VASARI ON TECHNIQUE
_All rights reserved_
[Illustration:
THE RARER KINDS OF STONE MENTIONED BY VASARI.
=A=, Egyptian Porphyry. =A=^1, Portion of the same piece that has
passed through the fire. =B=, Dark green porphyritic stone,
incorrectly called “Serpentine.” =C=, =D=, Two specimens of Breccias
of Seravezza (Stazzema). =E=, “Verde di Prato,” a true Serpentine.
=F=, =F=, Red Marble or Limestone from Monsummano, near Pistoja, as
used on the Duomo and Campanile, Florence. =G=, Pietra Serena. =H=,
Cipollino. =I=, True Touchstone or Basanite. =J=, White Statuary
Marble from Monte Altissimo. =K=, Bardiglio, or Grey Marble, from La
Cappella, near Seravezza. =L=, Istrian Stone. =M=, Pietra Forte.
=N=, Do. from Fortezza, Florence. =O=, Travertine. =P=, So-called
“Paragone,” a grey marble with lighter veins. =Q=, Peperino, from
Rome.
]
VASARI ON TECHNIQUE
BEING THE INTRODUCTION TO THE THREE ARTS OF DESIGN, ARCHITECTURE,
SCULPTURE AND PAINTING, PREFIXED TO THE LIVES OF THE MOST EXCELLENT
PAINTERS, SCULPTORS AND ARCHITECTS
By GIORGIO VASARI
PAINTER & ARCHITECT OF AREZZO
NOW FOR THE FIRST TIME TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH BY
LOUISA S. MACLEHOSE
EDITED WITH INTRODUCTION & NOTES BY
PROFESSOR G. BALDWIN BROWN
AND PUBLISHED BY
J. M. DENT & COMPANY
29 & 30 BEDFORD STREET, LONDON
1907
GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. LTD.
TO THE MEMORY OF
A BROTHER AND DEAR FRIEND
ROBERT MACLEHOSE, M.A.
OBIIT APRIL 18, 1907
PREFATORY NOTE
The title page indicates the general responsibility for the different
parts of the work now offered to the reader. It should be said however
that the editor has revised the translation especially in those portions
which deal with technical matters, while the translator has contributed
to the matter incorporated in the Notes. The translation was in great
part written during a sojourn near Florence, and opportunity was taken
to elucidate some of the author’s expressions by conversation with
Italian artificers and with scholars conversant with the Tuscan idiom.
The text has been translated without omissions, and the rendering has
been made as literal as is consistent with clearness and with a
reasonable regard for the English tongue. In the two editions issued in
Vasari’s lifetime the chapters are numbered continuously from one to
thirty-five through the three divisions of the work, but in more modern
editions each division has its chapters separately numbered. The latter
arrangement has been followed, but the continuous numbers of the
chapters have been added in brackets. With the view of assisting the
reader the text has also been broken up into numbered sections, each
with its heading, though there is no arrangement of the kind in the
original.
The shorter notes at the foot of the pages are intended to explain the
author’s meaning, which is not always very clear, and to help to
identify and localize buildings and objects mentioned in the text. A
certain number of the notes, the longer of which have been placed at the
ends of the three divisions, afford an opportunity for discussing more
general questions of historical or aesthetic interest raised by Vasari.
A number of plates and figures in the text have been added, some of
which are illustrative of Vasari’s descriptions, while others give
representations of unpublished objects, and examples of the different
kinds of artistic work included in the scope of the treatise. Our
acknowledgements for permission to reproduce are due to the authorities
of the Print-Room, British Museum, and the National Art Library; to
Signor Giacomo Brogi at Florence; and to others to whom we have
expressed our thanks in the text.
Vasari’s unit of measurement is the ‘braccio,’ and this term has been
retained in place of the more familiar English equivalent ‘cubit.’
Vasari’s braccio seems to be equal to about twenty-three inches or
fifty-eight centimetres. This equation is given by Aurelio Gotti, and
agrees with various dimensions Vasari ascribes to monuments that can now
be measured. A smaller unit is the ‘palmo,’ and this is not, as might be
supposed, the breadth of a hand, but what we should rather call a
‘span,’ that is the space that can be covered by a hand trying to
stretch an octave, and may be reckoned at about nine inches.
In the matter of proper names, Vasari’s own forms have in most cases
been followed in the text, but not necessarily in the commentary.
There are some passages in which we suspect that the printed text does
not exactly correspond with what Vasari originally wrote (see Index
_s.v._ ‘Text’), but no help is to be obtained here from any known MS.
sources. Vasari gives us to understand that the original edition of the
_Lives_ was printed, not from his own autograph, but from a transcript
made for him by a monastic calligraphist, placed at his disposal by a
friendly abbot who also corrected to some extent the text. Neither this
transcript, nor any MS. of the additions made for the second edition of
the work, is known to exist, and textual criticism has to be confined to
a comparison of the printed texts of the two editions published in
Vasari’s own lifetime.
The character of the subject matter and the multiplicity of the
processes and materials passed in review have rendered it needful to
invoke the aid of many Italian scholars and experts in historical and
technical matters, who have met our applications with a courteous
readiness to help for which we desire to express our sincere gratitude.
Our obligations to each of these are expressed in the notes, but we
cannot close this preface without a special word of thanks to Signor
Agnoletti, of the University of Glasgow, and to the Rev. Don Vittorio
Rossi, Priore of Settignano. Our acknowledgements are also due to Mr G.
K. Fortescue, Keeper of Printed Books at the British Museum; Mr G. H.
Palmer, of the National Art Library; Comm. Conte D. Gnoli, Biblioteca
Vittorio Emanuele, Rome; Comm. Dottore Guido Biagi, Biblioteca Medicea
Laurenziana, Florence; Dr Thomas Ashby, Director of the British School
at Rome; and Mr John Kinross, R.S.A. To many artists and connoisseurs in
this country whom we have consulted on technical points we are indebted
for information not easily to be found in books, and to Mr W. Brindley a
special tribute is due for the kindness with which he has opened to us
his unique stores of practical knowledge of stones and quarries.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFATORY NOTE, vii
TABLE OF CONTENTS, xi
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS, xxi
INTRODUCTORY ESSAY, 1
OF ARCHITECTURE, 23
CHAPTER I.
Of the different kinds of Stone which are used by Architects for
ornamental details, and in Sculpture for Statues; that is, Of
Porphyry, Serpentine, Cipollaccio, Breccia, Granites, Paragon or
Test-stone, Transparent Marbles, White Marbles and Veined Marbles,
Cipollini, Saligni, Campanini, Travertine, Slate, Peperigno,
Ischia Stone, Pietra Serena and Pietra Forte, 25
§ 1. _The Author’s object in the Discussion of Architecture_
(25). § 2. _Of the working of hard stones, and first of Porphyry_
(26). § 3. _Of Serpentine_ (35). § 4. _Of Cipollaccio_ (36). § 5.
_Of Breccia (‘Mischio,’ Conglomerate)_ (37). § 6. _Of Granite_
(39). § 7. _Of Paragon (Touchstone)_ (42). § 8. _Of Transparent
Marbles for filling window openings_ (43). § 9. _Of Statuary
Marbles_ (43). § 10. _Of Cipollino Marble_ (49). § 11. _Of White
Pisan Marble_ (50). § 12. _Of Travertine_ (51). § 13. _Of Slates_
(54). § 14. _Of Peperino_ (55). § 15. _Of the Stone from Istria_
(56). § 16. _Of Pietra Serena_ (57). § 17. _Of Pietra Forte_ (60).
§ 18. _Conclusion of Chapter_ (61).
CHAPTER II.
The Description of squared Ashlar-work (lavoro di quadro) and of
carved Ashlar-work (lavoro di quadro intagliato), 63
§ 19. _The work of the Mason_ (63).
CHAPTER III.
Concerning the five Orders of Architecture, Rustic, Doric, Ionic,
Corinthian, Composite, and also German Work, 65
§ 20. _Rusticated masonry and the Tuscan Order_(65). § 21. _The Doric
Order_ (68). § 22. _A constructive device to avoid charging
architraves_ (72). § 23. _The proportions and parts of the Doric Order_
(75). § 24. _The Ionic Order_ (78). § 25. _The Corinthian Order_ (79).
§ 26. _The Composite Order_ (80). § 27. _Of Terminal figures_ (82). §
28. _German Work (the Gothic Style)_ (83).
CHAPTER IV.
On forming Vaults in Concrete, to be impressed with Enrichment:
when the Centerings are to be removed, and how to mix the Plaster, 85
§ 29. _The Construction of enriched Stucco Vaults_ (85). § 30.
_Stucco made with Marble Dust_ (86).
CHAPTER V.
How Rustic Fountains are made with Stalactites and Incrustations
from water, and how Cockle Shells and Conglomerations of vitrified
stone are built into the Stucco, 87
§ 31. _Grottoes and Fountains of ‘Rocaille’ work_ (87).
CHAPTER VI.
On the manner of making Pavements of Tesselated Work, 91
§ 32. _Mosaic pavements_ (91). § 33. _Pictorial Mosaics for
Walls, etc._ (93).
CHAPTER VII.
How one is to recognize if a Building have good Proportions, and
of what Members it should generally be composed, 95
§ 34. _The Principles of Planning and Design_ (95). § 35. _An
Ideal Palace_ (96).
NOTES ON ‘INTRODUCTION’ TO ARCHITECTURE, 99
PORPHYRY AND PORPHYRY QUARRIES, 101
THE SASSI, DELLA VALLE, AND OTHER COLLECTIONS OF ANTIQUES OF THE
EARLY PART OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY, 102
THE PORPHYRY TAZZA OF THE SALA ROTONDA OF THE VATICAN, 108
FRANCESCO DEL TADDA, AND THE REVIVAL OF SCULPTURE IN PORPHYRY, 110
THE CORTILE OF THE BELVEDERE IN THE VATICAN, IN THE SIXTEENTH
CENTURY, 115
PARAGON (TOUCHSTONE) AND OTHER STONES ASSOCIATED WITH IT BY
VASARI, 117
TUSCAN MARBLE QUARRIES, 119
THE ROUND TEMPLE ON THE PIAZZA S. LUIGI DEI FRANCESI, AND
‘MAESTRO GIAN,’ 128
RUSTICATED MASONRY, 132
VASARI’S OPINION ON MEDIAEVAL ARCHITECTURE, 133
EGG-SHELL MOSAIC, 136
IDEAL ARCHITECTURE; AN IDEAL PALACE, 138
OF SCULPTURE, 141
CHAPTER I. (VIII.)
What Sculpture is; how good works of Sculpture are made, and what
qualities they must possess to be esteemed perfect, 143
§ 36. _The Nature of Sculpture_ (143). § 37. _Qualities
necessary for Work in the Round_ (143). § 38. _Works of Sculpture
should be treated with a view to their destined position_ (145). §
39. _The Proportions of the Human Figure_ (146). § 40. _Artists
must depend on their Judgement rather than on the Measuring Rule_
(146).
CHAPTER II. (IX.)
Of the manner of making Models in Wax and in Clay; how they are
draped, and how they are afterwards enlarged in proportion in the
Marble; how Marbles are worked with the point and the toothed
tool, and are rubbed with pumice stone and polished till they are
perfect, 148
§ 41. _The small Sketch-Model in Wax or Clay_ (148). § 42. _The
Preparation of Wax_ (148). § 43. _Polychrome Wax Effigies_ (149).
§ 44. _The Manipulation of Wax over an Armature_ (149). § 45. _The
Small Model in Clay_ (149). § 46. _The Full-sized Model in Clay_
(150). § 47. _Drapery on the Clay Model_ (150). § 48.
_Transference of the Full-sized Model to the Marble Block_ (151).
§ 49. _Danger of dispensing with the Full-sized Model_ (151). §
50. _The Tools and Materials used in Marble Carving_ (152).
CHAPTER III. (X.)
Of Low and Half Reliefs, the difficulty of making them and how to
bring them to perfection, 154
§ 51. _The Origin of Reliefs_ (154). § 52. _Pictorial or
Perspective Reliefs_ (154). § 53. _Low Reliefs (Bassi Rilievi)_
(156). § 54. _Flat Reliefs (Stiacciati Rilievi)_ (156).
CHAPTER IV. (XI.)
How Models for large and small Bronze Figures are made, with the
Moulds for casting them and their Armatures of iron; and how they
are cast in metal and in three sorts of Bronze; and how after they
are cast they are chased and refined; and how, if they lack pieces
that did not come out in the cast, these are grafted and joined in
the same bronze, 158
§ 55. _The Full-sized Model for Bronze_ (158). § 56. _The
Piece-Mould in Plaster_ (158). § 57. _The Construction of the
Core_ (159). § 58. _The Piece-Mould lined with a Skin of Wax_
(160). § 59. _This Skin of Wax applied over the Core_ (160). § 60.
_The fire-resisting Envelope applied over the Wax_ (161). § 61.
_The External Armature_ (162). § 62. _The Vents_ (162). § 63. _The
Wax melted out_ (162). § 64. _The Mould in the Casting-pit_ (163).
§ 65. _The Composition of the Bronze_ (163). § 66. _Making up
Imperfections_ (164). § 67. _A simpler Method of Casting small
Figures and Reliefs_ (165). § 68. _Chasing the Cast and Colouring
the Bronze_ (165). § 69. _Modern Tours de Force in small Castings_
(166).
CHAPTER V. (XII.)
Concerning Steel Dies for making Medals of bronze or other metals
and how the latter are formed from these metals and from Oriental
Stones and Cameos, 167
§ 70. _The Fabrication of Matrices for Medals_ (167). § 71. _The
Cutting of Intaglios and Cameos_ (168).
CHAPTER VI. (XIII.)
How works in White Stucco are executed, and of the manner of
preparing the Wall underneath for them, and how the work is
carried out, 170
§ 72. _Modelled and stamped Plaster Work_ (170).
CHAPTER VII. (XIV.)
How Figures in Wood are executed and of what sort of Wood is best
for the purpose, 173
§ 73. _Wood Carving_ (173).
NOTES ON ‘INTRODUCTION’ TO SCULPTURE, 177
THE NATURE OF SCULPTURE, 179
SCULPTURE TREATED FOR POSITION, 180
WAXEN EFFIGIES AND MEDALLIONS, 188
PROPORTIONATE ENLARGEMENT, 190
THE USE OF FULL-SIZED MODELS, 192
ITALIAN AND GREEK RELIEFS, 196
THE PROCESSES OF THE BRONZE FOUNDER, 199
OF PAINTING, 203
CHAPTER I. (XV.)
What Design is, and how good Pictures are made and known, and
concerning the invention of Compositions, 205
§ 74. _The Nature and Materials of Design or Drawing_ (205). §
75. _Use of Design (or Drawing) in the various Arts_ (206). § 76.
_On the Nature of Painting_ (208).
CHAPTER II. (XVI.)
Of Sketches, Drawings, Cartoons, and Schemes of Perspective; how
they are made, and to what use they are put by the Painters, 212
§ 77. _Sketches, Drawings, and Cartoons of different kinds_
(212). § 78. _The Use of Cartoons in Mural and Panel Painting_
(215).
CHAPTER III. (XVII.)
Of the Foreshortening of Figures looked at from beneath, and of
those on the Level, 216
§ 79. _Foreshortenings_ (216).
CHAPTER IV. (XVIII.)
How Colours in oil painting, in fresco, or in tempera should be
blended: and how the Flesh, the Draperies and all that is depicted
come to be harmonized in the work in such a manner that the
figures do not appear cut up, and stand out well and forcibly and
show the work to be clear and comprehensible, 218
§ 80. _On Colouring_ (218).
CHAPTER V. (XIX.)
Of Painting on the Wall, how it is done, and why it is called
Working in Fresco, 221
§ 81. _The Fresco process_ (221).
CHAPTER VI. (XX.)
Of Painting in Tempera, or with egg, on Panel or Canvas, and how
it is employed on the wall which is dry, 223
§ 82. _Painting in Tempera_ (223).
CHAPTER VII. (XXI.)
Of Painting in Oil on Panel or on Canvas, 226
§ 83. _Oil Painting, its Discovery and Early History_ (226). §
84. _How to Prime the Panel or Canvas_ (230). § 85. _Drawing, by
transfer or directly_ (231).
CHAPTER VIII. (XXII.)
Of Painting in Oil on a Wall which is dry, 232
§ 86. _Mural Painting in Oil_ (232). § 87. _Vasari’s own Method_
(233).
CHAPTER IX. (XXIII.)
Of Painting in Oil on Canvas, 236
§ 88. _Painting on Canvas_ (236).
CHAPTER X. (XXIV.)
Of painting in Oil on Stone, and what stones are good for the
purpose, 238
§ 89. _Oil Painting on Stone_ (238).
CHAPTER XI. (XXV.)
Of Painting on the wall in Monochrome with various earths: how
objects in bronze are imitated: and of groups for Triumphal Arches
or festal structures, done with powdered earths mixed with size,
which process is called Gouache and Tempera, 240
§ 90. _Imitative Paintings for Decorations_ (240).
CHAPTER XII. (XXVI.)
Of the Sgraffiti for house decoration which withstand water; that
which is used in their production; and how Grotesques are worked
on the wall, 243
§ 91. _Sgraffito-work_ (243). § 92. _Grotesques, or Fanciful
Devices, painted or modelled on Walls_ (244).
CHAPTER XIII. (XXVII.)
How Grotesques are worked on the Stucco, 246
CHAPTER XIV. (XXVIII.)
Of the manner of applying Gold on a Bolus, or with a Mordant, and
other methods, 248
§ 93. _Methods of Gilding_ (248).
CHAPTER XV. (XXIX.)
Of Glass Mosaic and how it is recognized as good and praiseworthy, 251
§ 94. _Glass Mosaics_ (251). § 95. _The Preparation of the
Mosaic Cubes_ (253). § 96. _The Fixing of the Mosaic Cubes_ (255).
CHAPTER XVI. (XXX.)
Concerning the Compositions and Figures made in Inlaid Work on
Pavements in imitation of objects in Monochrome, 258
§ 97. _Pavements in Marble Mosaic and Monochrome_ (258). § 98.
_Pavements in Variegated Tiles_ (260). § 99. _Pavements in Breccia
Marble_ (261).
CHAPTER XVII. (XXXI.)
Of Mosaic in Wood, that is, of Tarsia; and of the Compositions
that are made in Tinted Woods, fitted together after the manner of
a picture, 262
§ 100. _Inlays in Wood_ (262).
CHAPTER XVIII. (XXXII.)
On Painting Glass Windows and how they are put together with Leads
and supported with Irons so as not to interfere with the view of
the figures, 265
§ 101. _Stained Glass Windows, their Origin and History_ (265).
§ 102. _The Technique of the Stained Glass Window_ (268).
CHAPTER XIX. (XXXIII.)
Of Niello, and how by this process we have Copper Prints; and how
Silver is engraved to make Enamels over Bas-relief, and in like
manner how Gold and Silver Plate is chased, 273
§ 103. _Niello Work_ (273). § 104. _The Origin of Engraving_
(274). § 105. _Enamels over Reliefs_ (276).
CHAPTER XX. (XXXIV.)
Of Tausia, that is, work called Damascening, 279
§ 106. _Metal Inlays_ (279).
CHAPTER XXI. (XXXV.)
Of Wood Engraving and the method of executing it and concerning
its first Inventor: how Sheets which appear to be drawn by hand
and exhibit Lights and Half-tones and Shades, are produced with
three Blocks of Wood, 281
§ 107. _Chiaroscuro Wood Engravings_ (281). § 108. _Dependence
on Design of the Decorative Arts_ (284).
NOTES ON ‘INTRODUCTION’ TO PAINTING, 285
FRESCO PAINTING, 287
TEMPERA PAINTING, 291
OIL PAINTING, 294
ENRICHED FAÇADES, 298
STUCCO ‘GROTESQUES,’ 299
TARSIA WORK, OR WOOD INLAYS, 303
THE STAINED GLASS WINDOW, 308
VASARI’S DESCRIPTION OF ENAMEL WORK, 311
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
INSERTED PLATES
SPECIMENS OF STONES MENTIONED BY VASARI. (Reproduction
in colour of a drawing by the Editor.) Frontispiece.
PORTRAIT OF VASARI, FROM THE EDITION OF 1568. Probably Tail-piece to
by a German artist called in Italy ‘Cristoforo List of
Coriolano.’ Illustrations.
Plate I. LEO X WITH HIS CARDINALS. Mural Painting by
Vasari in the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence. (From a
photograph by Alinari.) To face p. 17
Plate II. PRINCIPAL DOORWAY AT S. MARIA NOVELLA,
FLORENCE, showing the position of the inscribed
porphyry tablet on the riser of the step. (From a
photograph by Alinari.) To face p. 32
Plate III. PORTRAIT IN PORPHYRY OF COSIMO ‘PATER
PATRIAE,’ BY FRANCESCO DEL TADDA, in the Magazines of
the National Museum, Florence. (From a photograph by
the Editor.) Unpublished. To face p. 34
Plate IV. INTERIOR OF GROTTO IN BOBOLI GARDENS,
FLORENCE, showing an unfinished statue ascribed to
Michelangelo. (From a photograph by the Editor.) To face p. 90
Plate V. PORTRAIT IN PORPHYRY OF LEO X, BY FRANCESCO DEL
TADDA, in the Magazines of the National Museum,
Florence. (From a photograph by the Editor.)
Unpublished. To face p. 114
Plate VI. SALAMANDER CARVED IN TRAVERTINE, on the Façade
of S. Luigi dei Francesi, Rome. The work of a French
artist ‘Maestro Gian.’ (From a photograph by the
Editor.) Unpublished. To face p. 132
Plate VII. ILLUSTRATION SHOWING PROCESS OF
PIECE-MOULDING IN PLASTER. (From the French
_Encyclopédie_.) To face p. 160
Plate VIII. ENGRAVINGS ILLUSTRATING THE PROCESS OF
CASTING IN BRONZE. (From the French _Encyclopédie_.) To face p. 164
Plate IX. STATUE OF S. ROCCO CARVED IN LIMEWOOD, by a
French artist ‘Maestro Janni,’ in the Church of the
Annunziata, Florence. (From a drawing by Robert J.
Rose.) Unpublished. To face p. 176
Plate X. _A._ INTERIOR OF A SCULPTOR’S STUDIO IN THE
EIGHTEENTH CENTURY, with illustrations of the methods
of measurement then in vogue. (From the French
_Encyclopédie_.)
_B._ DIAGRAM TO ILLUSTRATE LEON BATTISTA ALBERTI’S
METHOD OF MEASUREMENT. To face p. 192
Plate XI. SPECIMEN OF SO-CALLED ‘SGRAFFITO’ DECORATION,
on the exterior of the Palazzo Montalvo, Florence.
(From a photograph by Alinari.) To face p. 244
Plate XII. PORTION OF THE DECORATION OF THE LOGGIE OF
THE VATICAN, by Raphael and his assistants.
(Reproduced in colour from a hand-painted example of
the engravings of about 1770–80 by Ottaviani and
Volpato, in the National Art Library.) To face p. 248
Plate XIII. SPECIMEN OF NIELLO WORK. A ‘Pax,’ formerly
in the Baptistry, and now in the National Museum,
Florence. (From a photograph by Alinari.) To face p. 274
Plate XIV. CHIAROSCURO WOOD-ENGRAVING BY UGO DA CARPI,
in the Print-Room, British Museum. Subject: ‘Jacob’s
Dream,’ after Raphael. To face p. 282
Plate XV. HEAD OF MARY, FROM LUINI’S FRESCO OF THE
‘MARRIAGE OF THE VIRGIN’ AT SARONNO. (From a
photograph by Giacomo Brogi.) To illustrate the fresco
technique. To face p. 290
Plate XVI. EXAMPLE OF TARSIA WORK. S. Zenobi, by
Giuliano da Majano, in Opera del Duomo, Florence.
(From a photograph by Alinari.) To face p. 306
Plate XVII. PAINTED GLASS WINDOW IN THE LAURENTIAN
LIBRARY, FLORENCE. (From a photograph by Alinari.) To face p. 310
FIGURES IN THE TEXT
Fig. 1. Inscribed Porphyry Tablet at S. Maria Novella,
Florence. (Drawn from a photograph by the Editor.) p. 31
Fig. 2. Tools mentioned by Vasari, etc. (From drawings
by the Translator and Editor.) p. 48
Fig. 3. Fortezza da Basso at Florence. (Drawn from a
photograph by the Editor.) p. 67
Fig. 4. Rusticated masonry on the exterior of the
Fortezza da Basso at Florence. (Measured drawing by
the Editor.) p. 69
Fig. 5. Construction of the Portico of the Uffizi at
Florence, from Vasari’s description. (Drawn by the
Editor.) p. 71
Fig. 6. Drawing of the remains of the Basilica Aemilia
in the Forum at Rome, that survived to the time of
Vasari. (After Giuliano da San Gallo, in _Monumenti
del Istituto_, XII, T. 11, 12.) p. 77
Fig. 7. Roman Doric Cap, with Stucco Finish, at S.
Nicola in Carcere, Rome. (From _Mitteilungen d. k.
deutschen archeologischen Instituts_, XXI.) p. 78
Fig. 8. Portion of a Plan of Rome, before recent
alterations, from Nolli, _Nuova Pianta di Roma_, 1748. p. 105
Fig. 9. Sketch of shape of the large porphyry Tazza in
the Sala Rotonda of the Vatican. p. 109
Fig. 10. Sketch map of the marble-producing districts of
the Apuan Alps. p. 121
Fig. 11. Two views of unfinished Greek marble statue
blocked out on the ancient system. In quarries on
Mount Pentelicus, Athens. (From a photograph kindly
furnished by M. Georges Nicole.) p. 193
[Illustration:
PORTRAIT OF VASARI, FROM THE EDITION OF 1568,
probably by a German artist, called in Italy ‘Cristoforo Coriolano’.
]
INTRODUCTORY ESSAY
When Vasari published in 1550 his famous _Lives of the Artists_, he
prefixed to the work an Introduction, divided into three parts headed
respectively Architecture, Sculpture, and Painting. In the text of the
_Lives_ he refers more than once to this preliminary matter under the
terms ‘parte teorica’ and ‘capitoli delle teoriche,’ but as a fact it
only consists to a small extent in ‘theory,’ that is in aesthetic
discussions on the general character of the arts and the principles that
underlie them. The chief interest of the chapters is technical. They
contain practical directions about materials and processes, intended in
the first place to enlighten the general reader on subjects about which
he is usually but little informed; and in the second, to assist those
actually engaged in the operations of the arts.
To some of the readers of the original issue of Vasari’s work these
technical chapters proved of special interest, for we find a Flemish
correspondent writing to him to say that on the strength of the
information therein contained he had made practical essays in art, not
wholly without success. This same correspondent, as Vasari tells us in
the chapter on Flemish artists at the end of the _Lives_, hearing that
the work was to be reprinted, wrote in the name of many of his
compatriots to urge Vasari to prefix to the new edition a more extended
disquisition on sculpture, painting, and architecture, with illustrative
designs, so as to enforce the rules of art after the fashion of Alberti,
Albrecht Dürer, and other artists. This seemed however to Vasari to
involve too great an alteration in the scheme of his work, and in the
edition of 1568 he preserved the original form of the Introduction,
though he incorporated with it considerable additions. It is worth
noting that the increase is chiefly in the earlier part, as if Vasari
began his revision with the intention of carrying out the suggestion of
his correspondents, but gave up the idea of substantial enlargement as
he went on. For example the first chapter in the ‘Introduction’ to
Architecture is half as long again in the second as in the first
edition, and Architecture generally is increased by a third part, while
in Sculpture the additions are trifling. The total additions amount to
nearly one seventh of the whole. The matter thus added is in general
illustrative of the previous text, and adduces further examples of work
under review. It is this extended Introduction of the second, or 1568,
edition, which is now completely translated and issued with the needful
commentary.
The reputation of the writer and the value of his world-renowned
biographies naturally give importance to matter which he has
deliberately prefixed to these, and it is somewhat surprising that
though the text has been constantly printed it has not been annotated,
and that it has never yet been rendered as a whole into English, nor, as
far as can be ascertained, into any other European language.
Ernst Berger, in his learned and valuable _Beiträge zur
Entwicklungs-Geschichte der Maltechnik_, vierte Folge, München, 1901,
does justice to Vasari’s Treatise, of which, as he says, ‘the
thirty-five chapters contain a complete survey of the manual activities
of the time, in connection with which Vasari gives us very important
information on the condition of technique in the sixteenth century,’ and
he translates the chapters relating to painting with one or two useful
notes. There was apparently an intention of editing Vasari’s
Introduction in the Vienna series of Technical Treatises
(Quellenschriften) but the project was not carried out. Anglo-Saxon
readers will note that the chapters do not appear in the classic English
translation by Mrs Jonathan Foster, nor in the American reprint of
selected Lives lately edited with annotations by Blashfield and Hopkins;
they are omitted also from the French translation by Leclanché, and from
that into German by Ludwig Schorn. Mrs Foster explains that she only
meant to translate the _Lives_ and not Vasari’s ‘other works’; while the
German editor, though he admits the value of the technical chapters to
the artist, thinks that the latter ‘would have in any case to go to the
original because many of the technical terms would not be intelligible
in translation.’
On this it may be remarked that the chapters in question are not ‘other
works’ in the sense in which we should use the term in connection with
Vasari’s _Letters_, and the ‘_Ragionamenti_,’ or description of his own
performances in the Palazzo Vecchio at Florence, that are all printed by
Milanesi in the Sansoni edition of Vasari’s works. The chapters are
distinctly a part, and a valuable part, of the main work of the author,
and it is difficult to see any valid reason why they should ever have
been dissociated from it. With regard to the reason for omission given
by the German editor, surely the resources of the translator’s art are
not so limited as he supposed! It may be claimed, at any rate, that in
what follows a conscientious effort has been made to find technical
terms in English equivalent to Vasari’s, and yet intelligible to the
reader. Where such terms do not seem to be clear, a footnote has been
added in explanation.
It is probable that the real reason of the neglect of Vasari’s
Introduction by his translators has been the fact that when these
translations were made, more than half-a-century ago, not much interest
was taken by the reading public in the technical processes of the arts,
and this part of Vasari’s work was passed over in order not to delay the
reader anxious for the biographical details the author presents in so
lively a fashion. At the present time, largely as a result of the
inspiring influence of William Morris alike upon the craftsmen and the
artistic public, people have been generally awakened to the interest and
importance of these questions of technique, and a new translator of
Vasari would certainly not be betrayed into this omission. The present
translation and commentary may therefore claim to fill a gap that ought
never to have been suffered to exist, and on this ground to need no
explanation nor apology. Some English writers on the technique of the
arts, such as Mrs Merrifield and the late G. T. Robinson, have made
considerable use of the material that Vasari has placed before students
in these Introductory Chapters, and the practical service that they have
thus rendered is an additional reason why they should be brought as a
whole in convenient form before English readers.
Readers familiar with Vasari’s _Lives_ will miss in the technical
Introduction much of the charm and liveliness of style in which they
have been wont to delight. Vasari indeed had a natural gift for
biographical writing. He had a sense of light and shade and of contrast
in colouring that animates his literary pictures, and is the secret of
the fascination of his work, while it explains at the same time some of
its acknowledged defects. Above all things he will have variety. If one
artist have been presented to the reader of the _Lives_ as a man of the
world in constant touch with his fellows, the next artist who comes
forward on the stage is a recluse. If one be open and free, another is
secretive and brooding; the artist jealous of his brother’s fame and
envious of his secrets is contrasted with the genial companion ready to
impart all he knows to his less fortunate compeer. In bringing out these
picturesque comparisons, the writer sometimes forces the note, and is a
little more regardful of effect than of strict biographical accuracy,[1]
and this accounts for some of the censure which in the modern critical
age has fallen to the lot of the Aretine.
The technical disquisitions in the Introduction afford little
opportunity for picturesque writing of this kind, and they must be
judged from another standpoint. They have certain obvious defects that
are however counterbalanced by qualities of much value. Vasari’s
treatment in many parts lacks system and completeness, his statement is
wanting in clearness, his aesthetic comments are often _banal_. On the
other hand there are sections or chapters of great, even enthralling,
interest, as when he discourses with all a Florentine’s enthusiasm on
the virile and decided handling of a master in fresco painting; or lets
us follow step by step from the small sketch to the finished casting the
whole process of making a great bronze statue. Throughout the treatise
moreover, we have the advantage of hearing a practical craftsman
speaking about the processes and materials with which he is himself
familiar, for Vasari, though he did not put his own hand to nearly all
the kinds of work he describes, yet was all his life a professional, in
intimate touch with craftsmen in every branch of artistic production. If
he did not make painted glass windows, he at any rate designed for them.
His mural work involved modelled and stamped plaster enrichment and wood
carving, while his sections on different processes of decoration for
temporary purposes derive a personal interest from the fact that the
writer was a famous expert in the construction and adornment of showy
fabrics for pageants and state entries, of which his own letters give us
many details. If he be unavoidably tedious in his description of the
Orders of Architecture, he enlivens this by a digression on his own
devices in the masonry of the Uffizi palace. The august figure of
Michelangelo sometimes crosses the page, and in the midst of the rather
copious eulogies of which Vasari is lavish, we find here and there some
record of a word or work of Buonarroti which reminds us of the author’s
intimate personal relation to the master whom he calls in a letter ‘il
mio rarissimo e divinissimo Vecchio.’
Vasari’s general intention in this Introduction he explains at the close
of the ‘Proemio’ to the whole work that precedes the technical chapters.
The Introduction is primarily to instruct ‘every gracious spirit in the
most noble matters that appertain to the artistic professions’; and next
in order, ‘for his delight and service, to give him to know in what
qualities the various masters differed among themselves, and how they
adorned and how they benefitted each in his own way their country’; and
finally to enable any one that wills to gain advantage from the labour
and cunning of those who in times past have excelled in the arts.
Architecture will be shown to be the most universal, the most necessary,
and the most useful of human arts, for whose service and adornment the
other two arts exist; the different qualities of stones will be
demonstrated, with the styles of building and their proper proportions,
and the characteristics of good designs and good construction. Next in
order comes Sculpture, and here will be shown the manner of working
statues, in their correct forms and proportions, and the qualities that
make sculpture good, ‘with all the directions for work that are most
secret and most precious.’ Lastly, the treatment of Painting will
include design; the methods of colouring and of carrying out a picture;
the characteristics of painting and its subordinate branches, with
mosaics of every sort, niello work, enamels, damascening, and finally
engravings after pictures.
Vasari’s treatise does not stand alone but is only one among many
technical and theoretical essays which have come down to us from various
epochs both of the middle ages and of the Renaissance. The nature and
the value of it will be best understood if we compare it with one or two
representative publications of a similar kind, contemporary with it or
of earlier date. The comparison will serve to show the spirit in which
Vasari writes, and to exhibit the strong and the weak points in his
work.
About the middle of the last century, a number of technical treatises
and collections of recipes, from MSS. of the twelfth to the eighteenth
centuries, were edited and published by Mrs Merrifield, and the acumen
and accuracy with which she fulfilled her laborious task are warmly
eulogized by Dr Albert Ilg, the learned editor of Theophilus and Cennini
in the Vienna _Quellenschriften_. The most important of existing
treatises of the kind are however not included in Mrs Merrifield’s work,
though they have been translated and edited separately both by her and
by other scholars. The recent publication by Ernst Berger noticed above
gives the most complete account of all this technical literature. Those
of the early treatises or tracts that consist in little more than
collections of recipes need not detain us, and the only works of which
we need here take account are the following: (1) The _Schedula
Diversarum Artium_ of Theophilus, a compendium of the decorative arts as
they were practised in the mediaeval monastery, drawn up by a German
monk of the eleventh or twelfth century; (2) _Il Libro dell’ Arte, o
Trattato della Pittura_ of the Florentine painter Cennino Cennini,
written in the early part of the fifteenth century; (3) The _De Re
Aedificatoria_ and the tracts _Della Pittura_ and _Della Scultura_,
written rather later and in quite a different vein, by the famous
Florentine humanist and artist Leon Battista Alberti; (4) Benvenuto
Cellini’s treatises, _Sopra l’ Oreficeria e la Scultura_, that belong to
the same period as Vasari’s own Introduction, and partly cover the same
ground. There are later treatises, such as Borghini’s _Il Riposo_, 1584;
Armenini’s _Dei veri Precetti della Pittura_, 1587; Pacheco’s _Arte de
la Pintura_, 1649; Palomino’s _El Museo Pictorico_, etc., 1715–24, which
all contain matter of interest, but need not be specially noticed in
this place. Some of these later writers depend very largely on Vasari.
