Architectural Invention in Renaissance Rome Artists, Humanists, and The Planning of Raphael's Villa Madama

ARCHITECTURAL INVENTION IN RENAISSANCE ROME
Villa Madama, Raphael’s late masterwork of architecture, landscape, and

decoration for the Medici popes, is a paradigm of the Renaissance villa.
The coming-into-being of this important, unfinished complex provides a
remarkable case study for the nature of architectural invention. Drawing on
little-known poetry describing the villa while it was on the drawing board,
as well as ground plans, letters, and antiquities once installed there,Yvonne
Elet reveals the design process to have been a dynamic, collaborative effort
involving humanists as well as architects. She explores design as a self-
reflexive process, and the dialectic of text and architectural form, illuminating
the relation of word and image in Renaissance architectural practice. Her
revisionist account of architectural design as a process engaging different
systems of knowledge, visual and verbal, has important implications for
the relation of architecture and language, meaning in architecture, and the
translation of idea into form.
yvonne elet is Associate Professor of Art History at Vassar College. She

is a specialist in Italian early modern art and architecture, and her research
focuses on Renaissance villa culture; integrated designs for art, architecture,
and landscape; early modern stucco; and intersections among art, literature,
science, and natural philosophy. Her articles appear in the Journal of the
Society of Architectural Historians and I Tatti Studies in the Italian Renaissance.
She has received grants from the Center for Advanced Studies in the Visual
Arts, the Getty Research Institute, and the American Council of Learned
Societies. She has been a Fellow at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and at
the Frick Collection, and a visiting scholar at the Max-Planck-Institut für
Wissenschaftsgeschichte in Berlin.
ARCHITECTURAL
INVENTION IN
RENAISSANCE ROME
A RT I S T S , H U M A N I S T S , A N D T H E
P L A N N I N G O F R A P H A E L’ S
VILLA MADAMA
YVONNE ELET
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www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781107130524
doi: 10.1017/9781316418161
© Yvonne Elet 2017
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception
and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
no reproduction of any part may take place without the written
permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 2017
Printed in the United Kingdom by TJ International Ltd. Padstow Cornwall
A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
names: Elet,Yvonne, author. | Sperulo, Francesco, active 15th–16th century.
title: Architectural Invention in Renaissance Rome: Artists, Humanists, and
the Planning of Raphael’s Villa Madama / Yvonne Elet,Vassar College.
description: New York: Cambridge University Press, 2017. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
identifiers: lccn 2017012390 | isbn 9781107130524 (hardback)
subjects: lcsh: Architecture, Renaissance – Italy – Rome. | Humanism in
architecture – Italy – Rome. | Architectural practice – Italy – Rome –
History – 16th century. | Group work in architecture – Italy – Rome –
History – 16th century. | Sperulo, Francesco, active 15th–16th century –
Influence. | Raphael, 1483–1520 – Criticism and interpretation. |
Raphael, 1483–1520 – Friends and associates. | Villa
Madama (Rome, Italy) | Rome (Italy) – Buildings, structures, etc. | BISAC:
HISTORY / Renaissance.
classification: lcc na1120 .e45 2017 | ddc 720.945/09031–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017012390
isbn 978-1-107-13052-4 Hardback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of
URLs for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in this publication
and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is, or will remain,
accurate or appropriate.
Illustrations in this book were funded by a Society of Architectural Historians/Mellon

Author Award. Production was supported by a subvention from the Lucy Maynard Salmon
Research Fund at Vassar College.
To the memory of Bernadette and Chloe
and for Katja, my mother, and Eric
CONTENTS
List of Plates page ix

List of Figures xi
Preface and Acknowledgments xix
Note on Translations and Abbreviations xxv
INTRODUCTION: THE NATURE OF INVENTION,

IN WORD AND IMAGE 1
1 REVIVING THE CORPSE 15

Patrons, Humanists, and Artists in Leonine Rome 17
Raphael’s Lazarus: The Medici Villa Project 33
2 WRITING ARCHITECTURE 47
The Textual Villa 47
Poets and Muses at the Construction Site 54
3 SPERULO’S VISION 61
The Poet as Medici Vates 61
Sperulo Gives Meaning to Ancient Marbles 73
Envisioning Paintings: Battles and Clemency 79
4 ENCOMIA OF THE UNBUILT 85

Building the Villa in Verse and Prose: Sperulo’s and Raphael’s
Descriptions 85
Hortatory Ekphrasis 90
The Inventive Assemblage of Literary and Rhetorical Genres 93
Poetry and Planning 96
5 METASTRUCTURES OF WORD AND IMAGE 99

Multivalent Conceptual Programs 99
Topography of Christian Triumph 101
Parnassus 105
The Realm of Venus Genetrix 116
vii
viii CONTEN T S
Temple of Peace 118

Coenatio Iovis 124
Medici Ancestor Gallery 127
The Generative Power of Marbles 133
6 DYNAMIC DESIGN 142

Reconfiguring the Roles of Artists and Advisors 143
Poetry as Design Tool 152
Performing the Plans 153
Collaboration and Competition 155
Authorship and Building Practice 157
Modern Ruins and the Culture of Coming-to-Be 163
CONCLUSION: BUILDING WITH MORTAR AND VERSE 170
appendix i
Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata/
The Villa Giulia Medicea Constructed in Verse:
critical edition and translation by nicoletta marcelli
and gloss by the author 180
appendix ii
Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata:
analysis of the presentation manuscript 216
appendix iii
F rancesco Sperulo, Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia xviiii 226
Notes 228
Bibliography 291
Index 320
Color plates are to be found between pp. 6 and 7

P L AT E S
i Richard Wilson, Rome from the Villa Madama, detail, 1753. (Photo
courtesy of Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection)
ii Villa Madama, view of the complex looking southwest.
(Photo: author)
iii Villa Madama, view of the rear façade of the garden loggia,
adjoining the inner garden overlooking the fishpond. (Photo: author)
iv Villa Madama, view of the inner garden and fishpond from the
building. (Photo: author)
v Giovan Francesco da Sangallo, plan for Villa Madama. Florence,
Uffizi, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe, 273a. (Courtesy Ministero
dei beni e delle attività culturali e del turismo)
vi Antonio da Sangallo the Younger, plan for Villa Madama. Florence,
Uffizi, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe, 314a. (Courtesy Ministero
dei beni e delle attività culturali e del turismo)
vii Villa Madama, garden loggia, looking northeast. (Photo: author)
viii Villa Madama, garden loggia, exedra with painted and stucco
decorations depicting Venus. (Photo: author)
ix Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519.
BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, fol. 1v; actual size. (Photo © 2016 Biblioteca
Apostolica Vaticana)
x Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519.
BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, fol. 2r; actual size. (Photo © 2016 Biblioteca
xi Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519.
BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, fol. 3r; actual size. (Photo © 2016 Biblioteca
xii Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519.
BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, binding; actual size. (Photo © 2016 Biblioteca
xiii Lucian, Dialoghi maritimi, 1519. BAV, Vat. Lat. 5802, fol. 17r.
(Photo © 2016 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana)
xiv Lucian, Dialoghi maritimi, 1519. BAV, Vat. Lat. 5802, fol. 36r.
(Photo © 2016 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana)
xv Raphael and associates, Battle of the Milvian Bridge, detail, Sala
di Costantino,Vatican Palace. (Photo: Servizio Fotografico dei Musei
Vaticani, copyright Musei Vaticani)
ix
x LI ST OF P L AT E S
xvi Raphael and associates, Battle of the Milvian Bridge, detail of the Villa
Madama under construction on the hillside, Sala di Costantino,
Vatican Palace. (Photo: Servizio Fotografico dei Musei Vaticani,
copyright Musei Vaticani)
xvii Villa Madama, present-day façade, which is half of the planned
circular courtyard. (Photo: author)
xviii Giovanni Volpato (1738–1803),Villa Madama, garden loggia
looking northeast; engraving with watercolor, Kunstsammlungen
der Veste Coburg, Inv. xii.358.97. (Photo: Kunstsammlungen der
Veste Coburg, Germany)
xix Giovanni Volpato (1738–1803),Villa Madama, garden loggia
looking southwest; engraving with watercolor, Kunstsammlungen
der Veste Coburg, Inv. xii.358.99. (Photo: Kunstsammlungen
der Veste Coburg, Germany)
F IG U R E S
1 Lambert Lombard, The Raising of Lazarus with Villa Madama in the

Background, 1544. Düsseldorf, Kunstmuseum, Graphische Sammlung,
fp4748. (Foto Marburg/Art Resource, NY) page 16
2 Hieronymus Cock after Lambert Lombard, The Raising of Lazarus with
Villa Madama in the Background, Bibliothèque royale de Belgique,
Cabinet des Estampes, x.v. 89185. (Photo: Bibliothèque royale de
Belgique) 17
3 Raphael, Portrait of Pope Leo X with Two Cardinals (Giulio de’ Medici at
Leo’s proper right, and Luigi de’ Rossi behind him), 1518, Florence,
Uffizi. (Photo: Scala/Ministero per i beni e le attività culturali/
Art Resource, NY) 19
4 Marcantonio Raimondi after Raphael, Quos Ego (Neptune calming the
tempest which Aeolus raised against Aeneas’ fleet, surrounded by other
scenes from Book i of the Aeneid), engraving. (Photo: Frances Lehman
Loeb Art Center,Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York) 25
5 Raphael, Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, 1514–16 (debated), Paris,
Louvre. (Photo © RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY) 26
6 Raphael, Andrea Navagero and Agostino Beazzano, 1516, Rome, Galleria
Doria Pamphilj. (Photo: Galleria Doria Pamphilj, Rome/Bridgeman
Images) 27
7 Raphael, Portrait of Tommaso Inghirami, c. 1510–11 (debated), Florence,
Pitti Gallery. (Photo: Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY) 28
8 Raphael (or copy after), Portrait of Antonio Tebaldeo, c. 1515, location
unknown. (Photo: Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte, Munich,
Photothek) 29
9 Cristofano dell’Altissimo, Portrait of Ludovico Ariosto, c. 1552–68,
Florence, Uffizi. (Photo: Scala/Art Resource, NY) 30
10 Raphael, Project for a Stage Design, probably Ariosto’s I suppositi,
staged in the Vatican on 6 March 1519. Florence, Uffizi, Gabinetto
Disegni e Stampe, U 560ar. (Photo: Scala/Ministero per i beni e le
attività culturali/Art Resource, NY) 31
11 Raphael, A Landscape with Figures and the Ruins of a Column, c. 1512–13,
Windsor, Royal Library Inv. rcin 990117. (Photo supplied by Royal Collection
Trust / © HM Queen Elizabeth II 2015) 32
12 Heinrich von Geymüller, reconstruction of the Villa Madama complex,
showing the northern half of the gardens. 34
xi
xii LI ST OF FI G U R E S
13 Villa Madama, model of the reconstructed plan of the building, 1983;

