of the XVI century. It was formerly in the
Rospigliosi and Ffoulke Collections.
[Lectern, Walnut. Italian, Umbrian, XVI Century]