The fact just stated about the treatises of Cellini and Vasari suggests
the question whether the two are independent, or, if borrowing existed,
which treatise owes most to this adventitious aid. The dates of Vasari’s
two editions have already been given. Cellini’s two _Trattati_ first
appeared in 1568 the same year as Vasari’s second edition, and there
exists a second recension of his text which formed the basis of
Milanesi’s edition of 1857, republished in 1893. It is worth noting that
Vasari’s account of bronze casting, in which we should expect reliance
on Cellini, appears in full in the first edition of 1550, and the same
applies to the account of die-sinking. On the other hand Cellini’s
notice of the Tuscan building stones, pietra serena, etc., seems like a
clearer statement of what we find in Vasari’s edition of 1550. On the
whole it was Cellini who used Vasari rather than Vasari Cellini, though
the tracts can be regarded as practically independent. The _Trattati_ of
Cellini are really complementary to Vasari’s ‘Introductions.’
Vasari, as he says of himself, was painter and architect, while Cellini
was sculptor and worker in metal. In matters like die-sinking, niello
work, enamelling, and the making of medals, Cellini gives the fuller and
more practical information, for these were not exactly in the province
of the Aretine, while Vasari on his side gives us much information,
especially on the processes of painting and on architectural subjects,
for which we look in vain to Cellini.
Allowing for these differences, the two treatises agree in the general
picture that they give of the artistic activity of their times, and they
faithfully reflect the spirit of the High Renaissance, when the arts
were made the instruments of a dazzling, even ostentatious, parade, in
which decadence was unmistakeably prefigured. From this point of view,
the point of view, that is, of the general artistic tone of an age, it
is interesting to draw a comparison between the spirit of the treatises
of Vasari and Cellini on the one side, and on the other the spirit of
the earlier writings already referred to. If the former bring us into
contact with the Renaissance in the heyday of its pride, the artistic
tractates of Alberti, of a century before, show us the Renaissance
movement in its strenuous youth, already self-conscious, but militant
and disposed to work rather than to enjoy. Cennini’s _Book of Art_,
though certainly written in the lifetime of Alberti, belongs in spirit
to the previous, that is to the fourteenth, century. It reflects the
life of the mediaeval guilds, when artist and craftsman were still one,
and the practice of the arts proceeded on traditional lines in urban
workshops where master and apprentices worked side by side on any
commissions that their fellow citizens chose to bring. Lastly the
_Schedula_ of the monk Theophilus introduces us into quite a different
atmosphere of art. Carrying us back for two hundred years, it shows us
art cultivated in an ascetic community in independence of patrons or
guilds or civic surroundings; on purely religious lines for the glory of
the Almighty and the fitting adornment of His house.
This treatise by Theophilus is by far the most interesting and valuable
of all those that have been named. No literary product of the middle
ages is more precious, for it reflects a side of mediaeval life of which
we should otherwise be imperfectly informed. Can it be possible, we ask
ourselves, that men vowed to religion in its most ascetic form, who had
turned their backs on the world’s vain shows and whose inward eye was to
see only the mystic light of vision, could devote time and care to the
minutiae of the craftsman’s technique? Such however was the fact. We
cannot read the first few pages of Theophilus without recognizing that
the religion of the writer was both sincere and fervent, and that such
religion seemed to him to find a natural outcome in art. Art moreover
with the German monk was essentially a matter of technique. From end to
end of the treatise there is comparatively little about art as
representative. Sculpture and painting indeed in the monastic period
were not capable of embodying the ideal, so as to produce on the
spectator the religious impression of a Madonna by Angelico or Raphael.
The art of the eleventh and twelfth centuries was decorative, and aimed
at an effect of beauty with an under suggestion of symbolism. Theophilus
troubles himself little about symbolism but bases everything on a
knowledge of materials and processes; and in the workshop, whose homely
construction and fittings he describes, we are invited to see the gold
and silver and bronze, the coloured earths, the glass stained with
metallic oxides, all taking shape in dainty and beautiful forms, and
coming together in discreet but opulent display, till, as he phrases it,
the Abbey Church which they bedeck and furnish ‘shall shine like the
garden of Paradise.’ For to the mind of the pious craftsman this church
is a microcosm. Creative skill has made it all beautiful within, and
this is the skill of man, but it is only his in so far as man shares the
nature of the Divine Artist that fashioned the vast macrocosm of the
universe. Artistic knowledge and craftsmanship are a part of the
original heritage of man as he was made in the image of God the creator,
and to win back this heritage by patient labour and contriving is a
religious duty, in the fulfilment of which the Holy Spirit will Himself
give constant aid. Theophilus enumerates from St. Paul the seven gifts
of the Spirit, and shows how the knowledge, the wisdom, the counsel, and
the might, thus imparted to men, all find a field of exercise in the
monastic workshop.
Cennino Cennini da Colle di Val d’ Elsa was not a devotee nor a man of
religion, but a city tradesman and employer of labour. Art in his time
had taken up its abode in the towns that were the seat of the artistic
activity of the Gothic period in France and the neighbouring countries.
It was there practised by laymen in secular surroundings, but as the
French Cathedrals and the work of Giotto and Simone Martini testify, on
religious subjects and in a spirit of piety. Some gleams of the
visionary light that irradiates the workshop of Theophilus fall across
the panels which Cennini and his apprentices smooth and clamp, and prime
with gesso, and paint with forms of the Madonna or the Crucified. In one
of his chapters he demands for the artist a chaste and almost ascetic
life, as of one who studies theology or philosophy, and again he bids
him clothe himself for his art with love and obedience, with patience
and godly fear. When beginning a delicate piece of manipulation Cennini
bids the worker ‘Invoke the name of God,’ and it is characteristic too
that he tells him that such work must not be executed in haste, but
‘with great affection and care.’ In the main however, Cennini’s treatise
is occupied with a description of the processes of painting traditional
in the school of Florence, that was dominated throughout the fourteenth
century by the commanding figure of Giotto. We learn from the _Trattato_
how walls were plastered and prepared for the mural painter, and can
measure how far the technical practice of fresco had at the time been
carried. Fresco painting, on which the reader will find a Note at the
close of the ‘Introduction’ to Painting, was only the revival of an art
familiar to the ancients, but the best form of the technique, called by
the Italians ‘buon fresco,’ was only completely recovered in the course
of the fifteenth century. In the school of Giotto, represented by
Cennini, the practice was as yet imperfect, but his account of it is
full of interest. Painting on panels and on the vellum of books he
thoroughly understands, and his notices of pigments and media convey
much valuable information. Amongst other things he seems quite _au fait_
in the practice of oil painting, which Vasari has made many generations
believe was an invention of the Flemish van Eyck.
The chief importance however of Cennini for the present purpose is to be
found in his implicit reliance on authority and tradition, in which he
contrasts most markedly, as we shall see, with his fellow-countryman and
successor, Leon Battista Alberti. Cennini had himself worked for twelve
years with Agnolo Gaddi the son of Taddeo Gaddi, for twenty-four years
the pupil and assistant of Giotto, and he warns the student against
changing his teacher, and so becoming, as he calls it, a ‘phantasist.’
To quote his own words, ‘do thou direct thy course by this rule
according to which I will instruct thee in the painter’s art, for Giotto
the great master himself followed it. Four and twenty years was Taddeo
Gaddi, the Florentine, his scholar; Taddeo’s son was Agnolo; Agnolo kept
me by him twelve years, during which he taught me to paint in this
manner,’ and he points the moral from his own experience, ‘At the
earliest moment you can, put yourself under the best master you can
find, and stay with him as long as you are able.’
Cennini, who seems to have been born about 1372, probably wrote his
_Trattato_ towards the close of his life, and there is MS. authority for
dating the tract _Della Pittura_ of Leon Battista Alberti about 1435, so
that the two works may have been composed within the same generation.
The contrast between them is however most striking. Cennini’s ideas are
wholly those of the fourteenth century, when guild traditions were
supreme over artistic practice; whereas Alberti is possessed by the
spirit of the Early Renaissance, of which he is indeed one of the most
representative figures. In his view the artist should base his life and
his work on the new humanistic culture of the age, and build up his art
on science and the study of nature and on the example of the masters of
antiquity. With regard to the last, the reader, who hears Alberti
invoking the legendary shades of Pheidias and Zeuxis and Apelles, may
suspect that a new authority is being set up in place of the old and
that the promised freedom for the arts is to be only in the name. It is
of course true that the reliance on classical models, which came into
fashion with the Revival of Learning, was destined in future times to
lie like an incubus on the arts, and to give an occasion for many famous
revolts; but these times were not yet, and with Alberti the appeal to
antiquity is little more than a fashion of speech. At other epochs, when
men have suddenly broken loose from some old-established authoritative
system, they have turned to the classical world for the support which
its sane and rationally based intellectual and political systems seemed
to offer. It was so at the time of the French Revolution, and so it was
earlier when the men of the fifteenth century were passing out from
under the shadow of mediaeval authority. Alberti seems to find
satisfaction in the thought of the existence of unquestionable models of
perfection in those classical masters whose names were current in
humanistic circles, but he makes but little practical use of them. It is
remarkable indeed how little direct influence in the essentials of art
was exercised over the Italian painting and sculpture of the fifteenth
century by the models of the past. Classical subjects come in by the
side of the more familiar religious themes, and accessories in pictures
are drawn largely from antique remains, but the influence does not
penetrate very deep. How little there is that is classical in the spirit
and even the form of the art of Donatello! How closely we have to scan
the work or the utterances of Leonardo to find a trace of the study of
Roman or Hellenic antiquity!
With Alberti, as with the humanists in art in general, the watchword was
‘Nature.’ As if with direct reference to what Cennini had said about
adhering to a chosen master, Alberti in the third book of his _Della
Pittura_, derides those who follow their predecessors so closely as to
copy all their errors. Equally at fault are those who work out of their
own head without proper models before them. The real mistress is nature.
Now ever since the beginning of the Italian revival the study of nature
had been set before the artist, and Cennini bids the craftsman never to
pass a day without making some drawing from a natural object. The study
of nature however, with Alberti and the masters of the Early
Renaissance, meant something more. The outward aspect of things was to
be narrowly observed, and he instances the effect of wind on the drapery
of figures, but underneath this outward aspect the artist was to explore
the inner structure upon which the external appearance depends. The nude
figure must be understood under the drapery, the skeleton and muscular
system beneath the integument. Then nature as a whole, that is to say,
figures and objects in their mutual relations, must be investigated, and
this on a basis of mathematical science. Alberti has a passion for
geometry, and begins his treatise with a study from this point of view
of visible surfaces. The relation of the eye to visual objects, and
especially the changes which these are seen to undergo in their sizes
and relations according as the eye is moved, lead on to the study of
perspective, on which science, as is well known, depended so much of the
advance in painting in the fifteenth century. Everything in a picture is
to be studied from actual persons or objects. It will add life and
actuality to a historical composition if some of the heads are copied
from living people who are generally known, but at the same time a
common sort of realism is to be avoided, for the aim of the artist
should not be mere truth to nature but beauty and dignity.
It is in his conception of the artist’s character and life that Alberti
is least mediaeval. Here, in the third book of _Della Pittura_, we see
emerging for the first time the familiar modern figure of the artist,
who, as scholar and gentleman, holds a place apart from and above the
artizanception inspires the interesting chapter, the tenth in the ninth
book, of Alberti’s more important treatise _De Re Aedificatoria_, where
he draws out the character of the ideal architect, who should be ‘a man
of fine genius, of a great application, of the best education, of
thorough experience and especially of sound sense and firm judgement.’
The Renaissance artist was indeed to fulfil the idea of a perfectible
human nature, the conception of which is the best gift of humanism to
the modern world. As sketched in _Della Pittura_, he was to be learned
in all the liberal arts, familiar with the creations of the poets,
accustomed to converse with rhetoricians, ‘a man and a good man and
versed in all good pursuits.’ He was to attract the admiring regard of
his fellows by his character and bearing, and to be marked among all for
grace and courtesy, for ‘it is the aim and end of the painter to seek to
win for himself through his works praise and favour and good-will,
rather than riches.’ Such a one, labouring with all diligence and
penetration on the study of nature and of science, would win his way to
the mastery possessed by the ancient painters, and would secure to
himself that fame so dear to the Italian heart!
In the hundred years that intervened between the life-courses of Alberti
and of Vasari, the Renaissance artist, whom the former describes in the
making, had become a finished product, and the practice of the arts was
a matter of easy routine. The artistic problems at which the men of the
fifteenth century had laboured so earnestly were solved; the materials
had become plastic to the craftsman’s will; the forms of nature were
known so well that they ceased to excite the curiosity which had set
Leonardo’s keenly sensitive nature on edge. At the time Vasari wrote,
with the exception of the Venetians and of Michelangelo, all the men of
genius who had created the art of the Renaissance had passed away, and
the busy workers whose multitudinous operations he watched and
chronicled were, like himself, only epigoni—successors of the great. We
have only to read Vasari’s eulogy of Michelangelo’s frescoes on the
vault of the Sistine, in his Life of that master, to see how far the
tone of the age in regard to art had changed from the time when Alberti
was exhorting the student to work out his own artistic salvation with
fear and trembling. ‘No one,’ exclaims Vasari, ‘who is a painter cares
now any more to look out for novelty in inventions or attitudes or
drapery, for new modes of expression, and for sublimity in all the
varied effects of art; seeing that all the perfection which it is
possible to give in work done in this fashion has been imparted to these
figures by Michelangelo.’ The cultivation of the Michelangelesque,
instead of the severe and patient study of nature, that Leonardo had
called ‘the mistress of all masters,’ marks the spirit of the Florentine
and Roman schools after the middle of the sixteenth century, and
Vasari’s own works in fresco and oil, hastily executed and on a vast
scale, but devoid alike of originality and of charm, are the most
effective exponents of the ideas of his time and school. At this epoch
the artist himself was no longer the dominant figure in the world of
art, nor was his struggle for self-perfection in the forefront of
interest for the spectator. The stage was rather commanded by the
patron, the Pope Leo, the Duke Cosimo or the Cardinal Farnese of the
day, at whose bidding the artist must run hither and thither, and leave
one task for another, till a delicate nature like Raphael’s or Perino
del Vaga’s fails under the strain, and the sublime genius of
Michelangelo is thwarted in its free expression. With the exception of
the Venetians, most of the more accomplished Italian masters of the
period were at work on commissions set them by these wealthy patrons,
who lorded it over their kind and made the arts subservient to their
temporal glory. For such Vasari himself was always contentedly busy on
buildings or frescoes or pageants, and for work of the kind demanded
nature had exactly equipped him. He was evidently embarrassed neither by
ideals nor by nerves, but was essentially business-like. Galluzzi in his
History of the Grand Dukes says of him that ‘to the qualities of his
profession he united a certain sagacity and alertness of spirit which
gave to Duke Cosimo considerable pleasure from his company.’ He was
distinguished above his fellows for the characteristic, not too common
among artists, of always working to time. He might scamp his work, but
he would by one method or another get it finished in accordance with his
contract. His powers of application must have been of a high order, for
we should remember that his literary output was by no means
inconsiderable, and with his busy life the wonder is not that he wrote
rather carelessly but that he was able to do any serious literary work
at all.
A favourable specimen of Vasari’s decorative painting is the fresco in
the Palazzo Vecchio at Florence, given on Plate I. It represents Leo X
surrounded by his Cardinals, and introduces portraits of famous men of
the day. For instance, on the left above the balustrade in the upper
part of the fresco against the opening, will be observed four heads of
personages outside the conclave. That on the right is of Leonardo da
Vinci and the one on the left Michelangelo’s, while the two men with
covered heads who intervene are Giuliano de’ Medici, Duc de Nemours, and
his nephew Lorenzo de’ Medici, Duca d’ Urbino, the originals of
Michelangelo’s world-famous statues on the Medici tombs, that are of
course treated in a wholly ideal fashion. It will be observed that among
the foreground figures the heads of the second from the left and the
second from the right are rendered with much more force and character
than the rest. They are of Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici afterwards Clement
VII, and Cardinal de’ Rossi, and Vasari has saved himself trouble by
boldly annexing them, and with them the bust of the Pope, from Raphael’s
Portrait of Leo X, of which, as he tells us elsewhere, he had at one
time made a copy.
It has been well said of him by the continuators of his autobiography
that ‘to our Giorgio nature was very bountiful in her gifts; study and
good will had largely improved his natural disposition, but the taste of
the times, and the artistic education he received, corrupted the gifts
of nature, and the fruit of his unwearied studies.’ Vasari was not an
inspired artist, and he had neither the informing mind of a master nor
the judgement of a discriminating critic, but he was, as we have already
pointed out, above all things a thoroughly practical craftsman in
intimate touch with all the manifold artistic life of the Italy of his
time. He possessed moreover a most genial personality with which it is a
pleasure to come into contact, and his good temper (which only fails him
when he talks about Gothic art), though it may at times slightly provoke
us, accounts for not a little of the deserved popularity of his
writings.[2]
Vasari has no doubt at all about the arts being in the most healthy
condition in the best of all possible artistic worlds, but it is easy
for us to see that this art of the High Renaissance was not of the very
best; that the spirit had died out of it almost as soon as the form had
attained to outward perfection. We cannot share the facile optimism of
Vasari who will admire any work, or any at least in his own school and
style, in which there is initiative and force and technical mastery, and
in whose eyes to paint feigned architecture on a stucco façade, provided
it be deftly done, is as much a ‘cosa bellissima’ as to carve the
Marsuppini sarcophagus in S. Croce. We cannot however withhold our
admiration when we consider the copious artistic output of the age, the
manifold forms of aesthetic expression, the easy surrender of the most
intractable materials to the artist’s will. As we read Vasari’s
descriptions and recipes the air all about us seems full of the noise of
the mason’s hammer, the splash of plaster on the wall, the tinkle of the
carver’s chisel against the marble, the grating of the chaser’s rasp
upon the bronze. We feel ourselves spectators of an organized activity
on a vast scale, where processes are so well understood that they go on
almost of themselves. In the present day, in so much that is written
about art, the personal or biographical interest is uppermost, and the
lives of Italian artists, with their troubles and triumphs, absorb so
much attention that one wonders whether any is left for Italian art.
Hence one of the chief values of Vasari’s Technical Introduction is its
insistence on artistic practice in general, as distinct from the doings
of individual artists, and in this it may serve as a useful supplement
or corrective to the biographical writing now in vogue. In Vasari on
Technique there are no attractive personal legends, like that of
Giotto’s shepherding or Donatello’s adventure with the eggs, but we
learn in exchange to follow step by step the building and plastering and
painting of Giotto’s chapel at Padua, and can watch Donatello’s helpers
as they anxiously adjust the mould and core for casting the statue of
Gattamelata.
[Illustration:
PLATE I
LEO X WITH HIS CARDINALS
Mural Painting by Vasari, in the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence
]
It may assist the reader if there be here subjoined a succinct resumé of
the subjects treated by Vasari in the three ‘Introductions.’
The first of these, on Architecture, opens with a long chapter on stones
used in building and decoration, which is important as the fullest
notice of the subject that has come down to us from the Renaissance
period. Into his somewhat loose disquisitions on porphyry, marbles,
travertine, and other materials, Vasari introduces so many incidental
notices of monuments and personages of interest, that a somewhat
extended commentary has in this part been necessary. Next follows the
inevitable chapter on the five Orders, at the close of which comes the
notable passage in which Vasari adopts for late mediaeval architecture
the term ‘Gothic’ that has ever since adhered to it. With Vasari the
word ‘Gothic’ means ‘barbarian,’ and he holds that the style was
invented by the Goths, after they had conquered the Romans and destroyed
all the good antique structures. His description of what he terms the
‘abominations’ of slender shafts and niches and corbels and finials and
doors that touch the roof is quite spirited, and might be learned by
heart as a lesson in humility by some of our mediaeval enthusiasts. On
the question whether Vasari was the first to use the term ‘Gothic’ in
this sense a word will be said in the Note on the passage in Vasari’s
text.
Next come chapters on the architectural use of enriched plaster; on the
rustic fountains and grottoes, the taste for which was coming in in
Vasari’s time, and which at a later period generated the so-called
‘rocaille’ or ‘rococo’ style in ornamentation; and on mosaic pavements.
This ‘Introduction’ ends with a chapter on an interesting subject to
which it does not quite do justice, the subject of ideal architecture,
on which in that and the succeeding age a good deal was written.
Though Sculpture was not Vasari’s _métier_ his account of the processes
of that art is full and practical, though we miss the personal note that
runs through the descriptions of the same procedure in the _Trattato_ of
Cellini. After an introductory chapter we have one on the technique of
sculpture in marble, with an account first of the small, and then of the
full-sized, model in clay or wax, the mechanical transfer of the general
form of this to the marble block, and the completion of the statue by
the use of tools and processes which he describes. Chapter three
introduces the subject of reliefs, and there is here of course a good
deal about the picturesque reliefs in which perspective effects are
sought, that Ghiberti and Donatello had brought into vogue. The account
of bronze casting in chapter four is one of the most interesting in the
whole treatise, and the descriptions are in the main clear and
consistent. Illustrations have been introduced here from the article on
the subject in the French _Encyclopédie_ of the eighteenth century,
where is an account of the processes used in 1699 for casting in one
piece Girardon’s colossal equestrian statue of Louis XIV for the Place
Vendôme in Paris. A chapter on die-sinking for medals is followed by one
on modelled plaster work, for this material is dealt with in all the
three sections of the Introduction; while sculpture in wood forms the
subject of the concluding chapter, in which there is a curious notice of
an otherwise unknown French artist, who executed at Florence a statue of
S. Rocco which may still be seen in the church of the Annunziata. In
various places of this ‘Introduction’ to Sculpture questions of general
aesthetic interest are brought forward, and some of these are discussed
in the commentary at its close.
Of the three ‘Introductions’ that on Painting is the longest and deals
with the greatest variety of topics. After a preliminary chapter in
which Vasari shows that he regards the art with the eyes of a Florentine
frescoist, he gives a practical account of different methods of
executing drawings and cartoons, and of transferring the lines of the
cartoon to the fresh plaster of the wall, on which the fresco painter is
to work. A chapter on colouring in mural pictures leads on to the
account of the fresco process. As Vasari was in this an expert, his
description and appreciation of the process form one of the most
valuable parts of the treatise. He is enthusiastic in his praise of the
method, which he calls the most masterly and most beautiful of all, on
account of its directness and rapidity. Tempera painting on panel or on
dry plaster is next discussed, and then follows a notice of oil painting
on panel or canvas. The statement here made by Vasari that oil painting
was invented by van Eyck is the earliest enunciation of a dogma that has
given rise in recent times to a large amount of controversial writing.
He goes on next to treat of the right method of mural painting in the
oil medium, and in this last connection Vasari gives us the recipe he
had finally adopted after years of experiment, and employed for
preparing walls for the application of oil paint in the Palazzo Vecchio
at Florence. The use of oil paint on a ground of slate or other kinds of
stone furnishes matter for another chapter.
With chapter eleven begins what we may regard as a second division of
this ‘Introduction,’ in which various processes of the decorative arts
are grouped together under the head of Painting, on the ground of the
pictorial effects produced by their means. Decorative painting, in the
usual sense, is first described as executed in monochrome for permanence
on the façades of buildings, or for temporary purposes on triumphal
arches and similar structures; and then follows a chapter on what is
known as ‘Sgraffito’ work, or decoration in plaster of two colours,
especially valuable as the first statement of the method and aim of this
process, which had been evolved from _pâte-sur-pâte_ pottery not long
before Vasari’s time. ‘Grotesques’ in modelled and stamped plaster are
next described, and the uses of colour in various ways in connection
with them are noticed, though with tantalizing brevity. Recipes for
gilding follow, and then with a treatment of glass mosaic we pass on to
a discussion of eight different kinds of decorative work, which interest
Vasari chiefly because of their pictorial possibilities. Of glass
mosaic, while he gives very good advice about the sort of design
suitable for it, he says that it must be so executed as to look like
painting and not like inlaid work. Some, he says, are so clever that
they make it resemble fresco. Floor mosaics in coloured marbles are to
appear exactly like a flat picture; works in tarsia, or wood inlays, are
dismissed because they cannot do more than counterfeit painting without
equalling it; stained glass windows, on the other hand, are lauded
because they can be carried to the same perfection as fine pictures on
panel. Enamel is noticed because it is of the nature of picture-work,
and even damascening on metal ‘partakes of the nature both of sculpture
and of painting.’ Lastly wood-engraving is only described under the form
of the Chiaroscuri, or shaded prints, introduced early in the sixteenth
century, though W. J. Linton in his work _The Masters of Wood Engraving_
regards these as merely aping drawings, and hardly coming under the
engraver’s art at all!
To return for a moment in concluding to a comparison already drawn, the
contrast is very significant between Vasari’s attitude towards these
decorative processes and that of the mediaeval writer Theophilus.
Throughout his treatise Theophilus hardly says anything about design, or
what is to be represented in the various materials. It is the materials
themselves that are his concern, and the end before his eyes is the
effect of beauty and sumptuousness in colour and texture that their
skilful manipulation will secure. To Vasari these materials are chiefly
of importance as producing something of the effect of painting, and
though he deals with them and their manipulation from the technical
point of view, the vision of the completed result as a picture hovers
always before his eyes. In this Vasari was only following in his
theoretical treatment the actual facts of artistic development in his
times. Since the beginning of the Renaissance period all the forms of
industrial art which he describes had been gradually losing the purely
decorative character which belonged to them in the mediaeval epoch, and
were being hurried along at the chariot wheels of the triumphant art of
painting. This is one of the two dangers to which these forms of art are
always subject. The naturalism in design, which is encouraged by the
popularity of the painter’s art on its representative side, is as much
opposed to their true genius as is the modern system of mechanical
production, which deprives them of the charm they owe to the touch of
the craftsman’s personality. History brought it about that in the
century after Vasari these arts were in a measure rescued from the too
great predominance of the pictorial element, though they were subjected
at the same time to the other unfavourable influence just hinted at.
Italy, from which the artistic Renaissance had spread to other lands,
ceased in the seventeenth century to be the main centre of production or
of inspiration for the decorative arts, which rather found their home in
Paris, where they were organized and encouraged as part of the state
system. The _Manufacture des Meubles de la Couronne_, a creation of
Louis XIV’s minister Colbert, which had its headquarters at the Hotel
des Gobelins and the Savonnerie, was a manufactory of decorative work of
almost every kind and in the most varied materials. That this work,
judged on an aesthetic standard, was cold and formal, and wanting in the
breath of life which plays about all the productions of the mediaeval
workshop, was an inevitable consequence of its systematized official
character and of its environment. The lover of art will take more real
pleasure in the output of the old-fashioned and more personal English
craftsmanship of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, than in the
artistic glories of the French state factories under the _Ancien
Régime_. This native British craftsmanship was however struck into
inanition a century ago by the apparition of machinery; and the result
of half-a-century of the new industrial era was the Great Exhibition of
1851, wherein was displayed what was probably the greatest collection of
artistic failures that the world has ever beheld. In consequence
agencies were then set on foot, and engineered by the Science and Art
Department, to improve the artistic quality of industrial products, but
unfortunately these were based on principles not wholly sound. The
shibboleths ‘Historic Ornament’ and ‘Applied Ornament’ covered the
desponding view that the decorative arts were dead, and that enrichment
must henceforth not be a living thing, the concomitant and even the
product of the work itself, but a dead or ‘historic’ thing, that might
be procured from books or museums and then ‘applied’ as an afterthought
to whatever was to be made a ‘work of art.’ The results of this system
were not encouraging, and led to the revival of mediaeval ideas, which,
embodied in the magnetic personality of William Morris, have done much
to effect a real, though as yet not far-reaching artistic revival.
The first principle here is to discourage undue naturalism in ornamental
design by withdrawing the decorative arts from the influence of
painting, and attaching them rather to the arts of construction, under
the beneficent control of which they did so well in the middle ages. The
next principle, which is equally important, is to foster the personal
element in decorative work, but at the same time to prevent
individuality from becoming self-assertive and running into vagaries, by
insisting on the vital connection of ornament with material and
technique. For the worker to ornament a thing properly he must either
have made it or at any rate be in intimate touch with the processes of
fabrication, out of which the decorative treatment should grow. The fact
that the more advanced Schools of Art in our own country, such as that
at Birmingham, regard as essential parts of their equipment the range of
workshops where technical processes are explained and studied, is an
encouraging sign, and this return from the drawing-board and the book to
the bench and the tool gives an additional practical value to the older
treatises on the technique of the arts, of which Vasari’s Introduction
is one.
OF ARCHITECTURE
CHAPTER I.
Of the different kinds of Stone which are used by Architects for
ornamental details, and in Sculpture for Statues; that is, Of
Porphyry, Serpentine, Cipollaccio, Breccia, Granites, Paragon or
Test-stone, Transparent Marbles, White Marbles and Veined Marbles,
Cipollini, Saligni, Campanini, Travertine, Slate, Peperigno, Ischia
Stone, Pietra Serena and Pietra Forte.
§ 1. _The author’s object in the Discussion of Architecture._
How great is the utility of Architecture it does not fall to me to tell,
since the subject has been treated at length and most carefully by many
writers. For this reason, leaving on one side the limes, sands, wood,
iron armatures, mode of preparing the foundations, as well as everything
else that is used in a building; disregarding also the questions of
water and localities and sites, already enlarged on by Vitruvius[3] and
by our own Leon Battista Alberti,[4] I shall only discuss, for the use
of our artificers and for whoever likes to know, the essential qualities
of buildings, and in what proportions they should be put together and of
what parts composed in order to obtain that graceful beauty that is
desired. In short, I shall collect all that seems to me necessary for
the purpose in view.
§ 2. _Of the working of hard stones, and first of Porphyry._
In order that the great difficulty of working very hard and compact
stones may be clearly understood, we shall treat distinctly but briefly
of every variety which our workmen handle, and first of porphyry.[5]
This is a red stone, with minute white specks, brought into Italy from
Egypt, where it is generally believed that the stone when quarried is
softer than it is after it has been exposed to rain, frost and sunshine;
because all these influences make it harder and more difficult to
work.[6] Of this stone numberless works are to be seen, some of them
shaped with the chisel, some sawn into shape, and some again gradually
worked up by means of wheels and emery. There are many different
examples in divers places; for instance, square, round, and other pieces
smoothed for pavements, statues for edifices, a great number of columns
large and small, and fountains with various masks, all carved with the
greatest care. There are also sarcophagi still extant, with figures in
low and half relief, laboriously wrought, as at the temple of
Bacchus,[7] outside Rome, by Sant’ Agnese, where is said to be the
sarcophagus of Santa Costanza, daughter of the Emperor Constantine, on
which are carved many figures of children with grapes and vineleaves,
that testify how great was his labour who worked them in a stone so
hard. There is another example in an urn, near to the door known as the
Porta Santa in San Giovanni in Laterano, which is decorated with scenes
containing a great number of figures.[8] There is also in the piazza
della Ritonda a very beautiful urn made for sepulchral purposes[9] that
is worked with great care and diligence. It is of extremely graceful and
beautiful form, and is very different from the others. In the house of
Egizio and of Fabio Sasso[10] there used to be a seated figure,
measuring three and a half braccia, preserved to our days with the
remains of the other statues in the Casa Farnese.[11] In the courtyard
also of the Casa la Valle,[12] over a window, is a she-wolf most
excellently sculptured,[13] and, in the garden of the same house, the
two prisoners bound, each four braccia in height,[14] executed in this
same porphyry by the ancients with extraordinary skill. These works are
lavishly praised to-day by all skilled persons, knowing, as they do, the
difficulty the workers had in executing them owing to the hardness of
the stone.
In our day stone of this sort is never wrought to perfection,[15]
because our artificers have lost the art of tempering the chisels and
other instruments for working them. It is true that they can still, with
the help of emery, saw drums of columns into slices, and cut other
pieces to be arranged in patterns for floors, and make various other
ornaments for buildings. The porphyry is reduced little by little by
means of a copper saw, without teeth, drawn backwards and forwards
between two men, which, with the aid of emery reduced to powder, and
kept constantly wet with water, finally cuts its way through the
stone.[16] Although at different times many ingenious attempts have been
made to find out the method of working porphyry used by the
ancients,[17] all have been in vain, and Leon Battista Alberti, the
first to make experiments therein not however in things of great moment,
did not find, among the many tempering-baths that he put to the test,
any that answered better than goats’ blood; because, though in the
working it removed but little of that hardest of stones and was always
striking sparks of fire, it served him nevertheless so far as to enable
him to have carved, in the threshold of the principal door of Santa
Maria Novella in Florence, the eighteen antique letters, very large and
well proportioned, which are seen on the front of the step, in a piece
of porphyry. These letters form the words BERNARDO ORICELLARIO.[18] And
because the edge of the chisel did not suit for squaring the corners, or
giving the necessary polish and finish, he had a little revolving drill
made, with a handle like a spit, which was easily worked by placing the
said handle against the chest, and putting the hands into the crank in
order to turn it.[19] At the working end, instead of a chisel or bit, he
fixed copper discs, larger or smaller according to need, and these, well
sprinkled with emery, gradually reduced and smoothed the stone,
producing a fine surface and finishing the corners, the drill all the
while being dexterously twirled by the hand. But all this effort cost so
much time, that Leon Battista lost heart, and did not put his hand to
anything else, either in the way of statues, or vases, or other delicate
work. Others, afterwards, who set themselves to smoothing stones and
restoring columns by the same special process, have done it in this way.
They make for the purpose large and heavy hammers, with the points of
steel, keenly tempered with goats’ blood, and worked in the manner of
diamond points; with these they carefully tap on the porphyry, and
‘scabbling’ it, or working it down, little by little the best way they
can, finally reduce it, with much time and trouble, to the round or the
flat, as the workman chooses,—not however to the form of statues,
because of this we have lost the art—and they polish it with emery and
leather, scouring it till there comes a lustre very clear and well
finished.
[Illustration:
FIG. 1.—Inscribed Porphyry Tablet at Santa Maria Novella, Florence.
]
Now although every day refinements are being made on human inventions,
and new things enquired into, yet even the moderns, who from time to
time have tried fresh methods of carving porphyry, various
tempering-baths, and very carefully refined steels, have, as was said
above, up till recent years laboured in vain. Thus in the year 1553 Pope
Julius III, having been presented by Signor Ascanio Colonna[20] with a
very handsome antique porphyry basin, measuring seven braccia across,
ordered it to be restored, for some pieces were missing, that it might
adorn his vineyard: the work was undertaken, and many things tried by
the advice of Michelagnolo Buonarroti and of other excellent masters,
but after a great length of time the enterprise was despaired of,
chiefly because it was found impossible to preserve some of the arrises,
a matter essential to the undertaking: Michelagnolo, moreover, even
though accustomed to the hardness of stones, gave up the attempt, as did
all the others, and nothing more was done.
[Illustration:
PLATE II
PRINCIPAL DOORWAY AT S. MARIA NOVELLA, FLORENCE
Showing the position of the inscribed porphyry tablet on the riser or
the step
]
At last, since no other thing in our days was lacking to the perfection
of our arts, except the method of satisfactorily working porphyry, that
not even this should still be to seek, it was rediscovered in the
following manner. In the year 1555, Duke Cosimo, wishing to erect a
fountain of remarkable beauty in the court of his principal palace in
Florence, had excellent water led there from the Pitti Palace and
Garden, and ordered a basin with its pedestal to be made for the said
fountain from some large pieces of porphyry found among broken
fragments. To make the working of it more easy to the master, he caused
an extract to be distilled from an herb, the name of which is unknown to
me, and this extract had such virtue, that red-hot tools when plunged
into it acquired the hardest possible temper. With the aid of this
process then, Francesco del Tadda, the carver of Fiesole,[21] executed
after my design the basin of the said fountain, which is two and a half
braccia in diameter,[22] together with its pedestal, just as it may be
seen to-day in the above-named palace.[23] Tadda, judging that the
secret imparted to him by the duke was very precious, set himself to put
it to the test by carving something, and he has succeeded so well that
in a short time he has made, in three ovals, life-size portraits in half
relief of Duke Cosimo and of the duchess Leonora, and a head of Christ,
executed so perfectly that the hair and beard, most difficult to
reproduce in carving, are finished in a manner equal to that of the
ancients. The Duke was talking one day of these works with
Michelagnolo[24] when his Excellency was in Rome, and Buonarroti would
not believe in them; therefore, by the Duke’s order, I sent the head of
Christ to Rome where it was seen by Michelagnolo with great wonder, who
praised it highly and rejoiced greatly to see the sculpture of our time
enriched by this rare gift, which until our day had been searched for in
vain. Tadda has recently finished the head of the elder Cosimo de’
Medici[25] in an oval, like those mentioned above, and he has executed
and continues to execute many other similar works.