view as if looking downhill from the top of the site. (Photo:
Mirka Beneš) 36
14 Villa Madama, model of the reconstructed plan of the building, 1983.
(Photo: Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max-Planck-Institut für
Kunstgeschichte, Rome) 36
15 Villa Madama, schematic plan based on U 314a identifying areas of the
villa discussed, with Raphael’s vocabulary for the spaces described in his
letter, and a reference to the corresponding section of his letter in
Raphael/Dewez. (Eric Spitzer, adapted from Guy Dewez, Villa
Madama, fig. 44) 38
16 Villa Madama, aerial view showing the portion of the design that
was built. (Photo: H. A. Millon, copyright J. H. Aronson, 1979) 39
17 Villa Madama, vestibule. (Photo: Eric Spitzer) 40
18 Villa Madama, garden loggia. (Photo: Eric Spitzer) 41
19 Giovanni Volpato (1738–1803),Villa Madama, garden loggia opening to
the inner garden; view from the southwest end. Engraving with watercolor,
Kunstsammlungen der Veste Coburg, Inv. xii. 252.1. (Photo:
Kunstsammlungen der Veste Coburg, Germany) 42
20 Photomontage reconstructing the view through the garden loggia when
it was still unglazed. (From Mario Bafile, Il giardino di Villa Madama,
Rome, 1942) 44
21 Villa Madama, view of the inner garden and fishpond from the building.
(Photo: author) 45
22 Pliny the Younger, Epistolarum libri IX, Treviso: Ioannes Vercellius, 1483.
First folio of Bernardo Bembo’s copy of Pliny’s Letters. (Courtesy
Department of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries) 48
23 Francesco Zucchi, Pietro Bembo in Villa Bozza, in Opere del cardinale
Pietro Bembo,Venice, 1729. (Courtesy Princeton University Library) 49
24 Raphael and associates, Parnassus, detail depicting Dante, Homer,Virgil,
and Statius(?), perhaps as a self-portrait of the artist; 1509–11, Stanza
della Segnatura,Vatican Palace. (Photo: Servizio Fotografico dei Musei
Vaticani, copyright Musei Vaticani) 51
25 Tree of Medici family members mentioned in Sperulo’s poem.
(Diagram by Eric Spitzer) 62
26 Schematic plan of U 273a showing specific areas of Villa Madama for
which Sperulo proposes decorations. (Eric Spitzer, adapted from Guy
Dewez, Villa Madama, fig. 53) 63
27 Raphael, woven by Pieter van Aelst, The Arrival of Cardinal Giovanni de’
Medici in Rome in 1492, Flanked by the River Gods Arno and Tiber, from
Scenes from the Life of Leo X, borders to the Acts of the Apostles tapestries
for the Sistine Chapel, 1516–19,Vatican Museums. (Photo: Scala/Art
Resource, NY) 68
28 Associates of Raphael, Etruria, Home of the Medici, c. 1523, frescoed west
window embrasure, Sala di Costantino,Vatican Palace. (Photo: Servizio
Fotografico dei Musei Vaticani, copyright Musei Vaticani) 69
LIST OF FIGURES xiii
29 Salvator Rosa, The Dream of Aeneas, 1663–4, etching and drypoint,

Metropolitan Museum, New York. (Photo: Metropolitan Museum;
www.metmuseum.org) 70
30 Erotes tauroctonoi, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, inv. 6718;
Trajanic relief from the Temple of Venus Genetrix in Rome, formerly in
Villa Madama. (Photo: author, published courtesy of the Ministero dei
beni e delle attività culturali e del turismo – Museo Archeologico
Nazionale di Napoli) 76
31 Anonymous,Villa Madama, garden loggia, northeast wall; detail showing
area where the erotes tauroctonoi relief was installed, mid-sixteenth-century
drawing, private collection. (Photo: Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max-
Planck-Institut für Kunstgeschichte, Rome) 76
32 Anonymous,Villa Madama, garden loggia, northeast wall; mid-sixteenth-
century drawing, private collection. (Photo: Bibliotheca Hertziana –
Max-Planck-Institut für Kunstgeschichte, Rome) 77
33 Romualdo Moscioni,Villa Madama, garden loggia, view of northeast
wall c. 1885–9 showing black patch where the erotes tauroctonoi relief was
removed. (Photo: Servizio Fotografico dei Musei Vaticani, copyright
Musei Vaticani) 78
34 Villa Madama, garden loggia, northeast wall. The relief was inset in the
panel behind the cabinet. (Photo: Eric Spitzer) 78
35 Raphael, woven by Pieter van Aelst, The Capture of Cardinal Giovanni de’
Medici by French Troops in the Battle of Ravenna in 1512, from Scenes from
the Life of Leo X, borders to the Acts of the Apostles tapestries for the
Sistine Chapel, 1516–19,Vatican Museums. (Photo: Scala/Art
Resource, NY) 80
36 Raphael (in the hand of a copyist), Letter Describing Villa Madama,
Florence, Archivio di Stato, MAP 94, letter 162, cc. 214r. (Courtesy
of the Ministero dei beni e delle attività culturali e del turismo,
Archivio di Stato di Firenze) 86
37 Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519. BAV, Vat. Lat.
5812, fols. 15v–16r: the praeteritio listing items the poet sets aside.
(Photo © 2016 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana) 88
38 Fra Carnevale, The Ideal City, c. 1480–4. (Photo: The Walters Art
Museum, Baltimore) 93
39 Arch. Francesco Contini, Strada per la Croce di Monte Mario; for the
catasto of Pope Alexander VII, leadpoint and watercolor, 1665–7; ASR,
Catasto Alessandrino, b. 433, 41. Detail showing the Villa Madama and
the cross of Monte Mario just above it along the Via Triumphalis.
(Photo courtesy of the Ministero dei beni e delle attività culturali e del
turismo, Archivio di Stato di Roma) 103
40 Raphael, Parnassus, 1509–11, Stanza della Segnatura,Vatican Palace.
(Photo: Servizio Fotografico dei Musei Vaticani, copyright
Musei Vaticani) 107
41 Terpsichore, Museo del Prado, inv. 429. (Photo: Museo del Prado) 108
42 Urania, Museo del Prado, inv. 436. (Photo: Museo del Prado) 108
xiv LI ST OF FI G U R E S
43 Clio, Museo del Prado, inv. 401. (Photo: Museo del Prado) 109
44 Thalia, Museo del Prado, inv. 373. (Photo: Museo del Prado) 109
45 Melpomene, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, inv. sk4. (Photo ©
Nationalmuseum) 110
46 Erato, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, inv. sk7. (Photo © Hans Thorwid/
Nationalmuseum) 111
47 Muse with nebris, Stockholm Nationalmuseum, inv. sk5. (Photo © Hans
Thorwid/Nationalmuseum) 111
48 Melpomene (so-called Farnese Melpomene), Museo Archeologico Nazionale
di Napoli, inv. 6400. (Photo: author, published courtesy of the Ministero
dei beni e delle attività culturali e del turismo – Museo Archeologico
49 Muse, or so-called Niobide, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, inv.
6391. (Photo: author, published courtesy of the Ministero dei beni e
delle attività culturali e del turismo – Museo Archeologico Nazionale
di Napoli) 112
50 Marten van Heemskerck, Seated Muses at Villa Madama (Urania and
Terpsichore), Berlin, Staatliche Museen Kupferstichkabinett, Inv. Nr. 79
d 2, Römische Skizzenbücher, i, fol. 34r. (Photo: bpk, Berlin/
Kupferstichkabinett/Jörg P. Anders/Art Resource, NY) 113
51 Marten van Heemskerck, Muses at Villa Madama (left–right Thalia, Clio,
Muse with nebris, Niobide), Berlin, Staatliche Museen Kupferstichkabinett,
Inv. Nr. 79 d 2, Römische Skizzenbücher, i, fol. 34v. (Photo: bpk,
Berlin/Kupferstichkabinett/Jörg P. Anders/Art Resource, NY) 113
52 Villa Madama, stairs from the inner garden leading down to the
fishpond, and to the ambulatory behind it. (Photo: author) 114
53 Villa Madama, fishpond and tri-lobed ambulatory behind it.
(Photo: author) 115
54 Villa Madama, fishpond exedra with three sculpture niches.
(Photo: author) 116
55 Villa Madama, ambulatory along the fishpond, with three grotto-like
exedrae, each with three sculpture niches. (Photo: author) 117
56 Villa Madama, view from the area adjacent to the fishpond described by
Raphael as a dining area (cenatione). (Photo: author) 118
57 Plan for Villa Madama, annotated detail of U 273a (Plate v) indicating
the garden loggia with fountain diaeta, inner garden, and fishpond.
(Courtesy Ministero dei beni e delle attività culturali e del turismo) 119
58 Plan for Villa Madama, annotated detail of U 314a (Plate vi) indicating
the garden loggia, inner garden, and fishpond, as well as sculptures that
would be installed in these areas. (Courtesy Ministero dei beni e delle
attività culturali e del turismo) 119
59 Étienne Dupérac, The Basilica of Constantine and Maxentius, then
identified as the Temple of Peace, engraving. (Photo: Bibliotheca
Hertziana – Max-Planck-Institut für Kunstgeschichte, Rome) 120
60 Donato Bramante, Colonna Nymphaeum, Genazzano. (Photo:
Associazione Culturale Ninfea) 120
LIST OF FIGURES xv
61 Villa Madama, garden loggia, watercolor, c. 1927. (From W. E.

Greenwood, The Villa Madama, New York, 1928) 121
62 Marten van Heemskerck, Jupiter Ciampolini in the garden loggia of Villa
Madama, detail; Berlin, Staatliche Museen Kupferstichkabinett, Inv. Nr.
79 d 2, Römische Skizzenbücher, i, fol. 24r. (Photo: bpk, Berlin/
Kupferstichkabinett/Jörg P. Anders/Art Resource, NY) 122
63 Jupiter Ciampolini, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, s.n. (Photo:
author, published courtesy of the Ministero dei beni e delle attività
culturali e del turismo – Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli) 123
64 Domenico Aimo, Leo X, c. 1518, Santa Maria in Aracoeli, Rome.
(Photo: author) 126
65 Raphael school, Pope Clement I, with the features of Leo X, Sala di
Costantino,Vatican Palace. (Photo: Scala/Art Resource, NY) 127
66 Giulio Romano, Polyphemus, fresco on the northeastern wall of the
garden loggia (opposite the Jupiter Ciampolini),Villa Madama. (Photo:
Eric Spitzer) 128
67 Unknown sixteenth-century artist, drawing, probably a copy after a
lost preparatory drawing by Giulio Romano for the Polyphemus fresco,
Louvre, Département des Arts graphiques, inv. 3672. (Photo: © RMN-
Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY) 128
68 Polyphemus group from the grotto of Tiberius’ villa at Sperlonga, now in
the Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Sperlonga. (Photo: author) 129
69 Grotto of Tiberius’ villa at Sperlonga; view from the platform where the
Polyphemus group was installed. (Photo: author) 129
70 Collaborator of Raphael, project for the elevation of the circular
courtyard of Villa Madama, RIBA n. xiii-ii. (Photo: RIBA Library
Drawings and Archives Collection) 131
71, 72 Michelangelo, Tomb of Giuliano de’ Medici, Duke of Nemours and
Tomb of Lorenzo de’ Medici, Duke of Urbino, begun 1519; New Sacristy, San
Lorenzo, Florence. (Photo: Scala/Art Resource, NY) 132
73 Baccio Bandinelli, sculptures of Medici ancestors, Salone del
Cinquecento, Palazzo Vecchio, Florence. (Photo: Scala/Art
Resource, NY) 133
74 Marten van Heemskerck,Villa Madama, garden loggia, exedra with
sculptures including the Genius Augusti in the center; Berlin, Staatliche
Museen Kupferstichkabinett, Inv. Nr. 79 d 2, Römische Skizzenbücher,
ii, fol. 73r. (Photo: bpk, Berlin/Kupferstichkabinett/Volker-H.
Schneider/Art Resource, NY) 134
75 Standing Genius with Cornucopia (so-called Genius Augusti), Museo
Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, inv. 6053. (Photo: author, published
courtesy of the Ministero dei beni e delle attività culturali e del
turismo – Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli) 135
76 Charles-Louis Clerisseau, Interior of the Villa Madama, between 1750 and
1755; pen and brown wash, brush and brown and gray wash. (Courtesy
of the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg. (Photo Tatyana
Gorbokoneva, © The State Hermitage Museum.) 136
xvi LI ST OF FI G U R E S
77 Hubert Robert, Draughtsman Sketching at the Villa Madama, which records

sculptures still in situ, including the colossal Genius of the Roman People
in the garden niche at right; red chalk drawing, Thaw Collection, The
Pierpont Morgan Library. (Photo: The Pierpont Morgan Library,
New York) 138
78 Genius of the Roman People, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli,
inv. 5975. (Photo: author, published courtesy of the Ministero dei beni
e delle attività culturali e del turismo – Museo Archeologico
79 Raphael, Self-Portrait (with Giulio Romano?), 1518–20, Louvre. (Photo
© RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY) 144
80 Raphael school, Foundation of Old Saint Peter’s and Constantine’s
Presentation of the Plan to Pope Silvester (with the features of Antonio da
Sangallo and Clement VII, respectively), Sala di Costantino,Vatican
Palace. (Photo: Servizio Fotografico dei Musei Vaticani, copyright
Musei Vaticani) 148
81 Jacopo Chimenti da Empoli, Michelangelo Presenting Pope Leo X and
Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici his Models for the Façade of San Lorenzo and the
Cappella Medicea, and his Project Drawing for the Biblioteca Laurenziana,
detail, Florence, Casa Buonarroti. (Photo: Scala/Art Resource, NY) 150
82 Domenico Cresti da Passignano, Michelangelo Presenting his Model to
Pope Paul IV, detail, Florence, Casa Buonarroti. (Photo: Scala/Art
Resource, NY) 151
83 Federico Zuccaro, Federico Zuccaro and Vincenzo Borghini Discuss the
Decorative Program for the Dome of Florence Cathedral, Uffizi, Gabinetto
Disegni e Stampe, 11043f. (Photo courtesy Ministero dei beni e delle
attività culturali e del turismo) 152
84 Jacopo Bertoja, Construction of a Round Temple, study for fresco
decorations, Sala d’Ercole,Villa Caprarola; Louvre, Cabinet des Dessins,
10678r. (Photo © RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY) 161
85 Jacopo Bertoja, detail of Figure 84 depicting Vignola with other
architects and humanists discussing plans for a temple at its construction
site. (Photo © RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY) 162
86 Bernardo Prevedari, after Donato Bramante, Interior of a Ruined Church
or Temple with Figures, engraving, 1481. The British Museum, v,1.69.
(Photo © The Trustees of the British Museum/Art Resource, NY) 165
87 Raphael, Disputation over the Sacrament, detail of ruins and “modern
ruins” in the background, 1509–10, Stanza della Segnatura,Vatican
Palace. (Photo: Servizio Fotografico dei Musei Vaticani, copyright
Musei Vaticani) 166
88 Raphael and associates, Battle of the Milvian Bridge, detail of the Villa
Madama under construction on the hillside of Monte Mario
overlooking the bridge, Sala di Costantino,Vatican Palace. (Photo:
Servizio Fotografico dei Musei Vaticani, copyright Musei Vaticani) 166
89 Reconstruction of Villa Madama, after the drawings of Henri Jean Émile
Bénard, 1871; héliogravure, J. Chauvet. (Collection and photo: author) 168
LIST OF FIGURES xvii
90 Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519, BAV, Vat. Lat.
5812, fols. 1v–2r. (Photo: © 2016 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana) 217
91 Personal device of Bernardo Bembo: an elongated wreath of laurel and
palm sprigs tied by ribbons, framing the motto virtus et honor; in Paolo
Marsi, Bembicae peregrinae, fifteenth century, Eton College Collections,
MS 156, fol. 111v. (Reproduced by permission of the Provost and
Fellows of Eton College) 219
92 Bernardo Bembo’s personal device on the first folio of his copy of
Pliny the Younger, Epistolarum libri IX, Treviso: Ioannes Vercellius, 1483.
(Courtesy Department of Special Collections, Stanford University
Libraries) 219
93, 94 Leonardo, Portrait of Ginevra de’ Benci, recto and verso; the panel has
been cut down at the bottom, truncating the likeness and the wreath.
(Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington) 220
95 Donato Bramante or Cristoforo Foppa (Caradosso), Medal
Commemorating the Building of St. Peters, with a portrait of Julius II
(obverse) and St. Peter’s (reverse), 1506, The British Museum, g3,
pmae3.5. (Photo © The Trustees of the British Museum/Art
Resource, NY) 222
96 Donato Bramante, formerly attributed to Cristoforo Foppa (Caradosso),
Medal Commemorating the Building of St. Peters, with a portrait of
Bramante (obverse) and personification of the architect and St. Peter’s
(reverse), 1506, The British Museum, 1923,0611.8. (Photo © The
Trustees of the British Museum/Art Resource, NY) 222
97 Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519, BAV, Vat. Lat.
5812, fol. 16v; detail of the final page of the manuscript with the
signature or closing mark, probably in Sperulo’s hand. (Photo: © 2016
Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana) 224
98 Francesco Sperulo, Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia xviiii, BAV,Vat.
Lat. 1673, fol. 103r, detail. (Photo: © 2016 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana) 225
P R E FA C E A N D A C K N O W L E D G M E N T S
This book is not the one I set out to write. After finishing a dissertation about
Villa Madama, Raphael’s paradigmatic Roman villa for the Medici popes, and
in the course of writing a monograph, my analysis of proleptic poetry about
the villa began expanding and leading me in new directions. The resulting
book is only partly about the villa itself; it became a prismatic topic reflecting
several aspects of Italian Renaissance culture, especially the nature of invention
in architectural design, and shifting tensions in the relation of word and image.
The resulting book focuses on the collaboration of architects and humanists in
the design of architecture. The coming-into-being of Villa Madama is the case
study that anchors the book, although its implications are broader. Thus, this
multidisciplinary work operates at the intersection of several topics: Raphael as
architect, villa culture, literary studies, and the history of humanism.
Although even students of the Renaissance might question the need for
another book on Raphael, in fact studies of Raphael as architect have been
quiet in the last thirty years, following the intense focus on the subject dur-
ing the series of international exhibitions, conferences, and publications held
in 1983–4 celebrating the quincentenary of Raphael’s birth. The centerpiece
of these projects was the Raffaello architetto exhibition in Rome’s Palazzo dei
Conservatori, the eponymous catalogue of which remains the only modern
monograph on Raphael’s architecture.1 Caroline Elam assessed the state of
Raphael scholarship following those events, noting:
The pioneering days of Raphael studies are perhaps nearly over … What
came out of the conference was that while the biographical facts and
the limits of the oeuvre are more securely established, the need for more
subtle modes of historical interpretation remains. While attempts to dis-
tinguish hands in the later works may be sterile, one looks forward to
a more convincing model for characterizing the collaboration between
Raphael and his assistants. Equally, perhaps our notions of the evolution
of a project can be refined to include concurrent or overlapping ideas,
and to entertain a creative interchange between artist and patron.2
Her call has certainly been answered in subsequent studies, as detailed herein.
This book extends the roster of collaborators to include humanists, and their
role in the design of architecture. It thereby opens a new view of architectural
invention, in word and image, in Renaissance Rome.
xix
xx PREFAC E A N D A CKN O W L E DG M E N T S
The subject of this book began as a joint project in 2000–1 with James
Hankins for an article that was to publish for the first time Francesco Sperulo’s
long poem describing Villa Madama: Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata,
BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, with Hankins’ translation and my analysis. The project
was delayed, and in the meantime the poem was published in the late John
Shearman’s corpus of Raphael documents in 2003 (although the transcription
contained errors, and Shearman roundly dismissed the poem’s importance).3
Subsequently, my analysis from that unpublished article and my transcrip-
tion of the poem appeared in my dissertation of 2007.4 My thanks to James
Hankins for his early translation of part of the poem, his clarification of points
of Sperulo’s language, and his comments on the early text that was the core
of this book. I am also deeply indebted to Caroline Elam for guidance on
this project in its early stages, especially for analyzing problematic parts of the
poem with me, for discussing Sperulo’s use of architectural and spatial vocabu-
lary, and for comments on my analysis.
For this study of Renaissance collaborative practice, I have enjoyed a fruit-
ful collaboration with Nicoletta Marcelli, who edited my transcription of
Sperulo’s villa poem and provided the critical edition and translation that
appear in Appendix i of this book. Her deep knowledge of neo-Latin and
vernacular literature, especially in Medicean circles, and her shared enthusiasm
for iterative working sessions over issues of language and content have greatly
enriched my understanding of the poem. She also contributed many good
ideas to the gloss, read parts of the book manuscript, and offered important
suggestions about key points and bibliography; I am deeply grateful for her
contributions.
After centuries of obscurity, Sperulo is enjoying his moment. Just as this
book was going into production, a complete edition of his oeuvre appeared
by Paul Gwynne;5 thus, while I cite Gwynne’s conclusions at a handful of
important places, I have been unable to incorporate his findings substantively
into my text and notes. He and I worked independently without knowledge
of each other’s projects, and reached some similar basic conclusions about the
function of Sperulo’s villa poem, although I interpret the poet as offering more
fundamental contributions to the villa’s design development, involving func-
tional and spatial constructs as well as proposed decorations. Fundamentally, we
use some of the same evidence for different purposes. Gwynne’s monograph
presents Sperulo’s villa poem in the context of his complete oeuvre, and it
significantly expands our knowledge of his colorful vita, revealing the diverse
roles this humanist played in different contexts. This book instead considers
Sperulo’s Medici villa poem within the context of villa literature, and delves
deeply into the planning of the Medici villa. Additionally, my study focuses on
the important implications of this poem for our understanding of Renaissance
architectural invention, and the relation of word and image in Renaissance
architectural design.
P RE FAC E A ND AC K NOW L E D G M E NT S xxi
Various aspects of the material in this book were presented in talks at the
conferences of the College Art Association, 2001; the Renaissance Society
of America, 2006, 2008, 2009, and 2012; the Society for Textual Scholarship
International Conference, 2007; the Wesleyan Renaissance Colloquium, 2008;
the WritingPlace conference at the TU Delft, 2013; the Clark Art Institute, 2014;
the conference “Cultural Encounters and Shared Spaces in the Renaissance
City, 1300–1700” at the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, organized by
Roisin Cossar, Christina Neilson, and Filippo de Vivo, 2014; and the sympo-
sium “Raphael’s Collaborations” at the Worcester Art Museum, organized by
Linda Wolk-Simon and Jon Seydl, 2015. I am indebted to the organizers and
participants in all these events for fruitful discussions. Especially important for
this book was the 2006 RSA conference for which Nadja Aksamija and I co-
organized a day of talks on the subject of villa literature, assembling a group of
speakers and respondents to discuss the state of the field and new directions.
My talk for this event, “The villa constructed in verse: panegyrics of Raphael’s
Villa Madama in Rome,” proposed Sperulo’s poem as a brilliant example of a
little-known genre I identified as hortatory ekphrasis. I am grateful to every-
one who participated in this event, and especially to Nadja Aksamija, whose
insights and deep knowledge of villas and their literature have contributed
significantly to this book at several stages.
The section in Chapter 5 on the “Topography of Christian Triumph” presents
a short summary of my article, “Raphael and the Roads to Rome: Designing for
Diplomatic Encounters at Villa Madama,” in I Tatti Studies in the Renaissance 19.1
(2016); this material is © 2016 by TheVilla I Tatti – The Harvard University Center
for Italian Renaissance Studies, and appears herein by permission of the Center.
Some of the general conclusions of this volume appeared in Elet, “Writing the
Renaissance Villa,” in WritingPlace: Investigations in Architecture and Literature, ed.
Klaske Havik, Susana Oliveira, and Mark Proosten (Rotterdam, 2016).
This topic has taken me into unexpected places, and I am pleased to
acknowledge the additional benefactors, guides, companions, and sanctuar-
ies that have contributed so much to the result. I am grateful for a Society of
Architectural Historians/Mellon Author’s Award that supported the acquisi-
tion of images and image rights for this book, as well as a subvention from
the Lucy Maynard Salmon Research Fund at Vassar College that enabled the
publication in its current form. A leave from Vassar in the fall of 2011 provided
an important period of writing. During that time, I was a visiting professor at
the University of Bologna at the invitation of Prof. Francesco Ceccarelli, to
whom I am indebted for many rewarding discussions of villas and villa cul-
ture. A Getty postdoctoral research fellowship in 2008–9 provided a crucial
year of writing the monograph on the villa, when the ideas for this book first
crystallized.
xxii PREFAC E A N D A CKN O W L E DG M E N T S
This book would not have been possible without the generous permission
of Italy’s Ministero degli Affari Esteri to visit, study, and photograph the villa
on many occasions, and I wish to thank the Ufficio Cerimoniale, and espe-
cially Fabrizio Finazzi, Cav. Fernando Regaldo, and Dott.ssa Doriana Torselli
for accommodating my visits. I am also indebted to Prof. Dr. Christoph L.
Frommel and to the Bibliotheca Hertziana for an initial introduction to the
Ministry. My study of sculptures formerly in the villa was enabled by the kind
assistance of Dott.ssa Mariarosaria Borriello and Dott.ssa Rubino at the Museo
Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli. For my study of illuminated manuscripts,
I am fortunate to have had the expert help of Prof. Jonathan J. G. Alexander,
who kindly looked at images of Sperulo’s villa poem, and Dott. Paolo Vian in
Vatican Library, who examined the manuscript itself with me; I thank them
both very much.
Many libraries have provided a research base for this project. In Rome,
the libraries of the Bibliotheca Hertziana, the American Academy in Rome,
and the École française de Rome were a second home, and the holdings of
the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana and the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di
Roma were crucial to this study. I also benefited from the rich resources and
expert help in the photo archives of the Bibliotheca Hertziana and the Musei
Vaticani; and I am grateful for the many visual reproductions from the Musei
Vaticani and the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana. In New York, my work has
profited immeasurably from the holdings of the Avery Architectural Library
and Butler Library at Columbia; the Bobst and Chan libraries at NYU; the
Watson Library at the Metropolitan Museum; the Frick Art Reference Library;
and the New York Public Library, where I was grateful to David Smith and
Jay Barksdale for the privilege of working in the Wertheim study. At Vassar
College, I am indebted to our polymathic art librarian Thomas Hill for a wide
range of support, and to the interlibrary loan staff – Martha Conners, Lydia
Smith, and Jessica Cartelli – without whose assistance the book would be
much impoverished.
For this book that addresses the tensions between the ongoing processing of
ideas and finished project, and between individual and collective efforts, I am
particularly glad to record my gratitude to those who contributed so much to
my thinking, especially those who generously read the manuscript. My warm-
est thanks to Sheryl Reiss, whose close reading and encyclopedic knowledge
of all things related to Giulio de’ Medici saved me from many errors and
bibliographic omissions and enriched the manuscript in countless ways; I am
further grateful for our working relationship and friendship forged over shared
research interests and many conferences, trips to Rome, and to Villa Madama
itself. I am very fortunate to have as a close colleague at Vassar Nicholas Adams,
who brought to bear his wide-ranging architectural knowledge and expertise
on Sangallo as well as his formidable editorial skills, greatly enhancing this
P RE FAC E A ND AC K NOW L E D G M E NT S xxiii
book in content and expression, and leaving me with food for thought that
will resonate far beyond this project. Rachel Kousser has been a long-term
reader, sounding board, and source of invaluable knowledge about classical
sculpture and literary sources, who has contributed immeasurably to the pro-
cess as well as the final result of this volume. I wish I could thank by name the
two anonymous reviewers for Cambridge University Press, whose suggestions
strengthened the book’s organization and focus. My thanks to all these readers
for the many ways they enhanced the content of this book and its bibliography,
and sharpened its messages; and my apologies for any suggestions that did not
make their way into final form due to my limits of space, time, or imagination.
Of course, the conclusions and any errors in this book are my own.
I am also indebted to several other colleagues who read portions of this
material at various stages: James Ackerman, Sarah Brooks, Curtis Dozier, Anne
Leader, Julie Park, Lisa Rafanelli, Jean Sorabella, and Andrew Tallon. My edi-
tors at Cambridge, Beatrice Rehl and Asya Graf, both played vital roles in real-
izing this book, for which I give them warmest thanks. And I am very grateful
to Adam Hooper, who adeptly guided the book through production.
For fruitful conversations about many aspects of this material, it is a great
pleasure to thank Carmen Bambach, Mirka Beneš, Ann Blair, Amy Bloch,
Anthony Corbeill, Joseph Dyer, Tracy Ehrlich, Patricia Emison, Juliet Fleming,
Meredith Fluke, the late Oleg Grabar, Katja Grillner, Nicole Hegener, Tom
Henry, Christopher Heuer, Berthold Hub, the late Julian Kliemann, Ann
Kuttner, Amanda Lillie, Derek Moore, Arnold Nesselrath, Charlotte Nichols,
Jens Niebaum, Laurie Nussdorfer, Pierluigi Panza, Linda Pellecchia, Alberto
Pérez-Gómez, Maria Teresa Sambin de Norcen, Regine Schallert, Georg
Schelbert, Richard Schofield, Christine Smith, Femke Speelberg, Fay Davis
Taylor, the late Richard Tuttle, Patricia Waddy, Robert Williams, Kim Butler
Wingfield, Linda Wolk-Simon, and Bahadir Yildirim. I am fortunate to have
the support of many generous colleagues at Vassar, especially Eve D’Ambra,
Giovanna Borrodori, Nancy Bisaha,Andrew Bush, Peter Charlap, Jon Chenette,
Lisa Collins, Susan Donahue Kuretsky, Brian Lukacher, James Mundy, Molly
Nesbit, Ron Patkus, Harry Roseman, and Amanda Thornton. My special
thanks to Roberta Antognini, Olga Bush, and Karen Hwang for leavening my
work with their friendship as well as their expertise. Students in my seminars
on Raphael and on villas have posed stimulating questions and offered helpful
insights. I am grateful to several student research assistants who will see the
fruits of their labor in this volume: Moorea Hall-Aquitania, Ryder O’Dell,
Sara Sadeghi, and especially Virginia Duncan.
I owe a particular debt to the professors who advised my Ph.D. studies at
NYU’s Institute of Fine Arts, and also at Columbia: Hilary Ballon, Leonard
Barkan, Joseph Connors, Marvin Trachtenberg, Katherine Welch, and above all
Kathleen Weil-Garris Brandt. Katja is present throughout the book; from her
xxiv PREFAC E A N D A CKN O W L E DG M E N T S
advising of my dissertation to the thought-provoking conversations we have