All that remains to be said of porphyry is that, because the quarries
are now lost to knowledge,[26] it is necessary to make use of what is
left of it in the form of ancient fragments, drums of columns and other
pieces; and that in consequence he who works in porphyry must ascertain
whether or not it has been subjected to the action of fire, because if
it have, although it does not completely lose its colour, nor crumble
away, it lacks much of its natural vividness and never takes so good a
polish as when it has not been so subjected; and, what is worse, it
easily fractures in the working. It is also worth knowing, as regards
the nature of porphyry, that, if put into the furnace, it does not burn
away (non si cuoce),[27] nor allow other stones round it to be
thoroughly burnt; indeed, as to itself, it grows raw (incrudelisce) as
is shown in the two columns the men of Pisa gave to the Florentines in
the year 1117 after the acquisition of Majorca. These columns now stand
at the principal door of the church of San Giovanni; they are colourless
and not very well polished in consequence of having passed through fire,
as Giovanni Villani relates in his history.[28]
[Illustration:
PLATE III
PORTRAIT IN PORPHYRY OF COSIMO ‘PATER PATRIAE’
BY FRANCESCO DEL TADDA
]
§ 3. _Of Serpentine._
After porphyry we come to serpentine,[29] which is a green stone, rather
dark, with little crosses long and yellowish all through its texture.
The artificers busy themselves with making columns and slabs for
pavements in edifices from it, in the same way as from porphyry. It is
never seen carved into figures, although it is very often used for the
bases of columns, the pedestals of tables, and other works of a ruder
kind. Though this sort of stone is liable to fracture, and is harder
than porphyry, it is sweeter to work and involves less labour.
Serpentine is quarried in Egypt and Greece and the sound pieces are not
very large; consequently no work of greater dimensions than three
braccia in any direction is ever seen of serpentine, and such works as
exist are slabs and pieces of pavement. A few columns are found also but
not very massive nor thick, as well as some masks and sculptured
brackets, but figures never. This stone is worked in the same manner as
porphyry.
§ 4. _Of Cipollaccio._
Softer than serpentine is cipollaccio,[30] a stone quarried in various
places; it is of a crude yellowish green colour and has within it some
square black marks, large and small, and also biggish white marks. Of
this material one may see in various places columns both massive and
slender, as well as doors and other ornaments, but not figures. There is
a fountain of this stone in Rome in the Belvedere, that is to say a
niche in a corner of the garden where are the statues of the Nile and of
the Tiber;[31] Pope Clement VII had this niche made, after a design by
Michelagnolo,[32] to adorn the statue of a river god that it might look
very beautiful in this setting made in imitation of natural rocks, as
indeed it actually does. Cipollaccio is also sawn into panels, round and
oval, and into similar pieces which, when arranged with other stones in
pavements and other flat surfaces, make lovely compositions. It takes a
polish like porphyry and serpentine and is sawn in the same manner.
Numberless pieces of it are found in Rome, buried under the ruins; these
come to light daily and thus of ancient things modern works are made,
such as doors and other ornamental details, which, wherever placed, are
decorative and very beautiful.
§ 5. _Of Breccia (‘Mischio,’ Conglomerate)._
Here is now another stone, called ‘mischio’ (breccia),[33] from the
mixture of various stones coagulated together and made one by time and
by the mordant action of water. It is found in abundance in several
places, as in the mountains of Verona, in those of Carrara, and of Prato
in Tuscany, and in the hills of the Impruneta in the neighbourhood of
Florence.[34] But the best and choicest breccias have been found, not
long ago, at San Giusto at Monte Rantoli, five miles distant from
Florence.[35] In this material Duke Cosimo has commissioned me to
decorate all the new rooms of the palace with doors and chimney pieces,
and the effect is most beautiful. Also for the garden of the Pitti, very
fine columns seven braccia high have been quarried from the same place,
and I am astonished that in this stone such large pieces should be found
free from flaws.[36] Being of the nature of limestone, it takes a
beautiful polish and in colour inclines to a reddish purple streaked
with white and yellowish veins. But the finest examples of all are in
Greece and Egypt,[37] where the stone is much harder than ours in Italy,
and it is found in as many different colours as mother nature has
delighted and still delights to produce in all perfection. In the
breccias formed in this way one sees at Rome at the present day both
ancient and modern works, such as columns, vases, fountains, door
ornaments, and various inlays on buildings, as well as many pieces in
the pavements. There are various sorts, of many colours; some draw to
yellow and red, others to white and black, others again to grey and
white speckled with red and veined with numerous colours; then there are
certain reds, greens, blacks and whites which are oriental: and of this
sort of stone the Duke has an antique urn, four and a half braccia
across, in his garden at the Pitti, a thing most precious, being as I
said of oriental breccia very beautiful and extremely hard to work.[38]
Such stones are all very hard, and exquisite in colour and quality, as
is shown by the two columns, twelve braccia high at the entrance of St.
Peter’s in Rome, which support the first arcades of the aisles, one on
each side.[39] Of this stone, the kind which is found in the hills of
Verona, is very much softer than the oriental; and in that place is
quarried a sort which is reddish, and inclines towards a vetch
colour.[40] All these kinds are worked easily in our days with the
tempering-baths and the tools used for our own local stones. Windows,
columns, fountains, pavements, door posts and mouldings are made of
them, as is seen in Lombardy and indeed throughout Italy.
§ 6. _Of Granite._
There is another sort of extremely hard stone, much coarser and speckled
with black and white and sometimes with red, which, on account of its
grain and consistency, is commonly called granite.[41] In Egypt it
exists in solid masses of immense size that can be quarried in pieces
incredibly long, such as are seen now-a-days in Rome in obelisks,
needles, pyramids, columns, and in those enormous vessels for baths
which we have at San Pietro in Vincola, at San Salvadore del Lauro and
at San Marco.[42] It is also seen in columns without number, which for
hardness and compactness have had nothing to fear from fire or sword, so
that time itself, that drives everything to ruin, not only has not
destroyed them but has not even altered their colour. It was for this
reason that the Egyptians made use of granite in the service of their
dead, writing on these obelisks in their strange characters the lives of
the great, to preserve the memory of their prowess and nobility.
From Egypt there used also to come another variety of grey granite,
where the black and white specks draw rather towards green. It is
certainly very hard, not so hard however, but that our stonecutters, in
the building of St. Peter’s, have made use of the fragments they have
found, in such a manner that by means of the temper of the tools at
present adopted, they have reduced the columns and other pieces to the
desired slenderness and have given them a polish equal to that of
porphyry.
Many parts of Italy are enriched with this grey granite, but the largest
blocks found are in the island of Elba, where the Romans kept men
continually employed in quarrying countless pieces of this rock.[43]
Some of the columns of the portico of the Ritonda are made of it, and
they are very beautiful and of extraordinary size.[44] It is noticed
that the stone when in the quarry is far softer and more easy to work
than after it has lain exposed.[45] It is true that for the most part it
must be worked with picks that have a point, like those used for
porphyry, and at the other end a sharp edge like a toothed chisel.[46]
From a piece of this granite which was detached from the mass, Duke
Cosimo has hollowed out a round basin twelve braccia broad in every
direction and a table of the same length for the palace and garden of
the Pitti.[47]
§ 7. _Of Paragon (Touchstone)._[48]
A kind of black stone, called paragon, is likewise quarried in Egypt and
also in some parts of Greece. It is so named because it forms a test for
trying gold; the workman rubs the gold on this stone and discerns its
colour, and on this account, used as it is for comparing or testing, it
comes to be named paragon, or indexstone (a). Of this there is another
variety, with a different grain and colour, for it has, almost but not
quite, the tint of the mulberry, and does not lend itself readily to the
tool. It was used by the ancients for some of those sphinxes and other
animals seen in various places in Rome, and for a figure of greater
size, a hermaphrodite in Parione,[49] alongside of another most
beautiful statue of porphyry.[50] This stone is hard to carve, but is
extraordinarily beautiful and takes a wonderful polish (b). The same
sort is also to be found in Tuscany, in the hills of Prato, ten miles
distant from Florence (c), and in the mountains of Carrara. On modern
tombs many sarcophagi and repositories for the dead are to be seen of
it; for example, in the principal chapel in the Carmine at Florence,
where is the tomb of Piero Soderini (although he is not within it) made
of this stone, and a canopy too of this same Prato touchstone, so well
finished and so lustrous that it looks like a piece of satin rather than
a cut and polished stone (d). Thus again, in the facing which covers the
outside of the church of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence, all over the
building, there is a different kind of black marble (e) and red marble
(f), but all worked in the same manner.
§ 8. _Of Transparent Marbles for filling window openings._
Some sorts of marble are found in Greece and in all parts of the East,
which are white and yellowish, and very transparent. These were used by
the ancients for baths and hot-air chambers and for all those places
which need protection against wind, and in our own days there are still
to be seen in the tribune of San Miniato a Monte, the abode of the monks
of Monte Oliveto, above the gates of Florence, some windows of this
marble, which admit light but not air.[51] By means of this invention
people gave light to their dwellings and kept out the cold.
§ 9. _Of Statuary Marbles._
From the same quarries[52] were taken other marbles free from veins, but
of the same colour, out of which were carved the noblest statues. These
marbles were of a very fine grain and consistency, and they were
continually being made use of by all who carved capitals and other
architectural ornaments. The blocks available for sculpture were of
great size as appears in the Colossi of Montecavallo at Rome,[53] in the
Nile[54] of the Belvedere and in all the most famous and noble statues.
Apart from the question of the marble, one can recognize these to be
Greek from the fashion of the head, the arrangement of the hair, and
from the nose, which from its juncture with the eyebrows down to the
nostril is somewhat square.[55] This marble is worked with ordinary
tools and with drills, and is polished with pumice stone, with chalk
from Tripoli, and with leather and wisps of straw.
In the mountains of Carrara in the Carfagnana,[56] near to the heights
of Luni, there are many varieties of marble, some black,[57] some
verging towards grey, some mingled with red and others again with grey
veins.[58] These form an outer crust over the white marbles, and they
take those colours, because they are not refined, but rather are smitten
by time, water and the soil. Again, there are other sorts of marble,
called ‘cipollini,’[59] ‘saligni,’ ‘campanini’ and ‘mischiati.’[60] The
most abundant kind is pure white and milky in tone; it is easy to work
and quite perfect for carving into figures. Enormous blocks lie there
ready to be quarried, and in our own days, pieces measuring nine braccia
have been hewn out for colossal statues. Two of these colossi have
recently been sculptured, each from a single block. The one is
Michelagnolo’s ‘David,’ which is at the entrance of the Ducal Palace in
Florence;[61] the other is the ‘Hercules and Cacus’ from the hand of
Bandinello standing at the other side of the same entrance. Another
block of nine braccia in length was taken out of the quarry a few years
ago, in order that the same Baccio Bandinello should carve a figure of
Neptune for the fountain which the Duke is having erected on the piazza.
But, Bandinello being dead, it has since been given to Ammannato, an
excellent sculptor, for him likewise to carve a Neptune out of it.[62]
But of all these marbles, that of the quarry named Polvaccio,[63] in the
place of that name, has the fewest blemishes and veins and is free from
those knots and nuts which very often occur in an extended surface of
marble—occasioning no little difficulty to the worker, and spoiling the
statues even when they are finished. From the quarries of Seravezza,
near to Pietrasanta, there have been taken out a set of columns, all of
the same height, destined for the façade of San Lorenzo at Florence,
which is now sketched out in front of the door of that church;[64] one
of these columns is to be seen there, the rest remain, some in the
quarry, some at the seashore.
[Illustration:
FIG. 2.—Tools mentioned by Vasari, etc.
A, B, Models of Tools used in Egypt at the present day for working
hard stones.
C, The pick referred to by Vasari, p. 41.
D, A burin or graver.
E-J, Tools in actual use in a stone-cutter’s yard at Settignano:
E, Subbia, a point.
F, Calcagnuolo, a toothed chisel.
G, Gradina, a broader toothed chisel.
H, Scarpello, a chisel.
J, Trapano, a drill.
]
But returning to the quarries of Pietrasanta,[65] I say that they were
the quarries in which all the ancients worked, and no other marbles but
these were used for their statues by those masters, who were so
excellent. While the masses were being hewn out, they were always at
work, blocking out figures in the rough on the stones while they were
still in the quarry. The remains of many of these can be seen even yet
in that place.[66] This same marble, then, the moderns of to-day use for
their statues, not only in Italy, but in France, England, Spain and
Portugal, as can be seen to-day in the tomb executed in Naples by
Giovanni da Nola, the excellent sculptor, for Don Pietro di Toledo,
viceroy of that kingdom, to whom all the marbles were presented, and
sent to Naples by Duke Cosimo de’ Medici.[67] This kind of marble has in
itself larger available pieces and is more yielding and softer to work
and receives a finer polish than any other marble. It is true that
occasionally the workman meets with flaws called by the sculptors
‘smerigli’ (emery veins) which usually cause the tools to break. The
blocks are first roughed into shape, by a tool called ‘subbia’
(point)[68] which is pointed like a stake in facets, and is heavier or
lighter as the case may be. At the next stage are used chisels, named
‘calcagnuoli’ (toothed chisels), which have a notch in the middle of the
edge of the blade; after that finer and finer tools with more teeth are
used to score the marble, after which it is smoothed with another chisel
called ‘gradina,’ (broader toothed chisel) used to reduce and refine the
figures. The tooth marks left in the marble are removed with iron rasps
straight and curved, and thus at last, by polishing gradually with
pumice stone the surface aimed at is attained. In order not to fracture
the marble, all the drill-holes are made with drills of different sizes
weighing from twelve pounds each even to twenty, according to the size
of the hole needed,[69] and they serve to finish every sort of work and
to bring it to perfection.
Of certain white marbles, streaked with grey,[70] sculptors and
architects make ornaments for doors and columns for houses and the same
are used also for pavements and for facings of large buildings, and for
all sorts of things. All the marbles called ‘mischiati’[71] are used for
the same purposes.
§ 10. _Of Cipollino Marble._[72]
The cipollini marbles are another kind, different in grain and colour,
and found in other places besides Carrara. Most of them are greenish,
and full of veins; they are useful for various things, but not for
figures. Those which the sculptors call ‘saligni,’[73] because they are
partly transparent, and have that lustrous appearance seen in salt, have
something of the nature of stalagmite, and are troublesome enough to
make figures of; because the grain of the stone is rough and coarse, or
because in damp weather water drops from it continually or else it
sweats. The ‘campanini’ marbles are so named because they sound like a
bell under the hammer and give out a sharper note than other
marbles.[74] These are hard and crack more easily than the kinds above
mentioned. They are quarried at Pietrasanta.[75] Again at Seravezza[76]
in many places and at Campiglia[77] there are marbles excavated, which
are for the most part excellent for ashlar work and even fairly good
sometimes for statues.
§ 11. _Of White Pisan Marble._
A kind of white marble, akin to limestone, is found likewise at Monte
San Giuliano near Pisa.[78] It has been used for covering the outside
walls of the Duomo and the Camposanto of Pisa, as well as for many other
ornaments to be seen in that city. Formerly the said marbles were
brought to Pisa from the hill at San Giuliano with trouble and expense,
but now it is different, because Duke Cosimo, in order to make the
district more healthy and also to facilitate the carriage of the marbles
and other stones taken from those mountains, has turned into a straight
canal the river Osoli and many other streams, which used to rise in
those plains and do damage to the country. By means of this canal, the
marbles, either worked or rough, can be easily conveyed, at a trifling
cost, and with the greatest advantage to the city which is now almost
restored to its former magnificence, thanks to the said Duke, who has no
object more dear to him than that of improving and restoring the city,
which was falling into ruins, before His Excellency became its lord.[79]
§ 12. _Of Travertine._
There is another sort of stone called travertine, which is much used for
building and also for carvings of various sorts. It is always being
quarried in many places throughout Italy, as in the neighbourhood of
Lucca, at Pisa, and round about Siena; but the largest blocks and the
best, that is, those which are most easily worked, are taken from above
the river Teverone at Tivoli.[80] The stone is all a kind of coagulation
of earth and of water, which by its hardness and coldness congeals and
petrifies not only earth, but stumps and branches and leaves of trees.
On account of the water that remains within the stones—which never can
be dry so long as they lie under water—they are full of pores which give
them a spongy and perforated appearance, both within and without.
Of travertine the ancients constructed their most wonderful buildings,
for example, the Colosseum, and the Treasury by the church of Ss. Cosimo
e Damiano[81] and many other edifices. They used it without stint for
the foundations of their public buildings, and in working these
basements, they were not too fastidious in finishing them carefully, but
left them rough, as in rustic work; and this they did perhaps because so
treated they possess a certain grandeur and nobility of their own.[82]
But in our days there has been found one who has worked travertine most
skilfully, as was formerly seen in that round temple, begun but never
finished, save only the basement, on the piazza of San Luigi de’
Francesi in Rome.[83] It was undertaken by a Frenchman named Maestro
Gian, who studied the art of carving in Rome and became so proficient,
that his work in the beginning of this temple could stand comparison
with the best things, either ancient or modern, ever seen carved in
travertine. He carved astrological globes, salamanders in the fire,
royal emblems, devices of open books showing the leaves, and carefully
finished trophies and masks. These, in their own place, bear witness to
the excellence and quality of the stone which, although it is coarse,
can be worked as freely as marble. It possesses a charm of its own,
owing to the spongy appearance produced by the little cavities which
cover the surface and look so well. This unfinished temple being left
imperfect, was razed by the French, and the said stones and other pieces
that formed part of its construction were placed in the façade of the
church of San Luigi[84] and in some of its chapels, where they are well
arranged, and produce a beautiful effect.
Travertine is excellent for walls, because after it is built up in
squared courses and worked into mouldings, it can be entirely covered
with stucco[85] and thereafter be impressed with any designs in relief
that are desired, just as the ancients did in the public entrances to
the Colosseum[86] and in many other places; and as Antonio da San Gallo
has done in the present day in the hall of the Pope’s palace, in front
of the chapel,[87] where he has faced the travertine with stucco bearing
many excellent devices. More than any other master however has
Michelagnolo Buonarroti ennobled this stone in the decoration of the
court of the Casa Farnese.[88] With marvellous judgement he has used it
for windows, masks, brackets, and many other such fancies; all these are
worked as marble is worked and no other similar ornament can be seen to
excel this in beauty. And if these things are rare, more wonderful than
all is the great cornice on the front façade of the same palace, than
which nothing more magnificent or more beautiful can be sought for.
Michelagnolo has also employed travertine for certain large chapels on
the outside of the building of St. Peter’s, and in the interior, for the
cornice that runs all round the tribune; so finished is this cornice
that not one of the joints can be perceived, everyone therefore can well
understand with what advantage to the work we employ this kind of stone.
But that which surpasses every other marvel is the construction in this
stone of the vault of one of the three tribunes in St. Peter’s; the
pieces composing it are joined in such a manner that not only is the
building well tied together with various sorts of bonds, but looked at
from the ground it appears made out of a single piece.[89]
§ 13. _Of Slates._
We now come to a different order of stones, blackish in colour and used
by the architects only for laying on roofs. These are thin flags
produced by nature and time near the surface of the earth for the
service of man. Some of these are made into receptacles, built up
together in such a manner that the pieces dovetail one into the other.
The vessels are filled with oil according to their holding capacity and
they preserve it most thoroughly. These slates are a product of the sea
coast of Genoa, in a place called Lavagna;[90] they are excavated in
pieces ten braccia long and are made use of by artists for their oil
paintings, because pictures painted on slate last much longer than on
any other material, as we shall discuss more appropriately in the
chapters on painting.
§ 14. _Of Peperino._[91]
We shall also refer in a future chapter to a stone named piperno or more
commonly peperigno, a blackish and spongy stone, resembling travertine,
which is excavated in the Roman Campagna. It is used for the posts of
windows and doors in various places, notably at Naples and in Rome; and
it also serves artists for painting on in oil, as we shall relate in the
proper place. This is a very thirsty stone and indeed more like cinder
than anything else.
§ 15. _Of the Stone from Istria._[92]
There is moreover quarried in Istria a stone of a livid white, which
very easily splits, and this is more frequently used than any other, not
by the city of Venice alone, but by all the province of Romagna, for all
works both of masonry and carving. It is worked with tools and
instruments longer than those usually employed, and chiefly with certain
little hammers that follow the cleavage of the stone, where it readily
parts. A great quantity of this kind of stone was used by Messer Jacopo
Sansovino, who built the Doric edifice of the Panattiera[93] in Venice,
and also that in the Tuscan style for the Zecca (mint) on the Piazza of
San Marco.[94] Thus they go on executing all their works for that city,
doors, windows, chapels, and any other decorations that they find
convenient to make, notwithstanding the fact that breccias and other
kinds of stone could easily be conveyed from Verona, by means of the
river Adige. Very few works made of these latter materials are to be
seen, because of the general use of the Istrian stone, into which
porphyry, serpentine and other sorts of breccias are often inlaid,
resulting in compositions which are very ornamental. This stone is of
the nature of the limestone called ‘alberese,’ not unlike that of our
own districts, and as has been said it splits easily.
§ 16. _Of Pietra Serena._
There only remains now the pietra serena and the grey stone called
‘macigno’[95] and the pietra forte which is much used in the mountainous
parts of Italy, especially in Tuscany, and most of all in Florence and
her territory. The stone that they call pietra serena[96] draws towards
blue or rather towards a greyish tint. There are quarries of it in many
places near Arezzo, at Cortona, at Volterra, and throughout the
Apennines. The finest is in the hills of Fiesole, and it is obtained
there in blocks of very great size, as we see in all the edifices
constructed in Florence by Filippo di Ser Brunellesco, who had all the
stones needed for the churches of San Lorenzo and of Santo Spirito
quarried there, and also an unlimited quantity which are in every
building throughout the city. It is a very beautiful stone to look at,
but it wastes away and exfoliates where it is subjected to damp, rain,
or frost. Under cover however it will last for ever. Much more durable
than this and of finer colour is a sort of bluish stone, in our day
called ‘pietra del fossato.’[97] When quarried, the first layer is
gravelly and coarse, the second is never free from knots and fissures,
the third is admirable being much finer in grain. Michelagnolo used
this, because of its yielding grain, in building the Library and
Sacristy of San Lorenzo for Pope Clement, and he has had the mouldings,
columns, and every part of the work executed with such great care that
even if it were of silver it would not look so well.[98] The stone takes
on a very fine polish, so much so that nothing better in this kind of
material could be wished for. On this account it was forbidden by law
that the stone be used in Florence for other than public buildings,
unless permission had been obtained from the governing authorities.[99]
The Duke Cosimo has had a great quantity of this stone put into use, as
for example, in the columns and ornaments of the loggia of the Mercato
Nuovo, and for the work begun by Bandinello in the great audience
chamber of the palace and also in the other hall which is opposite to
it; but the greatest amount, more than ever used elsewhere, has been
taken by his Excellency for the Strada de’ Magistrati,[100] now in
construction, after the design and under the direction of Giorgio Vasari
of Arezzo. This stone demands as much time for working it as marble. It
is so hard that water does not affect it and it withstands all other
attacks of time.
Besides this there is another sort called pietra serena, found all over
the hill, which is coarser, harder, and not so much coloured, and
contains certain knots in the stone. It resists the influence of water
and frost, and is useful for figures and carved ornaments. Of this is
carved La Dovizia (Abundance), a figure from the hand of Donatello on
the column of the Mercato Vecchio in Florence;[101] and it serves also
for many other statues executed by excellent sculptors, not only in this
city, but throughout the territory.
§ 17. _Of Pietra Forte._[102]
The pietra forte is quarried in many places; it resists rain, sun,
frost, and every trial, and demands time to work it, but it behaves very
well; it does not exist in very large blocks.[103] Both by the
Goths[104] and by the moderns have been constructed of this stone the
most beautiful buildings to be found in Tuscany, as can be seen in
Florence in the filling of the two arches, which form the principal
doors of the oratory of Orsanmichele,[105] for these are truly admirable
things and worked with the utmost care. Of this same stone there are
throughout the city, as has been said, many statues and coats of
arms,[106] as for instance in the Fortress and various other places. It
is yellowish in colour with fine white veins that add greatly to its
attractiveness, and it is sometimes employed for statues where there are
to be fountains, because it is not injured by water. The walls of the
palace of the Signori, the Loggia, and Orsanmichele are built of it,
also the whole interior of the fabric of Santa Maria del Fiore, as well
as all the bridges of our city, the Palace of the Pitti and that of the
Strozzi families. It has to be worked with picks because it is very
compact. Similarly, the other stones mentioned above must be treated in
the manner already explained for the working of marble and other sorts
of stones.
§ 18. _Conclusion of Chapter._
After all however, good stones and well tempered tools apart, the one
thing essential is the art, the intelligence, and the judgement of those
who use them, for there is the greatest difference between artists,
although they may all use the same method, as to the measure of grace
and beauty they impart to the works which they execute. This enables us
to discern and to recognize the perfection of the work done by those who
really understand, as opposed to that of others who know less. As,
therefore, all the excellence and beauty of the things most highly
praised consist in that supreme perfection given to them by those who
understand and can judge, it is necessary to strive with all diligence
always to make things beautiful and perfect—nay rather, most beautiful
and most perfect.
CHAPTER II.
The Description of squared Ashlar-work (lavoro di quadro) and of
carved Ashlar-work (lavoro di quadro intagliato).
§ 19. _The work of the Mason._
Having thus considered all the varieties of stone, which our artificers
use either for ornament or for sculpture, let us now go on to say, that
when stone is used for actual building, all that is worked with square
and compasses and that has corners is called squared ashlar work (lavoro
di quadro). The term (quadro) is given, because of the squared faces and
corners, for every order of moulding or anything which is straight,
projecting, or rectangular is work which takes the name of ‘squared,’
and so is it commonly known among the artificers. But when the stone
does not remain plain dressed, but is chiselled into mouldings, friezes,
foliage, eggs, spindles, dentels and other sorts of carving, the work on
the members chosen to be so treated is called by the mason carved ashlar
work (opera di quadro intagliato or lavoro di intaglio). Of this sort of
plain and carved ashlar are constructed all the different Orders,
Rustic, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, and Composite, and so too, in the
times of the Goths, the German work[107] (lavoro tedesco): and no kind
of ornament can be made that is not founded on both sorts of the work
above described. It is the same with breccias and marbles and every sort
of stone, and also with bricks, used as a foundation for moulded stucco
work. The same applies to walnut, poplar, and every kind of wood. But,
because many do not recognize the difference between one Order and
another, let us discuss distinctly and as briefly as possible in the
chapter which follows, every mode and manner of these.
CHAPTER III.
Concerning the five Orders of Architecture, Rustic, Doric, Ionic,
Corinthian, Composite, and also German Work.
§ 20. _Rusticated masonry and the Tuscan Order._
The work called Rustic[108] is more stunted, and more massive than that
of any other Order, it being the beginning and foundation of all. The
profiles of the mouldings are simpler and in consequence more beautiful,
as are the capitals and bases as well as every other member. The Rustic
socles or pedestals, as we call them, on which rest the columns, are
square in proportion, with a solid moulding at the foot and another
above which binds it like a cornice. The height of the column measures
six heads,[109] in imitation of people who are dwarfed and adapted to
sustain weights. Of this Order there are to be seen in Tuscany many
colonnades both plain and rusticated, with and also without bosses and
niches between the columns: and many porticoes which the ancients were
accustomed to construct in their villas; and in the country one still
sees many tombs of the kind as at Tivoli and at Pozzuolo. This Order
served the ancients for doors, windows, bridges, aqueducts, treasuries,
castles, towers, and strongholds for storing ammunition and artillery;
also for harbours, prisons and fortresses; in these the stones project
in an effective manner in points like a diamond, or with many facets.
The projections are treated in various ways, either in bosses,
flattened, so as not to act as a ladder on the walls—for it would be
easy to climb up if the bosses jutted out too much—or in other ways, as
one sees in many places, and above all in Florence, in the principal
façade of the chief citadel, built by Alexander, first duke of
Florence.[110] This façade, out of respect to the Medici emblems, is
made with ornaments of diamond points and flattened pellets, but both in
low relief. The wall composed of pellets and diamonds side by side is
very rich and varied and most beautiful to look at. There is abundance
of this work at the villas of the Florentines, the gates and entrances,
and at the houses and palaces where they pass the summer, which not only
beautify and adorn that neighbourhood, but are also of the greatest use
and convenience to the citizens. But much more is the city itself
enriched with magnificent buildings, decorated with rusticated masonry,
as for example the Casa Medici, the façade of the Pitti Palace, the
palace of the Strozzi family and innumerable others. When well designed,
the more solid and simple the building, the more skill and beauty do we
perceive in it, and this kind of work is necessarily more lasting and
durable than all others, seeing that the pieces of stone are bigger and
the assemblage much better, all the building being in bond, one stone
with another. Moreover, because the members are smooth and massive, the
chances of fortune and of weather cannot injure them so severely as the
stones that are carved and undercut, or, as we say here, ‘suspended in
the air’ by the cleverness of the sculptors.
[Illustration:
FIG. 3.—Fortezza da Basso at Florence.
]
§ 21. _The Doric Order._
[Illustration:
FIG. 4.—Rusticated masonry on the exterior of the Fortezza da Basso at
Florence.
]
The Doric Order was the most massive known to the Greeks, more robust
both as to strength and mass, and much less open than their other
Orders. And not only the Greeks but the Romans also dedicated this sort
of building to those who were warriors, such as generals of armies,
consuls, praetors—and much more often to their gods, as Jove, Mars,
Hercules and others. According to the rank and character of these the
buildings were carefully distinguished—made plain or carved, simple or
rich—so that all could recognize the grade and the position of the
different dignitaries to whom they were dedicated,[111] or of him who
ordered them to be built. Consequently one sees that the ancients
applied much art in the composition of their buildings, that the
profiles of the Doric mouldings are very graceful, and the features
harmonious and of a high degree of beauty; and also that the proportion
of the shafts of the columns is very well understood, as they are
neither too thick nor too thin. The form of the columns, as is commonly
said, resembles that of Hercules; it shows a certain solidity capable of
sustaining the weight of the architraves, friezes, cornices and the rest
of the upper parts of the building. Because this Order, as more secure
and stable than the others, has always much pleased Duke Cosimo, he
desires that the building, which he has charged me to construct for
thirteen civil magistrates of his city and dominion, should be of the
Doric Order. This building is to have splendid decoration in stone, and
is to be placed between his own palace and the river Arno.[112]
Therefore, in order to bring back into use the true mode of
construction, which requires the architraves to lie level over the
columns, and avoid the falsity of turning the arches of the arcades
above the capital, I have followed in the principal façade the actual
method of the ancients, as can be seen in the edifice. This fashion of
building has been avoided by architects of the recent past, because
stone architraves of every sort both ancient and modern are all, or the
greater part of them, seen to be broken in the middle, notwithstanding
that above the solid of the columns and of the architraves, frieze, and
cornice, there are flat arches of brick that are not in contact with and
do not load the work below. Now, after much consideration on the whole
question, I have finally found an excellent way of putting into use the
true mode of proceeding so as to give security to the said architraves,
by which they are prevented from suffering in any part and everything
remains as sound and safe as can be desired, as the result has proved.
This then, is the method, that is stated here below for the benefit of
the world at large and of the artificers.
[Illustration:
FIG. 5.—Construction of the portico of the Uffizi at Florence, from
Vasari’s description.
]
§ 22. _A constructive device to avoid charging architraves._[113]
Having set up the columns, and above the capitals the architraves, which
are brought into contact the one with the other above the middle axis of
the column, the builder proceeds to make a square block or die (D, D,
Fig. 5). For example, if the column be a braccio thick and the
architraves the same in width[114] and height, let the die in the frieze
be made equal to them; but in front let there remain an eighth in the
face for the vertical joint, and let another eighth or more have a
sinking into the die on each side, bevelled to an angle of 45°, Fig. 5
(1). Then since the frieze in each intercolumniation is in three pieces
(B, A, B), let the two at the sides (B, B) have bevelled projections in
the opposite sense to the sinkings, increasing from within outwards,
Fig. 5 (2), so that each may be mortised in the die and be keyed after
the manner of an arch, and in the front the amount of the eighth must
bond vertically; while the part on the other side must do the same to
the other die. And so above the column[115] one must arrange that the
piece in the middle of the said frieze closes within and is recessed in
quarter-round form up to the middle, while the other half must be
squared and straight and set with an empty space below, in order that it
may hold as does an arch, the wall on the external face appearing worked
with vertical joints.[116] Do not let the stones of the said frieze rest
on the architrave, but let a finger’s breadth be between them; in this
way, making an arch, the frieze comes to support itself and does not
burden the architrave. Afterwards make on the inside, for filling up the
said frieze, a flat arch of bricks as high as the frieze, that stretches
from die to die above the columns. Then make a piece of cornice as wide
as the die[117] above the columns, which has the joints in front like
those of the frieze, and within let the said cornice be keyed like the
blocks of the frieze, care being taken to make the cornice, as the
frieze, in three pieces, of which the two at the sides hold from within
the middle piece of the cornice above the die of the frieze,[118] and
mind that the middle piece of the cornice, C, C, slips down into the
sinkings so as to span the void, and unites the two pieces at the sides
so as to lock them in the form of an arch. In this fashion everyone can
see that the frieze sustains itself, as does the cornice, which rests
almost entirely on the arch of bricks.[119] Thus one thing helping
another, it comes about that the architrave does not sustain any but its
own weight, nor is there danger of its ever being broken by too heavy a
load. Because experience shows this method to be the most sure, I have
wished to make particular mention of it, for the convenience and benefit
of all; especially as I know that when the frieze and the cornice were
put above the architrave as was the practice of the ancients, the latter
broke in course of time, possibly on account of an earthquake or other
accident, the arch of discharge which was introduced above the cornice
not being sufficient to preserve it. But throwing the arches above the
cornices made in this form, and linking them together with iron, as
usual,[120] secures the whole from every danger and makes the building
endure eternally.
Returning to the matter in hand, let us explain then that this fashion
of work may be used by itself alone, or can be employed in the second
floor from the ground level, above the Rustic Order, or it can be put
higher up above another variety of Order such as Ionic, Corinthian or
Composite, in the manner shown by the ancients in the Colosseum in Rome,
in which arrangement they used skill and judgement. The Romans, having
triumphed not only over the Greeks but over the whole world, put the
Composite Order at the top, of which Order the Tuscans have composed
many varieties. They placed it above all, as superior in force, grace,
and beauty, and as more striking than the others, to be a crown to the
building; for to be adorned with beautiful members gives to the work an
honourable completion and leaves nothing more to be desired.
§ 23. _The proportions and parts of the Doric Order._
To return to the Doric Order, I may state that the column is made seven
heads in height. Its pedestal must be a little less than a square and a
half in height and a square in width,[121] then above are placed its
mouldings and beneath its base with torus and two fillets, as Vitruvius
directs. The base and capital are of equal height, reckoning the capital
from the astragal upwards. The cornice with the frieze and architrave
attached projects over every column, with those grooved features,
usually called triglyphs, which have square spaces[122] interposed
between the projections, within which are the skulls of oxen, or
trophies, or masks, or shields, or other fancies. The architrave,
jutting out, binds these projections with a fillet, and under the fillet
are little strips square in section, at the foot of each of which are
six drops, called by the ancients ‘guttae’ (goccie). If the column in
the Doric order is to be seen fluted, there must be twenty hollow facets
instead of flutes,[123] and nothing between the flutes but the sharp
arris. Of this sort of work there is an example in Rome at the Forum
Boarium which is most rich;[124] and of another sort are the mouldings
and other members in the theatre of Marcellus, where to-day is the
Piazza Montanara, in which work there are no bases (to the Doric
columns) and those bases which are visible are Corinthian. It is thought
that the ancients did not make bases, but instead placed there a
pedestal of the same size as the base would have been. This is to be met
with in Rome by the prison of the Tullianum where also are capitals
richer in members than others which appear in the Doric Order.[125] Of
this same order Antonio da San Gallo has made the inner court of the
Casa Farnese in the Campo di Fiore at Rome, which is highly decorated
and beautiful; thus one sees continually ancient and modern temples and
palaces in this style, which for stability and assemblage of the stones
have held together better and lasted longer than all other edifices.