had about this material over many years since its inception, she has contrib-
uted more to this study and to my thinking than anyone else. She has been the
keenest critic, and the most supportive friend I could imagine – a powerful
combination, for which I am very fortunate, and profoundly appreciative.
I am indebted to many friends and family members, human and feline, who
have supported this project in untold ways. I have been especially thankful for
two very dear, late friends, Bernadette and above all Chloe, who understood
better than anyone the special energy of the writing zone. I am deeply grate-
ful to my mother, Norma Miller Elet; in addition to the helpful characteristics
she has modeled for me all my life – intense curiosity, zeal for all-consum-
ing projects, attention to detail, and the close scrutiny of buildings, interiors,
and landscapes – she has provided a fundamental source of encouragement
throughout this endeavor. My deepest debt is to my husband Eric Spitzer, who
has embraced the study of Villa Madama himself, contributing to this book
in myriad ways, directly and indirectly. I am grateful to him for dedicating his
analytical and technical skills to this project, and especially for his support and
deep well of patience throughout it.
The dedicatees of this book are more numerous than the Graces and fewer
than the Muses, to paraphrase Varro’s recipe for a successful convivium. They
have each graced my life and inspired my work in countless ways for which I
am infinitely grateful, and for which a book is inadequate thanks.
N O T E O N T R A N S L AT I O N S A N D A B B R E V I AT I O N S
TR A N S L AT ION S
All references to Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata (The
Villa Giulia Medicea Constructed in Verse), BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, are to the critical
edition and translation by Nicoletta Marcelli in Appendix i; references to the
dedicatory letter preceding the poem are identified by section (§) and to the
poem itself by line numbers. Citations of classical sources are from the Loeb
editions unless otherwise specified. All other translations are the author’s unless
otherwise noted.
ABB R E V IAT ION S
ASF Archivio di Stato di Firenze

ASR Archivio di Stato di Roma
BAV Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana
BNCR Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Roma
Crusca Vocabolario degli Accademici della Crusca (Venice, 1612)
LTUR Lexicon topographicum urbis Romae (Oxford)
MANN Museo Archeological Nazionale di Napoli
OCD Oxford Classical Dictionary, ed. Simon Hornblower and
Antony Spawforth (Oxford, 1996)
OLD Oxford Latin Dictionary, ed. P. G. W. Glare (Oxford, 2003)
Raphael/Dewez
Raphael, “Letter Describing Villa Madama”: transcrip-
tion, translation, and commentary, in Guy Dewez, Villa
Madama: A Memoir Relating to Raphael’s Project (London,
1993), 21–31
Ruesch Adolf Ruesch, Guida illustrata del Museo Nazionale di Napoli
(Naples, 1908)
xxv
I N T R O D U C T I O N : T H E N AT U R E O F
INVENTION, IN WORD AND IMAGE
What extraordinary new mansion is this, rising so swiftly? To what end is there so much labor
and sweat all around? Everywhere crowds of febrile workers, iron tools in hand, fall upon the
stones.Vast foundations are laid in the open ground, from which an enormous mountain-peak
of roofline climbs toward the stars. The clangor from the arduous work wanders through the
seven hills of marveling Rome, the winding valleys echoing with the sound.
Francesco Sperulo, The Villa Giulia Medicea Constructed in Verse

(Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata), 1–7.1
In early 1519, the humanist and papal courtier Francesco Sperulo went for
a walk on the Monte Mario, a wooded hill on the northwest edge of Rome
with a breathtaking view of the city (Plate i).There, he tells us, he was inspired
to write a poem, which he did as soon as he returned home. The object of his
visit and his verse was the construction of the magnificent new villa overlook-
ing the Tiber that we now know as Villa Madama, then being built by Pope
Leo X Medici and his cousin and vice chancellor of the church, Cardinal
Giulio de’ Medici. Not only a pleasurable villa suburbana for the Medici, this
complex would also be a papal hospitium to welcome foreign dignitaries about
to make a ceremonial entry into Rome. It was to be one of the first grand
villas of the Roman Renaissance, conceived on a colossal scale unprecedented
in modern Rome. The complex was also intended to rival and surpass its
ancient prototypes, known from archeological remains as well as evocative
literary descriptions of Roman villa life. The new villa, designed and deco-
rated by Raphael and his associates, would present a Rome of revived ancient
1
2 I NTRODU CT I O N
splendor and power to its important visitors. For Raphael, at the height of
his powers, the Medici villa commission was a rare opportunity to conceive
architecture and decoration together from the ground up, and a unique
chance to design an entirely new, freestanding building and its landscape.
As it turned out, it was also his last testament, incomplete at the artist’s death
in 1520.2 Although the utopian complex was only partially realized, one wing
and some of the gardens were largely completed and lavishly ornamented,
creating a novel and extraordinary decorative ensemble integrating landscape,
architecture, ancient sculpture, painted and stucco decoration, gardens, and
waterworks (Plates ii–viii).3 Moreover, the villa has long attracted legions of
visiting architects, artists, and writers, from Raphael’s own day through Grand
Tourists and twentieth-century Rome Prize winners. The responses of these
pilgrims to Raphael’s complex can be seen in many forms, in word and image,
from Renaissance Europe to Beaux-Arts New York.
At the time of the poet Sperulo’s visit, however, the villa was nothing but
a muddy construction site, begun only half a year earlier, its plans still in flux.
Sperulo wrote to Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici saying that he was so struck by
this locus amoenus – the pleasant place of classical legend4 – that he, too, wanted
to engage in building the villa, which he had just done with ink and the help
of the Muses.The poet chronicled the state of the villa’s construction and fore-
told its planned decorations in a long neo-Latin poem titled Villa Iulia Medica
versibus fabricata (The Villa Julia Medicea Constructed in Verse), which he recorded
in a pocket-sized, leather-bound illuminated manuscript that survives in the
Vatican Library (Plates ix–xii). Other, more celebrated poets described the
villa at this early stage, too, if not at such length, notably Antonio Tebaldeo and
Marco Girolamo Vida. Discounting Sperulo’s declaration of poetic inspiration,
what actually prompted these humanists to compose poems about a villa that
was still on the drawing board? And what did Sperulo mean by his claim to
construct in verse – a common metaphorical trope – in this context of an
actual construction project?5 Examining the poets’ descriptions of what they
saw – or foresaw – at the Medici villa reveals the significant role of human-
ists in conceiving the complex, and it opens a window into the collaborative
working processes by which this important villa came into being.
This book considers the making of Renaissance architecture through
language and design. Or rather, the making of architecture through a design
process that encompassed verbal modes, as well as visual and spatial ones:
language was a tool of design. The coming into being of Raphael’s par-
adigmatic Roman Renaissance villa turns out to have been a collective
enterprise engaging architects, artists, patrons, agents, and also humanists,
who played a surprisingly active and important role in the design, from
the earliest stages. Examining their visual–verbal dialectic in its intellec-
tual and social context yields a new understanding of their collaboration: a
I N TRO D U C TI O N 3
sometimes congenial, sometimes adversarial endeavor to design the Medici

papal hospitium. Their struggles throw into sharp relief the often agonistic
relationship of word and image in this period. The book presents a revision-
ist view of the architectural design process, shining a light on the relation
of architecture and language, the nature of invention, and the ways that idea
could become form in Renaissance Rome.
§
This narrative unfolds in the historically tumultuous years when the
Leonine pontificate was confronting serious challenges from Martin Luther
and the Ottoman Turks, as well as dealing with wars across the Italian
peninsula. The Vatican was focused on proclaiming the renovatio imperii, and bet-
ting its strategy on the international power of Latinity, in contrast to other voices
in Italy and northern Europe who saw the future in the vernacular. The papal
neo-Latin communications campaign was crafted by humanists – scholars, poets,
and letterati of Greek and Latin – many of whom held posts in the Curia and
further participated in the intellectual and social circles of the Roman sodalities.
Drawn from all over the Italian peninsula and beyond, this cosmopolitan cohort
encompassed rising luminaries such as Pietro Bembo, Baldassare Castiglione, and
Ludovico Ariosto – all friends of Raphael – as well as functionaries less well known
to us today, such as Sperulo. Leo X, following his father Lorenzo the Magnificent,
placed an important value on multimedia communications involving word and
image, reflected especially in his extravagant patronage of humanists.These word-
smiths flocked to Rome, creating an intellectual hothouse with intense com-
petition for jobs and favors, and fostering a climate of symbiotic alliances, bitter
rivalries, and tensions for control in collaborative projects. The intersection of
cultural, social, and professional agendas was manifest in working environments
that variously included elements of constructive collaboration but more often cut-
throat competition. These circles of erudite, sharp-tongued scholars worked and
socialized in fluid groupings that also included artists and patrons. Intensive philo-
logical, archeological, and topographical studies were the focus of their activity,
spurred by the physical as well as textual remains of ancient Rome. They mixed
business and pleasure in outings as well as convivia held in their villa gardens, the
sites of legendary feasts. These influential humanists were shaping contemporary
politico-linguistic discourse; formulating ideas about creative imitation, selection,
and composition; promoting the use of neo-Latin after the model of Cicero as
the highest form of communication; and quarreling over the valorization of the
vernacular as an emblem of nascent Italianità. Their ideas on these issues were
propagated in writings from papal briefs to literature and treatises. In Latin and in
the vernacular, words functioned as tools to proclaim a new Golden Age under
the patronage of Pope Leo X Medici, and to convey papal messages about a new
Christian res publica that transumed the peak of ancient empire.6
4 I NTRODU CT I O N
Raphael, who rocketed to prominence as the leading artist and architect in

Leonine Rome, was engaged in the same enterprise.7 He created a new system
of design and a new visual language – a visual rhetoric – that would parallel
humanist verbal and philological attempts to proclaim the renovatio imperii.8
He deployed his brilliant formulation of this new rhetoric in the service of
the papacy as chief architect of St. Peters, painter of the Vatican Stanze fres-
coes, Prefect of Marbles, and designer of the Vatican Logge and Villa Madama.
Raphael’s role in the visual–verbal enterprise to create a new Christian res
publica of revived ancient splendor has yet to be fully appreciated – especially
in his architectural projects. Although he is most widely remembered today
as a painter, in part thanks to Vasari’s unjustified pigeonholing,9 Raphael was
equally famous in his own day as an architect, as recorded on his tomb in the
Roman Pantheon in a Latin epitaph composed by his friend and colleague,
the humanist Pietro Bembo. He was also highly admired for his abilities as
a designer in many media, from architecture and landscape to tapestries and
prints. The modern separation of art- and architectural-historical studies, an
unfortunate turn for the early modern period in general,10 especially limits
and distorts our understanding of a polymath such as Raphael, and hinders
our understanding of his multimedia, multidisciplinary projects.11 Of course,
painter-architects were not exceptional in Renaissance Italy; the practice
was well known from the time of Giotto, and was familiar in early sixteenth-
century Rome in the persons of Donato Bramante and Baldassare Peruzzi.12
Yet few designed for as many different media as Raphael, or created such
synthetic multimedia ensembles. He was also unusually engaged in projects
involving extra-artistic knowledge: active as an archeologist, a topographer of
ancient Rome, and supervisor of antiquities for Leo X, as well as collaborating
on scenographic, philological, and literary projects.
In addition to his own inventive powers, an important aspect of Raphael’s
success lay in his aptitude for collaboration, which is now widely recognized,
although little evidence has surfaced to explain how group efforts actually
worked.13 He is legendary for his remarkable ability to assemble and direct a large
and dynamic workshop encompassing talented specialists in diverse media, who
were deployed on a staggering array of simultaneous grand projects. Somehow,
he ensured brilliant conceptions, productive collaboration, and (almost always)
high-quality execution. His was a model that later artists strove to emulate, but
few ever equaled. Little is understood, however, about how, exactly, Raphael
accomplished these feats. Certainly the post-Romantic valorization of individual
artistic genius has been overtaken in recent years by notions of the “nontrium-
phant Renaissance,” and a broader view of the talents and skills that enable artistic
success in any period.14 This has been accompanied by an interest in workshop
practice, although here again the evidence for Raphael’s working methods is
frustratingly thin.15 Additionally, deep-seated ideas about individual creativity
and agency have fostered long-standing practices of studying attribution at the

expense of collaboration, which is just now beginning to change.16
What did it mean to collaborate? The practice certainly entailed work-
ing with fellow artists, architects, masons, and builders in the workshop
and beyond. It also involved working with patrons and their representa-
tives, many of whom were deeply engaged and contributed significantly to
their projects.17 Some patrons claimed the mantle of architectural auctor for
themselves, rather than the architect, such as Raffaelle Riario (1460–1521) or
Giovanni Pontano (1426–1503), who was a poet as well as a building patron.18
Most members of the Medici family were thoroughly steeped in methods of
close collaboration with artists, architects, and humanists, and notable among
them was Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici, who directed the planning of Villa
Madama. He had been raised alongside Michelangelo and the Sangallo fam-
ily of architects, and became a remarkably shrewd and “hands-on patron”
of art and architecture.19 Many patrons delegated substantial authority to
architectural agents, from the “courtier architect” in quattrocento Ferrara,
to humanist-builders in early cinquecento Rome such as Mario Maffei, who,
significantly for this story, actively worked on his own villas while managing
the building of Villa Madama.20
Humanist collaborators also contributed to the development of visual pro-
jects in many ways. That they served as advisors and propagandists is well
known, but we have scant knowledge of exactly how they worked with art-
ists, and especially with architects. How did their ideas make their way into
form? The role of the humanist advisor has been studied primarily in respect
to the representational media of painting and sculpture, focusing on so-called
iconographic programs or inventions; but their role in architectural projects is
much less understood.21 Of course, distinguishing individual ideas and agency
in the creative process is a problematic endeavor for any medium in the early
modern period. We lack evidence for most aspects of Raphael’s design process
other than the spotty record of surviving drawings and documents, discussed
more specifically below.Thus, we know little about how conceptual ideas were
proposed, developed, and translated into visual and spatial forms, or how ideas
were negotiated or approved by this cohort of artists, humanists, and patrons
in Renaissance Rome. This issue is the root problem that motivates my study.
This book examines Raphael’s multimedia visual rhetoric and the collabora-
tive processes by which it was generated in designing Villa Madama. Like a pas-
toral Vatican, this complex was to embody papal and Medicean messages in many
media. Raphael’s brief for this ambitious project necessitated the design of all
elements from roads, landscape, and architecture to ornament and decoration – a
task well suited to his fertile, wide-ranging inventiveness and his adroit navigation
of Rome’s professional culture encompassing architects, artists, humanists, and
patrons. Therefore, it is fruitful to situate architectural design in broad cultural
6 I NTRODU CT I O N
and social contexts. My enterprise considers the agency of a group of planners,