[Illustration:
FIG. 6.—Drawing by Giuliano da San Gallo of a portion of the Basilica
Aemilia in the Roman Forum, that survived to the time of Vasari.
]
§ 24. _The Ionic Order._
[Illustration:
FIG. 7.—Roman Doric cap, with stucco finish, at S. Nicola in Carcere,
Rome.
]
The Ionic Order, more slender than the Doric, was made by the ancients
in imitation of persons who stand mid-way between the fragile and the
robust; a proof of this is its adoption in works dedicated to Apollo,
Diana, and Bacchus, and sometimes to Venus. The pedestal which sustains
the column is one and a half squares high and one wide, and the
mouldings, above and below, are in accordance with this Order. Its
column measures in height eight times the head, and its base is double
with two tori, as described by Vitruvius in the third chapter of his
third book. Its capital with its volutes or scrolls or spirals, as
anyone may call them, should be well turned, as one sees in the theatre
of Marcellus in Rome, above the Doric Order; and its cornice adorned
with modillions and with dentils, and its frieze slightly convex
(pulvinated). Should it be desired to flute the columns, there must be
twenty-four flutes, but divided in such a manner as to leave between
each two of them a flat piece that measures the fourth part of the
flute. This order has in itself the most beautiful lightness and grace
and is consequently adopted by modern architects.
§ 25. _The Corinthian Order._
The Corinthian style was invariably a favourite among the Romans, who
delighted in it so greatly that they chose this Order for their most
elaborate and most prized buildings to remain as a memorial of
themselves; as is seen in the Temple at Tivoli above the Teverone, in
the remains of the temple of Peace,[126] in the arch of Pola, and in
that of the harbour of Ancona; but much more beautiful is the Pantheon,
that is the Ritonda of Rome. This Order is the richest and most
decorated of all the Orders spoken of above. The pedestal that supports
the column is measured in the following way; a square and two thirds
wide (high)[127] and the mouldings above and below in proportion,
according to Vitruvius[128]: the height of the column nine heads with
base and capital, which last shall be in height the diameter of the
column at the foot, and its base half of the said thickness. This base
the ancients used to carve in various ways. Let the ornament of the
capital be fashioned with its tendrils and its leaves, as Vitruvius
directs in the fourth book, where he records that this capital has been
taken from the tomb of a Corinthian girl. Then follow its proper
architrave, frieze and cornice measured as he describes, all carved with
the modillions and ovolos and other sorts of carving under the drip. The
friezes of this Order may be carved with leafage, or again they may be
plain, or adorned with letters of bronze let into marble, as those on
the portico of the Ritonda. There are twenty-six flutes in the
Corinthian columns, although sometimes also there are fewer, and the
fourth part of the width of each flute remains flat between every two,
as is evident in many ancient works and in modern works copied from the
ancients.
§ 26. _The Composite Order._
The Composite Order, although Vitruvius has not made mention of
it—having taken account of none others than the Doric, Ionic,
Corinthian, and Tuscan, and holding those artists lawless, who, taking
from all four Orders, constructed out of them bodies that represented to
him monsters rather than men—the Composite Order has nevertheless been
much used by the Romans and in imitation of them by the moderns. I shall
therefore proceed, to the end that all may have notice of it, to explain
and give the proportions of buildings in this Order also, for I am
convinced of this, that if the Greeks and Romans created these first
four Orders and reduced them to a general rule and measure, there may
have been those who have done the same for the Composite Order, forming
of it things much more graceful than ever did the ancients.
As an example of the truth of this I quote the works of Michelagnolo
Buonarroti in the Sacristy and Library of San Lorenzo in Florence, where
the doors, niches, bases, columns, capitals, mouldings, consoles and
indeed all the details, have received from him something of the new and
of the Composite Order, and nevertheless are wonderful, not to say
beautiful. The same merit in even greater measure is exhibited by the
said Michelagnolo in the second story of the Court of the Casa
Farnese[129] and again in the cornice which supports on the exterior the
roof of that palace. He who wishes to see in this manner of work the
proof of this man’s excellence—of truly celestial origin—in art and
design of various kinds, let him consider that which he has accomplished
in the fabric of St. Peter’s in compacting together the body of that
edifice and in making so many sorts of various and novel ornaments, such
beautiful profiles of mouldings, so many different niches and numerous
other things, all invented by him and treated differently from the
custom of the ancients. Therefore no one can deny that this new
Composite Order, which through Michelagnolo has attained to such
perfection, may be worthily compared with the others. In truth, the
worth and capacity of this truly excellent sculptor, painter, and
architect have worked miracles wherever he has put forth his hand.
Besides all the other things that are clear as daylight, he has
rectified sites which were out of the straight and reduced to perfection
many buildings and other objects of the worst form, covering with lovely
and fanciful decoration the defects of nature and art.[130] In our days
certain vulgar architects, not considering these things judiciously and
not imitating them, have worked presumptuously and without design almost
as if by chance, without observing ornament, art, or any order. All
their things are monstrous and worse than the German.
Returning now to our subject, it has become usual for this manner of
work to be called by some the ‘Composite,’ by others the ‘Latin,’ and by
others again the ‘Italic’ Order. The measure of the height of this
column must be ten heads, the base the half of the diameter of the
column, measured in the same way as the Corinthian column, as we see in
the arch of Titus Vespasianus in Rome. And he who wishes to make flutes
in this column can do so, following the plan of the Ionian or Corinthian
column—or in any way that pleases him who adopts this style of
architecture, which is a mixture of all the Orders. The capitals may be
made like those of the Corinthian except that the echinus moulding of
the capital must be larger and the volutes or tendrils somewhat larger,
as we see in the above mentioned arch. The architrave must be three
quarters of the thickness of the column and the rest of the frieze
supplied with modillions, and the cornice equal to the architrave,
because the projection gives the cornice an increase of size, as one
sees in the uppermost story of the Roman Colosseum; and in the said
modillions grooves can be cut after the manner of triglyphs, and there
can be other carving according to the taste of the architect; the
pedestal on which the column rests must be two squares high, with the
mouldings just as he pleases.
§ 27. _Of Terminal Figures._
The ancients were accustomed to use for doors or sepulchres or other
kinds of enrichment, various sorts of terminal figures instead of
columns, here a figure which has a basket on the head for capital, there
a figure down to the waist, the rest, towards the base, a cone or a tree
trunk; in the same way they made virgins, chubby infants, satyrs, and
other sorts of monsters or grotesque objects, just as it suited them,
and according as the ideas occurred to them so the works were put into
operation.
§ 28. _German Work (the Gothic Style)._
We come at last to another sort of work called German, which both in
ornament and in proportion is very different from the ancient and the
modern. Nor is it adopted now by the best architects but is avoided by
them as monstrous and barbarous, and lacking everything that can be
called order. Nay it should rather be called confusion and disorder. In
their buildings, which are so numerous that they sickened the world,
doorways are ornamented with columns which are slender and twisted like
a screw, and cannot have the strength to sustain a weight, however light
it may be. Also on all the façades, and wherever else there is
enrichment, they built a malediction of little niches one above the
other, with no end of pinnacles and points and leaves, so that, not to
speak of the whole erection seeming insecure, it appears impossible that
the parts should not topple over at any moment. Indeed they have more
the appearance of being made of paper than of stone or marble. In these
works they made endless projections and breaks and corbellings and
flourishes that throw their works all out of proportion; and often, with
one thing being put above another, they reach such a height that the top
of a door touches the roof. This manner was the invention of the Goths,
for, after they had ruined the ancient buildings, and killed the
architects in the wars, those who were left constructed the buildings in
this style.[131] They turned the arches with pointed segments, and
filled all Italy with these abominations of buildings, so in order not
to have any more of them their style has been totally abandoned.
May God protect every country from such ideas and style of buildings!
They are such deformities in comparison with the beauty of our buildings
that they are not worthy that I should talk more about them, and
therefore let us pass on to speak of the vaults.
CHAPTER IV.
On forming Vaults in Concrete, to be impressed with Enrichment: when
the Centerings are to be removed, and how to mix the Plaster.
§ 29. _The Construction of enriched Stucco Vaults._
When walls have reached the point where the arches of brick or light
stone or tufa have to spring, it is necessary to turn a centering with
planks in a close circle, over the framework of struts or boarding. The
planks are fitted together according to the form of the vault, or in the
shape of a boat, and this centering for the vaults must be fixed with
strong props in whatever mode you wish, so that the material above does
not strain it by its weight; and afterwards every crevice, in the
middle, in the corners, and everywhere, must be firmly stopped up with
clay so that when the concrete is spread the mixture shall not filter
through. This finished, above that surface of boards they make caissons
of wood, which are to be worked contrariwise, with projections where a
hollow is wanted; in the same way let the mouldings and details that we
wish to make be worked by opposites, so that when the material is cast,
it may come, where (the mould is) hollow, in relief; where in relief,
hollow, and thus similarly must all the members of the mouldings be
arranged. Whether the vault is to be smooth or enriched, it is equally
necessary to have shapes of wood, which mould the desired forms in clay;
with this clay also are made the square panels for such decoration, and
these are joined the one to the other on the flat or by mouldings or
enriched bands, which can be made to follow the line of this centering.
Having finished covering it all with enrichments of clay, formed in
intaglio and fitted together, as was said above, one must then take
lime, with pozzolana earth or sand riddled finely, mixed liquid and
mostly lime, and of that lay evenly a coating over all, till every mould
is full. Afterwards, above this coating make the vault with bricks,
raising or lowering them according as the vault turns, and continually
adding till the arch be closed. This done, it must all be left to set
and get firm, till the work be dry and solid.[132] Then when the props
are removed and the vault is left free, the clay is easily taken away
and all the work remains modelled and worked as if done in stucco, and
those parts that have not come out well are gone over with stucco till
they are complete. In this manner have been executed all the works in
the ancient edifices, which had afterwards stucco enrichment upon them.
This the moderns have done to-day in the vaults of St. Peter’s, and many
other masters throughout Italy have done the same.
§ 30. _Stucco made with Marble Dust._
Now let us show how the stucco is mixed.[133] Chips of marble are
pounded in a stone mortar; no other lime is used for this stucco save
white lime made either of marble chips or of travertine; instead of sand
the pounded marble is taken and is sifted finely and kneaded with the
lime, in the proportion of two thirds lime to one third pounded marble.
The stucco is made coarser or finer, according as one wishes to work
coarsely or finely. Enough now of stuccoes because the rest will be said
later, when I shall treat of them in connection with Sculpture. Before
passing to this subject, we shall speak briefly of fountains which are
made for walls and of their various ornaments.
CHAPTER V.
How Rustic Fountains are made with Stalactites and Incrustations from
water, and how Cockle shells and Conglomerations of vitrified stone
are built into the Stucco.
§ 31. _Grottoes and Fountains of ‘Rocaille’ work._
The fountains which the ancients made for their palaces, gardens, and
other places, were of different kinds; some stood alone, with basins and
vases of different sorts, others were attached to the walls, and bore
niches with masks, figures, or ornaments suggesting the sea; others
again for use in hot baths, were simpler and plainer, and finally others
resembled woodland springs that rise naturally in the groves; while
those which the moderns have made and continue to make are also of
different kinds. The moderns, always varying them, have added to the
inventions of the ancients, compositions of Tuscan work,[134] covered
with stalactites from petrified waters, which hang down resembling
roots, formed in the lapse of time of congelations of such waters as are
hard and are charged with sediment. These exist not only at Tivoli,
where the river Teverone petrifies the branches of trees, and all
objects that come in contact with it, turning them into gum-like
exudations and stalactites; but also at the lake Piè di Lupo,[135] where
the stalactites are very large; and in Tuscany at the river Elsa,[136]
whose water makes them clear so that they look like marble, glass, or
artificial crystals. But the most beautiful and curious of all are found
behind Monte Morello[137] also in Tuscany, eight miles from Florence. Of
this sort Duke Cosimo has had made in his garden at Olmo near
Castello[138] the rustic ornaments of the fountains executed by the
sculptor Tribolo. These stalactites removed from where nature has
produced them are introduced into work done by the artificer and fixed
with iron bars, with branches soldered with lead or in some other way,
or they are grafted into the stones so as to hang suspended. They are
fixed on to the Tuscan work in such a way as to leave it here and there
exposed to view. Then by adjusting leaden tubes hidden between these
stalactites, and distributing holes among them, jets of water are made
to pour out, when a key at the entrance of the conduit is turned; and
thus are arranged pipes for water and various jets through which the
water rains down among the incrustations of these stalactites, and in
falling sounds sweet to the ear and is beautiful to the eye.
There is also another kind of grotto, of a more rustic fashion,
imitating sylvan fountains in the following way. Some take sponge-like
stones and joining them together sow grass over them, thus, with an
order which appears disorder and wild, the grottoes are rendered very
natural and real. Others make smoother and more polished grottoes of
stucco, in which are mingled both stones and stucco, and while the
stucco is fresh they insert, in bands and compartments, knobs or bosses,
cockle shells, sea snails, tortoise shells, shells large and small, some
showing the outside and some the reverse: and of these they make flower
vases and festoons, in which the cockle shells represent the leaves, and
other varieties of shells the fruit;[139] and to these they add shells
of turtles, as is seen in the vineyard at the foot of Monte Mario that
Pope Clement VII, when still Cardinal, had made by the advice of
Giovanni da Udine.[140]
Again a rustic and very beautiful mosaic in many colours is made by
using little bits of old bricks that have been too much baked, and
pieces of glass which has run owing to the pans of glass bursting in an
overheated furnace. The work is done by sticking these bits into the
stucco on the wall as was said above, and arranging between them corals
and other spoils from the sea, things in themselves full of grace and
beauty. Thus are made animals and figures, covered with the shells
already mentioned as well as with coloured pastes in various pieces
arranged in rustic fashion, very quaint to look upon. There have been
many fountains of this kind recently set up at Rome, which by their
charm have incited the minds of countless persons to be lovers of such
work. Another kind of ornament entirely rustic is also used now-a-days
for fountains, and is applied in the following manner. First the
skeleton of the figure or any other object desired is made and plastered
over with mortar or stucco, then the exterior is covered in the fashion
of mosaic, with pieces of white or coloured marble, according to the
object designed, or else with certain little many coloured pebbles: and
these when carefully worked have a long life. The stucco with which they
build up and work these things is the same that we have before
described, and when once set it holds them securely on the walls. To
such fountains pavements are made of sling-stones, that is, round and
flat river pebbles, set on edge and in ripples as water goes, with
excellent effect. Others, for the finer fountains, make pavements with
little tiles of terra cotta in various divisions and glazed in the fire,
as in clay vases painted in various colours and with painted ornaments
and leafage; but this sort of pavement is more suitable for hot-air
chambers and baths than for fountains.[141]
[Illustration:
PLATE IV
INTERIOR OF GROTTO IN BOBOLI GARDENS, FLORENCE
Showing an unfinished statue ascribed to Michelangelo
]
CHAPTER VI.
On the manner of making Pavements of Tesselated Work.
§ 32. _Mosaic Pavements._
There are no possible devices in any department that the ancients did
not find out or at any rate try very hard to discover,—devices I mean
that bring delight and refreshment to the eyes of men. They invented
then, among other beautiful things, stone pavements diversified with
various blendings of porphyry, serpentine, and granite, with round and
square or other divisions, whence they went on to conceive the
fabrication of ornamental bands, leafage, and other sorts of designs and
figures. Therefore to prepare the work the better to receive such
treatment, they cut the marble into little pieces, so that these being
small they could be turned about for the background and the field, in
round schemes or lines straight or twisted, as came most conveniently.
From the joining together of these pieces they called the work
mosaic,[142] and used it in the pavements of many of their buildings, as
we still see in the Baths of Caracalla in Rome and in other places,
where the mosaic is made with little squares of marble, that form
leaves, masks, and other fancies, while the background for these is
composed of squares of white marble and other small squares of black.
The work was set about in the following manner. First was spread a layer
of fresh stucco of lime and marble dust thick enough to hold firmly in
itself the pieces fitting into each other, so that when set they could
be polished smooth on the top; these in the drying make an admirably
compacted concrete, which is not hurt by the wear of footsteps nor by
water. Therefore this work having come into the highest estimation,
clever people set themselves to study it further, as it is always easy
to add something valuable to an invention already found out. So they
made the marble mosaics finer, and of these, laid pavements both for
baths and for hot rooms, and with the most subtle mastery and diligence
they delicately fashioned various fishes in them, and imitated painting
with many colours suitable for that work, and with many different sorts
of marbles, introducing also among these some pieces cut into little
mosaic squares of the bones of fishes which have a lustrous
surface.[143] And so life-like did they make the fishes, that water
placed above them, veiling them a little, even though clear, made them
appear actually alive in the pavements; as is seen in Parione in Rome,
in the house of Messer Egidio and Fabio Sasso.[144]
§ 33. _Pictorial Mosaics for Walls, etc._
Therefore, this mosaic work appearing to them a picture, capable of
resisting to all eternity water, wind, and sunshine, and because they
considered such work much more effective far off than near, the ancients
disposed it so as to decorate vaults and walls, where such things had to
be seen at a distance, for at a distance one would not perceive the
pieces of mosaic which when near are easily distinguished. Then because
the mosaics were lustrous and withstood water and damp, it was thought
that such work might be made of glass, and so it was done, and producing
hereby the most beautiful effect they adorned their temples and other
places with it, as we still see in our own days at Rome in the Temple of
Bacchus[145] and elsewhere.[146] Just as from marble mosaics are derived
those which we now call in our time glass mosaics, so from the mosaic of
glass we have passed on to egg-shell mosaic,[147] and from this to the
mosaic in which figures and groups in light and shade are formed
entirely of tesserae, though the effect is like painting; this we shall
describe in its own place in the chapters on that art.[148]
CHAPTER VII.
How one is to recognize if a Building have good Proportions, and of
what Members it should generally be composed.
§ 34. _The principles of Planning and Design._
But since talking of particular things would make me turn aside too much
from my purpose, I leave this minute consideration to the writers on
architecture, and shall only say in general how good buildings can be
recognized, and what is requisite to their form to secure both utility
and beauty. Suppose then one comes to an edifice and wishes to see
whether it has been planned by an excellent architect and how much
ability he has shown, also whether the architect has known how to
accommodate himself to the site, as well as to the wishes of him who
ordered the structure to be built, one must consider the following
questions. First, whether he who has raised it from the foundation has
thought if the spot were a suitable one and capable of receiving
buildings of that style and extent, and (granted that the site is
suitable) how the building should be divided into rooms, and how the
enrichment on the walls be disposed in view of the nature of the site
which may be extensive or confined, elevated or low-lying. One must
consider also whether the edifice has been tastefully arranged and in
convenient proportion, and whether there has been furnished and
distributed the proper kind and number of columns, windows, doors, and
junctions of wall-faces, both within and without, in the given height
and thickness of the walls; in short whether every detail is suitable in
and for its own place. It is necessary that there should be distributed
throughout the building, rooms which have their proper arrangement of
doors, windows, passages, secret staircases, anterooms, lavatories,
cabinets, and that no mistakes be apparent therein. For example there
should be a large hall, a small portico or lesser apartments, which
being members of the edifice, must necessarily, even as members of the
human body, be equally arranged and distributed according to the style
and complexity of the buildings; just as there are temples round, or
octagonal, or six sided, or square, or in the form of a cross, and also
various Orders, according to the position and rank of the person who has
the buildings constructed, for when designed by a skilful hand these
exhibit very happily the excellence of the workman and the spirit of the
author of the fabric.
§ 35. _An ideal Palace._
To make the matter clearer, let us here imagine a palace,[149] and this
will give us light on other buildings, so that we may be able to
recognize, when we see them, whether they are well fashioned or no.
First, then, if we consider the principal front, we shall see it raised
from the ground either above a range of outside stairs or basement
walls, so that standing thus freely the building should seem to rise
with grandeur from the ground, while the kitchens and cellars under
ground are more clearly lighted and of greater elevation. This also
greatly protects the edifice from earthquakes and other accidents of
fortune. Then it must represent the body of a man in the whole and
similarly in the parts; and as it has to fear wind, water, and other
natural forces it should be drained with sewers, that must be all in
connection with a central conduit that carries away all the filth and
smells that might generate sickness. In its first aspect the façade
demands beauty and grandeur, and should be divided as is the face of a
man. The door must be low down and in the middle, as in the head the
mouth of the man, through which passes every sort of food; the windows
for the eyes, one on this side, one on that, observing always parity,
that there be as much ornament, and as many arches, columns, pilasters,
niches, jutting windows, or any other sort of enrichment, on this side
as on that; regard being had to the proportions and Orders already
explained, whether Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, or Tuscan. The cornice
which supports the roof must be made proportionate to the façade
according to its size, that rainwater may not drench the façade and him
who is seated at the street front. The projection must be in proportion
to the height and breadth of the façade. Entering within, let the first
vestibule have a great amplitude, and let it be arranged to join
fittingly with the entrance corridor, through which everything passes;
let it be free and wide, so that the press of horses or of crowds on
foot, that often congregate there, shall not do themselves any hurt in
the entrance on fête days or on other brilliant occasions. The
courtyard, representing the trunk, should be square and equal, or else a
square and a half, like all the parts of the body, and within there
should be doors and well-arranged apartments with beautiful decoration.
The public staircase needs to be convenient and easy to ascend, of
spacious width and ample height, but only in accordance with the
proportion of the other parts. Besides all this, the staircases should
be adorned or copiously furnished with lights, and, at least over every
landing-place where there are turns, should have windows or other
apertures. In short, the staircases demand an air of magnificence in
every part, seeing that many people see the stairs and not the rest of
the house. It may be said that they are the arms and legs of the body,
therefore as the arms are at the sides of a man so ought the stairs to
be in the wings of the edifice. Nor shall I omit to say that the height
of the risers ought to be one fifth of a braccio at least,[150] and
every tread two thirds wide,[151] that is, as has been said, in the
stairs of public buildings and in others in proportion; because when
they are steep neither children nor old people can go up them, and they
make the legs ache. This feature is most difficult to place in
buildings, and notwithstanding that it is the most frequented and most
common, it often happens that in order to save the rooms the stairs are
spoiled. It is also necessary that the reception rooms and other
apartments downstairs should form one common hall for the summer, with
chambers to accommodate many persons, while upstairs the parlours and
saloons and the various apartments should all open into the largest one.
In the same manner should be arranged the kitchens and other places,
because if there were not this order and if the whole composition were
broken up, one thing high, another low, this great and that small, it
would represent lame men, halt, distorted, and maimed. Such works would
merit only blame, and no praise whatever. When there are decorated
wall-faces either external or internal, the compositions must follow the
rules of the Orders in the matter of the columns, so that the shafts of
the columns be not too long nor slender, not over thick nor short, but
that the dignity of the several Orders be always observed. Nor should a
heavy capital or base be connected with a slender column, but in
proportion to the body must be the members, that they may have an
elegant and beautiful appearance and design. All these things are best
appreciated by a correct eye, which, if it have discrimination, can hold
the true compasses and estimate exact measurements, because by it alone
shall be awarded praise or blame. And this is enough to have said in a
general sense of architecture, because to speak of it in any other way
is not matter for this place.
NOTES ON ‘INTRODUCTION’ TO ARCHITECTURE
PORPHYRY AND PORPHYRY QUARRIES.
[See § 2, _Of Porphyry_, ante, p. 26.]
Porphyry, which is mineralogically described as consisting of crystals
of plagioclase felspar in a purple felspathic paste, is a very hard
stone of beautiful colour susceptible of a high polish. ‘No material,’
it has been said, ‘can approach it, either in colour, fineness of grain,
hardness or toughness. When used alone its colour is always grand; and
in combination with any other coloured material, although displaying its
nature conspicuously, it is always harmonious’ (_Transactions_, Royal
Institute of British Architects, 1887, p. 48). Though obtained, as
Vasari knew, from Egypt, it was not known to the dynastic Egyptians, but
was exploited with avidity by the Romans of the later imperial period.
The earliest mention of it seems to be in Pliny, _Hist. Nat._, XXXVI,
11, under the name ‘porphyrites’ and statues in the material were
according to this author sent for the first time to Rome from Egypt in
the reign of Claudius. The new material was however not approved of, and
for some time was by no means in fashion. It was not indeed till the age
of the Antonines that as Helbig remarks ‘the preference for costly and
rare varieties of stone, without reference to their adaptability for
sculpture, began to spread.’ After this epoch, the taste for porphyry
and other such strongly marked or else intractable materials grew till
it became a passion, and the Byzantine emperors carried on the tradition
of its use inherited by them from the later days of paganism. The
material was quarried in the mountains known as Djebel Duchan near the
coast of the Red Sea, almost opposite the southern point of the
peninsula of Sinai, and the Romans carried the blocks a distance of
nearly 100 miles to Koptos on the Nile whence they were transported down
stream to Alexandria, where Mr Brindley thinks there would be reserve
dépôts where lapidaries and artists resided, a source of supply for the
large quantities used by Constantine. The same authority estimates that
there must be about 300 monolith porphyry pillars still extant in
Europe, the finest being the eight great columns under the side apses in
S. Sophia, Constantinople. The most important of all porphyry monuments
is the column, 100 feet high, which Constantine erected at
Constantinople where it still stands though somewhat mutilated and
damaged by fire. It consisted in nine cylindrical drums each 11 feet
long and 11 feet in diameter.
The quarries, as Vasari later on remarks, were in his time not known,
and seem never to have been worked since the time of the Romans. The
site of them was visited by Sir Gardner Wilkinson in 1823, and they were
rediscovered by Mr Brindley in 1887. If they are again to be worked, the
material will now be transferred to the Red Sea coast, distant only
about 20 miles. Mr Brindley’s account of his expedition, with notes on
the material, is contained in the _Transactions_ of the Royal Institute
of British Architects for 1888.
THE SASSI, DELLA VALLE, AND OTHER COLLECTIONS OF ANTIQUES OF THE EARLY
PART OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
[See §§ 2, 32, ante, pp. 28, 93.]
In chapters I and VI of the ‘Introduction’ to Architecture Vasari refers
to the ‘casa di Egizio e di Fabio Sasso’ and the ‘casa di messer Egidio
e Fabio Sasso’ ‘in Parione.’ Parione is that one of the 14 wards or
‘rioni’ of Rome that lies to the south of the Piazza Navona, and
according to Gregorovius (_Geschichte der Stadt Rom im Mittelalter_,
Stutt., 1886, etc., III, 537) the name is connected with the Latin
‘parietes,’ ‘walls,’ and was derived from the ruins of the Theatre of
Pompeius, that bulked largely within its borders. There is now a ‘Via
Parione’ to the west of the Piazza Navona, but older plans of near
Vasari’s time show that the name was then applied to the more important
thoroughfare south of the piazza, which is now called ‘Via del Governo
Vecchio.’ The truth is that the present Via Parione should be called, as
marked on older maps, ‘Via di S. Tommaso in Parione,’ beside which
church it runs, and should not have been allowed to usurp the old
historical name.
Among the families noted by Gregorovius as inhabiting this region were
the Sassi, who, he says (VII, 708), possessed there ‘a great palace with
many antiques.’ A notice of the Sassi, in the _Archivio della R. Società
Romana di Storia Patria_, Roma, vol. XX, p. 479, tells us that they were
among the most illustrious families of the ‘rione.’ In 1157 one Giovanni
Sassi was a senator of Rome, and the family was especially flourishing
in the fifteenth century, but later on declined. Branches of the Sassi
stock still exist. When Vasari was in Rome in the service of the
Cardinal Ippolito de’ Medici, about 1530, one branch at any rate of the
family was represented by a certain Fabio Sasso and his brother, whom
Vasari calls ‘Egidius’ but who appears in a document quoted by Lanciani
(_Storia degli Scavi di Roma_, Roma, 1902, I, 177) as ‘Decidius,’ who
possessed the family palace with its antiques, situated a little west of
S. Tommaso in Parione. When Michaelis wrote the paper presently to be
noticed, the exact situation of the palace was not identified, but the
Conte Gnoli, the learned and courteous director of the Biblioteca
Vittorio Emanuele, has pointed out the remains of the Sassi habitation
at No. 48 in the present Via del Governo Vecchio, where an early
Renaissance doorway bears above it the cognizance of the family, and
below on one jamb the syllable ‘DOM’ and on the other ‘SAX’ (Domus
Saxorum). The house in general, which is claimed by legend as the
residence of Raphael’s Fornarina, has been reconstructed. The plan, Fig.
8, is taken from a large map of Rome dating 1748 and shows this
particularly interesting portion of the city as it was before recent
changes. The line of the present Corso Vittorio Emanuele is shown by
dotted strokes.
By the middle of the sixteenth century the family fortunes had declined,
and in his will made in 1556 Fabio records that he had let all his three
houses in Parione. This may account for the fact that no Palazzo Sassi
occurs in the lists of Roman palaces of the seventeenth century.
Furthermore, in 1546 the two brothers effected a sale of their antiques
to the Duke Ottavio Farnese, who transferred them to the then newly
erected Farnese palace. See text of Vasari, ante p. 28, and Lanciani,
l.c.
When Vasari first knew the Sassi collection it was one of the best in
Rome, and Michaelis (_Jahrbuch d. deutschen Archeologischen Instituts_,
1891, p. 170) quotes two writers of the early part of the century who
praise it. Moreover there exists a contemporary drawing of the antiques
and the court in which they were kept, that Michaelis (l.c.) has
published. The early notices just referred to, and the notes of
Aldovrandi (Mauro, _Le Antichità della Città di Roma_, Venet. 1556, p.
147) who saw the works in the Farnese collection in 1550, give
prominence to the two pieces that are specially mentioned by Vasari. The
‘figura a sedere di braccia tre e mezzo’ in porphyry (ante, p. 28) is
described by Aldovrandi (p. 147) as ‘un bellissimo simulacro di una Roma
trionfante assisa,’ partly in porphyry and partly in bronze, and as
having been formerly in the house of Messer Fabio Sasso. The statue has
passed with the Farnese antiques to Naples, where it was numbered when
Michaelis wrote, 212 b. It is now recognized as not a ‘Rome’ but a
seated Apollo fully draped, and is numbered 6281.
The other one of the Sassi antiques mentioned by Vasari is referred to
in the text § 7, ante, p. 42, as ‘una figura in Parione d’ uno
ermafrodito’ in the stone called ‘paragone’ or ‘touchstone.’ This is
also praised by the earlier writers, and is seen in the drawing which
Michaelis has published. Aldovrandi calls it (p. 152) ‘uno Hermafrodito
di paragone, maggiore del naturale’ and notes its provenance. It is the
‘Apollo’ at Naples, No. 6262, and Michaelis gives the material as
basalt. It is noticed by Winckelmann as an Apollo.
The della Valle collection was more important than that of the Sassi,
and was the finest of all those that were being formed in the early part
of the sixteenth century. There is a full notice of it by Michaelis in
the _Jahrbuch_, 1891, p. 218 f., who prints the inventory drawn up at
the time of the sale of the collection in 1584 to Cardinal Ferdinando
de’ Medici, by whom the antiques were removed to the Villa Medici,
whence many of them, including most probably the ‘Medici Venus,’ found
their way to Florence.
[Illustration:
FIG. 8.—Portion of a Plan of Rome, from Nolli, _Nuova Pianta di Roma_,
1748.
607, Palazzo Pamphili Doria.
610, Torre Millina.
615, S. Tommaso in Parione.
620, Piazza Pasquino.
625, Palazzo Massimi.
653, Via di Parione.
783, Piazza della Valle.
794, Palazzo Capranica.
795, Teatro della Valle.
806, Palazzo Medici, or, Madama.
808, S. Luigi dei Francesi.
The dotted portion marks the line of the recent Corso Vittorio
Emanuele. The site of the Sassi Palace, near S. Tommaso, is marked
by a cross.
]
The della Valle were a family of high importance, counting many branches
and numerous houses in that part of Rome, south-east of the Piazza
Navona, where church and piazza and palace and theatre still keep alive
their name. The most important member of the family was Cardinal Andrea
della Valle, one of Leo X’s creations of 1517. Vasari introduced him
into the fresco in the Palazzo Vecchio at Florence representing Leo X
with his Cardinals, that is given as a favourable specimen of Giorgio’s
painting on Plate I. His is the uppermost figure on the extreme right of
the picture. Referring to this fresco, Vasari describes him in his third
‘Ragionamento’ (_Opere_, VIII, 158) as ‘quel cardinale della Valle, che
fece in Roma quello antiquario, e che fu il primo che mettessi insieme
le cose antiche, e le faceva restaurare.’ About the last clause a word
will be said later on.
Lanciani (l.c., I, 123) draws attention to the vast estates, urban and
suburban, possessed by these wealthy proprietors, and the opportunities
thus afforded of obtaining antique treasures for the mere trouble of
digging for them. Nobles who had official charge of the streets and open
places could turn the opportunities of their position to account for the
same purpose, and in the first half of the century lovers of ancient art
did not buy antiques but simply dug for them. Cardinal Andrea, Lanciani
says, ‘era appassionato scavatore,’ and he made excavations in the
Thermae of Agrippa near which his palace lay, and in the vineyards of
the Lateran. Several writers of the early part of the century celebrate
this collection. One (Fichard, in _Frankfurtisches Archiv_, Frankfurt,
1815, III, 68) writes, in 1536, that the Cardinal’s house was the real
treasury of Roman antiquity, and he singles out for notice the same
porphyry wolf about which Vasari writes, ante, p. 28. There were so many
statues there, he says, that you would have thought everything ever
found in Rome had been brought together to that one place! The whole
collections of the family however were divided among three or four
palaces, but Andrea had the lion’s share. He built a new palace for his
treasures early in the century and displayed the best pieces in a court.
There were to be seen a Venus, that was probably the Medicean, and the
Florentine Ganymede, both now in the Uffizi, Nos. 548 and 115, and close
to these above a window the porphyry wolf of which we hear from Vasari.
The present location of this piece is not known, but Michaelis suggests
it might be looked for at the Villa Medici or at Florence. Vasari also
mentions ‘two prisoners bound,’ also of porphyry, as being in the garden
of the palace (ante, p. 29). These are mentioned in the inventory
referred to above (_Jahrbuch_, 229) as ‘two barbarians, draped, of
porphyry, 11 palms high.’ They were transported from the Villa Medici at
Rome to Florence in 1790, and are now very familiar to visitors in
Florence, for they stand just within the Boboli Gardens, one on each
side of the main walk that leads up towards the Amphitheatre. They are
about eight feet high, of porphyry, with heads and hands of white
marble. Two similar figures are to be seen in the Louvre, under the
staircase at the top of which is the Niké from Samothrace.
Della Valle was not content with his fine house and museum, but desired
another which he began to build about 1520. The work was directed by
Lorenzo Lotti (Lorenzetto) a pupil and assistant of Raphael, and Vasari
gives us an account of it in his life of the former artist (_Opere_, IV,
579). In connection with this we have from Vasari an interesting notice
of the beginning of the practice of ‘restoring’ antiques, which from
this period onwards was an established custom. When Lorenzetto, he tells
us, was building for the Cardinal Andrea della Valle the upper garden of
his palace, situated where is now the Teatro della Valle (see Fig. 8),
he arranged niches and other places for the Cardinal’s antiques. ‘These
were imperfect, some wanting a head and others arms, while others again
were legless, and all were in some way mutilated. Nevertheless the
artist managed everything excellently well, for he got good sculptors to
make again everything that was wanting, and this led to other lords
doing the same thing, and having many antique fragments restored. This
was done for example by Cardinals Cesis, Ferrara, and Farnese, and in a
word by all Rome. And in truth these antiques, restored in this fashion,
have a much more pleasing effect than those mutilated torsos, and limbs
without a head, and such-like fragments.’ On the restoration of the
Papal antiques see Note, postea, p. 116.
THE PORPHYRY TAZZA OF THE SALA ROTONDA OF THE VATICAN.
[See § 2, _Of Porphyry_, ante, p. 32.]