many of whom were not artists or architects. I consider the conceptualization,
design, and very partial realization of the villa by this cohort, showing how they
contributed ideas that could be transformed into visual and spatial forms. This
study looks at the relation between conceptual ideas (ideological, literary, and
archeological) and visual forms (architectural ground plans, figural decoration,
sculptures, and ancient spoils). Additionally, it reconsiders the relation between
architects and wordsmiths.
Examining several types of evidence in tandem allows new insights into the
planning of the Medici villa by these professionals: architectural ground plans,
poetry and prose descriptions of the villa, and ancient sculpture and spoils cho-
sen to be installed in the fabric of the building. In particular, this book makes a
serious study of poetry about the villa, evidence that has received scant atten-
tion on its own, and has been virtually unstudied in broader literary context
or in relation to architectural design. The poets Tebaldeo,Vida, and Sperulo all
made their way to the Medici construction site and praised the villa, although
Sperulo’s poem is unusually revealing. It has been known since the 1907 edition
of Ludwig von Pastor’s Geschichte der Päpste, but was published only recently
in Shearman’s anthology of documents related to Raphael, and the poem has
either been mined for factual nuggets or dismissed as a pedestrian work by
a sycophantic courtier.22 But Sperulo’s work cannot be disdained as empty
flattery, as this analysis reveals, and as Paul Gwynne also concluded in his new
monograph.23 As this book demonstrates, Sperulo’s poem turns out to be one
of the most extensive of all Renaissance villa descriptions, and it is strikingly
more detailed and specific to the actual building than is typical of this tradition.
Moreover, it lies outside traditional forms of architectural ekphrasis or literary
or rhetorical genres.
This study proposes that Sperulo’s poem cloaked in the high diction of
Virgilian hexameters was used for the nuts-and-bolts purpose of designing
the building. Sperulo’s claim to build the villa in verse was not just metaphor,
but also a coded proposal, readily accessible to its Renaissance audiences. I
trace how Sperulo distilled Medici ideology, literary metaphor, and informa-
tion about available ancient spoils into poetic proposals for the villa, exhort-
ing Raphael and their Medici patrons to follow the poet’s ideas. Thus, taking
Sperulo seriously opens fascinating new forms of evidence about the villa and
its genesis. Considering the purpose of Sperulo’s poem, as well as his claim to
construct Raphael’s villa in verse, sheds new light on the role of humanists, and
the dialectic of verbal ideas and visual forms.
Raphael also undertook a written description of the Medici villa project
in a well-known letter, which is part pastiche of the famous villa descriptions
of Pliny, part declaration of the architect as author, and part walk-through
of the plans. Although the letter has been the subject of extensive analysis,24
I Richard Wilson, Rome from the Villa Madama, detail, 1753.Yale Center for British Art.
II Villa Madama, view of the complex looking southwest.

III Villa Madama, view of the rear façade of the garden loggia, adjoining the inner garden overlooking
the fishpond.
IV Villa Madama, view of the inner garden and fishpond from the building.
V Giovan Francesco da Sangallo, Plan for Villa Madama. Florence, Uffizi, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe, 273a.
VI Antonio da Sangallo the Younger, plan for Villa Madama. Florence, Uffizi, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe, 314a.
VII Villa Madama, garden loggia, looking northeast.
VIII Villa Madama, garden loggia, exedra with painted and stucco decorations depicting Venus.
IX Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519. BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, fol. 1v;
actual size.
X Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519. BAV,Vat. Lat. 5812, fol. 2r;
actual size.
XI Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519. BAV,Vat. Lat. 5812, fol.3r;
actual size.
XII Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519. BAV,Vat. Lat. 5812,
binding; actual size.
XIII Lucian, Dialoghi maritimi, 1519. BAV,Vat. Lat. 5802, fol. 17r.
XIV Lucian, Dialoghi maritimi, 1519. BAV,Vat. Lat. 5802, fol. 36r.
XV Raphael and associates, Battle of the Milvian Bridge, detail, Sala di Costantino,Vatican
Palace.Villa Madama is seen at top left, on the hillside of Monte Mario overlooking the bridge.
XVI Raphael and associates, Battle of the Milvian Bridge, detail of the Villa Madama under construction
on the hillside, Sala di Costantino,Vatican Palace.
XVII Villa Madama, present day façade, which is half of the planned circular courtyard.
XVIII Giovanni Volpato (1738–1803),Villa Madama, garden loggia looking northeast;
engraving with watercolor, Kunstsammlungen der Veste Coburg, Inv. xii.358.97.
XIX Giovanni Volpato (1738–1803),Villa Madama, garden loggia looking southwest;

engraving with watercolor, Kunstsammlungen der Veste Coburg, Inv. xii.358.99.
considering the architect’s writing in relation to contemporary poetry, and

within the context of social and professional conventions of textual communi-
cation among elite humanists and patrons, enables a new understanding of this
famous document, and of architectural and literary agency.
Tracing the sculpture and antiquities once in the villa is also revealing for
this story. It emerges that humanists were occupied not only with conceptual
and literary issues, but also with physical aspects of design, especially the place-
ment and meaning of ancient sculpture and spoils to be installed in the villa
complex. Their poetry reveals that the disposition of significant antiquities
was an important factor early in the planning process, and details the genera-
tive role of ancient sculpture and spoils for the architectural and decorative
ensemble. The Renaissance appetite for antiquities is legendary, but the study
of Villa Madama yields unusually specific examples of how papal patrons could
appropriate ancient spoils, and employ them for rhetorical and ideological
purposes. I trace how artists and humanists working together, in a milieu that
emphasized intense visual and verbal archeological study, assembled ancient
sculptures and repaired, re-membered, and recontextualized them, thereby
reincarnating antiquity in surprisingly literal terms.
This analysis of literature, sculpture, and spoils invites and informs a new
look at the ground plans and construction history of the villa. Traditional
architectural methodologies provide an invaluable source of information and a
springboard for this study, but leave unanswered fundamental questions about
processes of ideation and authorship. Architectural historians have long studied
plans and documents to trace the morphology of ideas for a project, consider-
ing the attribution of drawings to distinguish the contributions of different
collaborators. Significantly, the great quantity of surviving preliminary-stage
architectural drawings beginning in exactly this period, notably at St. Peter’s,
suggests their increasing importance.25 Of course, the limitations of these
methodologies are well known. Recent studies have acknowledged the perils
of imposing a linear chronology on a fragmentary set of surviving drawings,
some of which could have represented alternatives or variants in play at the
same moment.26 Also, determining the extent to which the draftsman was
the ideator remains problematic for drawings more finished than “brainstorm
sketches.”27 The standard practice of delegating the preparation of drawings
to associates makes attribution difficult if not impossible, an issue especially
relevant to the overextended Raphael. Our understanding of Raphael as
architect and of the plans for the unfinished Villa Madama is indebted to
studies by several generations of distinguished architectural historians, from
Baron Heinrich von Geymüller to Christoph L. Frommel.28 The surviving
architectural plans for Villa Madama are by the hands of Antonio da Sangallo
the Younger (1484–1546), Francesco da Sangallo (1494–1576), and Giovan
Francesco da Sangallo (1482–1530), with just one by Raphael himself;29 as
8 I NTRODU CT I O N
Frommel notes, the villa project exemplifies the complexity of determining

individual contributions.30 The numerous preparatory drawings by Antonio
reflect that he was not simply an amanuensis for Raphael’s ideas, but played an
important design role himself, which included planning the building as well as
addressing the difficulties of the steeply sloping villa site (which was plagued by
argillaceous soil, frequent landslides, and erosion), and laying out the hydraulic
systems for the villa’s waterworks.31 Thus, the major plans reflect the ideas of
both Raphael and Antonio, as well as those contributed by its patrons,32 and
also by humanists, as this book will show. In a discussion of autograph plans as
“snapshots of the design process” (Momentaufnahmen aus dem Entwurfsprozeß),
Christof Thoenes has analyzed the perils of assessing authorial intent from the
fragmentary corpus of surviving drawings for a large complex, many of which
do not show the entire building.33 The survival of drawings for partially built or
unbuilt elements further complicates the task of interpretation. Frommel has
discussed the limitations of architectural reconstruction, and Guy Dewez spe-
cifically posed similar questions with respect to Villa Madama.34 Stefano Ray
observed that the spotty survival of drawings and documents for all Raphael’s
architectural projects is one factor responsible for obscuring his reputation as
an architect.35 Indeed, the surviving record for the planning of Villa Madama
is sparse: about a dozen architectural plans and the letter by Raphael, plus two
letters from Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici to the project manager, Mario Maffei,
and a meager selection of payment documents.36 Of these, few shed any light
directly on the ideation of concepts and forms, or the roles of individual artists
and advisors in the process. Considering poetry and sculpture together with
architectural plans opens a new view of the design process, revealing how ideas
could be generated, developed, disseminated, and actualized.
The intersection of humanism and architecture takes on special relevance
for the villa, the building type perhaps most closely associated with literary
culture since antiquity. Amanda Lillie has examined Renaissance notions of the
“humanist villa,” calling for further study of the relation between literary frame-
work and Renaissance villa architecture.37 This idea has reverberated among
several historians of architecture. Nadja Aksamija has drawn attention to “textual
villas,” or poems as literary simulacra of actual villas in Counter-Reformation
Bologna;38 and other scholars have mined rich literary veins in recent studies
of quattrocento villas in Ferrara and Naples.39 The present book explores the
dialectic between villa architecture and literature in Raphael’s circle, revealing
how the written word and architectural forms could inform each other; the
reciprocal agency of architecture and text emerges in unexpected ways.
This study of poetry, spoils, and ground plans requires a cross-disciplinary
approach: one that looks across the media (i.e. architecture, sculpture, and
painting) and also beyond the history of art and architecture. My study com-
plements conventional morphological analyses of architectural ground plans
by making a detailed consideration of literary and archeological evidence; and

it builds on traditional literary analysis by taking into account the function
and agency of poetry. My curiosity about why Sperulo devoted over 400 lines
of verse to a construction site, and further recorded it in a luxurious illumi-
nated manuscript booklet, demanded a consideration of the context in which
this poetry – and the architectural designs themselves – were produced. An
appreciation of the common social environment and shared discursive field of
Roman Renaissance humanists and artists allows for a deeper understanding
of the forms, function, and meaning of their interrelated works, in word and
image.40 Historians of knowledge in many fields have increasingly studied how
ideas are communicated, orally and by material media; architectural histori-
ans analyze the communicative function of drawings,41 and historians of the
book consider the function and circulation of manuscripts and printed books.
The parallel traditions of oral, scribal, and print publication in early sixteenth-
century Italy complicate traditional notions of “publication,” and challenge
our understanding of why literature was produced, consumed, and circulated.42
Sociological and anthropological approaches have recently been applied to the
work of Renaissance humanists, considering the function of literary works
in social context.43 Lauro Martines marveled at what he considered histori-
ans’ astonishing neglect of poetry’s social function, calling for “social literary
analysis,” and recognizing that poems were “a form of practical action” in the
world;44 and recent studies have indeed emphasized the agency of poetry in
Italian humanist culture, and in Raphael’s own circle.45 Applying these meth-
odologies and working across traditional disciplinary boundaries of art and
architectural history, literary and manuscript studies, and cultural history allows
a new and holistic perspective on Raphael’s work, and a rare glimpse of intel-
lectual culture and creative processes in his circle.
The emphasis of this study on design reflects the increasing attention to
artistic process as well as product in recent art and architectural studies focused
on making and building.46 The rich history of architectural design and con-
struction in early cinquecento Rome provides a fundamental knowledge base
about planning and practice, notably at the Fabbrica of St. Peter’s, the epi-
center of Italian architectural practice and discourse.47 But most discussions of
architectural process focus on spatial, structural, or technical issues of how an
architect gave form to a building, as well as the use of materials and construc-
tion; here instead, we see the process of transforming conceptual ideas into
architectural forms – a discourse more familiar to scholars of painting and
studies of iconographic programs.48
This analysis of the coming-into-being of Villa Madama prompts an onto-
logical reconception of architectural design. This book considers design in the
sense of the temporal process, from conceptual ideas to their transformation
into spatial and visual forms through writings, drawings, plans, construction, and
10 I NTRODU CT I O N
decoration. I propose that for Raphael and a variety of associates, design was a
dynamic process that incorporated different systems of knowledge. I consider
design to encompass not only the creative contributions of architects designing
spatial and visual forms but those of wordsmiths contributing conceptual ideas,
as well as the collective processes of collaboration and negotiation among many
constituents to transform ideas into reality. By design, I mean this process of
generating, developing, and presenting mental ideas, whether in visual, spatial, or
verbal modes. I also refer to ideation to stress the generative aspect of this practice,
or invention, a term used by sixteenth-century writers. (I leave aside notions of
genius, human or divine inspiration, and theological and philosophical notions
of creation and conception and their analogue in the visual arts.49)
This study takes the notions of humanism and design off their sometimes
lofty literary and artistic pedestals and into the everyday working world of
humanists, artists, and architects. Sperulo, the foremost humanist in my study,
was indeed brilliantly educated in Greek and Latin, with an extensive com-
mand of ancient literature, philosophy, and rhetoric, and a sophisticated ability
to generate neo-Latin poetry in many meters; yet he deployed these skills in
his day job in the service of the papal Curia generating efficacious poetry.50
Similarly, the architectural design process, then as now, encompassed creative
invention and execution, but also responded to external demands, shifting
needs, and accommodation of the different parties involved. Architecture is
frequently described as a social art: one that cannot be made single-handedly,
and which must be presented to an outside audience to have meaning.51 For
Raphael’s late masterwork, the design process itself was a social art; it emerges
that this social interaction encompassed a broad range of players, including
humanists, who were involved from the earliest stages of design, and who con-
tributed significantly to the outcome.
For both wordsmiths and artists, however, the outcome of a project did not
necessarily reflect a unified vision, originally or at any other point along the way;
rather, it involved a series of compromises, based on negotiation among different
constituencies. The transformational agency of time was a crucial factor in this
diachronic, iterative, collaborative design process that extended over long periods.
Adopting methodologies applied to texts by editorial theorists, I problematize
notions of “original” or fixed-stage plans, as well as ideas of authorial intention.52
Broadening the view of the architectural design process to encompass
professionals from different disciplines reveals thought patterns and working
practices shared by architects, artists, and humanists. Tools of literature, rheto-
ric, and the ars memoriae could be applied to tasks from restoring a fragmen-
tary ancient statue to designing a building, harnessing the imaginary to shape
the real. Moreover, there was a striking epistemological similarity between
early sixteenth-century visual and verbal traditions of appropriating ancient
models to forge a new language. Notions of composition and citazionismo
were common to architects and humanists, who selected fragments of ancient

buildings and texts, respectively, and recomposed them into new discourses.53
Scholars have fruitfully analyzed Renaissance theoretical issues of architecture
and language, exploring conceptions of ut lingua architectura, and specifically ut
architectura poesis,54 and showing how linguistic approaches helped shape new
architectural vocabularies by architects in the early sixteenth century, nota-
bly Raphael and Michelangelo.55 Raphael adapted literary methodologies,
applying to architecture issues of creative imitation and selection articulated
by Bembo and Castiglione, as Hans Aurenhammer and David Hemsoll have
shown;56 while their studies focus on the linguistic and theoretical founda-
tion of formal architectural design, this book looks instead at Raphael’s work-
ing processes, tracing the intersections of literary practices with architectural
design. Likewise, mid-century architectural theorists would focus on parallels
between rhetoric and design, equating the maniere del dire and the maniere del
edificare, such as Daniele Barbaro who expounded on the similarities between
crafting a speech and designing a building.57 But once again, these discussions
focus on formal and stylistic issues, especially the use of ornament and the lan-
guage of the orders, or on linguistic analogies or metaphors of architecture.58
The present study, by contrast, examines literature in relation not to architec-
tural style or form, but to function; it shows how discursive or literary working
methods were employed as tools in the conceptualization and design of an
actual building, focusing on process rather than formal analysis of the product.
Strikingly, this could be an agonistic process, engaging visual and verbal means
of representing ideas as rival modes, as scholars including W. J. T. Mitchell have
treated them.59 My story comes to a head at the moment of a major design
change for the villa, corresponding to the two major surviving ground plans
(Plates v, vi); planning for this change was under way early in 1519, when Sperulo
composed his poem. I believe that Sperulo made a bid to control important
conceptual invenzioni for the project at this juncture, which raises interesting
questions about the contemporary understanding of architectural invention, and
its expression in text or plans. The poet’s challenge, although unsuccessful, pre-
sents a revealing instance of the long-running polemic over the relative powers
of word and image, set in the context of Renaissance architectural practice.
The process of designing Raphael’s grand papal villa engaged a large ensemble
of people on a highly visible stage. The villa was one of the most closely watched
projects in Renaissance Europe; what Raphael and the Medici did, and how they
did it, was of keen interest to architects, artists, patrons, and humanists, who kept
abreast by letter and visits to the unfinished site. Further, many of the artists who
worked with Raphael dispersed throughout Europe after the master’s untimely
death and the Sack of Rome, spreading his ideas about process and product to a
far-flung audience. Indeed, although the master plan for the Medici villa was not
fully realized, it quickly became surprisingly widely known, and emerged as a
paradigm of the Renaissance villa all’antica; echoes of Raphael’s ideas and plans –
even the unexecuted aspects – appear in later projects and writings, from his own
day to the present. Studying this important villa as imagined and as built, and the
design processes by which it came to be, has significant implications for our under-
standing of Renaissance architectural practice, in Raphael’s circle and beyond.
§
The processes and protagonists I am discussing do not fit neatly into tradi-
tional vocabulary of architectural design, so a brief clarification of terminology
is helpful. As noted, I refer to design in the sense of the temporal process, from
artistic and conceptual ideas through drawings, plans, and descriptions used to
realize the villa and its multimedia decorations. I use the terms design, ideation,
and invention to designate the process of generating, developing, and presenting
ideas using visual and verbal modes. I use the term multimedia in its literal sense
to describe Raphael’s novel ensembles, which could integrate the many media
of landscape, architecture, painted and stucco decorations, antiquities, modern
sculpture, and waterworks, as Villa Madama did. By planners I mean the large and
varied group of patrons and professionals engaged in various activities necessary
to conceptualize this project and bring it into existence, including architects, art-
ists, humanists, agents, and project managers. In particular, I use the terms artist
and architect primarily in the traditional sense to designate, respectively, a designer
of the figurative arts of painting and sculpture, or of the built environment,
including buildings, landscape, and urban space. But as the title of the book
reflects and this study demonstrates, this distinction breaks down for Raphael
and his projects.Throughout the book, I use the term humanist with the under-
standing that it refers to training or intellectual outlook, rather than a specific
job;60 humanists held various professional roles – physician, lawyer, notary, sec-
retary, priest, to name a few. And I use wordsmith as a generic term to designate
those professional roles that engaged the manipulation of words, especially via
literary or philological sources. In particular, I use the umbrella terms wordsmith
or artist to distinguish those whose powers of invention were expressed primar-
ily via verbal or visual means, respectively. Together, they generated conceptual
ideas that could be “embodied” or transformed into the body of the architecture.
§
This book tracing the coming-into-being of the Medici villa begins with the
context for villa building and description in Renaissance Rome. The first chap-
ter places Raphael’s conception of the Medici villa within the broader con-
text of his interdisciplinary projects to revive the “corpse” of ancient Rome.
It introduces the protagonists in this narrative, situating them in cultural
context at the intersection of Curial humanism and the Roman humanist sodali-
ties.The chapter further orients the reader to the villa itself, tracing its history and
appearance, as envisioned and as built. The following chapter introduces Sperulo