Ascanio Colonna, who was brother to the famous Vittoria Colonna the
friend of Michelangelo, was one of the chief representatives of the
imperial interests in Italy, in the stormy times of the first half of
the sixteenth century. Charles V made him in 1520 Grand Constable of
Naples. With Pope Paul III he had a bitter feud, and the Pope seized on
his possessions. On the election in 1550 of Julius III, the new Pope, in
order to please the Emperor, reinstated Ascanio, and it was on the
occasion of this reconciliation that Colonna presented to the Pope the
famous basin of porphyry of which Vasari writes. The ‘vineyard’ for
which the Pope destined it was connected with the casino and villa
outside the Porta del Popolo which bear the name of the Pope and where
is now installed the Villa Papa Giulio Museum. The tazza in question is
the superb bowl that occupies the centre of the Sala Rotonda in the
Vatican Museum. It is said to have been found temp. Julius II, in the
Thermae of Titus (Pistolesi, _Il Vaticano Descritto_, V, 206), and after
remaining for a time at the papal villa it was conveyed by Clement XI to
the Vatican and placed in the court of the Belvedere, now the Cortile
Ottagono. Francesco de’ Ficorini (_Le Vestigia e Rarità di Roma_, Roma,
1744, bk. II, ch. 2, p. 15) says that in this court was the ‘gran conca
di porfido,’ and another of white oriental granite, both found in the
Thermae of Titus. When Clement XIV (1769–75) added the octagonal
colonnade in the interior of the Cortile, the tazza was apparently no
longer needed there, for soon afterwards Pius VI, who with Clement was
the creator of the Museo Pio-Clementino, placed it in his newly
constructed Sala Rotonda, where it remains. Pasquale Massi in his
_Indicazione antiquaria del Ponteficio Museo Pio-Clementino_, 1792, p.
118, speaks of ‘una vastissima tazza di porfido di palmi 62 di
circonferenza tutta massiccia (all of one piece), la quale si trovava
già in Vaticano trasportatavi dalla Villa di Giulio III, fuori di Porta
del Popolo, ed ora squisitamente risarcita.’ This restoration was
completed in 1792 and was no doubt carried out by the same artists whom
Pius VI employed for the repair of the porphyry sarcophagi noticed ante,
p. 27. In this way the work, which Vasari says in the text had to be
left unfinished, was finally accomplished. Cancellieri (_Lettera ...
intorno la maravigliosa Tazza di Porfido_, etc., Roma, 1822) makes the
surprising statement that at one time the tazza had been mended with
pieces of white granite!
[Illustration:
FIG. 9.—Sketch of shape of the large porphyry Tazza in the Sala
Rotonda of the Vatican.
]
The tazza is the largest existing piece of the kind and measures 14 ft.
in diameter. It is shallow and has in the interior the usual projecting
central boss. Independently of this boss the tazza has only one arris,
or in Vasari’s words ‘canto vivo,’ at A in the rough sketch, Fig. 9. A
smaller but more artistically wrought porphyry tazza, beautifully
restored, and measuring 8 ft. 6 in. in diameter, is in the Pitti at
Florence close to the entrance to the passage to the Uffizi. It was a
gift from Clement VII to the Medici, and was brought from Rome (Villa
Medici) to Florence in 1790, where it was repaired in the Tuscan
manufactory of mosaics (Zobi, _Notizie Storiche sull’ Origine e
Progressi dei Lavori di Commesso in Pietre Dure_, Firenze, 1853, p.
118). Both these pieces are superb works, and display the magnificent
qualities of the red Egyptian porphyry to full advantage.
The original purpose of these great basins is not very clear. The
‘conche’ mentioned in the footnote to p. 27, ante, though now used as
sarcophagi, were certainly in their origin baths, but the shallow tazza
would be unsuitable for such a purpose, and moreover the central
ornament would have almost precluded such a use. There seems no sign of
a central opening through which a water pipe could have been introduced,
so that the tazza might serve as the basin of a fountain. Perhaps their
employment was simply ornamental.
FRANCESCO DEL TADDA, AND THE REVIVAL OF SCULPTURE IN PORPHYRY.
[See § 2, _Of Porphyry_, ante, p. 29.]
Vasari does not give a biography of this artist among his _Lives_,
though he more than once refers to him in connection with other
sculptors. There is on the other hand a notice of him and of other
artists of his family in Baldinucci’s _Notizie de’ Professori del
Disegno_, published 1681–1728. Baldinucci knew personally the son of
Francesco, but was so poorly informed about Francesco’s early life that
he makes two persons of him and describes his early career as if it were
that of another Francesco del Tadda. (It is true that there was an
earlier Francesco Ferrucci but he was not called ‘del Tadda’ and he died
before 1500). The commentators on Vasari previous to the Milanesi
edition seem to have been misled by Baldinucci, but in this edition the
mistake is corrected, and a genealogical tree of the whole Ferrucci
family is given in vol. IV, p. 487.
Francesco derived his name ‘del Tadda’ from his grandfather Taddeo
Ferrucci, who belonged to a family of sculptors in Fiesole. In early
life he worked with other sculptors under the orders of Clement VII at
the completion of the chapel of Our Lady of Loretto, and afterwards
assisted Michelangelo in his work in the Sacristy of S. Lorenzo at
Florence. In the Life of Giovanni Agnolo Montorsoli Vasari praises him
as ‘intagliatore excellente’ (_Opere_, VI, 638). The works in porphyry
mentioned in Vasari’s text, ante, p. 32 f., will be noticed presently,
but it may be noted here that del Tadda’s chief work in this material,
executed after Vasari published his _Lives_, was the figure of ‘Justice’
which stands on the granite column in the Piazza di S. Trinità at
Florence. The column, which is 36 ft. high, came from the Baths of
Caracalla at Rome and was presented by Pius IV to Duke Cosimo I.
Among the letters of Vasari published in the eighth volume of the
Milanesi edition is one dated December 18, 1561, to Duke Cosimo, giving
the measurements of this column which was then lying at Rome awaiting
its transport to Florence. The system of measurement is instructive and
has been referred to ante, p. 66 (see _Opere_, VIII, 352). The column
was taken to Florence, occupying a year on its journey, and was erected
in 1565 on the Piazza S. Trinità where it now stands. Cellini
(_Scultura_, ch. 6) says that it is of Elban granite, but it is more
likely to be from Egypt.
Francesco del Tadda received the commission for a porphyry figure to
surmount it, and the work is said to have taken him and his son eleven
years; it is in five or six pieces and about 11 ft. 6 in. high. The
statue was placed in position on June 9, 1581, and the drapery of bronze
was adjusted to it on July 21 (Francesco Settimanni quoted by Zobi, page
105). The figure has been adversely criticized but is a fairly
successful piece of work, considering the difficulties of its execution.
Francesco del Tadda died in 1585 and was buried in the church of S.
Girolamo at Fiesole, where his epitaph signalizes his unique position as
a worker in porphyry ‘cum statuariam in Porphyretico lapide mult. ann.
unicus exerceret,’ and bears his portrait by his own hand in relief in
porphyry on a field of green Prato serpentine.
On the whole subject of work in porphyry, after the early Byzantine
period when the late Roman imperial tradition was still in force, the
following may be noted.
Vasari does not say that the art of working the stone was ever wholly
lost, and mentions, ante, p. 29, the cutting of the stone for use in
inlaid pavements, Cosmati-work, and the like, as may be seen in St.
Mark’s, Venice; at Ravello, and in numberless Roman churches. He also
describes the ‘scabbling’ of the stone by heavy hammers with steel
points to reduce it to even surfaces both rounded and flat (ante, p.
31). Fine examples of the use of the material in mediaeval days, for
purposes other than statuesque, can be seen in the Cathedral of Palermo.
There are there four noble sarcophagi, with canopies supported by
monolithic shafts all in the same stone, dating from the thirteenth
century. They contain the bodies of the Emperor Frederick II, who died
in 1250, and of earlier members of his house, and show that at that time
the artificers of southern Italy and Sicily could deal successfully on a
large scale with this intractable material. Anton Springer, _die
Mittelalterliche Kunst in Palermo_, Bonn, 1869, remarks in this
connection, p. 29, that the Sicilians are to this day specially expert
in the working of hard stones. Porphyry was also used on the original
façade of S. Maria del Fiore at Florence that was demolished in 1588.
Vasari might too have mentioned the porphyry sarcophagus completed in
1472 by Andrea del Verrocchio for the monument of Piero and Giovanni de’
Medici in S. Lorenzo at Florence. The Verrocchio sarcophagus is however
composed only of flat slabs of porphyry, like those round the pulpit in
St. Mark’s, Venice, whereas Vasari is drawing a distinction between this
architectural use of the stone and its employment in figure sculpture,
of which he makes Francesco del Tadda the first restorer.
In regard to this use of porphyry it must not be forgotten that in the
Cabinet of Gems in the Uffizi there is a beautifully executed porphyry
statuette, or rather group, of Venus with Cupid, about ten inches high,
signed in Greek characters with the name of ‘Pietro Maria.’ This was
Pier Maria da Pescia, noticed by Vasari in his life of Valerio Vicentino
and others, as a famous worker in hard stones of the days of Leo X
(_Opere_, V, 370). This however was executed, so Zobi says (p. 97), with
the wheel after the manner of gem engraving, whereas the works of
Ferrucci, of later date, were on the scale of statuary proper.
In connection with the latter we have Vasari’s story of the invention of
Duke Cosimo. This is explained by Galluzzi, (_Istoria del Granducato di
Toscana_, Firenze, 1781, I, 157 f.) who says that Cosimo’s efforts to
exploit the mineral wealth of Tuscany (see postea, p. 120 f.) gave him
an interest in metals, and that he set up a laboratory in his palace,
where he carried on experiments in chemistry and physics. Hence the
discovery of which Vasari writes. Cosimo certainly in his own time had
some personal association with this cutting of porphyry, for Galluzzi
says he used to make presents to his friends of porphyry reliefs
executed with tools tempered by the new process, and quotes (II, 229) a
letter of thanks from a Cardinal to whom a gift of the kind had been
forwarded. On the other hand Cellini, (_Scultura_, ch. 6) makes Tadda
the inventor and ignores Cosimo altogether, while Baldinucci, though,
like Vasari, he was devoted to the Medici, scouts the idea of Cosimo
having had any personal share in the invention of the new tempering
bath, which he ascribes to Tadda alone, and he adduces in support of
this Tadda’s own testament, in which are the words _Franciscus de
Fesulis sculptor porfidi, et ipse inventor, seu renovator talis
sculpturae, et artis porfidorum incidendi_. Cosimo’s participation in
the discovery, whatever it was, can hardly have been ascribed to him
without some small foundation in fact, and Aurelio Gotti, _Le Gallerie e
I Musei di Firenze_, 2nd Ed., Firenze, 1875, p. 45, gives credit for it
to the Duke.
However this may be, Tadda appears to have used the new process for the
first time in the production of the tazza for the fountain in the
cortile of the Palazzo Vecchio, and to have advanced from this to the
more artistic work Vasari goes on to describe. Endeavours to discover
the present habitat of the oval portraits of the Medici and the Head of
Christ, referred to by Vasari, ante, p. 33, have led to the following
result. Signor Supino, the Director of the National Museum at Florence,
courteously informed us that the portraits of Cosimo _Pater Patriae_, of
Leo X, and of Clement VII, with one of Giovanni de’ Bicci, were
preserved in the magazines of the Bargello, where he has kindly allowed
one of us to photograph them. The head of Cosimo has on the chamfer of
the bust the inscription OPA DI FRANC^O DA FIESOLE, which identifies it
with certainty as the work of Tadda of which Vasari writes. The others
are treated in the same fashion, and all are mounted on flat oval slabs
of green serpentine of Prato. They are no doubt all by the same hand.
They were formerly in the Uffizi but have been for many years in the
Bargello, and their historical and artistic interest would certainly
vindicate for them more honourable treatment than at present is their
lot. Plates III and V give the Cosimo _Pater Patriae_ portrait and that
of Leo X. They measure about 19 in. by 14 in.
With regard to the other examples noticed by Vasari, Zobi, l.c., p. 108,
informed his readers that the two ovals of Duke Cosimo I and his wife
the Duchess Leonora were at that time (about 1850) in the Pitti ‘on the
wall of the vestibule in the part called Meridiana,’ but he complicates
matters by announcing the same about the head of the older Cosimo, which
we have just found at the Bargello, and which Gotti says, l.c., p. 46,
was originally in the Villa of Poggio Imperiale whence it was conveyed
in 1862 to the Uffizi. Zobi’s words are subjoined in the original. ‘Ed i
ritratti in profilo del duca Cosimo I, d’ Eleonora di Toledo sua moglie,
e di Cosimo appellato il _padre della patria_, scolpiti a mezzo rilievo
e rapportati sul fondo di serpentino, si trovano oggidì situati insieme
con altri ritratti parimente porfiretici, sulle pareti del vestibolo al
quartiere detto della _Meridiana_ nel palazzo regale.’
The part of the Pitti referred to is on the second floor of the palace
and receives its name from a meridian line in brass marked on the floor
on which, at the psychological moment, the sun shines through a hole in
the roof. Here, through the courtesy of Signor Cornish the Conservator
of the Royal Palace, we have seen no fewer than seven oval portraits in
porphyry mounted on serpentine that are built into the wall in
situations which make their study rather difficult. Among them the
marked features of Duke Cosimo are not apparent, but on one of them is
the inscription, ‘Ferdinandus Magnus Dux Etr. 1609,’ and on another the
name and date of Christina, Duchess of Tuscany, 1669. This all bears out
what Baldinucci tells us, that the Ferrucci family in general put their
hands to this particular class of work, which was their speciality, just
as the glazed terra-cottas were specialities of the della Robbia, while
they also adopted into the circle pupils from outside. Zobi, p. 109,
quotes an old inventory of 1574, the date of the death of Duke Cosimo I,
which mentions ten such portraits of members of the family as at that
time existing, all mounted on serpentine. Later on, Baldinucci mentions
three sons of Francesco, to one of whom, Romolo, he is supposed to have
left his ‘secret.’ There was however also an Andrea Ferrucci, and a
Mattias Ferrucci, who if they lacked the pretended ‘secret’ at any rate
did the same work, and finally one Raffaello Curradi, a pupil of Andrea,
who in 1636 abandoned sculpture and took the Franciscan habit. According
to Zobi, p. 116, he was the last of the porphyry sculptors, and ‘dopo
quest’ epoca affatto s’ ignora se furono prodotte altre opere porfiree.’
In view of the date 1669 on one of the ovals in the Pitti, this should
not perhaps be taken too absolutely. That porphyry has been worked
successfully at Florence at later dates, the admirable restoration of
the porphyry tazza in the Pitti, mentioned ante, p. 109, and other more
recent productions noted by Zobi, sufficiently show.
[Illustration:
PLATE V
PORTRAIT IN PORPHYRY OF LEO X
BY FRANCESCO DEL TADDA
]
If we add to the series of ovals the various porphyry busts of members
of the Medici house, exhibited in the outer vestibule of the Uffizi and
other places, there would be enough porphyry versions of the Medici to
furnish material for a monograph.
With regard finally to the ‘Head of Christ’ which Vasari says was taken
to Rome and much admired by Michelangelo, the original seems to be lost,
but Zobi states, p. 95, that in his time a scion of the Ferrucci family,
living at Lugo in the Province of Ravenna, possessed a head of Christ in
porphyry signed MATHIAS FERRUCCEUS CIVIS FLORENTINUS FECIT, and he
thinks this may have been copied from the original by Francesco del
Tadda, of which there is question in Vasari’s text.
THE CORTILE OF THE BELVEDERE IN THE VATICAN, IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
[See § 4, _Of Cipollaccio_, ante, p. 36.]
The history of this famous Cortile forms the subject of an elaborate
paper by Professor Adolf Michaelis in the _Jahrbuch_ of the German
Archaeological Institute for 1890. It has been described as ‘the most
noteworthy place of art in all Italy or rather in the world,’ as it was
the first home of the nascent collection of antique statues formed by
successive Popes from the beginning of the sixteenth century, that has
grown into the Vatican museum of sculpture. It must be remembered that
the octagonal portico which now surrounds the Cortile is a later
addition of the last part of the eighteenth century, and when Vasari
knew it, about 1530, in the pontificate of Clement VII, it was laid out
as a garden of orange trees, with niches by Bramante in the four corners
and in the middle of the sides. In these niches and on pedestals in the
court were displayed notable antiques, such as the ‘Laocoon,’ the ‘Nile’
now in the Braccio Nuovo, the ‘Tiber’ now in the Louvre, the ‘Torso,’
the ‘Cleopatra,’ two Venuses, the ‘Apollo Belvedere,’ and others. This
was a favourite resort of Clement, who used to walk here in the mornings
reading his breviary, and listened in the evenings to music made for him
by Benvenuto Cellini and others (Cellini, _Autobiography_, transl.,
Lond., 1878, p. 42). Here too he consulted with Michelangelo in 1532 on
the question of the restoration of the antiques, and Michelangelo
recommended to him for the purpose the youthful sculptor Fra Giovann’
Agnolo Montorsoli, whom the Pope installed in the Belvedere to carry out
the work (see ante, p. 107). Among the features of the court were
fountains in some of the niches, on which were statues. The ‘Cleopatra’
of the Vatican was one of these, and Clement seems to have desired to
make a second fountain corresponding to that of the Cleopatra, to be
adorned by the river god Tigris. The ‘Tigris,’ which is now in the Sala
a Croce Greca, is said to have been restored by the august hands of
Michelangelo himself, and it was for the installation of the ‘Tigris’
that Buonarotti designed the fountain of which Vasari writes. Vasari’s
account, which had escaped the notice of Michaelis, is our only
authority for this work by Michelangelo, which is not, so far as the
present writers can discover, mentioned in any of the numerous ‘Lives’
of the artist. There is a drawing of the fountain by Heemskerck,
reproduced by Michaelis, but this only gives the figure, and not the
decorative treatment of the niche, which is the point of interest as a
_parergon_ by Michelangelo. The situation of the ‘Tigris’ fountain was
in the corner where is now the Cabinet of the Laocoon. (Michaelis l.c.,
and Plans and Drawings of the Vatican in the King’s Library at
Bloomsbury. Of older writers Bonanni, _Numismata Summorum Pontificum
Templi Vaticani Fabricam Indicantia_, Roma, 1696, is praised by Lanciani
as the most useful and trustworthy).
PARAGON (TOUCHSTONE) AND OTHER STONES ASSOCIATED WITH IT BY VASARI.
[See § 7, _Of Paragon_, ante, p. 42.]
There are at least six different kinds of stone referred to in this
section, and for convenience they are lettered in the text (a) (b) etc.
(a) There is a stone specially suited for the process of testing the
precious metals in the way Vasari describes. It is called in various
tongues ‘touchstone,’ ‘pierre de touche,’ ‘Probirstein,’ ‘pietra di
paragone,’ ‘basanite’ from Greek βάσανος, a test, and in Latin ‘Lapis
Lydius’ from the reason that it was found in Lydia. According to
Theophrastus, Περὶ Λίθων, § 35, and Pliny, _Hist. Nat._, XXXIII, 8, it
was only found in small nodules, and this agrees with the character of
the stone. It is described by Professor Bonney as a ‘silicified
argillite,’ that is to say a clayey sedimentary stone largely
impregnated with silica, and, as used by the modern jeweller and
goldsmith, it is in appearance and texture an extremely hard stone of
very fine grain and of a velvet blackness, the colour being due to the
presence of carbonaceous elements. Small lumps of fine texture are found
embedded in a coarser matrix. It has no mystic power of testing metals.
The piece of metal to be essayed is simply rubbed on the stone and the
mark scrutinized, or compared as regards colour with marks from similar
rubbings of metal pins of known composition. A piece of the stone,
showing some marks of the kind, is given as I on the Frontispiece. For
the above purpose any hard, fine-grained, compact stone of a dark colour
will serve, and black jasper Wedgewood-ware answers the demand as well
as a natural stone. The small portion of the metal rubbed off as above
may however be tested more searchingly by the application of acid, and
for this to be practicable the stone must not be a limestone, which
would be at once attacked by the acid and confuse the test.
(b) The ‘other variety with a different grain and colour,’ of which
Egyptian sphinxes were made, must be basalt (or diorite) in which
material the statue which Vasari calls the ‘hermaphrodite in Parione’ is
actually cut. A fine-grained basalt would serve well enough as a
touchstone, though it is not the true material.
(c) There appears to be a kind of granitic stone, which Mr Brindley
calls ‘an augite variety of green granite found alongside the Prato
serpentine’ (for which see below) found near Prato (Repetti, art. ‘Monte
Ferrato,’ writes of a ‘granito di Prato’ or ‘granitone di Figline’), but
the stone that Vasari goes on to describe (d) as used for sarcophagi, is
of another composition altogether. This is a black or grey limestone
that used to be abundantly employed as the setting for Florentine
mosaics, and is still used for such purposes as inlaid letters, etc., in
white marble. P, as above, shows a piece cut for such use. It is however
liable to white or light-grey veins, and is now supplanted at the
Florentine mosaic manufactory by a black marble or limestone imported
from Belgium. The sarcophagus of Piero Soderini, behind the high altar
in the church of the Carmine at Florence is in a grey limestone much
traversed by lighter veins. Such a stone could not be suitably used as a
touchstone, as in the first place it is not hard enough, and, in the
second, would not admit of the use of the acid test. The name ‘paragone’
is however very commonly applied to it. The ‘canopy of Prato touchstone’
is mentioned by other writers beside Vasari, but is no more to be seen
and may have perished in the Carmine fire.
(e) Here again we have a quite different stone, though one very well
known and in common use. The dark stone which occurs in bands on Tuscan
buildings in Florence and elsewhere is known as ‘Verde di Prato’ and is
a species of (true) serpentine, very dark in hue and often seeming
purplish or puce-coloured rather than green. It would be too soft to
make a good touchstone, and is disposed to disintegrate when exposed to
severe climatic conditions. Thus on the façade of S. Miniato a Monte on
the hill facing the north it is far more weathered than on the Duomo or
Campanile below. For the quarries of it and its use see the Note,
postea, p. 127. E, as above, shows a characteristic piece kindly lent
from his collection by Professor Bonney.
(f) Lastly there is the red marble used in bands on the Campanile and
Duomo. For this also see the Note p. 128.
TUSCAN MARBLE QUARRIES.
[See §§ 5, 9, 97, 99, etc.]
The best work on the subject of Italian stones is that by Jervis, _I
Tesori Sotterranei dell’ Italia_, Torino, 1889, and a considerable
amount of information is contained in the local articles in E. Repetti’s
_Dizionario geographico, etc., della Toscana_, Firenze, 1839, and also
in the Official Catalogue of the Italian section in the London
International Exhibition of 1862. In connection with investigations
which we have had to make on all this subject of the stones, we have to
acknowledge with all gratitude the expert aid kindly afforded by
Professors Bonney of Cambridge and Geikie of Edinburgh, as well as the
valuable local assistance and information kindly given to us by
Professor Enrico Bonanni of Carrara and the representatives of the firm
Henraux et Cie of Seravezza, the owners of the Monte Altissimo quarries
presently to be mentioned. From both these sources we have obtained
knowledge which we could not otherwise have compassed, and we desire
again to express our obligations to Mr W. Brindley, who is as well known
in the Carrara district as in London, and who gave us these
introductions as well as much technical information.
The quarries mentioned by Vasari are named in the accompanying table,
where there are also indications of the kinds of stone he signalizes as
their products. It must of course be understood that extensive quarries
generally produce more than one kind of stone, as Vasari notes in the
case of the Carrara quarries in § 9, and again in ‘Painting’ § 97, where
he speaks of variegated marbles alternating with the white.
The principal deposits of marble are those in the Carrara district, in
the mountains called the Apuan Alps near the sea coast between Pisa and
Spezia. The marbles of the district have been exploited since the time
of the Romans, under the name of marbles of Luna or Luni. The site of
the Etrusco-Roman town of Luni is a little south of the railway line,
about half way between Avenza-Carrara and Sarzana, and traces of the
Roman workings are observable in many of the present quarries. The
industry received a notable impulse at the great artistic epoch of the
Renaissance. Duke Cosimo de’ Medici gave considerable attention to the
exploitation of this form of mineral wealth, as was also the case with
the metal-producing mines (ante, p. 112). He opened new quarries in the
Pietrasanta district of the Apuan Alps, and also gave special attention
to the quarries in the Pisan Mountains, between Pisa and Lucca, and to
facilitating the transport of the material from the hills to the former
town.
The special quarries of which the town of Carrara is the centre and
dépôt are the oldest and the most prolific, and a useful local guide to
Carrara gives a long list of the effective ones in their different
groups, with their respective products. Of these, that which has
furnished the finest statuary marble in the largest blocks is the quarry
of Polvaccio, in the Ravaccione valley under Monte Sagro, one of the
culminating points of the ridge of the Apuan Alps. See the sketch map,
Fig. 10. Vasari (ante, p. 46) specially praises the Polvaccio marbles,
as being free from the veins and flaws so tiresome to the sculptor.
There are now other localities in the district that furnish as good
pieces as Polvaccio.
There is another important centre a little to the south-east, that is of
more interest in the present connection. This is Pietrasanta, which is
the emporium for the quarries of Seravezza several times mentioned by
Vasari, and those of Stazzema, a little further up among the hills.
The Seravezza district is quite apart from that of Carrara, and the
little town in question nestles in the folds of the ridges that descend
from Monte Altissimo, the culminating point next to the south from Monte
Sagro, both peaks being between 5 and 6,000 feet high. Both districts
are rich in memories of Michelangelo. About his work at Carrara there is
more than one published treatise, as for example Carlo Frediani’s
_Ragionamento Storico_, 2nd Ed., Siena, 1875, while in connection with
his proceedings at Seravezza, and especially the identification of
localities mentioned in his correspondence and memoranda, MM. Henraux
have furnished us with some first-hand information. Both at Carrara and
at Pietrasanta inscriptions indicate houses where he lodged on his
visits to the localities. Carrara was his first love, and when charged
by Leo X in 1516 with the work at S. Lorenzo at Florence he betook
himself thither for marbles. Vasari, in his Life of Michelangelo,
_Opere_, ed. Milanesi, VII, 189, tells us how while he was there he
received a letter from the Pope bidding him turn his attention rather to
the Seravezza district, which was actually in Tuscan territory, whereas
Carrara was in the principality of Massa-Carrara, and at the time under
the rule of the Marchese Alberigo, who was Michelangelo’s friend.
[Illustration:
FIG. 10.—Sketch map of the marble-producing districts of the Apuan
Alps.
]
Repetti has published documents of the year 1515, which show that at
that date the Commune of Seravezza resolved to make a donation to the
Florentine people of the right to quarry in the cliffs of Monte
Altissimo, in which it is said, ‘there are supposed to be mines and
quarries of marble’ (_in quibus dicitur esse cava et mineria pro
marmoribus cavendis_), and also of the ground necessary for making a
road for transport. This was the cause of the Pope’s orders to
Michelangelo, which Vasari says he obeyed with great reluctance. In the
invaluable ‘Contratti’ and ‘Ricordi,’ which G. Milanesi has printed in
his volume of Michelangelo’s _Lettere_ (Firenze, 1875), we find
Buonarroti in 1516–7 at Carrara, getting material from the Polvaccio
quarry, but at the beginning of 1518 he notes (_Lettere_, p. 566)
‘_Andai a cavare a Pietra Santa e fecivi l’avviamento_ (the start) _che
oggi si vede fatto_,’ and from this time his chief work was beneath the
wild cliffs of Monte Altissimo (ibid., p. 573 f.). A memorandum of a
later date (_Lettere_, p. 580) thus worded, ‘_a dì circa venticinque di
febraio nel mille cinquecento diciassette_ (our 1518) _... non mi
possendo servire a Carrara di detti marmi, mi missi a fare cavare nelle
montagnie di Seraveza, villa di Pietra Santa, dove inanzi non era mai
più stato cavato_,’ shows that this was pioneer work. The contract made
at Pietrasanta on March 15, 1518, for the work of quarrying (_Lettere_,
p. 673) indicates that the locality was the gorge of the Serra, which
runs up northward from Seravezza to the heart of the mountains. Two
localities are mentioned, one, ‘Finochiaia sive Transvaserra,’ and
another opposite to this, ‘dirimpetto et riscontro,’ called ‘alla
Cappella.’ The first place is now called ‘Trambiserra,’ and will be seen
on the sketch map on the west of the gorge with ‘la Cappella’ over
against it on the east. Another contract of April 14 in the same year
mentions quarrying projected ‘a l’ Altissimo’ in a locality called ‘a la
Piastra di verso Strettoia sive Antognia.’ There is a Strettoia on the
lower hills west of Seravezza, but that the operations in question were
really higher up the gorge among the very cliffs of Monte Altissimo is
proved by a letter of later date from Vincenzio Danti to Duke Francesco
de’ Medici (July 2, 1568; Gaye, _Carteggio_, III, 254), who reports that
he examined the old workings and road of Michelangelo ‘al Altissimo,’
and mentions various localities, ‘la Polla,’ ‘Costa dei Cani,’ etc., the
sites of which are at the head of the valley as shown on the map. ‘La
Polla’ means the water-head. Moreover, in a letter from Seravezza dated
August, 1518, _Lettere_, p. 394, Michelangelo speaks of the road for the
transport of the marbles as being nearly finished, though in three
places rocks had still to be cut away. The places are ‘a Rimagno,’ ‘poco
passato Rimagno per andare a Seraveza,’ and ‘a l’ ultime case di
Seravezza, andando verso la Corvara.’ The places are marked on the
sketch map. Marbles from any part of the upper gorge of the Serra would
have to be brought past Rimagno on their way down, and we therefore see
that Michelangelo exploited to some extent the actual marbles of the
Altissimo, which for the last half century have furnished the very
finest and most costly statuary marble of the whole Apuan Alps, Mr
Brindley says, of the whole world. The existing quarries are under the
serrated peaks of Monte Altissimo, at an elevation of some 3 to 4,000
feet, and the marbles are now brought down in trolleys sliding along a
rope stretched across the valley and mounting to the highest levels. It
is believed locally that the workings called ‘Vincarella’ are some of
the first opened by Michelangelo, and from somewhere at any rate among
these cliffs, in the latter part of 1518, by the agency of some skilled
workmen who had been sent from Settignano as well as local hands, and by
means of ropes and windlasses and sledges, Michelangelo was letting down
a column, which however fell and was broken.
A letter from Seravezza of April 20, 1519, _Lettere_, p. 403, gives
details of the accident, which was due to the fracture of a defective
ring of iron, and he says, ‘Siàno stati a un grandissimo pericolo della
vita tutti che eravamo attorno: e èssi guasto una mirabil pietra.’ No
wonder he records in a memorandum that he subsequently left Pietrasanta
ill, and that he exclaims in a postscript to a letter of April 1518,
_Lettere_, p. 138, ‘Oh, cursed a thousand times be the day and the hour
when I quitted Carrara!’
The Monte Altissimo quarries are situated in a scene that to us to-day
is sufficiently wild, though the modern lover of the mountains finds it
full of an austere beauty. To Michelangelo, who was fretting at his
enforced loss of time and in no mood to surrender himself to the
influences of nature, it was a savage and inhospitable country. He
writes from Seravezza to Florence in August 1518, (_Lettere_, p. 394),
‘The place where we have to quarry here is very rugged (_molto aspro_),
and the men are very unskilled in such work: nevertheless we must have
much patience for several months till the mountains are tamed and the
men are instructed. Afterwards we shall go on more quickly: it is enough
that what I have promised, that will I at all costs perform, and I will
do the finest work that has ever yet been accomplished in Italy, if God
be my aid!’ As a fact it was 1521 before the first column for the façade
of S. Lorenzo arrived in Florence, the rest, as Vasari says, (ante, p.
47 and _Opere_, VII, p. 190) remained in the quarries or by the
seashore, and the ‘finest work’ was never even begun. MM. Henraux state
that they know of no traces of the columns said to have been left thus
‘on the sea shore’ (by Forte dei Marmi) but they possess a piece of a
fractured column found near the site of Michelangelo’s supposed workings
at ‘la Polla.’
At the death of Pope Leo nothing had been accomplished but the
foundations of the façade, and the transport of a great column from
Seravezza to the Piazza di S. Lorenzo! For nearly thirty years after
this time the quarries of this district were almost deserted, and the
roads which Michelangelo had begun were not completed.
At a later period however Duke Cosimo I paid special attention to the
quarries of the Seravezza region, and had a casino or summer residence
built here for himself by Ammanati, now termed ‘Il Palazzo,’ and the
residence of the Mayor. A commissioner was established at Pietrasanta as
the metropolis of the district, to supervise the workings. In the
‘Introduction’ to Painting at Chapter XVI, § 99, postea, p. 261, Vasari
gives us an interesting notice of the opening of some new quarries in
1563 near the village of Stazzema, which lies behind the mountains which
overhang Pietrasanta, and is approached from Seravezza up the Versiglia,
or the gorge of the river Vezza. The road, of which he speaks in this
place (p. 261) as in course of making, he mentions in some of his
letters of 1564, and also in the Life of Michelangelo, but he gives no
indication of its course. It was probably the road from Seravezza across
the marsh-land to the sea, a more troublesome affair than roads along
mountain valleys.
As regards the products of all these quarries of the Apuan Alps,
statuary marble occurs as we have seen in many places, and it is found,
where it occurs, in compact masses or nodules embedded in and flanked by
marbles impure in colour and streaked and variegated in divers fashions.
A vast amount of the marble quarried in the hills is what the quarrymen
call ‘Ordinario,’ and is of a grey hue and often streaked with veins,
which when well marked give it a new value as ‘fiorito,’ or ‘flowered.’
Of a more decided grey is the prized marble called ‘Bardiglio,’ which is
the kind furnished by the ‘alla Cappella’ quarries. Bardiglio again may
be ‘fiorito.’ These correspond to the ‘three sorts of marble that come
from the mountains of Carrara’ of which Vasari writes in § 97, postea,
p. 259, ‘one of which is of a pure and dazzling white, the other not
white but of a livid hue, while the third is a grey marble (_marmo
bigio_) of a silvery tint.’ The white and the grey are shown in the
coloured drawing at J and K.
More decidedly variegated are the marbles known as ‘Mischi’ or
‘Breccias,’ and of these the Stazzema quarries yield the chief supply.
The ‘Mischio di Seravezza’ of which Vasari writes in a letter, Gaye,
III, 164, was from this locality, and so too the ‘Mischi’ mentioned in
§§ 5, 9, ante, pp. 37, 45, of which some are ‘Mischiati di rosso.’ C and
D as above show characteristic specimens of Breccias of Stazzema.
Repetti, art. ‘Stazzema,’ says that the ‘Bardigli fioriti’ and Breccias
of Stazzema are generally known as ‘Mischi da Seravezza.’
It should be mentioned that Massa, between Carrara and Pietrasanta, is
also a quarry centre of importance.
Leaving the Apuan Alps, the next marble-producing locality we come to on
descending the coast is that of the Monti Pisani, the range of hills
separating the territories of Pisa and Lucca. Monte S. Giuliano is on
the road between the two cities, and there are quarries near Bagni S.
Giuliano about six kilometres from Pisa. It will be seen that Vasari
(ante, p. 50) speaks favourably of this marble, and Mr W. Brindley
thinks this notice in Vasari is of special interest, as he reports of
this marble that ‘for durability and delicate honey-tint it is superior
to Carrara.’ The local term ‘ceroide’ ‘wax-like’ used for this stone
conveys the same idea. It was used at Lucca as well as on Pisan
buildings. From the same quarries come red and veined marbles and
Breccias and ‘Mischi’ (Torelli, _Statistica della Provincia di Pisa_,
Pisa, 1863).
The exploitation of these marbles was rendered difficult at Pisa by the
marshy nature of the ground at the foot of the hills which impeded
transport, and Duke Cosimo set himself to find a remedy. He took up the
question of drainage and regulation of watercourses in what is called
the ‘pianura di Pisa,’ and among the forty medals struck to celebrate
his various achievements were some for ‘Clima Pisano Risanato.’ In 1545
an ‘Uffizio dei fossi’ was constituted, and the modern hydraulic system
which has done so much to benefit this region, dates from these measures
of Cosimo. Vasari, § 11, ante, p. 50, speaks of a river ‘Osoli’ the
course of which was straightened and confined. This is probably a
mistake for ‘Oseri’ or ‘Osari,’ names applying to one of the small
streams close to Pisa in the direction of the quarries. Targioni
Tozzetti in his _Viaggi in Toscana_ has a long discussion on this river,
the Auser of the ancients, for which he gives the modern equivalents
‘Oseri,’ or ‘Osoli’ (the latter probably derived from this passage in
Vasari). There is a ‘Fossa dell’ Oseretto’ to the west of the city.
These straightened watercourses facilitated the transport of the stone
in barges.
Continuing southwards along the coast we come to some marble quarries
mentioned by Vasari on the promontory of Piombino, opposite the island
of Elba. The locality Vasari names is Campiglia (§ 10, ante, p. 50) but
the whole of Monte Calvi above that town is marble-bearing, and the
products were said to be as good in quality as those of the Carrara
district (Torelli, l.c., p. xc). Vasari says that the Campiglia marbles
are excellent for building purposes, and Repetti asserts that in the
fifteenth century, for the cupola of S. Maria del Fiore, more marble was
used from this region than from Carrara itself. The ancient reputation
of the district is not however now maintained.
Hitherto all the marbles used for building purposes that Vasari has
mentioned have been white or variegated, but everyone who has visited
the Tuscan cities knows that the decorative effect of the buildings
depends on the juxtaposition of bands of white and of black, or at any
rate, dark marble, with occasional bands of red. The dark marbles come
chiefly from the neighbourhood of Prato, and this introduces us to a
group of inland quarries within a few miles of Florence to the north and
also to the south and east. Vasari does not say much about this dark
stone, which was however of the utmost importance in Tuscan
architecture. It is commonly called Prato Serpentine, or ‘Verde di
Prato,’ and the quarries at Monte Ferrato, by Figline, three miles north
of Prato, produce it of the finest quality. The Figline quarries are
reported on by Professor Bonney in a paper on ‘Ligurian and Tuscan
Serpentines’ in the _Geological Magazine_ for 1879. He has kindly lent
us the specimen from the quarry figured as E on the Frontispiece. This
stone is of a deep green colour, tending sometimes towards a purple or
puce tint. Stone of much the same character is found, as Vasari states,
near the Impruneta, six or seven miles east of Florence. It is this
Prato Serpentine that has been so largely used from the twelfth century
to the fifteenth in Tuscany for alternating with the white marbles in
the incrustation of façades. There are deposits of the same stone in the
Pisan mountains. The same stone was sometimes used for decorative stone
work in connection with sepulchral monuments. According to Vasari
however, ante, p. 42 f., it was the ‘paragone’ or dark limestone of
Prato that was chiefly employed for this purpose.
If Vasari’s information about this important stone, and his interest in
it, seem scanty, it must be borne in mind that it was a mediaeval
material rather than a Renaissance one. We find it on the churches and
bell towers and baptistries of the twelfth and following centuries, but
not on the palaces of the fifteenth and sixteenth. Hence the stone was
not so interesting in Vasari’s eyes as it is in ours.
Finally, the red stone seen in bands on the Duomo and the Campanile at
Florence, that Vasari calls ‘marmo rosso’ (ante, p. 43), is not fully
crystalline and is rather a limestone than a marble. It is deep red when
quarried, but on the buildings has bleached to a pinky hue from exposure
to the air. It is apt to scale, but this is partly due to its not being
laid on its proper bed. The specimens F F on the coloured plate show the
smoothed external surface bleached light by exposure. We are informed by
Signor Cellerini, the experienced _capomaestro_ of the Opera del Duomo
at Florence, that in old time this stone was quarried at Monsummano, at
the northern extremity of the Monte Albano not far from Pistoja. A more
modern source of supply is the Tuscan Maremma, where the stone, called
‘Porta Santa,’ is quarried between Pisa and Grosseto, near Gavorrano.
From this place the stone has been brought for recent use on the new
façade of the Duomo at Florence.
Other Tuscan marbles, such as those of Siena, that are not referred to
by Vasari, are not noticed in this place.
THE ROUND TEMPLE ON THE PIAZZA S. LUIGI DEI FRANCESI, AND ‘MAESTRO
GIAN.’
[See § 12, _Of Travertine_, ante, p. 51 f.]
It is surprising that practically nothing appears to be known, either
about the French sculptor mentioned here, ‘Maestro Gian’ (or Jean), or
about the French wood carver of the same name called by Vasari ‘Maestro
Janni,’ who is referred to at the close of the ‘Introduction’ to
Sculpture, postea, p. 174. Equally strange is it that their works, which
Vasari describes in terms of high praise, and which are in public view
in Rome and in Florence, do not seem to have attracted attention among
students either of French art or of Italian. The standard older book on
French artists abroad, Dussieux, _Les Artistes Français à l’Étranger_,
Paris, 1856, takes no note of either of them, nor are they referred to
in Bérard’s _Dictionnaire Biographique des Artistes Français du XII au
XVII Siècle_, Paris, 1872. In the more recent Italian work however by A.
Bertolotti, _Artisti Francesi in Roma nei Secoli XV, XVI, e XVII_,
Mantova, 1886, there is a mention on p. 220 of ‘un Giovanni Chavenier,
che forse disegno quel tempio tondo, attribuito dal Vasari all’
architetto Jean,’ and on p. 24 it is said that ‘Giovanni Chiavier, o
Chavenier, di Rouen lavorò pel Governo pontificio e morì a Roma nel
1527.’ Bertolotti unfortunately gives no references to his authorities,
while the work of Müntz, _Les Arts à la Cour des Papes_ breaks off
before the sixteenth century, and gives no help.
LIST OF TUSCAN MARBLE QUARRIES WITH THEIR PRODUCTS, AS FAR AS THESE ARE
MENTIONED BY VASARI.
[§§. 5–11 and §§ 97–99.]
The reference to pages is to the present volume, the capital letters
refer to the coloured drawing of the stones on the Frontispiece.
Names in square brackets do not actually occur in Vasari.
DISTRICT. CHIEF PLACE. QUARRIES. PRODUCTS.
[Apuan Alps] Carrara Carrara in Breccias (p. 37 f.)
general (C.D.)
Monti di Luni [Bardigli] (p. 45)
(K.)
Garfagnana Paragone (p. 42)
(P.)
White Statuary (p. 45)
Black „
‘Saligni’ „
‘Campanini’ „
Mischiati „
Cippollino (pp. 36,
49) (H.)
Best Statuary
„ Polvaccio Marble in (p. 46)
largest blocks
„ Pietrasanta [Monte Columns for S. (p. 46)
Altissimo, Lorenzo
Alla ‘Campanini,’
Seravezza Cappella, ‘Saligni,’ (p. 50)
etc.] coarse marbles
Statuary Marble (p. 261)
Stazzema (not now (C.D.)
obtained)
Mischi (Breccias)
Fine White
[Monti Pisani] Pisa Monte S. Marble, used on (p. 50)
Giuliano Duomo &
Campo-Santo
[Tuscan Gavorrano [Caldana di [Red Limestone]
Maremma] Ravi]
[Promontory Coarse Marbles,
opposite [Piombino] Campiglia suited for (p. 50)
Elba] building
Red Marble (p. 43)
[Monte Albano] [Pistoja] [Monsummano] (limestone) on (F.)
Duomo, Florence
Neighbourhood [Monte Marmo Nero [Verde (p. 43)
of Florence, Prato Ferrato, di Prato] on (E.)
Figline] Duomo, Florence
North „ „ „ „
3 m. N. of Paragone (p. 42)
Prato (limestone) for (P.)
monuments
East Impruneta
7 m. E. of Breccias (p. 37)
Florence
Monte Rantoli
between S. Giusto or
South valleys of [Monte Breccias (p. 37)
Ema and Martiri]
Greve
In the course of our inquiries we communicated with the Director of the
Biblioteca Vittorio Emmanuele at Rome, Commendatore Conte Gnoli, who
kindly gave attention to the subject, and contributed to the _Giornale
d’ Italia_ of Dec. 24, 1906, an interesting article, in which, though he
could give no account of Maestro Gian, he described fully the extant
works of which Vasari writes, and made some pertinent suggestions as to
the ‘round temple.’ He thinks it unlikely that the building of a
circular church from the foundations was contemplated by the French, and
suggests that they were utilizing the foundations of a round chamber
belonging to the Thermae of Nero which were in that neighbourhood, so
that the ‘round temple’ would have been like the present S. Bernardo in
the Thermae of Diocletian. M. Marcel Reymond has suggested that it was
the sack of Rome in 1527 that led to the abandonment of the project—for
the date of the undertaking can be fixed in the reign of François I of
France, who came to the throne in 1515, from the fact that his
cognizance, the salamander, occurs in the sculpture prepared for its
embellishment. If the artist be really Bertolotti’s ‘Chavenier,’ as he
died in 1527, this fact would also explain the abandonment.
The sculptures in question are in part incrusted in the façade of the
present church of S. Luigi (see ante, p. 52) and the fact that some of
them are carved on curved surfaces shows at once that they were prepared
for a building of cylindrical form. There are two large salamanders in
round frames of which one is shown on Plate VI, and two panels higher up
in the façade with the curious device of an eagle with the head of a
woman and outspread wings from which depend by ribbons on each side
small medallions. There are also some lions’ heads. The most curious
piece of all is built into the wall of the Palazzo Madama close beside
the church, and this contains the various devices that Vasari calls
‘astrological globes’ ‘open books showing the leaves,’ ‘trophies,’ etc.
The panel is small and placed too high to be properly seen, but Sig.
Gnoli, by the aid of the architect of the palace, was able to give a
description of them in the article above mentioned. The work is very
minute and elaborate, and there are inscriptions from which it appears
that the devices signify that the seven liberal arts are nourished by
the lilies of France. The sculpture is not only elaborate in design but
most artistic as well as delicate in execution. The ‘Salamander’ it will
be seen is excellent work. M. Marcel Reymond points out that at the
early part of the sixteenth century the Italians were accustomed to use
marble for decorative carvings, and that this French artist, whoever he
was, having been accustomed to carve the limestones of his native
country, took naturally to the manipulation of travertine, and that his
success with the material attracted the attention and admiration of the
Romans which Vasari’s commendations reflect. It has been noticed above
that Michelangelo’s frieze in the cortile of the Palazzo Farnese was not
carved but modelled in stucco. See ante, p. 53.
On the subject of the mysterious artist a word will be said in
connection with the later passage indicated at the beginning of this
Note. See postea, p. 175.
RUSTICATED MASONRY.
[See § 20, _Rusticated Masonry and the Tuscan Order_, ante, p. 65.]
In masonry of this kind the sides of the stones, where they come into
contact with each other, are dressed smooth, but the face of each stone
is left to project beyond the plane of the wall. The projections may be
rough and irregular, in which case the appearance is that of natural
stones, and a rugged rock-like aspect is given to the wall-face. The
projections may however be wrought into bosses of regular form, or into
the diamonds and facets of which Vasari goes on to speak, and of which a
notable example is the so-called ‘Palazzo de’ Diamanti’ at Ferrara.
This method of treating stones, at least when they are left rough and
irregular, saves time and labour, and hence it has been in use among
many ancient peoples, but almost always for substructures and parts not
meant to be seen. The Romans made a more extensive employment of it, and
we find it not only on sustaining walls, such as those of the Hadrianic
platform of the Olympeion at Athens, but on monumental wall-faces, as on
the enclosing wall of the Forum of Augustus near the Arco dei Pantani at
Rome, one of the finest extant specimens of Roman masonry but still
utilitarian in character. The deliberate use of rustication, as an
element of artistic effect, on the façade of a public building, is
another matter, and it is doubtful if any instance of this occurs before
the Italian Renaissance. There is a piece of Roman rusticated masonry
behind the ancient theatre at Fiesole, the classical Faesolae, and
Professor Durm thought at one time that the Florentine builders might
have derived from this their idea of using the device as a means of
expression in stonework. It may be questioned however whether this was
visible at all in the fifteenth century, and it is much more likely that
Renaissance rustication was a natural development from the treatment of
the wall in many mediaeval Tuscan buildings, in which the surface of the
stones is left to project in an irregular undesigned fashion. The
Palazzo Vecchio and the Gothic Palazzo Alessandri at Florence are
examples. In any case, in the hands of the architects of the Renaissance
rustication became an important element in the architectural style of
the period, and is one of the special contributions of this style to
architecture at large.
[Illustration:
PLATE VI
SALAMANDER CARVED IN TRAVERTINE
On the façade of S. Luigi dei Francesi, Rome, by a French artist,
‘Maestro Gian’
]
Rustication has two artistic advantages. In the first place, it
emphasizes the separate stones in an assemblage, and when these are of
great size and boldly hewn, as at the Pitti Palace at Florence, the work
gains in dignity through this individualizing of the distinct units of
the structure. The bossed surface of some of the blocks at the Pitti
stands out as much as three feet from the wall, and one of the stones is
twenty eight feet in length. In the second place, this rustic treatment
gives a look of rugged strength that is very effective, especially on
the lower stages of monumental buildings, where indeed the treatment is
most in place. The façade of Michelozzo’s Riccardi Palace, which Vasari
refers to under its older name the ‘Casa Medici’ is epoch-making in its
fine handling of rustication in degrees according to the stages of the
elevation.
It needs hardly to be said that the elaborately cut facets which Vasari
finds so beautiful, and of which we have seen an example in Fig. 4,
ante, p. 69, are too artificial to be reckoned in good architectural
style. It was a common practice, when the stones themselves were not all
of the same size, to cut these diamonds and other geometrical forms in
independence of the joints of the masonry, so that a facet might be half
on one stone and half on another. As this ignores the individuality of
the blocks, which the simpler rustication so effectually emphasizes, it
is by no means to be commended. Vasari’s last sentences in § 20, about
this treatment of stonework in general, are excellent. The rustication
on the Fortezza, shown in Fig. 4 is sincere, in that the jointing
corresponds with the design.
VASARI’S OPINION ON MEDIAEVAL ARCHITECTURE.
[See § 28, _German Work (the Gothic Style)_, ante, p. 83.]
Vasari’s tirade against the iniquities of the mediaeval mason is of
historical interest as reflecting the ideas of his age, but need not now
be taken seriously. The reason why he writes of it as ‘German’ work is
to be found in the close intercourse during the whole mediaeval period
between Germany and Italy, that were nominally under the one imperial
sceptre, and were only separated by the Brenner. ‘Tedesco’ stood to the
mind of the Italian for everything north of the Alps, and though the
pointed style in architecture was of French origin it appears to have
found its way into Italy through the Tyrol. One of the first churches in
this style in Italy, S. Francesco at Assisi, was designed by a German
master from Meran. But not only does Vasari call the manner he detests
‘Tedesco,’ he expressly, in this passage and elsewhere, ascribes it to
the Goths, who, after ruining the ancient buildings and killing off the
classically trained architects, had set to work to build with pointed
arches. It is clear from this phrase, as well as from the description he
gives of the little niches and pinnacles and leaves and the extravagant
height of doors, that he had in his mind the pointed style, that dates
from about the middle of the twelfth century. The Goths had then passed
out of existence for some six hundred years and Vasari’s chronology is
hopelessly at fault. The name ‘Gothic’ however, which he was the first
to apply in this sense, has adhered to the style ever since, and in
spite of efforts which have been made to supplant it, will probably
remain always in use, though no one will now or in the future make the
mistake of connecting it ethnologically with the historical Goths of the
fifth and sixth centuries.
The question who was actually the first to apply the term ‘Gothic’ in
this sense has been a subject of controversy. Some have attributed the
invention of the term to Raphael, or the author of the Report on the
condition of Roman monuments which passes under his name; while others
have claimed the dubious honour for Cesare Cesariano, the translator and
commentator of Vitruvius. Neither of these writers however uses the word
in the sense referred to. Raphael it is true writes of a ‘Gothic’ style
in architecture which succeeded to the classic Roman, but he makes it,
quite correctly, belong to the actual era of the Gothic conquest of
Italy in the fifth century and to the succeeding hundred years. The
later mediaeval architecture Raphael terms ‘architectura Tedesca,’ and
when he writes of this he seems to have in his view what we should
rather call Lombard Romanesque, for he blames in it the ‘strange animals
and figures, and foliage out of all reason.’ In other words Raphael, or
the author of the Report, distinctly does _not_ commit the historical
enormity of dragging the word ‘Gothic’ six centuries out of its proper
location and use.
With regard to Cesare Cesariano, this personage was born in 1483 and
studied architecture under Bramante. He was of good repute, Vasari tell
us, (_Opere_, IV, 149) as a geometrician and architect, and at one time
he was employed as director of the works on the cathedral of Milan, the
interior of which he completed in its present form. In 1521 there was
published at Como, at the charges of certain scholars and notables of
Milan and Como, an edition of Vitruvius headed ‘Di Lucio Vitruvio
Pollione a Caesare Augusto De Architectura Incomenza Il Primo Libro.
Translato In Vulgare Sermone Commentato Et Affigurato Da Caesare
Caesariano Citadino Mediolanense Professore Di Architectura Et C^a.’
Cesariano’s commentary is a fearsome work of appalling verbosity, but
there is nothing in it about the Goths being the originators of the
pointed style. He mentions the Goths on fol. cviii, b, but not in
connection with architecture, whereas when he does refer to late
mediaeval building he calls it not Gothic but German. On fol. xiii b and
on the succeeding pages he gives some interesting plans and drawings of
the cathedral of Milan, important in connection with the theory of the
use in Gothic design of the equilateral triangle, but distinctly notes
it as constructed by ‘Germanici architecti,’ ‘Germanico more,’ and
‘secundum Germanicam symmetriam’; while on fol. cx b he again says that
the building was in the hands of a German architect. (See Mothes,
_Baukunst des Mittelalters in Italien_, Jena, 1884, p. 502 ff.) It is
clear therefore that Cesare Cesariano has nothing to do with the use of
‘Gothic’ as an architectural term, and his name need not be mentioned in
this connection.
Filarete’s _Trattato dell’ Architettura_, dating about 1464, is not the
source of the usage, and as far as can be seen at present the credit, if
it be such, of the invention of the term ‘Gothic’ rests with Vasari.
EGG-SHELL MOSAIC.
[See § 33, _Pictorial Mosaics for Walls, etc._, ante, p. 93.]
This reference on the part of Vasari to ‘musaico di gusci d’ uovo,’
‘mosaic of egg-shells,’ is puzzling. In his Life of Gaddo Gaddi
(_Opere_, I, 348) he is more explicit, and states there ‘Dopo ciò,
ritornò Gaddo a Firenze, con animo di riposarsi: perchè, datosi a fare
piccole tavolette di musaico, ne condusse alcune di guscia d’ uova con
diligenza e pacienza incredibile; come si può, fra le altre, vedere in
alcune che ancor oggi sono nel tempio di San Giovanni di Firenze.’
The Lemonnier editors of Vasari added a note to this passage to the
effect that one of these small plaques, representing a Christ with an
open book in His left hand, was preserved when they wrote in the Uffizi,
and that the mosaic was ‘composed of very minute pieces of egg-shell
united together with a diligence and a patience truly incredible.’ This
piece is now in the Chapel in the Bargello and Dr Giovanni Poggi has had
the kindness to examine it minutely. He reports that there is no sign of
the use of egg-shell in it, but that it is a finely executed mosaic of
small pieces of coloured materials of a hard substance, in all respects
similar to the portable Byzantine mosaics of which there are two notable
specimens in the Opera del Duomo at Florence (Gori, _Thes. Vet.
Diptychorum_, III, 320 f.). Eugène Müntz noticed various examples of
this kind of work in an article in the _Bulletin Monumental_, 1886, and
one of them, an ‘Annunciation’ in the Victoria and Albert Museum, is a
typical piece. It is composed of tesserae of minute size of different
coloured marbles, lapis lazuli, etc., on a ground of gold formed of
little cubes of the metal, all bedded in wax or similar yielding
substance. There is no sign of the use of egg-shell, and indeed the idea
of a mosaic of pieces of egg-shell seems absurd, because there is no
variety of colour, and therefore no possibility of mosaic effect without
painting each piece some special hue.
Were it only Vasari who mentioned this supposed egg-shell mosaic the
matter might be passed over, but as a fact one of the chapters of
Cennino Cennini’s _Trattato_ is devoted to this very subject. He there
describes, c. 172, what he calls a ‘mosaic’ of small cubes of the pith
of feathers and of egg-shells, but the technique as he explains it is
not mosaic, properly so-called, but rather an imitation of mosaic by
means of painting on a roughened ground giving something of the effect
of a ground laid with tesserae. Egg-shells are apparently crushed down
on the surface so as to give it a sort of crackled appearance, and
varieties of colour are added by the paint brush. Vasari mentions in his
life of Agnolo Gaddi, _Opere_, I, 643 f., that he had seen a MS. of
Cennino’s treatise, and it is possible that he remembered the heading
‘musaico di gusci d’ uovo’ and, with his instinct for giving a personal
interest to everything, attributed to one of his early Florentines,
Gaddo Gaddi, the use of the supposed technique. We have not been able to
hear of any extant piece of work corresponding to Cennino’s description,
though we have to thank several expert authorities for kindly
interesting themselves in the matter. Cennino’s notice is appended in
the original. It does not occur in the Tambroni text.
Description of the technique in Cennino Cennini, _Il Libro dell’ Arte_,
ed. Milanesi, Firenze, 1859, cap. clxxii.
‘Come si Lavora in Opera Musaica per adornamento di Reliquie; e del
Musaico di Bucciuoli di penne, e di Gusci d’ Uovo.
* * * * *
... A questa opra medesima, e molto fine, buccioli di penne tagliati
molto minuti sì come panico e tinti sì come detto ho. Ancora puoi
lavorare del detto musaico in questo modo. Togli le tue guscia d’ uovo
ben peste pur bianche, e in sulla figura disegnata campeggia, riempi e
lavora sì come fussi coloriti: e poi quando hai campeggiata la tua
figura coi colori propii da cassetta, e temperati con un poco di
chiara d’ uovo, va’ colorendo la figura di parte in parte, sì come
facessi in su lo ’ngessato propio, pur d’ acquerelle di colori; e poi
quando è secco, vernica sì come vernici l’altre cose in tavola. Per
campeggiare le dette figure, sì come fai in muro, a te conviene
pigliare questo partito, di toglier fogliette dorate, o arientate, o
oro grosso battuto o ariento grosso battuto: taglialo minutissimo, e
colle dette mollette va’ campeggiando a modo che campeggi i tuoi gusci
pesti, dove il campo richiede oro. Ancora, campeggiare di gusci
bianchi il campo; bagnare di chiara d’ uovo battuta, di quella che
metti il tuo oro in sul vetro; bagna della medesima; metti il tuo oro
come trae il campo; lascia asciugare, e brunisci con bambagia. E
questo basti alla detta opera musaica, o vuoi greca.’
IDEAL ARCHITECTURE; AN IDEAL PALACE.
[See § 35, _An Ideal Palace_, ante, p. 96.]
The construction—in words—of an imaginary mansion of the type suited to
the ideas of the Renaissance was a favourite exercise among both
professional and amateur writers, and Vasari might have made a greater
effort than he has done to rise to the height of his subject. The theme
had some significance. The intent of those who dealt with it was to
provide the man of the Renaissance with a fit setting for his life, and
the spacious and lordly palace corresponded to the amplitude of the
personality developed by the humanistic culture of the age. The
representative man of the Renaissance may have missed certain of the
higher ethical qualities, but he was many-sided, in mind and person a
finely developed creature, self-reliant, instinct with vigour and set on
mastery. Such a being demanded space and opulence with an air of
greatness in his habitation, and fitly to house him was a task calling
forth all the powers of the architects of the period. An imposing façade
with heraldic achievements should proclaim his worth, wide gateways and
roomy courts and loggie give an impression of lordly ease, broad
staircases and ample halls suggest the coming and going of companies of
guests. He would need a garden, where marble seats in ilex shades or in
grottoes beside cool fountains should await him in hours when reflection
or reading, music or conversation, called him awhile from keen conflict
of wit or policy with his peers in the world outside. He would exact
moreover that over all the place Art should breathe a spell to soothe
the senses and to flatter pride; art sumptuous in materials,
accomplished in technique, pagan in form and spirit, should people the
galleries with sculptured shapes, cover walls and roof with graceful
imagery, and set here and there on cabinet or console some jewel of
carved ivory or gilded wood or chiselled bronze.
All the great architects of the Renaissance were at work on these
palaces first at Florence and then in every rich Italian town, but the
actual achievement that circumstances allowed fell far short of the
ideal perfection, the effort after which was the best spiritual product
of the Renaissance. Hence it became the fashion to draw out visionary
schemes of princely dwellings, and even of whole city quarters for the
setting of these, and ideal architecture furnishes matter for a chapter
in the art history of the times. Filarete’s _Trattato dell’
Architettura_ is full of matter of the kind. In his eighth Book he
describes a palace for a prince, in Book eleven an ideal mansion for a
nobleman; and his proposed arrangements are all on a grandiose scale.
Ammanati, who built the Ponte della Trinità at Florence, left a whole
collection of drawings for a ‘Città Ideale,’ and Leonardo da Vinci’s
codices are fertile in similar suggestions. In France, where this phase
of the artistic activity of the Renaissance was as much in evidence as
in Italy, the actual palaces of king or noble were far outdone in
splendour and in symmetry by the schemes of Palissy or De l’Orme, of
which Baron de Geymüller has given an interesting notice in his
_Baukunst der Renaissance in Frankreich_, published in the _Handbuch der
Architectur_.
Nor was it only the professed artists who occupied themselves in this
fashion. It was a literary exercise to scheme out in vague and general
outlines the ideal habitation for prince or for community, and Rabelais’
Abbey of Theleme, with its nine thousand three hundred and thirty two
rooms, its libraries, theatres, and recreation halls, is the most famous
example of its kind. In our own literature too there must not be
forgotten Francis Bacon’s Essay on Building, in which he draws out the
general configuration of what he calls a ‘perfect palace,’ where the
façade is in two wings ‘uniform without, though severally partitioned
within,’ and these are to be ‘on both sides of a great and stately
tower, in the midst of the front; that as it were joineth them together
on either hand.’ Symmetry is of course the characteristic of all these
ideal structures, as it was long ago of the visionary temple described
by Ezechiel, and Vasari’s palace is no exception to the rule. Vasari’s
description does not convey a very clear idea of what he conceived the
ideal palace would be, and he might have done better for the theme had
he not hampered himself at the outset with the otiose comparison of the
house to a human body. This he may have derived from Filarete, who also
employs the conceit.
OF SCULPTURE
CHAPTER I. (VIII.)
What Sculpture is; how good works of Sculpture are made, and what
qualities they must possess to be esteemed perfect.
§ 36. _The Nature of Sculpture._
Sculpture is an art which by removing all that is superfluous from the
material under treatment reduces it to that form designed in the
artist’s mind.[152]
§ 37. _Qualities necessary for Work in the Round._
Now seeing that all figures of whatever sort, whether carved in marble,
cast in bronze, or wrought in plaster or wood, must be in salient work
in the round, and seeing too that as we walk round them they are looked
at from every side, it is clear that if we want to call them perfect
they must have many qualities. The most obvious is that when such a
figure is presented to our eyes, it should show at the first glance the
expression intended, whether pride or humility, caprice, gaiety or
melancholy—according to the personage portrayed. It must also be
balanced in all its members: that is, it must not have long legs, a
thick head, and short and deformed arms; but be well proportioned, and
from head to foot have each part conforming with the others. In the same
way, if the figure have the face of an old man, let it have the arms,
body, legs, hands, and feet of an old man, the skeleton symmetrically
ordered throughout, the muscles and sinews and veins all in their proper
places. If it have the face of a youth, it must in like manner be round,
soft and sweet in expression, harmonious in every part. If it is not to
be nude, do not let the drapery that is to cover it be so meagre as to
look thin, nor clumsy like lumps of stone, but let the flow of the folds
be so turned that they reveal the nude beneath—and with art and grace
now show now hide it without any harshness that may detract from the
figure. Let the hair and beard be worked with a certain delicacy,
arranged and curled to show they have been combed, having the greatest
softness and grace given to them that the chisel can convey; and because
the sculptors cannot in this part actually counterfeit nature, they make
the locks of hair solid and curled, working from manner[153] rather than
in imitation of nature. Even though the figures be draped, the feet and
hands must be modelled with the care and beauty shown in the other
parts. And as the figure is in the round, it is essential that in front,
in profile, and at the back, it be of equal proportions, having at every
turn and view to show itself happily disposed throughout. Indeed the
whole work must be harmonious, and exhibit pose, drawing and unity,
grace and finish; these qualities taken together show the natural talent
and capacity of the artist.
§ 38. _Works of Sculpture should be treated with a view to their
destined position._
Figures in relief as well as in painting ought to be produced with
judgement rather than in a mechanical way,[154] especially when they are
to be placed on a height, at a great distance. In this position the
finish of the last touches is lost, though the beautiful form of the
arms and legs, and the good taste displayed in the cast of drapery, with
folds not too numerous, may easily be recognized; in this simplicity and
reserve is shown the refinement of the talent. Figures whether of marble
or of bronze that stand somewhat high, must be boldly undercut in order
that the marble which is white and the bronze which tends towards black
may receive some shading from the atmosphere, and thus the work at a
distance appear to be finished, though from near it is seen to be left
only in the rough. This was a point to which the ancients paid great
attention, as we see in their figures in the round and in half relief,
in the arches and the columns in Rome, which still testify to the great
judgement they possessed. Among the moderns, the same quality is notably
exhibited in his works by Donatello. Again, it is to be remembered, that
when statues are to be in a high position, and there is not much space
below to enable one to go far enough off to view them at a distance, but
one is forced to stand almost under them, they must be made one head or
two taller. This is done because those figures which are placed high up
lose in the foreshortening, when viewed by one standing beneath and
looking upwards. Therefore that which is added in height comes to be
consumed in the foreshortening, and they turn out when looked at to be
really in proportion, correct and not dwarfed, nay rather full of grace.
And if the artist should not desire to do this he can keep the members
of the figure rather slender and refined, this gives almost the same
effect.
§ 39. _The Proportions of the Human Figure._
It is the custom of many artists to make the figure nine heads high;
dividing it in the following manner; the throat, the neck, and the
height of the foot (from the instep to the sole) are equal to one head
and the rest of the body to eight; of these, the shinbone measures two
heads, from the knee to the organs of generation two more, while the
body up to the pit of the throat is equal to three, with another from
the chin to the top of the forehead, so that there are nine in all.[155]
As to the measurements across, from the pit of the throat to the
shoulder on each side is the length of a head, and each arm to the wrist
is three heads. Thus the man with his arms stretched out measures
exactly as much as his height.
§ 40. _Artists must depend on their Judgement rather than on the
Measuring Rule._
After all the eye must give the final judgement, for, even though an
object be most carefully measured, if the eye remain offended it will
not cease on that account to censure it.
Let me repeat that although measurement exercises a just control in
enlarging the figure so that the height and breadth, kept according to
rule, may make the work well proportioned and beautiful, the eye
nevertheless must decide where to take away and where to add as it sees
defect in the work, till the due proportion, grace, design and
perfection are attained, so that the work may be praised in all its
parts by every competent authority. And that statue or figure which
shall have these qualities will be perfect in beauty, in design and in
grace. Such figures we call figures ‘in the round,’ provided that all
the parts appear finished, just as one sees them in a man, when walking
round him; the same holds good of all the details which depend on the
whole. But it seems to me high time to come to the particulars of the
subject.
CHAPTER II. (IX.)
Of the manner of making Models in Wax and in Clay; how they are
draped, and how they are afterwards enlarged in proportion in the
Marble; how Marbles are worked with the point and the toothed tool,
and are rubbed with pumice stone and polished till they are perfect.
§ 41. _The small Sketch-Model in Wax or Clay._
Sculptors, when they wish to work a figure in marble, are accustomed to
make what is called a model for it in clay or wax or plaster; that is, a
pattern, about a foot high, more or less, according as is found
convenient, because they can exhibit in it the attitude and proportion
of the figure that they wish to make, endeavouring to adapt themselves
to the height and breadth of the stone quarried for their statue.
§ 42. _The Preparation of Wax._
In order to show how wax is modelled, let us first speak of the working
of wax and not of clay. To render it softer a little animal fat and
turpentine and black pitch are put into the wax, and of these
ingredients it is the fat that makes it more supple; the turpentine adds
tenacity, and the pitch gives it the black colour and a certain
consistency, so that after it has been worked and left to stand it
becomes hard. And he who would wish to make wax of another colour, may
easily do so by putting into it red earth, or vermilion or red lead; he
will thus make it of a yellowish red or some such shade; if he add
verdigris, green, and so on with the other colours. But it is well to
notice that the colours should be ground into powder and sifted, and in
this state afterwards mixed with the wax made as liquid as possible. The
wax is also made white for small things, medals, portraits, minute
scenes and other objects of bas-relief. And this is done by mixing
powdered white lead with the white wax as explained above.
§ 43. _Polychrome Wax Effigies._[156]
Nor shall I conceal that modern artists have discovered the method of
working in wax of all sorts of colours, so that in taking portraits from
the life in half relief, they make the flesh tints, the hair, the
clothes and all the other details so life-like that to these figures
there lacks nothing, as it were, but the spirit and the power of speech.
§ 44. _The Manipulation of Wax over an Armature._
But to return to the manner of preparing the wax; when the mixture has
been melted and allowed to go cold, it is made into sticks or rolls.
These from the warmth of the hands become, in the working, like dough
and are suitable for modelling a figure that is seated or erect or as
you please. To make the figure support itself, it may have underneath
the wax an armature either of wood, or of iron wires according to the
pleasure of the artist; or this can be omitted if it suit him better.
Little by little, always adding material, with judgement and
manipulation, the artist impresses the wax by means of tools made of
bone, iron, or wood, and again putting on more he alters and refines
till with the fingers the utmost finish is given to the model.
§ 45. _The Small Model in Clay._
Should he wish to make his model in clay, he works exactly as with wax,
but without the armature of wood or iron underneath, because that would
cause the clay to crack open or break up;[157] and that it may not crack
while it is being worked he keeps it covered with a wet cloth till it is
completed.
§ 46. _The Full-sized Model in Clay._
When these small models or figures of wax or clay are finished, the
artist sets himself to make another model as large as the actual figure
intended to be executed in marble. In fashioning this he must use
deliberation, because the clay which is worked in a damp state shrinks
in drying; he therefore, as he works, adds more bit by bit and at the
very last mixes some baked flour with the clay to keep it soft and
remove the dryness.[158] This trouble is taken that the model shall not
shrink but remain accurate and similar to the figure to be carved in
marble. To ensure that the large clay model shall support itself and the
clay not crack, the artist must take some soft cuttings of cloth or some
horse hair, and mix this with the clay to render it tenacious and not
liable to split. The figure is supported by wood underneath with pressed
tow or hay fastened to it with string.[159] The bones of the figure are
made and placed in the necessary pose after the pattern of the small
model, whether erect or seated; and from the beginning to the end of the
process of covering it with clay the figure is formed in the nude.
§ 47. _Drapery on the Clay Model._
This completed, if the artist desire afterwards to clothe it with thin
drapery, he takes fine cloth, if with heavy, he takes coarse, and wets
it and then covers it over with clay, not liquid but of the consistency
of rather thick mud, and arranges it around the figure in such folds and
creases as the mind suggests; this when dry, becomes hardened and
continues to keep the folds.[160]
§ 48. _Transference of the Full-sized Model to the Marble Block._
Models, whether of wax or of clay, are formed in the same manner. To
enlarge the figure proportionately in the marble[161] it is necessary
that against this same block, whence the figure has to be carved, there
shall be placed a carpenter’s square, one leg of which shall be
horizontal at the foot of the figure while the other is vertical and is
always at right angles with the horizontal, and so too with the straight
piece above; and similarly let another square of wood or other material
be adjusted to the model, by means of which the measures may be taken
from the model, for instance how much the legs project forward and how
much the arms. Let the artist proceed to carve out the figure from these
measurements, transferring them to the marble from the model, so that
measuring the marble and the model in proportion he gradually chisels
away the stone till the figure thus measured time after time, issues
forth from the marble, in the same manner that one would lift a wax
figure out of a pail of water, evenly and in a horizontal position.
First would appear the body, the head, and the knees, the figure
gradually revealing itself as it is raised upwards, till there would
come to view the relief more than half completed and finally the
roundness of the whole.
§ 49. _Danger of dispensing with the Full-sized Model._
Those artificers who are in a hurry to get on, and who hew into the
stone at the first and rashly cut away the marble in front and at the
back have no means afterwards of drawing back in case of need.[162] Many
errors in statues spring from this impatience of the artist to see the
round figure out of the block at once, so that often an error is
revealed that can only be remedied by joining on pieces, as we have seen
to be the habit of many modern artists. This patching is after the
fashion of cobblers and not of competent men or rare masters, and is
ugly and despicable and worthy of the greatest blame.
§ 50. _The Tools and Materials used in Marble Carving._
Sculptors are accustomed, in working their marble statues, to begin by
roughing out the figures with a kind of tool they call ‘subbia,’ which
is pointed and heavy; it is used to block out their stone in the large,
and then with other tools called ‘calcagnuoli’ which have a notch in the
middle and are short, they proceed to round it, till they come to use a
flat tool more slender than the calcagnuolo, which has two notches and
is called ‘gradina’: with this they go all over the figure, gently
chiselling it to keep the proportion of the muscles and the folds, and
treating it in such a manner that the notches or teeth of the tool give
the stone a wonderful grace. This done, they remove the tooth marks with
a smooth chisel, and in order to perfect the figure, wishing to add
sweetness, softness and finish to it, they work off with curved files
all traces of the gradina. They proceed in the same way with slender
files and straight rasps, to complete the smoothing process,[163] and
lastly with points of pumice stone they rub all over the figure to give
that flesh-like appearance that is seen in marvellous works of
sculpture. Tripoli earth is also used to make it lustrous and polished,
and for the same reason it is rubbed over with straw made into
bunches—till, finished and shining, it appears before us in its
beauty.[164]
CHAPTER III. (X.)
Of Low and Half Reliefs, the difficulty of making them and how to
bring them to perfection.
§ 51. _The Origin of Reliefs._
Those works that sculptors call half reliefs[165] were invented by the
ancients to make figure compositions with which to adorn flat walls, and
they adopted this treatment in theatres and triumphal arches, because,
even had they wished to sculpture figures in the round, they could not
place them unless they first constructed a standing ground or an open
place that was flat. Desiring therefore to avoid this, they invented a
kind of sculpture which they named half relief, and it is called ‘mezzo
rilievo’ still among ourselves.
§ 52. _Pictorial or Perspective Reliefs._
In the manner of a picture this kind of relief sets forth first the
whole of the principal figures, either in half round or still greater
salience, as may happen, the figures on the second plane partly hidden
by the first, and those on the third by the second, just as living
people are seen when they are assembled and crowded together. In this
kind of half relief, for the sake of perspective, they make the most
distant figures low, some of the heads indeed extremely low, and no less
so the houses and scenery which are the objects most remote. By none has
this species of half relief ever been better executed, with more
observation, or with its figures diminished and spaced one from the
other more correctly than by the ancients;[166] for they, who were
students of the truth and gifted artists, never made the figures in such
compositions with ground that is foreshortened or seems to run away, but
placed them with their feet resting on the moulding beneath them. In
contrast to this, some of our own moderns, over eager, have, in their
compositions in half relief, made their principal figures stand on the
plane which is in low relief and recedes, and the middle figures on the
same plane in such a position that, as they stand, they do not rest the
feet as firmly as is natural, whence it not infrequently happens that
the points of the feet of those figures that turn their backs actually
touch the shins of their own legs, so violent is the foreshortening.
Such things are seen in many modern works, and even in the gates of the
Baptistry and in many examples of that period. Therefore half reliefs of
this character are incorrect, because, if the foremost figures project
half out of the stone while others have to be placed behind them, there
must be a rule for the retiring and diminution; the feet of the figures
have to be on the ground, so that the ground may come forward in front
as required by the eye and the rule in things painted. Accordingly the
figures must be gradually reduced in proportion as they recede till they
reach the flattened and low relief; and because of the harmony required
it is difficult to carry out the work perfectly seeing that in relief
the feet and heads are foreshortened. Great skill in design therefore is
necessary if the artist wish to exhibit his ability in this art. The
same degree of perfection is demanded for figures in clay or wax as for
those worked in bronze and marble. Therefore of all the works which have
the qualities that I indicate the half reliefs may be considered most
beautiful and most highly praised by experienced artists.
§ 53. _Low Reliefs (Bassi Rilievi)._
The second species called low reliefs projects much less than the half
reliefs; they have not more than half the boldness of the others, and
one can rightly make in these low reliefs the ground, the buildings, the
prospects, the stairs and the landscapes as we see in the bronze pulpits
in San Lorenzo at Florence, and in all the low reliefs of Donatello, who
in this art produced things truly divine with the greatest truth to
nature. These reliefs present themselves easily to the eye and without
errors or barbarisms, seeing that they do not project forward so much as
to give occasion for errors or censure.
§ 54. _Flat Reliefs (Stiacciati Rilievi)._
The third species called low or flattened reliefs only shows up the
design of the figure in the very lowest and most depressed relief. These
reliefs are very difficult for they demand great skill in design and
invention, and as all depends on the outlines it is a hard thing to
impart charm to them. Donatello worked better here than did any other,
with art, design and invention.[167] In the ancient vases of
Arezzo,[168] many figures, masks, and other ancient compositions are to
be seen in this sort of work: likewise in the antique cameos, in moulds
for striking bronze pieces for medals, and also in coins. This style was
chosen because, if the relief had been too high, the coins could not
have been struck, for the blow of the hammer would not have produced the
impression since the punches have to be pressed on to the cast material,
and when this is in low relief it costs little trouble to fill the
cavities of the punch. Now-a-days we see that many modern artists have
worked divinely in this style, more even than did the ancients, as shall
be fully described in their Lives. Therefore, he who recognizes in the
half reliefs the perfection of the figures so carefully made to
diminish, and in the lower reliefs the excellence of the design in the
perspectives and other inventions, and in the flattened reliefs the
clearness, the refinement and the beautiful form of the figures, will do
well to regard them on account of these qualities as worthy of praise or
blame, and will teach others also so to regard them.
CHAPTER IV. (XI.)
How Models for large and small Bronze Figures are made, with the
Moulds for casting them and their Armatures of iron; and how they
are cast in metal and in three sorts of Bronze; and how after they
are cast they are chased and refined; and how, if they lack pieces
that did not come out in the cast, these are grafted and joined in
the same bronze.
§ 55. _The Full-sized Model for Bronze._
It is the custom of competent artists, when they wish to cast large
figures in metal or bronze,[169] to make first a statue of clay as large
as that intended to be cast in metal, and to perfect the clay statue as
far as their art and their knowledge will allow.
§ 56. _The Piece-Mould in Plaster._
When this, which they call the model, is finished and brought to this
point of perfection, they then begin, with plaster that will set, to
build over it piece by piece, making the pieces correspond to the relief
of the model. On every piece they make a key, marking the pieces with
numbers or letters of the alphabet or with other signs in order that the
pieces can be taken off and register together. So they mould it part by
part, oiling the pieces of the cast where the edges have to be
connected; till from piece to piece the figure grows, the head, the
arms, the body and the legs, to the last detail, in such a manner that
the concave of the statue, that is the hollow mould, comes to be
imprinted on the inner surface with all the parts and with the very
minutest marking which is in the model.[170] This completed, the plaster
casts are laid aside to harden.
§ 57. _The Construction of the Core._
The workers then take a rod of iron longer than the whole figure that
they wish to make, and that is to be cast, and over this they make a
core of clay into which, while kneading it to make it soft, they mix
horse dung and hair. The core has the same form as the model and is
baked in successive layers so as to draw out the dampness of the clay;
this is of use afterwards to the figure, for in casting the statue all
this core, which is solid, leaves an empty space that is not filled with
bronze, because if it were, the figure could not be moved on account of
the weight. They make this core large enough and justly measured, so
that when the layers are heated and baked, as has been said, the clay
becomes well burned through and so entirely freed from damp, that in
pouring the bronze upon it afterwards it does not spurt nor do injury,
as has happened many times, involving the death of the masters and the
ruin of the work. Thus they go on balancing the core and adjusting and
examining the pieces, till they tally with it and represent it, so that
there comes to be left exactly the thickness, or, (if we like to say
so,) the thinness, of the metal, according as you wish the statue to be.
Frequently this core has an armature of rods of copper across it, and
irons that can be taken out and put in to hold it with security and with
greater strength.[171] The core, after it is finished, is yet again
baked with a gentle heat, and the moisture, should any have remained,
entirely removed; it is then again laid aside.
§ 58. _The Piece-Mould lined with a Skin of Wax._
Returning now to the pieces of the hollow mould, these are lined
severally with yellow wax that has been softened and incorporated with a
little turpentine and tallow.[172] When the wax is melted at the fire,
it is poured into the two halves of the mould made up of the hollow
pieces in such a manner as causes the wax to come thin according to the
worker’s idea for the cast, and the pieces, which have been shaped to
correspond with the relief of the core already made of clay, are joined
to it and fitted and grafted together.
§ 59. _This Skin of Wax applied over the Core._
[Illustration:
PLATE VII
ILLUSTRATION SHOWING PROCESS OF PIECE-MOULDING IN PLASTER
]
With thin skewers of copper the pieces of wax pierced with the said
skewers are now fixed to the baked core, and so, piece by piece, they
are inserted and fitted to the figure and render it entirely finished.
This completed they proceed to remove all the superfluous wax that has
overflowed into the interstices of the pieces, and bring it as well as
possible to that finished excellence and perfection which one desires in
the bronze cast. Before going further, the craftsman sets up the figure
and considers diligently if the wax have any deficiency, and he proceeds
to repair it and to fill up again, putting on more or taking away where
necessary.[173]
§ 60. _The fire-resisting Envelope applied over the Wax._
After that, the wax being completed and the figure braced together, he
puts it where fire can be applied to it[174] on two andirons of wood,
stone, or iron like a roast, arranging so that it can be raised or
lowered; and with moistened ash, specially fitted for that purpose, by
means of a paint brush he covers the entire figure so that the wax is
quite concealed, and over every hollow and chink he clothes it well with
this material. Having applied the ash to it he replaces the transverse
rods, which pass through the wax and the core, just as he has left them
in the figure, because these have to support the core within and the
mould without, which is the casing of the hollow space between the core
and the mould, where the bronze is to be poured. When this armature has
been fixed, the artificer begins to take some fine earth, beaten
together with horse dung and hair, as I said, and carefully lays a very
thin coating all over which he allows to dry, and so on time after time
with other coatings, always allowing each to dry until the figure
becomes covered with earth raised to the thickness of half a span at the
most.
§ 61. _The External Armature._
This done, he girds those irons that hold the core within with other
irons which hold the mould outside, and fixes them together, so that
chained and bound the one to the other they form a mutual support,[175]
the core within sustaining the mould without and the mould without
holding firm the core within.
§ 62. _The Vents._
It is usual to make certain little pipes between the core and the outer
mould called vents, that have issue upwards; they are put, for instance,
from a knee to an arm that is raised, because these give passage to the
metal[176] to make up for that which on account of some impediment may
not flow properly, and these little tubes are made many or few,
according as the casting is difficult or not.
§ 63. _The Wax melted out._
This done, the worker proceeds to apply heat to the said mould equally
all over, so that it may become united and little by little be warmed
through, and he increases the heat till the mould is thoroughly hot
throughout, so that the wax which is in the hollow space becomes melted
and all flows out at the spot through which the metal is to be poured,
without any particle of the wax remaining within.[177] To be sure of
this, it is needful, before the pieces of wax are grafted in to their
places on the figure, to weigh them piece by piece; in the same way
after drawing out the wax, it must be weighed again, when by making the
subtraction the artist sees if any wax be left between the core and the
mould, and how much has come out. Notice that the skill and care of the
artist is manifested in the process of taking out the wax; herein is
seen the difficulty of producing the casts so that they come out sharp
and beautiful, for if any of the wax be left, it would ruin the whole
cast, especially that part where the wax remains.
§ 64. _The Mould in the Casting-pit._
This finished, the craftsman puts the mould under ground near to the
furnace where the bronze is melted, propping it so that the bronze may
not strain it, and he makes the channels through which the bronze is to
flow, and at the top he leaves a certain thickness, which allows for the
surplus of the bronze to be sawn off afterwards, and this he does in
order to secure sharpness.[178]
§ 65. _The Composition of the Bronze._
The artist prepares the metal as he thinks fit, and for every pound of
wax he puts ten pounds of metal.[179] Statuary metal is made of the
combination of two thirds of copper and one third of brass according to
the Italian rule. The Egyptians, from whom this art took its origin, put
into the bronze two thirds of brass and one third of copper. In electron
metal, which is the finest of all, two parts copper are put to one part
silver. In bells, for every hundred parts of copper there are twenty of
tin, in order that the sound of the bells may carry far and be more
blended; and for artillery, in every hundred parts of copper, ten of
tin.[180]
§ 66. _Making up Imperfections._
There only remains to us now to teach the method of grafting a piece
into the figure should it have a defect, either because the bronze
coagulated, or ran too thin, or did not reach some part of the mould. In
this case let the artificer entirely remove the defective part of the
cast and make a square hole in its place, cutting it out under the
carpenter’s square, then let him adjust a piece of metal prepared for
that spot, that may project upward as much as he pleases, and when
fitted exactly in the square hole let him strike it with the hammer to
send it home, and with files and tools make it even and thoroughly
finished.
[Illustration:
PLATE VIII
ENGRAVINGS ILLUSTRATING THE PROCESS OF CASTING IN BRONZE
From the French _Encyclopédie_
]
§ 67. _A simpler Method of Casting small Figures and Reliefs._
Now should the artificer wish to cast small figures in metal, they are
first made of wax, or if he happen to have them in clay or other
material, he makes the shell of plaster over them in the same way as for
the large figures, and fills it all with wax. But the shell must be
moistened that the wax, when poured into it, may set (with a hard skin)
by reason of the coldness of the wet cast. Then by shaking about and
agitating the cast, the wax (which is not hardened) within the cavity is
thrown out, so that the cast remains hollow in the interior: the
craftsman afterwards fills up the vacant space with clay and puts in
skewers of iron. This clay serves then for core, but it must be allowed
to dry well. Thereafter he adjusts the mould as for the other large
figures, giving it its armature and placing the tubes for the vents.
Then he bakes it and gets rid of the (skin of) wax and thus the vacant
space remains clear so that the bronze can easily be poured in. The same
is done with the low and half reliefs and with every other work in
metal.
§ 68. _Chasing the Cast and Colouring the Bronze._
These casts being finished, the workman then, with suitable tools, that
is, with burins, burnishers, chasing tools, punches, chisels and files,
removes material where needed, and where needed presses inward the
overflow of the metal and smoothes it down; and with other tools that
scrape, he shaves and cleans the whole of it diligently, and finally
with pumice stone gives the last polish. This bronze which is red when
it is worked assumes through time by a natural change a colour that
draws towards black. Some turn it black with oil, others with vinegar
make it green, and others with varnish give it the colour of black, so
that every one makes it come as he likes best.
§ 69. _Modern Tours de Force in small Castings._
But that is a truly marvellous thing which is come to pass in our times,
this mode of casting figures, large as well as small, so excellently
that many masters make them come out in the cast quite clear so that
they have not to be chased with tools, and as thin as the back of a
knife. And what is more, some clays and ashes used for this purpose are
actually so fine, that tufts of rue and any other slender herb or flower
can be cast in silver and in gold, quite easily and with such success,
that they are as beautiful as the natural; from which it is seen that
this art is more excellent now than it was in the time of the ancients.
CHAPTER V. (XII.)
Concerning Steel Dies for making Medals of bronze or other metals and
how the latter are formed from these metals and from Oriental Stones
and Cameos.
§ 70. _The Fabrication of Matrices for Medals._
The craftsman who wishes to make medals of bronze or silver or gold
after the manner of the ancients, must first with iron punches work in
relief the faces of steel dies of which the metal has been softened
piece by piece in the fire; as for example, the head alone in low
relief, in a single steel die; and so with the other parts which are
joined to it. Fashioned thus of steel, all the dies needed for the medal
are tempered by fire; and on the block of tempered steel, that is to
serve for mould and matrix of the medal, the artist proceeds to imprint
by means of hammer strokes the head and the other parts in their proper
places. And after imprinting the whole, he diligently smoothes it and
polishes it again, giving finish and perfection to the said mould that
has afterwards to serve for matrix. Many artificers have been in the
habit however of carving the matrices with wheels, just as intaglio work
is done in crystals, jaspers, calcedonies, agates, amethysts, sardonyx,
lapis lazuli, chrysolites, cornelians, cameos and other oriental stones;
and the work done in this way makes the matrices more sharp, as is the
case in the aforesaid stones. In the same way they make (the matrix for)
the reverse of the medal, and with these two, the matrix of the head and
that of the reverse side, (trial) medals of wax and of lead are struck.
These are moulded afterwards with a very finely powdered earth suitable
for the purpose; and in these moulds, when the wax or leaden (trial)
medal has been taken out, and they are pressed together in the frame,
you may cast any kind of metal which pleases you for your medal.
These casts are then replaced in the steel matrices that correspond to
them and by force of screws or wedges and with hammer blows they are
pressed so tightly, that they take that finish of surface from the stamp
that they have not taken from the casting process. But coins and other
medals in low relief are stamped without screws, by blows of the hammer
struck by hand.[181]
§ 71. _The Cutting of Intaglios and Cameos._
Those oriental stones that we spoke of above are cut in intaglio with
wheels by means of emery, which with the wheel cuts its way through any
sort of hardness of any stone whatever. And as the craftsman proceeds,
he is always testing by wax impressions the intaglio which he is
fashioning; and in this manner he goes on removing material where he
deems it necessary, till the final touches are given to the work. Cameos
however are worked in relief; and because this stone is in layers, that
is white above and dark underneath, the worker removes just so much of
the white as will leave the head or figure white on a dark ground. And
sometimes, in order to secure that the whole head or figure should
appear white on a dark ground, he dyes the ground when it is not so dark
as it should be. In this art we have seen wondrous and divine works both
ancient and modern.
CHAPTER VI. (XIII.)
How works in White Stucco are executed, and of the manner of preparing
the Wall underneath for them, and how the work is carried out.
§ 72. _Modelled and stamped Plaster Work._
The ancients, when they wished to make vaults or panels or doors or
windows or other ornaments of white stucco, were in the habit of
building a skeleton of walling either of baked bricks or of tufa, that
is, a stone that is soft and easy to cut. Making use of these, they
built up the bones underneath, giving them the form of mouldings or
figures or whatever they wished to make, cutting them out of the bricks
or stones, which were afterwards put together with mortar.
Then with stucco, which in our fourth chapter (of Architecture) we
described as crushed marble mixed with lime from travertine, they begin
to cover the aforesaid skeleton with the first daub of rough stucco,
that is coarse and granulated, to be covered over with finer when the
first stucco has set and is firm, but not thoroughly dry. The reason for
this is that to work the mass of the material above a damp bed makes it
unite better, therefore they keep wetting the stucco at the place where
the upper coating is laid on so as to render it more easy to work.
To make (enriched) mouldings or modelled leafage it is necessary to have
shapes of wood carved in intaglio with those same forms that you wish to
render in relief. The worker takes stucco that is not actually hard nor
really soft, but in a way tenacious, and puts it on the work in the
quantity needed for the detail intended to be formed. He then places
over it the said hollowed mould which is powdered with marble dust,
striking it with a hammer so that the blows fall equally, and this
leaves the stucco imprinted; he then proceeds to clean and finish it so
that the work becomes true and even. But if he desire the work to have
bolder relief in projection, in the spot where this is to come he fixes
iron supports or nails or other armatures of a similar kind which hold
the stucco suspended in the air, and by these means the stucco sets
firmly, as one sees in the ancient edifices where the stucco and the
iron supports are found still preserved to the present day.[182]
Moreover, when the artificer wishes to produce a composition in
bas-relief on a flat wall, he first inserts numerous nails in the wall,
here projecting less, there more, according as the figures are to be
arranged, and between these he crowds in little bits of brick or tufa,
in order that the ends or heads of these may hold the coarse stucco of
the first rough cast, which he afterwards goes on refining delicately
and patiently till it consolidates. While it is hardening he works
diligently, retouching it continually with moistened paint-brushes in
such a manner as may bring it to perfection, just as if it were of wax
or clay. By means of this same arrangement of nails and of ironwork made
on purpose, larger and smaller according to need, vaults and partition
walls and old buildings are decorated with stucco, as one sees all over
Italy at the present day to be the habit of many masters who have given
themselves to this practice. Nor is one to suspect work so done of being
perishable; on the contrary it lasts for ever, and hardens so well as
time goes on, that it becomes like marble.
CHAPTER VII. (XIV.)
How Figures in Wood are executed and of what sort of Wood is best for
the purpose.
§ 73. _Wood Carving._
He who wishes figures of wood to be executed in a perfect manner, must
first make for them a model of wax or clay, as we have said. This sort
of figure is much used in the Christian religion, seeing that numberless
masters have produced many crucifixes and other objects. But in truth,
one never gives that flesh-like appearance and softness to wood that can
be given to metal and to marble and to the sculptured objects that we
see in stucco, wax, or clay. The best however of all the woods used for
sculpture is that of the lime, because it is equally porous on every
side, and it more readily obeys the rasp and chisel. But when the
artificer wishes to make a large figure, since he cannot make it all of
one single piece, he must join other pieces to it and add to its height
and enlarge it according to the form that he wishes to make. And to
stick it together in such a way that it may hold he must not take cheese
mucilage, because that would not hold, but parchment glue;[183] with
this melted and the said pieces warmed at the fire let him join and
press them together, not with iron nails but with pegs of the wood
itself; which done, let him work it and carve it according to the form
of his model. There are also most praiseworthy works in boxwood to be
seen done by workmen in this trade, and very beautiful ornaments in
walnut, which when they are of good black walnut almost appear to be of
bronze. We have also seen carvings on fruit stones, such as those of the
cherry and apricot executed by the hand of skilful Germans[184] with a
patience and delicacy which are great indeed. And although foreigners do
not achieve that perfect design which the Italians exhibit in their
productions, they have nevertheless wrought, and still continue to work,
in such a manner that they bring their art to a point of refinement that
makes the world wonder: as can be seen in a work, or to speak more
correctly, in a miracle of wood carving by the hand of the Frenchman,
Maestro Janni, who living in the city of Florence which he had chosen
for his country, adopted, for his designs, in which he always delighted,
the Italian style. This, with the practice he had in working in wood,
enabled him to make a figure in limewood of San Rocco as large as life.
With exquisite carving he fashioned the soft and undercut draperies that
clothe it, cut almost to the thinness of paper and with a beautiful flow
in the order of the folds, so that one cannot see anything more
marvellous. In like manner, he has carried out the head, beard, hands
and feet of that Saint with such perfection that it has deserved, and
always will deserve infinite praise from every man; and what is more, in
order that the excellence of the artist may be seen in all its parts,
the figure has been preserved to our days in the church of the
Annunziata at Florence beneath the pulpit, free from any covering of
colour or painting, in its own natural colour of wood and with only the
finish and perfection that Maestro Janni gave it, beautiful beyond all
other figures that can be seen carved in wood.[185] And this suffices
for a brief notice of all the things relating to sculpture. Let us now
pass on to painting.
[Illustration:
PLATE IX
STATUE OF S. ROCCO CARVED IN LIMEWOOD, by a French Artist ‘Maestro
Janni,’ in the Church of the Annunziata, Florence
]
NOTES ON ‘INTRODUCTION’ TO SCULPTURE
THE NATURE OF SCULPTURE.
[§ 36, _The Nature of Sculpture_, ante, p. 143.]
The remark with which Vasari opens his ‘Introduction’ to Sculpture,
though it sounds rather trite, involves a point of some interest. Vasari
says that the sculptor removes all that is superfluous from the material
under treatment, and reduces it to the form designed for it in his mind.
This is true of the technique of sculpture proper, that is stone or
marble carving, but there are processes in the art other than that of
cutting away a block of hard material. Michelangelo, in a letter he
wrote in 1549 to Benedetto Varchi, on the ever-recurring theme of the
relative dignity of painting and sculpture, notices the fact that the
sculptor proceeds in two ways, by the progressive reduction of a mass,
as is the case with the marble carver, or in his own words, ‘per forza
di levare’; and also by successive additions, as in modelling in clay or
wax, which he calls ‘per via di porre,’ ‘by the method of putting on.’
The distinction is one of fundamental importance for a right
understanding of the art, and upon it depends the characteristic
difference between Greek reliefs, which are almost all carved in marble,
and if not are beaten up on metal plates by the repoussé process, and
Italian reliefs that are very often in cast bronze, the models for which
have been prepared by modelling, ‘per via di porre,’ in wax. On this
point something will be found in the Note on ‘Italian and Greek
Reliefs,’ postea, p. 196 f.
With regard to sculpture effected ‘by taking away,’ ‘per forza di
levare,’ Michelangelo has left a famous utterance in one of his sonnets,
No. XV in the edition of Guasti, which opens as follows:—
‘Non ha l’ ottimo artista alcun concetto,
Ch’ un marmo solo in sè non circonscriva
Col suo soverchio; e solo a quello arriva
La man che ubbidisce all’ intelletto,’
and is thus translated by J. A. Symonds:—
‘The best of artists hath no thought to show
Which the rough stone in its superfluous shell
Doth not include. To break the marble spell
Is all the hand that serves the brain can do.’
The conceit is really a classical one, and is probably due to some Greek
writer used by Cicero in his tract _De Divinatione_. Some one had
testified to the fact that, in a certain marble quarry on Chios, a
block, casually split open, had disclosed a head of Pan; and Cicero, or
the writer he had before him, remarks that such a chance might occur,
though the similitude would only be a rude one. In any case however, he
goes on, it must be conceded that even the very finest heads imaginable
are really in existence throughout all time in every block of stone of
sufficient size. All that even a Praxiteles could do would be to bring
them into view by taking off all that was superfluous in the marble. He
would add nothing to what was there already. The whole process would be
the removal of what was superfluous and bringing to light what was
concealed within.
SCULPTURE TREATED FOR POSITION.
[§ 38, _Works of Sculpture should be treated with a view to their
destined Position_, ante, p. 145.]
Vasari is dealing with sculpturesque treatment as conditioned by the
position and lighting for which works of statuary are destined, and a
somewhat interesting question in the aesthetics of the plastic art is
opened up.
There are here two matters to be distinguished; one is the general
treatment of a figure or relief in relation to position, and the other
is the deliberate alteration in the proportions of it, with a view to
the same consideration. It is almost a matter of course that an artist,
in preparing his model, will keep in view the aspect under which the
finished work will be presented to the spectator, but the definite
change in proportions is another matter. Vasari is clear in his own mind
that Donatello and other sculptors did make changes of proportions as
well as of general treatment on the grounds indicated, but in alleging
this he is not drawing on his own expert knowledge as an artist, so much
as echoing a judgement of literary critics often expressed in both
ancient and modern times. There is a passage in Plato’s _Sophist_ which
shows that in Greek aesthetics this question was discussed, and a
distinction is there drawn, pp. 235–6, between exact imitation of
nature, and an imitation that modifies the forms of nature for artistic
effect. In large works, Plato points out, if the true proportions were
given ‘the upper part which is further off from the eye would appear to
be out of proportion in comparison with the lower, which is nearer; and
so our artists give up the truth in their images and make only the
proportions which appear to be beautiful disregarding the true ones.’
The same idea connected with a concrete instance is embodied in a legend
preserved in some verses by the Byzantine writer Tzetzes, to the effect
that Pheidias and Alcamenes competed on one occasion with rival figures
of the goddess Athene. Alcamenes finished his with great delicacy, and
on a near view it was preferred to that by Pheidias. The latter
sculptor, ‘being versed in optics and geometry,’ had allowed for
distance and exaggerated certain details. When both figures were put
into position the superiority of that by Pheidias was at once apparent.
It has been argued from a passage in Eustatius that Pheidias fashioned
his Zeus at Olympia with the head slightly inclined forwards, so as to
bring it more directly into view from the floor of the temple below.
In modern times Donatello’s works have been specially singled out as
illustrating this same principle, and not by Vasari alone. The
following, for instance, is an _obiter dictum_ of the Florentine writer
Davanzati in a letter affixed to his translation of Tacitus published
first in 1596, (see _Opere di Tacito_, Bern. Davanzati, Padova, 1755, p.
656), where he says, ‘You must look at the way an effect is introduced,
as in the case of Donatello and his famous Zuccone (Bald Head) on our
Campanile of the Duomo. The eyes of this statue as one looks at it on
high seem as if dug out with the spade, but if he had worked it on the
ground (for a near view) the figure would appear to be blind. The reason
is that distance swallows up all refinement of work (la lontananza si
mangia la diligenzia).... In the same way the rudeness of rustic work on
great palace walls does not take away from but rather adds to the effect
of majesty.’ Modern critics have agreed in commending Donatello for his
judicious treatment, with a view to situation, of works like the statues
on the Campanile, which are more than fifty feet above the ground. Hans
Semper praises specially from this standpoint the ‘Abraham and Isaac’ on
the Campanile, and remarks that if this group were taken down and seen
on the ground there would be a great outcry about faults of proportion
in the legs, (_Donatello_, Wien, 1875, p. 122.) In Lord Balcarres’s
recent book on Donatello there is a discussion of the Campanile statues,
and other works by the master, in relation to the same aesthetic
principle, (_Donatello_, London, 1903, p. 17 ff.)
There is no question that the boldness and vigour which were
characteristic of Donatello were well suited to give his works a telling
effect at a distance, and this may be noticed in the case of his
‘Cantoria’ with the dancing children in the Opera del Duomo at Florence.
We are reminded here of the Pheidias and Alcamenes story. On a near view
Donatello’s Cantoria suffers in a comparison with the more delicate work
on the same theme of Luca della Robbia, but when both galleries were ‘in
position,’ high up, and in the semi-darkness of the Duomo, the effect of
Donatello’s relief must have been far finer. This bold and sketchy
treatment was not due to the fact that the master could work in no other
way, for Donatello treated very low relief, spoken of later on by Vasari
as ‘stiacciato,’ with remarkable delicacy and finish. Hence we may
fairly credit him with intention in the strong effects of some of his
monumental works.
This is however quite a different matter from deliberate alteration of
the proportions of a figure in view of the position it is to occupy. In
spite of what Vasari and some modern writers have said, it must be
doubted whether Donatello or any other responsible sculptor has done
anything of the kind. Vasari speaks of figures ‘made a head or two
taller’ when they have to be seen in a near view from below, but he does
not refer to any examples. Decorative figures of elongated proportions
may be instanced, but it does not follow that these proportions were
intended to correct perspective foreshortening. The twelfth century
statues in the western portals at Chartres are curiously elongated, and
so too are the stucco nymphs of Primaticcio in the Escalier du Roi at
Fontainebleau, but in both cases the figures are but little above the
level of the eye, and their shape is certainly not due to any such
consideration as was in the mind of Vasari. The actual proportions of
Donatello’s Campanile statues seem perfectly normal, though the works
may have been deliberately treated with a view to position.
It is worth notice that, proportions apart, the principle of ‘treatment
for position’ has by no means been generally observed. In the greatest
and most prolific periods of sculpture indeed, there seems to have been
little consistency of practice in this regard, while some of the finest
decorative works in the world appear to have been very little affected
by any considerations of the kind. As in duty bound, Vasari appeals to
the antique, but as a matter of fact, classical decorative sculpture
exhibits only in a very minor degree these studied modifications of
treatment in relation to position. In the frieze of the Parthenon the
background is cut back a little deeper above than below, so as to
increase the apparent salience of the parts farthest from the eye, and
on the column of Marcus Aurelius at Rome, which may have been in
Vasari’s mind when he mentions reliefs on columns, the salience of the
relief is much bolder above than below. The well-known band of ornament
on the framing of Ghiberti’s ‘Old Testament’ gates shows similar variety
in treatment. On the earlier column of Trajan, on the other hand, the
eye can detect no variation in treatment of the kind. The groups from
the pediments of the Parthenon give little indication that they were
designed to be looked at sixty feet above the eye, while the heads by
Scopas from the pediments at Tegea are finished with the utmost
delicacy, as if for the closest inspection.
In the matter of the choice of low or high relief according to the
distance from the eye, the frieze of the Parthenon is often adduced as
canonical, because, being only visible from near, it is in very low
relief. It is forgotten however that the nearly contemporary friezes on
the Theseum and from the interior of the temple at Bassae, though they
were correspondingly placed and actually nearer to the eye, are both in
high relief. On the Roman triumphal arches, of which Vasari writes,
there are similar anomalies. Thus the well-known panels within the
passage way of the Arch of Titus, that must have been calculated for
very near stand-points, are in boldest projection.
The magnificent decorative sculpture on the French Gothic cathedrals
shows little trace of the sort of calculation here spoken of. It is true
that the figures of Kings in the ‘Galeries des Rois’ across the west
fronts are as a rule rudely carved, but this is because they are so
purely formal and give the artist little opportunity. At Reims some of
the finest and most finished work is to be found in the effigies of
Kings, the Angels, and other figures, on the upper stages of the
building, while the ‘Church Triumphant’ up above on the southern
transept façade is every whit as delicately beautiful as the ‘Mary of
the Visitation,’ in the western porch.
Enough has been said to show that on this subject literary statements
are not to be trusted and practice is very uncertain. It remains to be
seen what light can be thrown upon it, first, from the side of aesthetic
principle; and, second, from that of the actual procedure and expert
judgement of sculptors of to-day.
The principle will hardly be controverted that anything abnormal, either
in the proportions of a figure or even in its treatment, will tend to
defeat its own object by confusing our regular and highly effective
visual process. The organs which co-operate in this are so educated that
we interpret by an unconscious act of intelligence what we actually see,
and make due allowance for distance and position. It is often said that
objects look larger through a mist. This is not the case. They do not
look larger but they look further off, and the equation between apparent
size and apparent distance which we unconsciously establish is vitiated,
so that the impression is produced that the particular object is
abnormally large. Now in the same way we allow for the distance and the
perspective angle at which a work of sculpture is seen and interpret
accurately the actual forms and effects of texture and light and shade
the image of which falls on the retina. If the sculptor have altered his
proportions there is a danger that we shall derive the impression of a
distorted figure, because we have made our allowances on the supposition
that the proportions are normal. If he have forced the effect by
emphasizing the modelling, he will make the parts where this is done
appear too near the eye, and this will involve a false impression of the
height and dimensions of the structure on which the sculpture is
displayed. There is this forcing of effect in the case of the column of
Marcus Aurelius, but it is of no artistic advantage, and would tend to
make the column itself look lower than it really is. In the column of
Trajan the spiral lines have a certain artistic waviness, so that the
band of sculpture varies in width in different parts, but the treatment
is the same throughout, and as the reliefs were not only to be seen from
below but also from the lofty neighbouring structures of the Trajanic
Forum, this was not only in accordance with principle but with common
sense. It is obvious indeed that works of monumental sculpture are
practically always visible from other points than the one for which
their effect is chiefly calculated; and hence if proportions be modified
so as to suit one special standpoint, the work may look right in this
one aspect, but in all others may appear painfully distorted.
As regards the second point, we have asked Mr Pittendrigh Macgillivray,
R.S.A., a question on this subject, and he has kindly given us his
opinion in the following note.
‘The question as to whether or not sculptors deliberately alter the
normal proportions of the human figure in order to adapt their works to
special circumstances is one which is frequently asked, and which I have
never found reason to answer otherwise than in the negative. The rule in
the classic examples of all periods, as far as I have observed, is
normal proportion and execution, irrespective of site and circumstances,
and, to anyone familiar with the art and practice of sculpture, the
difficulties and uncertainties consequent upon a lawless method of
dealing with the normal quantities of the figure, are a sufficient
deterrent against vagaries in scale and proportion. To change the
proportions of the figure in order to meet the peculiarities and
limitations of some special site, seems on the surface so reasonable
that one is not greatly surprised at the persistence of the idea in
literary circles, where it has not been possible to balance it against
that technical knowledge which is the outcome of actual practice and
experience in handling the _métier_ of the art. To adapt statuary by
fanciful proportions to unfortunate conditions and circumstances, for
which truer artistic taste and understanding, on the part of architects,
would never propose it, seems such a ’cute notion that it has
occasionally attracted the clever ones of the profession as a way out of
the difficulty, but one which has led only to ultimate discomfiture.
‘The fact is, I imagine, that the normal proportions of the human figure
are so deeply printed on the inherited memory of the race that, except
within very narrow limitations, they cannot be modified and yet at the
same time convey lastingly any high order of serious emotion or effect.
The great men doing serious work in sculpture will never find it
necessary to go beyond the law of nature for the architectonic basis of
their expression. Faulty or arbitrary proportion in handling the human
figure is unnecessary; it is of no real help to the artist, and no more
desired by him than is the liberty of 16 lines and ballad measure, by
the sonneteer expert in the Petrarchan form and rhyme of 14 pentameter
verses. The real matter to be dealt with in respect of peculiarities of
site and circumstances lies within the sphere of the artistic capacity,
and is at once more easy and more difficult than any wooden process of
mis-handling the proportions of the figure. It is at issue in the legend
of the Byzantine writer, Tzetzes, to which reference is made, wherein it
is said that Pheidias and Alcamenes competed on one occasion with rival
figures of Athene, but the explanation given of the reason why the work
of Pheidias was admired and preferred at the site, is, I venture to say,
the wrong one, in as far as it presupposes abnormal proportions in the
successful statue. To the author’s mind, no doubt, something profound
and abstruse was necessary in order to explain such a triumph, and the
idea that Pheidias was deeply versed in what must then have been the
occult mysteries of optics and geometry, fitted the need and was
pleasant to the love of the marvellous.
‘In such a case, Pheidias would certainly, with the intuitive artistic
sense and experience of a master, handle the style, composition, lights
and shadows, mass, line and silhouette of his work in relation to its
size, and the average height and distance from which it was to be
viewed. It might be finished highly in respect of surface, or left
moderately rough, a condition of little consequence compared with the
factors enumerated above. It would be made readable and expressive, but
there would be no modification of the sacred proportions of the figure;
no trace of allowance in order that “the upper part which is further off
from the eye should appear to be in proportion when compared with the
lower, which is nearer.” That artists should appear to give up natural
truth in their images for considerations of abstract beauty, was
grateful to the mind of Plato, but is only another proof of the soaring
qualities of the White Horse in the Human Chariot!
‘Outside of a somewhat conscious effort towards the decorative in form
and towards the effective articulation of parts, I find little in the
work of Donatello to justify his being specially singled out as
illustrating those principles of the modification of true proportions
for sculpture in relation to the exigencies of site. The statues on the
Campanile need not, I imagine, be taken too seriously as exhibitions of
Donatello’s most careful judgement. Compared with such works of his as
we may feel at liberty to believe personal, they are rude and
ill-considered in design and execution. There is in the bones, mass, and
arrangement of the work very probably something of Donatello, but in the
detail and execution there is little or nothing of the hand that did the
Christ of S. Antonio of Padua, the bronze David of the Bargello, or the
bust of Niccolo da Uzzano.’
WAXEN EFFIGIES AND MEDALLIONS.
[§ 43, _Polychrome Wax Effigies_, ante, p. 149.]
Wax has been used from the time of the ancients as a modelling material,
both in connection with casting in bronze, and with the making of small
studies for reproduction in more permanent materials. The production of
a plastic work in wax intended to remain as the finished expression of
the artist’s idea is of course a different matter. Among the Greeks,
Lysistratos, the brother of Lysippos, about the time of Alexander the
Great, introduced the practice of taking plaster moulds from the life,
and then making casts from them in wax. These he may have coloured, for
the use of colour, at any rate on terra cotta, was at the time
universal, and in this way have produced waxen effigies. (Hominis autem
imaginem gypso e facie ipsa primus omnium expressit ceraque in eam
formam gypsi infusa emendare instituit Lysistratus Sicyonius frater
Lysippi. Plin. _Hist. Nat._, XXXV, 153). Busts in coloured wax of
departed ancestors were kept by the Romans of position in the atria of
their houses, and the funereal use of the wax effigy can be followed
from classical times to those comparatively modern, for in Westminster
Abbey can still be seen the waxen effigies of Queen Elizabeth, Charles
II, and other sovereigns and nobles of the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries. These, like the modern wax-works of popular exhibitions, are
hardly productions of art. What Vasari writes of is a highly refined and
artistic kind of work, that was practised in Italy from the early part
of the sixteenth century, and spread to France, Germany, and England in
each of which countries there were well-known executants in the
seventeenth or eighteenth centuries. _The Connoisseur_ of March, 1904,
contained an article on the chief of these.
Though modelled effigies in wax of a thoroughly artistic kind were
executed of or near the size of life and in the round, as may be seen in
the Italian waxen bust of a girl in the Musée Wicar at Lille, that has
been ascribed to Raphael, yet as a rule the execution was in miniature
and in relief. Specimens of this form of the work are to be seen in the
British Museum, in the Wallace Collection, and at South Kensington.
In the _Proceedings_ of the Huguenot Society of London, III, 4, there is
an article on the Gossets, a Huguenot family, some members of which
practised the art in England from the early part of the eighteenth
century, and a recipe for colouring the wax is there quoted which it may
be interesting to compare with that given by Vasari. ‘To two ounces of
flake white (the biacca of Vasari) add three of Venice turpentine, if it
be in summer, and four in winter, with sufficient vermilion (cinabrio)
to give it a pinkish tint. Grind these together on a stone with a
muller; then put them into a pound of fine white wax, such as is used
for making candles: this is molten ready in an earthen pipkin. Turn them
round over the fire for some time. When thoroughly mixed the composition
should be immediately removed and poured into dishes previously wetted
to prevent the wax from sticking to them.’
This refers to the preparation of a self-coloured wax which may be
prepared of a flesh tint, or of a creamy white, or of any other desired
hue like those Vasari enumerates. The portraits in wax referred to in
our museums are sometimes in self-coloured material of this kind, but at
other times are coloured polychromatically in all their details. This is
the technique referred to by Vasari in § 43 as having been introduced by
certain ‘modern masters.’ In _Opere_, IV, 436 he refers to one Pastorino
of Siena as having acquired great celebrity for wax portraits, and as
having ‘invented a composition which is capable of reproducing the hair,
beard and skin, in the most natural manner. It would take me too long’
he continues ‘to enumerate all the artists who model wax portraits, for
now-a-days there is scarcely a jeweller who does not occupy himself with
such work.’ This last remark is significant, for one feature of these
polychrome medallions is the introduction of real stones, seed pearls,
gold rings, and the like, in connection with the modelled wax, so that
collectors used to style the works ‘Italian sixteenth century jewelled
waxes.’ A portrait bust in the Salting collection, shown on loan at
South Kensington, representing Elizabeth of France, wife of Philip II,
is a good specimen of the technique. The lady wears a jewelled hair net
set with real red and green stones, and a necklet of seed pearls. In her
ear is a ring of thin gold wire. The flesh parts are naturally coloured,
the hair is auburn, the bodice black, and there are two white feathers
in the headdress. We should gather from Vasari’s words in § 43 that
works of the kind were built up of waxes variously coloured in the mass,
and a close examination of extant specimens clearly shows that this was
the case. Local tints such as the red of the lips, etc., were added with
pigment.
The best modern notice of wax modelling in these forms is that contained
in Propert’s _History of Miniature Art_, Lond. 1887, chapter xii, but
little is said there of the technique. It should be noticed that the
medallion in coloured wax as a form of art has been revived with
considerable success in our own time and country by the Misses Casella
and others. The artists just named consider that it would be impossible
to finish work on the usual small scale in coloured waxes alone, without
touches of pigment added with the brush. It would be interesting in this
connection to know what were the exact processes of painting in wax used
by the ancients. Paintings, which must have been on a small scale
because they were on a ground of ivory, were executed in coloured waxes
laid on by the ‘cestrum’ (Pliny, _Hist. Nat._, XXXV, 147), which is
usually described as a sort of spatula, something like one of the steel
tools used by artists for finishing figures in plaster. However the
substance was applied, the whole process was apparently carried out in
the coloured waxes. There must have been some similarity between this
technique and that of the wax medallions of Renaissance and modern
times.
PROPORTIONATE ENLARGEMENT.
[§ 48, _Transference of the full-sized Model to the Marble Block_, ante,
p. 151.]
‘To enlarge the figure proportionately in the marble.’ Vasari has said,
ante, p. 150, that the model is to be the full size of the marble so
that there would be no question of enlargement but only of accurately
copying the form of the model in the new material. For this mechanical
aids are invoked, the latest and most elaborate of which is the
‘pointing machine’ now in common use. The appliances in Vasari’s time
were much simpler. Cellini, in his _Trattato sopra la Scultura_,
describes the mechanical arrangements he made for enlarging a model to
the size of a proposed colossal effigy, and the principle is the same
whether there is to be enlargement or exact reproduction.
The model, and a block roughly trimmed by rule of thumb to the size and
shape required, but of course somewhat larger than will ultimately be
needed, are placed side by side on tables of exactly the same form and
dimensions. About the model is set up a sort of framework simple or
elaborate, according to the character of the piece, and a framework
precisely similar in all respects is disposed about the block. A
measurement is then taken from one or more points on the framework to a
point on the model, and from a point or points similarly situated on the
other framework, and in the same relative direction, a similar
measurement is led towards the block. As this is _ex hypothesi_ a little
larger than the model, the full measurement cannot be taken until some
of the superfluous marble has been removed by suitable tools. When this
is done a point can be established on the block exactly corresponding to
the point already fixed on the model. This process can be repeated as
often as is necessary until all the important or salient points on the
model have been successively established on the marble block, which will
ultimately have approached so nearly to the exact similitude of the
model, that the artist can finish it by the eye.
The nature of what has been termed the framework, from which all the
measurements are taken, may vary. Cellini, on the occasion referred to,
surrounded his model with a sort of skeleton of a cubical box, from the
sides and corners of which he measured. In the _Encyclopédie_ of Diderot
and d’Alembert, of the middle of the eighteenth century, similar square
frames, like those used as stretchers for canvases, are suspended
horizontally over model and block, and plumb lines are hung from the
corners, so that skeleton cubes are established, which would answer the
same purpose as Cellini’s box. See Plate X, A. The arrangement
contemplated by Vasari was somewhat simpler. He does not establish a
complete hollow cube about his model and his block, but is apparently
satisfied with erecting perpendiculars beside each, from which the
measures would be led. The carpenter’s square (squadra) he has in mind
consists of two straight legs joined together at right angles. If one
leg be laid horizontally along the table the one at right angles to it
will be vertical, and from this the measurements are taken. In the
treatise on Sculpture by Leon Battista Alberti there is an elaborate
description of a device he invented for the purpose in view, and one of
his editors has illustrated this by a drawing reproduced here in Plate
X, B. The device explains itself, and any number of similar contrivances
could be employed.
THE USE OF FULL-SIZED MODELS.
[§ 49, _Danger of Dispensing with the Full-sized Model_, ante, p. 151.]
The question here is of the possibility of dispensing altogether with a
full-sized clay model, and proceeding at once to attack the marble with
the guidance only of the small original sketch. In modern times this is
practically never done, but it was the universal practice of the Greek
sculptors at any rate down to the later periods of Hellenic art. These
remarks of Vasari come just at the time of the change from the ancient
to the modern technique, for we shall see that Donatello in the
fifteenth century worked according to the simpler ancient method, while
Michelangelo in the sixteenth after beginning in the same fashion
finally settled down to the use of the full model, which has ever since
remained _de rigeur_.
[Illustration:
PLATE X
_B_
DIAGRAM to illustrate Alberti’s method of measurement
_A_
INTERIOR OF A SCULPTOR’S STUDIO IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
With illustrations of methods of measurement
]
[Illustration:
FIG. 11.—Two views of unfinished Greek marble statue blocked out on
the ancient system. In quarries on Mount Pentelicus, Athens.
]
The technique of the Greeks furnished the subject for an article by
Professor Ernest Gardner in the 14th volume of the _Journal of Hellenic
Studies_. He shows there by a comparison of unfinished works that the
Greek sculptors attacked the marble directly, and proceeded apparently
on the following method. Having obtained a block about the size and
shape required they set it up before them as if in a front view, and
then hewed away at the two sides till they had brought the contour of
these to the exact lines required for the finished work. They then
passed round through a right angle to the side, and treated in a similar
fashion the front and back of the block, bringing these to the shape of
the front and back of the desired figure. The block would then, when
looked at from the front or back or from the sides, present the required
outlines, but the section of it would still be square in every
part—there would be no rounding off. The sketches, Fig. 11, show two
views of a figure blocked out in this fashion by an ancient Attic
sculptor. It was found in old marble workings on Mount Pentelicus, and
is preserved at the modern marble quarry at the back of that mountain.
We owe the use of the photographs employed to the courtesy of M. Georges
Nicole, of Geneva. They were published in the volume entitled _Mélanges
Nicole_, Geneva, 1905, in connection with an article on the figure by
the archaeologist just named. The next process was to cut away these
corners and with the guidance of the already established contours
gradually bring the whole into the required shape. A small model may in
every case be presupposed and there must have been some system of
measurement. Indeed on some antiques, as on a crouching Venus in the
gallery leading to the Venus of Milo in the Louvre, there are still to
be seen the knobs (puntelli) to which measurements were taken during the
progress of the work. Of the use of full-sized clay models there is in
Greece no evidence at all, until the late period of the first century
B.C., when we are told of Pasiteles, a very painstaking sculptor of a
decadent epoch, that he never executed a work without first modelling it
(nihil unquam fecit antequam finxit). This no doubt implies a full-sized
model in clay, for a small sketch would not be mentioned as it is a
matter of course.
The practice of the Italians is described by Cellini in words which are
important enough to quote. They are from the fourth chapter of his
treatise on Sculpture. ‘Now although many excellent masters of assured
technique have boldly attacked the marble with their tools, as soon as
they had carved the little model to completion, yet at the end they have
found themselves but little satisfied with their work. For, to speak
only of the best of the moderns, Donatello adopted this method in his
works; and another example is Michelangelo, who had experience of both
the methods, that is to say, of carving statues alike from the small
model and the big, and at the end, convinced of their respective
advantages and disadvantages, adopted the second method (of the
full-sized model). And this I saw myself at Florence when he was working
in the sacristy of S. Lorenzo (on the Medici tombs).’ As regards
Michelangelo’s early practice, Vasari records in his Life that he carved
the colossal marble ‘David’ with the sole aid of a small wax model,
according to Vasari one of those now preserved in the Casa Buonarroti at
Florence. This was in 1504. The Medici tombs date twenty years later.
In connection with the direct practice of Donatello, it is worth while
referring to some words of Francesco Bocchi, a rhetorical eulogist of
the arts and artists of his native Florence, who wrote in 1571 a
literary effusion on the sculptor’s St. George. He notes in his
introduction that Donatello was accustomed to compose his marble figures
compactly and to avoid projecting hands and arms, while for his effigies
in bronze he used much greater freedom in action. The difference is
really one of material, and Donatello’s practice of working directly on
the marble would necessarily involve this restraint in composition.
Anyone accustomed to deal with marble blocks as vehicles of artistic
expression, would avoid unnecessary projections as these cause great
waste of material and expenditure of time. When plastering clay or wax
on a flexible armature this consideration is not present, and modelled
figures will naturally be freer in action than carved ones. As will
presently be seen, certain marked differences in the treatment of relief
sculpture depend on these same considerations of material and technique.
In direct work on the marble there is of course always the danger of the
sort of miscalculation that Vasari goes on to notice. Greek figures
sometimes show variations from correct proportions, for example, the
left thigh of the Venus of Milo is too short, but the errors are not
such as to destroy the effect of the works. Greek work in marble shows a
marvellously intimate knowledge on the part of the carver of his
material as well as a clear conception of what he was aiming at. Even
Michelangelo yields in this respect to the ancients, for though no one
was ever more thoroughly a master of the carver’s technique, he made
serious mistakes in calculating proportions, as in the ‘Slave’ of the
Louvre, where he has not left enough marble for the leg of the figure.
Moderns generally have not the ease which tradition and practice gave to
the Greek sculptors, and the full-sized model is now a necessary
precaution.
ITALIAN AND GREEK RELIEFS.
[§ 52, _Pictorial or Perspective Reliefs_, ante, p. 154.]
Vasari ascribes comprehensively to the ‘ancients’ the invention of the
pictorial or perspectively treated relief, which was not in use in
mediaeval times, but came into vogue in the early years of the fifteenth
century. The first conspicuous instance of its employment was in the
models by Ghiberti for the second set of gates for the Baptistry at
Florence begun in 1425, but as these gates were not finally completed
till 1452, other artists had in the meantime produced works in the same
style. Donatello’s bronze relief of the beheading of John the Baptist,
on the font at Sienna, was completed in 1427 and shows the same
treatment in a modified form. It is a treatment often called pictorial
as it aims at effects of distance, with receding planes and objects made
smaller according to their supposed distance from the foreground. The
style has been sufficiently criticized, and it is generally agreed that
it represents a defiance of the barriers fixed by the nature of things
between painting and sculpture. It depended mainly however not on the
influence of painting but on the study of perspective, which
Brunelleschi brought into vogue somewhere about the year 1420.
Brunelleschi’s perspectives, or those which he inspired, were worked out
in inlaid woods, or tarsia work, see postea, p. 303 f., and exhibited
elaborate architectural compositions crowded with receding lines. These
compositions were adopted by Donatello and others for the backgrounds of
their figure reliefs, and Ghiberti filled his nearer planes with a crowd
of figures represented as Vasari describes according to the laws of
linear, and so far as the material permitted, of aerial perspective.
The question of the amount of warrant for this in antique practice as a
whole calls attention to an interesting moment in the general history of
relief sculpture. This has been dealt with recently by Franz Wickhoff,
in the Essay contributed by him to the publication of the Vienna
‘Genesis,’ and issued in an English translation by Mrs Strong under the
title _Roman Art_ (London, 1900), and also in Mrs Strong’s own _Roman
Sculpture_ (London, Duckworth, 1907). The tendency to multiply planes in
relief, and to introduce the perspective effects and the backgrounds of
a picture, shows itself in some of the late Greek or ‘Hellenistic’
reliefs, published by Schreiber under the title _Die Hellenistischen
Reliefbilder_ (Wien, 1889 etc.), and more especially in the smaller
frieze from the altar base at Pergamon. Etruscan relief sculpture is
also affected by it. It is however in Roman work of the early imperial
period that we actually find the antique prototypes for the kind of work
that Vasari has in his mind. The reliefs on the tomb of the Julii at St
Rémy, of the age of Augustus, those on the Arch of Titus, and most
conspicuously the decorative sculpture connected with the name of
Trajan, are instances in point. They show differences in plane, and
occasionally a distinct effort after perspective effects, and it is
possible that the study of some of these Roman examples by Brunelleschi
and Donatello at the opening of the fifteenth century may have
contributed to the formation of the picturesque tradition in Florentine
relief sculpture of the period. This style was however by no means
universal in Roman work. The carved sarcophagi are not much influenced
by it, and these sarcophagi are of special importance in the later
history of sculpture, in that they were the models used by Nicola Pisano
and the other French and Italian sculptors of the so-called
‘proto-Renaissance’ of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. In relation
to antique sculpture as a whole the pictorial style is quite abnormal.
The genius of the classical Greek relief is indeed totally opposed to
that of the Italian reliefs represented centrally by those of Ghiberti.
The difference is fundamentally one of material and technique. It is the
same distinction that was drawn by Michelangelo in his letter to
Benedetto Varchi, and noticed already in the Note on ‘The Nature of
Sculpture,’ ante, p. 179, the distinction, that is, between sculpture
that proceeds by additions, ‘per via di porre,’ and that which advances
by taking material away, ‘per forza di levare.’ The normal Italian
relief was in cast bronze and was necessarily modelled work. The
classical relief was in marble and was essentially carved work, for the
diversifying of a flat surface. When the Greek relief was in baked clay
it was generally stamped from moulds and not modelled up by hand. The
cast bronze relief in classical Greece may be said only to have existed
in the form of small plaques for the decoration of vases or other
objects in metal. The normal bronze relief in the ancient world was
beaten up in sheet metal by the repoussé process.
In the case alike of the relief carved on the marble slab, or stamped in
clay from moulds, or beaten up in the sheet of metal, the nature of the
technique renders flatness of effect almost obligatory. The Greek
decorative relief cut ‘per forza di levare’ in a smooth marble slab,
that is most often one of the constructive stones of an edifice,
naturally sacrifices as little of the material as is possible, and in
all Greek reliefs, whether low or high, as much as possible of the work
is kept to the foremost plane, the original surface of the stone. Again,
a mould that is undercut, or at all deeply recessed, cannot be used for
stamping clay, while the difficulty of relief work in sheet metal is
greatly increased in proportion to the amount of salience of the forms.
Hence the general flatness of the antique relief, observable even on the
late Roman sarcophagi which served as models at the first revival of
Italian sculpture. Whether the field of the relief is open or crowded,
the objects all come together to the front.
How different are the conditions when the relief is modelled up by hand
in clay or wax! Here the starting point is the background, not as in the
carved relief the foreground, and the forms, worked ‘per via di porre,’
can be made to stand out against this with an ease and effectiveness
which tempt the modeller to try all sorts of varieties of relief in the
same composition or the same figure, and to multiply planes of distance
till the objects on the foremost plane are starting out clear of the
ground. There is direct evidence (see ante, p. 194) that in the first
century B.C. the use of clay modelling as a preliminary process in
sculpture was greatly extended, and Roman pictorial reliefs may
themselves have been influenced from this side. There is no question at
any rate that the Italians of the Renaissance surrendered themselves
without hesitation to the fascination of this kind of work, and the
style of it dominates their later reliefs. The contrast in this respect
between Ghiberti’s second, or Old Testament, Gates, and his earlier ones
which adhered to the simpler style of Andrea Pisano’s reliefs on the
first of the three Baptistry Gates, is most instructive. Andrea’s
reliefs are in character mediaeval, and the nearest parallel to them are
the storied quatrefoils on the basement of the western portals at
Amiens. It is worthy of notice how classical these are in style, and
this is due to the fact that like Greek reliefs, such as the frieze of
the Parthenon, they were cut in the constructive stones of the edifice
_in situ_, and are in true stone technique.
This contrast of Greek and Italian reliefs furnishes a most conspicuous
object lesson on the importance of material and technique in
conditioning artistic practice. As was pointed out in the Introductory
Essay, these considerations have not in the past been sufficiently
emphasized in the scheme of education in design recognized in our
Schools of Art, though in several quarters now there is a promise of
better things.
THE PROCESSES OF THE BRONZE FOUNDER.
[§§ 55–69, ante, p. 158 ff.]
Vasari’s account of the processes attendant on casting in bronze is
intelligible and interesting, though he had himself little practical
acquaintance with the craft. Benvenuto Cellini on the other hand was an
expert bronze founder and the account he gives of the necessary
operations in the first three chapters of his treatise on Sculpture is
extremely graphic and detailed, and may be usefully employed to amplify
and explain Vasari’s notice. An expert knowledge of the founder’s craft
was not by any means universal among the Italian sculptors of the
Renaissance. Donatello did not possess it, nor did Michelangelo. In the
case of the former this is somewhat remarkable, for Donatello was such a
vigorous craftsman that we should have expected to find him revelling in
all the technical minutiae of the foundry. We are expressly told however
by Pomponius Gauricus that Donatello lacked this knowledge, and never
cast his own works but always relied on the help of bell founders (Hans
Semper, _Donatello_, Wien, 1875, p. 317). Michelozzo on the other hand,
who worked with Donatello, could cast, and so could Ghiberti, A.
Pollaiuolo, and Verrocchio, while Alessandro Leopardi of Venice, who
cast Verrocchio’s Colleoni statue, was famed for his practical skill in
this department. It was customary, when expert help in casting was
required, to enlist the services of bell founders and makers of cannon,
but Cellini warns sculptors against trusting too much to these mere
mechanicians who lacked ingenuity and resource.
The following general sketch of the processes of casting will render
Vasari’s account more easy to follow. A successful cast in bronze
consists in a thin shell of the metal, representing on the exterior the
exact form of the model, or the complete design in the artist’s mind.
The best way to procure this is to provide first a similar shell,
perfect on its exterior surface, of wax, and then to melt away the wax
and replace it by molten bronze. For this to be possible the shell of
wax must be closely sealed between an outer envelope and an inner
packing or core. It can then be got rid of by melting, but care must
have been taken lest the core when it loses the support of the wax
should shift its position in relation to the envelope. To prevent this,
metal rods are run, skewer-fashion, through core and envelope to retain
them firmly in their relative positions. Molten bronze may then be
introduced into the space formerly occupied by the wax, and this, when
it is cold, and the envelope and core are both removed, will be the cast
required.
Attention has to be paid to secure that there shall be no moisture and
no remnant of wax in the parts where the molten bronze is to come,
otherwise steam may be generated and a dangerous explosion follow.
Similarly, air holes or vents must be provided, so that the air may
escape before the flowing metal. The cast when cold should,
theoretically, give a perfect result, but as a matter of fact, unless
very accomplished skill or great good fortune have presided over the
operations, the metal will be blistered or seamed or flawed in parts,
and these imperfections will have to be remedied by processes which come
under the head of chasing, and are described by Vasari at the close of
the chapter.
A direct and ingenious method of procuring the needful shell of wax is
that described by Vasari in § 67 as suitable for small figures and
reliefs. Over the model for such a small figure an envelope is formed,
in the shape of a hollow mould of fire-resisting material, so
constructed that it can be taken to pieces, the model extracted, and the
mould closed up again. The mould must now be cooled with cold water and
it is then filled with melted wax. Contact with the cold sides of the
mould chills the wax, which hardens all over in a sort of crust or skin.
The rest of the wax, still liquid, is then poured out and the skin or
crust suffered to harden. The interior is then filled with clay of a
kind that will stand heat. Rods or skewers are passed through this and
the envelope, the wax is melted out and its place taken by the molten
bronze.
This process, one of course only suitable for small objects, presupposes
the existence of a completely finished model to be exactly reproduced in
the metal. The simplest of all processes of bronze casting dispenses
with this model. Vasari does not describe this simplest method but
Cellini, who employed it both for his ‘Nymph of Fontainebleau’ and his
‘Perseus,’ gives an account of it which is worth summarizing because the
process is probably the one adopted in most cases by the old Greek
masters.
Cellini tells us that in making his large lunette-shaped relief of the
‘Nymph of Fontainebleau,’ now in the Louvre, he began by modelling up
the piece in fire-resisting clay, of course over a proper armature or
skeleton. He worked it out to full size and then let it dry till it had
shrunk about a finger’s breadth. He then covered it with a coating of
wax of rather less than this thickness, which he modelled with the
utmost care, finishing it in every detail so that it expressed to the
full his own idea for the finished work. This was then carefully covered
in successive layers with an envelope of fire-resisting material, which
would be properly tied by transverse rods to the core, and braced on the
exterior by an armature. The wax was then melted out, and the core and
envelope thoroughly dried, when the molten bronze was poured in so as to
reproduce the wax in every detail.
It is obvious that this is not only the most direct but the most
artistic method of work. The wax forms a complete unbroken surface and
receives and retains the exact impression in every detail of the
master’s hand. If the cast be thoroughly successful, the bronze will
reproduce the surface of the wax so perfectly that no further work upon
it will be needed, and an ‘untouched cast’ will be the result. This
method would suit the genius of the Greeks, and was no doubt commonly
employed by them, but it has the practical drawback that if anything go
wrong, and the bronze do not flow properly, the whole work is spoilt,
and will have to be built up again _de novo_ from the small study.
Cellini tells us that his ‘Perseus,’ which he was casting in this
fashion, nearly came to grief from the cause just indicated, and he
accordingly recommends what he calls the second method, a longer and
less direct process, which has however the advantage that a full-sized
completed model is all the time preserved.
This process is the one described by Vasari. A full-sized clay model is
prepared and finished, and this is then covered with a plaster envelope
made in numerous sections, so that it can be taken to pieces and put
together again without the model, which may be preserved for further
use. The next step is to line the inside of the empty envelope, or
piece-mould, as it is called, with wax, and to fill up all the rest of
the interior with a core. The piece-mould is then removed, and the
surface of the wax is carefully gone over to secure that it shall be
perfect in every part. Over it is then laid in successive coats a
fire-resisting envelope between which and the core the wax is
hermetically sealed. The wax can then be melted out and replaced with
bronze. The piece-mould, which has been detached section by section from
the wax, will serve again for other reproductions. The processes in
which wax is employed are called _cire perdue_ processes, because the
wax is got rid of in order to be replaced by the metal. The usual
process in vogue at the present day dispenses with any employment of
wax. The figure to be cast is piece-moulded and reproduced in a suitable
material, a certain thickness of which is in every part pared away
according to the thickness required for the bronze. This core is then
replaced with proper adjustments within a fireproof mould, and the
bronze is poured into the space prepared for it.
OF PAINTING
CHAPTER I. (XV.)
What Design is, and how good Pictures are made and known, and
concerning the invention of Compositions.
§ 74. _The Nature and Materials of Design or Drawing._[186]
Seeing that Design, the parent of our three arts, Architecture,
Sculpture, and Painting, having its origin in the intellect, draws out
from many single things a general judgement, it is like a form or idea
of all the objects in nature, most marvellous in what it compasses, for
not only in the bodies of men and of animals but also in plants, in
buildings, in sculpture and in painting, design is cognizant of the
proportion of the whole to the parts and of the parts to each other and
to the whole. Seeing too that from this knowledge there arises a certain
conception and judgement, so that there is formed in the mind that
something which afterwards, when expressed by the hands, is called
design, we may conclude that design is not other than a visible
expression and declaration of our inner conception and of that which
others have imagined and given form to in their idea. And from this,
perhaps, arose the proverb among the ancients ‘ex ungue leonem’ when a
certain clever person, seeing carved in a stone block the claw only of a
lion, apprehended in his mind from its size and form all the parts of
the animal and then the whole together, just as if he had had it present
before his eyes. Some believe that accident was the father of design and
of the arts, and that use and experience as foster-mother and
schoolmaster, nourished it with the help of knowledge and of reasoning,
but I think that, with more truth, accident may be said rather to have
given the occasion for design, than to be its father.
But let this be as it may, what design needs, when it has derived from
the judgement the mental image of anything, is that the hand, through
the study and practice of many years, may be free and apt to draw and to
express correctly, with the pen, the silver-point, the charcoal, the
chalk, or other instrument, whatever nature has created. For when the
intellect puts forth refined and judicious conceptions, the hand which
has practised design for many years, exhibits the perfection and
excellence of the arts as well as the knowledge of the artist. And
seeing that there are certain sculptors who have not much practice in
strokes and outlines, and consequently cannot draw on paper, these work
instead in clay or wax, fashioning men, animals, and other things in
relief, with beautiful proportion and balance. Thus they effect the same
thing as does he who draws well on paper or other flat surface.
The masters who practise these arts have named or distinguished the
various kinds of design according to the description of the drawing
which they make. Those which are touched lightly and just indicated with
the pen or other instrument are called sketches, as shall be explained
in another place. Those, again, that have the first lines encircling an
object are called profiles or outlines.
§ 75. _Use of Design (or Drawing) in the Various Arts._
All these, whether we call them profiles or otherwise, are as useful to
architecture and sculpture as to painting. Their chief use indeed is in
Architecture, because its designs are composed only of lines, which so
far as the architect is concerned, are nothing else than the beginning
and the end of his art, for all the rest, which is carried out with the
aid of models of wood formed from the said lines, is merely the work of
carvers and masons.[187]
In Sculpture, drawing is of service in the case of all the profiles,
because in going round from view to view the sculptor uses it when he
wishes to delineate the forms which please him best, or which he intends
to bring out in every dimension, whether in wax, or clay, or marble, or
wood, or other material.
In Painting, the lines are of service in many ways, but especially in
outlining every figure, because when they are well drawn, and made
correct and in proportion, the shadows and lights that are then added
give the strongest relief to the lines of the figure and the result is
all excellence and perfection. Hence it happens, that whoever
understands and manages these lines well, will, with the help of
practice and judgement, excel in each one of these arts. Therefore, he
who would learn thoroughly to express in drawing the conceptions of the
mind and anything else that pleases him, must after he has in some
degree trained his hand to make it more skilful in the arts, exercise it
in copying figures in relief either in marble or stone, or else plaster
casts taken from the life, or from some beautiful antique statue, or
even from models in relief of clay, which may either be nude or clad in
rags covered with clay to serve for clothing and drapery. All these
objects being motionless and without feeling, greatly facilitate the
work of the artist, because they stand still, which does not happen in
the case of live things that have movement. When he has trained his hand
by steady practice in drawing such objects, let him begin to copy from
nature and make a good and certain practice herein, with all possible
labour and diligence, for the things studied from nature are really
those which do honour to him who strives to master them, since they have
in themselves, besides a certain grace and liveliness, that simple and
easy sweetness which is nature’s own, and which can only be learned
perfectly from her, and never to a sufficient degree from the things of
art. Hold it moreover for certain, that the practice that is acquired by
many years of study in drawing, as has been said above, is the true
light of design and that which makes men really proficient. Now, having
discoursed long enough on this subject let us go on to see what painting
is.
§ 76. _Of the Nature of Painting._
A painting, then, is a plane covered with patches of colour on the
surface of wood, wall, or canvas filling up the outlines spoken of
above, which, by virtue of a good design of encompassing lines, surround
the figure.[188] If the painter treat his flat surface with right
judgement, keeping the centre light and the edges and the background
dark and medium colour between the light and dark in the intermediate
spaces, the result of the combination of these three fields of colour
will be that everything between the one outline and the other stands out
and appears round and in relief. It is indeed true that these three
shades cannot suffice for every object treated in detail, therefore it
is necessary to divide every shade at least into two half shades, making
of the light two half tints, and of the dark two lighter, and of the
medium two other half tints which incline one to the lighter and the
other to the darker side. When these tints, being of one colour only
whatever it may be, are gradated, we see a transition beginning with the
light, and then the less light, and then a little darker, so that little
by little we find the pure black. Having then made the mixtures, that
is, these colours mixed together, and wishing to work with oil or
tempera or in fresco, we proceed to fill in the outlines putting in
their proper place the lights and darks, the half tints and the lowered
tones of the half tints and the lights. I mean those tints mixed from
the three first, light, medium and dark, which lights and medium tints
and darks and lower tones are copied from the cartoon or other design
which is made for any work before we begin to put it into execution. It
is necessary that the design be carried out with good arrangement, firm
drawing, and judgement and invention, seeing that the composition in a
picture is not other than the parcelling out of the places where the
figures come, so that the spaces be not unshapely but in accordance with
the judgement of the eye, while the field is in one place well covered
and in another void. All this is the result of drawing and of having
copied figures from the life, or from models of figures made to
represent anything one wishes to make. Design cannot have a good origin
if it have not come from continual practice in copying natural objects,
and from the study of pictures by excellent masters and of ancient
statues in relief, as has been said many times. But above all, the best
thing is to draw men and women from the nude and thus fix in the memory
by constant exercise the muscles of the torso, back, legs, arms, and
knees, with the bones underneath. Then one may be sure that through much
study attitudes in any position can be drawn by help of the imagination
without one’s having the living forms in view. Again having seen human
bodies dissected one knows how the bones lie, and the muscles and
sinews, and all the order and conditions of anatomy, so that it is
possible with greater security and more correctness to place the limbs
and arrange the muscles of the body in the figures we draw. And those
who have this knowledge will certainly draw the outlines of the figures
perfectly, and these, when drawn as they ought to be, show a pleasing
grace and beautiful style.
He who studies good painting and sculpture, and at the same time sees
and understands the life, must necessarily have acquired a good method
in art. Hence springs the invention which groups figures in fours,
sixes, tens, twenties, in such a manner as to represent battles and
other great subjects of art. This invention demands an innate propriety
springing out of harmony and obedience; thus if a figure move to greet
another, the figure saluted having to respond should not turn away. As
with this example, so it is with all the rest. The subject may offer
many varied motives different one from another, but the motives chosen
must always bear relation to the work in hand, and to what the artist is
in process of representing. He ought to distinguish between different
movements and characteristics, making the women with a sweet and
beautiful air and also the youths, but the old always grave of aspect,
and especially the priests and persons in authority. He must always take
care however, that everything is in relation to the work as a whole; so
that when the picture is looked at, one can recognize in it a harmonious
unity, wherein the passions strike terror, and the pleasing effects shed
sweetness, representing directly the intention of the painter, and not
the things he had no thought of. It is requisite therefore, for this
purpose, that he form the figures which have to be spirited with
movement and vigour, and that he make those which are distant to retire
from the principal figures by means of shade and colour that gradually
and softly become lower in tone. Thus the art will always be associated
with the grace of naturalness and of delicate charm of colour, and the
work be brought to perfection not with the stress of cruel suffering, so
that men who look at it have to endure pain on account of the suffering
which they see has been borne by the artist in his work, but rather with
rejoicing at his good fortune in that his hand has received from heaven
the lightness of movement which shows his painting to be worked out with
study and toil certainly, but not with drudgery; so will it be that the
figures, every one in its place, will not appear dead to him who
observes them, but alive and true. Let painters avoid crudities, let it
be their endeavour that the things they are always producing shall not
seem painted, but show themselves alive and starting out of the canvas.
This is the secret of sound design and the true method recognized by him
who has painted as belonging to the pictures that are known and judged
to be good.