and other poets who wrote proleptic verse about the Medici construction site,
and positions their descriptions of the villa within broader literary traditions and
practices. It traces classical and earlier Renaissance villa literature, from Pliny and
Statius, through works of late quattrocento humanists in Laurentian Florence and
Aragonese Naples, to early cinquecento humanists extolling the villas of Agostino
Chigi as well as the Medici in Rome. Other literary and also rhetorical traditions
served as models for these poets, notably mnemonic composition techniques; the
ekphrasis of architecture and sculpture, such as the Laocoön; and descriptions of the
non-existent, from Homer to the Hypnerotomachia Polifili.This chapter reveals the
remarkably rich array of sources to which Renaissance poets were indebted, as
they creatively selected elements and recomposed them into new villa discourses.
The third chapter analyzes Sperulo’s claim to build the villa and his vision for
it, from overarching conceptual ideas to more specific plans.This section reveals
the poet’s sophisticated use of authorial personae to reify his prophetic plans
for the villa and present his proposals for frescoes and the installation of specific
antiquities. Considering Sperulo’s plans in light of the little-known antiquities
collection once actually installed at the villa reveals that he was not just spin-
ning poetic fictions but, in some cases, planning for actual marbles. (This and
subsequent chapters are complemented by the appendices. Appendix i pro-
vides a new critical edition and translation of Sperulo’s villa poem by Nicoletta
Marcelli, with a gloss by the author. Appendix ii analyzes the presentation man-
uscript of the poem as a material object, considering its format and its bind-
ing, illumination, and scribal hand. These findings round out the discussion of
the poem’s function in oral and manuscript culture, contributing an interesting
case study in the history of the early modern book, and in verbal performance
practice. Appendix iii contains an additional elegy by the poet on the subject of
Pope Leo’s clemency, which informed the poet’s ideas for the villa.)
The proleptic character of specific villa descriptions is the focus of the fourth
chapter. It emerges that Sperulo’s poem represents a little-known Renaissance
mode, which I call hortatory ekphrasis. I explore the sources of this genre,
showing how Renaissance humanists creatively adapted elements of classical
literature and rhetoric to forge an authoritative and persuasive tool, exhorting
patrons and artists to follow their ideas. The chapter also considers the rela-
tion between Sperulo’s poem and Raphael’s letter describing the unbuilt villa,
analyzing these two texts to propose ideas about their function, the relation of
poet and architect, and the relation of literature to the concrete villa project.
The fifth chapter raises the question of what exactly a letterato like Sperulo
was involved in designing. I problematize the notion of “program” or invention,
and instead find that he was proposing what I call “conceptual structures” or
“metastructures” for architecture and decoration, which could involve spatial,
functional, philological, archeological, or ideological notions. Case studies of
this imagery show it to be at once familiar – it was supposed to be understood
by its target audience – and also more densely layered than we might think.
This matrix of evidence reveals a pattern of dynamic collaboration by a highly
sophisticated group of patrons, artists, and wordsmiths: the subject of the sixth
chapter. I characterize their design process as an iterative, collaborative effort,
which engaged ideas and working methods from different fields. I show how
this cohort generated concepts, ideology, and imagery that were fundamentally
important for the Medici villa from its earliest stages.This chapter also considers
the effect of long-term construction for such an extensive project, with atten-
dant changes in vision along the way; and it raises questions about the nature of
authorship, intentionality, and the building as an autonomous work of art.
Given the focus of this study on the process of coming into being, this
book purposefully does not analyze the villa as it was actually constructed.61
Therefore, it is intentional that the villa as built and decorated does not fully
come into focus here. I introduce select information about the villa’s plans,
appearance, and decoration necessary to illuminate specific aspects of the plan-
ning process for which evidence has emerged, without attempting a complete
treatment of the villa. Nor is it a detailed study of the construction history or
financing, for which we lack sufficient data.
The Conclusion draws together the discussion of visual and verbal modes
of ideation at Villa Madama, presenting a new view of architectural design as a
dynamic, collective process involving different epistemes. The instrumental role
of word and image as tools for shaping the villa argues for a more holistic con-
ception of Renaissance architectural thinking. The relation of architecture and
literature in this context was not theoretical, but a practical working discourse,
in which form and meaning evolved dialectically. Literary practices were mobi-
lized for the practical goal of designing a building, and conceptual ideas could
be manifested in architectural practice, and in spatial and decorative forms.
Furthermore, the interactive invention of ideas, words, and visual forms was a
valued cultural matrix in itself.That is, the design process was not simply a means
to an end, but part of larger cultural discourses.Visions of the villa as an architec-
tural and literary edifice were recorded in proleptic villa descriptions thematiz-
ing ideation, which reflects that this process was considered a narrative worth
recording. In part, this is an instance of the long-standing practice of harnessing
the visionary to shape the real. The emphasis on process also reflects medieval
notions of experiencing a work of art not as a static object, but as an ongoing,
dynamic journey.62 This practice also reflects the fundamental importance in
Renaissance thought of the Aristotelian notion of the arts, especially architec-
ture, as a process of bringing-into-existence, or poiesis (ποίησις). The notion is
consonant with the Italian sixteenth-century metamorphic mindset, indebted to
theological as well as natural historical beliefs about the world continually in the
process of formation.63 This book develops a conception of architectural design
as a dynamic process that is also self-reflexive, opening a new view of the relation
of discursive thought, language, and architecture in Raphael’s Rome.
CHAPTER ONE
REVIVING THE CORPSE
You, too, Raphael, while with your wondrous talent you construct Rome, mutilated throughout
her body and recall to life and to its ancient beauty the city’s body, mangled by the sword, fire,
and the years … you can return the breath of life to things long dead.
Baldassare Castiglione, Carmen on the Death of Raphael, c. 1520.1
In Raphael’s Rome, artists, humanists, and patrons were engaged in what they
understood as a collective enterprise to revive the corpse of Rome. Drawing
on Petrarch’s notion of rimembrare – to reassemble the limbs of a body as a
form of memory2 – the corpse metaphor served as an organizational system
for reviving ancient sculpture, buildings, and the city of Rome itself. Figural
sculptures emerged from the ground like mutilated bodies,3 awaiting the heal-
ing powers of sculptors and poets to restore their limbs, in marble and in words.
The ruins of ancient buildings, too, were understood as bodies, following the
anthropological metaphor common to Renaissance architectural thinking.
This image of Rome as a corpse had been a popular conceit from the time
of Poggio Bracciolini (1380–1459).4 Artists and humanists alike proclaimed
themselves to be the healers of these mangled bodies, a project they under-
took in various modes. In his own lifetime as well as after his death, Raphael
would be particularly associated with this imagery, fashioned as the Christ-like
healer of Rome’s broken body, whose restauratio of Rome would become a
metaphor for the divine, life-giving power of the artist.5 In his famous letter to
Leo X about the antiquities of Rome, Raphael laments that Rome is almost a
15
16 REVIVING THE CORPSE
1. Lambert Lombard, The Raising of Lazarus with Villa Madama in the Background, 1544.
Düsseldorf, Kunstmuseum, Graphische Sammlung, fp4748.
corpse, its monuments like the bones of the body without the flesh – a body
that he, implicitly, is renewing.6 During Raphael’s lifetime, he was praised as
god-like for these powers to reconstruct Rome; and the outpouring of poetry
at his unexpected death describing his work as reviving the corpse reflects
the currency of this metaphor.7 Most famous among the many examples is
Castiglione’s carmen for his friend, quoted above.
In addition to the renovation of Rome’s ancient remains, new construction
after the antique was also understood as a tool for reviving the city; the paral-
lel sight of crumbling ruins and scaffolded construction sites – “new ruins” –
encouraged a conceptual equation of restoration and building activities.8 So,
the revival of the city, via old and new structures, was a collective venture of
architects, artists, and poets. Thus, it would not have seemed a paradox that
the Medici papal hospitium – a work of ex-novo construction outside the
central city – gave Raphael the fullest opportunity to restore the glory of
ancient Rome. In part, this reflects the revival of the villa all’antica as a locus of
Renaissance cultural values.9 More specifically, this villa, the late masterwork
that the “divine” Raphael did not live to see completed, took on an important
symbolic value. Lambert Lombard, who was among the northern artists in
Rome in the 1530s, made a particular study of Raphael’s works, and took him
Patrons , humanists, and artists in leonine rome 17
2. Hieronymus Cock after Lambert Lombard, The Raising of Lazarus with Villa Madama in the
Background, Bibliothèque royale de Belgique, Cabinet des Estampes, x.v. 89185.
as a personal model; on returning to Liège, Lombard composed a Raphaelesque

scene of Christ raising Lazarus set in front of the Medici villa, ambiguously
rendered as ruin or half-built structure, a capriccio that was engraved by
Hieronymous Cock (Figures 1, 2.)10 Given Lombard’s close identification with
Raphael, his choice to set the Lazarus miracle in front of a prominent and
meticulously rendered portrait of Raphael’s unfinished villa surely reflected
contemporary ideas about the late Raphael’s Christ-like powers, and his villa
as a resurrection of antiquity.11 Thus, his papal villa all’antica represented not
only a formal and cultural rinascità, but also a triumphal Christian resurrection.
This chapter presents the Medici villa project as Raphael’s Lazarus, first
introducing the patrons, humanists, and artists engaged in this visual–verbal
enterprise to revive the corpse, and then presenting the villa complex itself.
PATRO N S, H U MA N IS T S, A N D A RT IS T S IN LEO NINE RO M E
For its patrons – Pope Leo X Medici (r. 1513–21) and Cardinal Giulio de’
Medici (later Pope Clement VII, r. 1523–34) – the villa Raphael designed
on Monte Mario was a stage for the family’s dynastic ambitions, as well as
for papal ceremonial. The complex was conceived and constructed during a
turbulent period in Leo’s pontificate: a time of acute political, religious, and
economic threat to the Papal States, when its territory was being assaulted
in wars with the French and the Emperor Charles V, and through incursions
by the Ottoman Turks. Papal authority was being challenged by the rising
Lutheran threat, European rulers, and the national churches, and papal cof-
fers were scant.12 The Vatican struggled to project an image of papal author-
ity and magnificence with limited funds. The Medici family had been exiled
from Florence for two decades, and they were restored to power there just a
year before Leo X was elected in 1513 as the first Medici pope. A conspiracy
of cardinals to assassinate Leo allegedly occurred in 1517, and although most
scholars now believe that Leo feigned these events for his own ends, the fallout
occupied the Curia for several years to come.13 The Medici were therefore
faced with a crisis of authority in both cities at once: in Rome they were
viewed by the clannish Roman nobility and the Vatican bureaucracy as inter-
lopers from Florence, and in Florence they had to combat perceptions that
they were tyrants and usurpers of Republican power. Accordingly, a primary
goal of much Medici patronage and rhetoric in the second decade of the
sixteenth century was to convince powerful groups in both cities of the legiti-
macy and benevolence of Medicean rule.14 The family’s hopes for broader
Medici dynastic control were dashed, however, by the premature deaths of the
two legitimate family heirs, Giuliano, Duke of Nemours, in 1516 and Lorenzo,
Duke of Urbino, in 1519. Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici shared with his cousin
Leo the burdens of these political, religious, and dynastic efforts; beginning in
March 1517, Giulio served as vice chancellor of the church, a powerful role
akin to Secretary of State, to which Raphael gives visual form in their portrait
by placing Giulio at Leo’s proper right (Figure 3).15
This precarious political moment was nonetheless characterized by utopian
thinking; humanists declared that theirs was a new Leonine Golden Age, con-
fident in the power of the papacy to unite Christian Europe in an empire that
would outshine the cultural achievements of the ancient Romans.16 This papal
public relations machine focused on the persuasive power of word and image
to proclaim the peaceful, new Christian res publica.17 Curial humanists declared
a syncretic union between classical learning and Roman Christianity, formu-
lating an ideology of the Christian fulfillment of all earlier history – Greek,
Roman, Egyptian, and Jewish – centered in Rome, the caput mundi. Using
neo-Latin, they proclaimed the glory of this Rome reborn, declaring that the
Christian papal empire had inherited the mantle of temporal power from the
Roman empire. During the reign of Leo X, this rhetoric of persuasion was
deployed with special skill to promote the notion of a new Christian era of
peace under the Medici.18 Drawing on Augustan and earlier Medici imagery,
Leo fostered the personal imagery of a peace-bringer, the Rex pacificus, in
marked contrast to his predecessor Julius II, known as the warrior-pope.
Patrons , humanists , and artists in leonine rome 19
3. Raphael, Portrait of Pope Leo X with Two Cardinals (Giulio de’ Medici at Leo’s proper right,
and Luigi de’ Rossi behind him), 1518, Florence, Uffizi.
Leo’s and Giulio’s formation in Laurentian Florence was fundamental to

their style of patronage.The cousins absorbed the patronage culture of Lorenzo
and Piero il Gottoso in Florence, including patterns of Medici family collabo-
ration, as well as close collaboration with and fostering of humanists, archi-
tects, and artists. Leo’s boyhood tutor had been the humanist-poet Angelo
Poliziano (1454–94), who served as a kind of “Medicean house-philologist”

under Lorenzo.19 Thus, from boyhood Leo had absorbed Poliziano’s bril-
liant formulations of Medici imagery, which were embodied in media from
poetry and parade floats to music and paintings, notably by Botticelli. Giulio
may have lived as a young boy in the household of Antonio da Sangallo the
Elder; and both cousins grew up with the young Michelangelo, who was taken
into the Medici household and sculpture garden. Once in Rome, these two
Medici cousins worked at the nexus of very different patronage cultures: the
Florentine culture of Lorenzo de’ Medici, in which they were raised, and the
Roman papal culture that sought to surpass the grandeur of imperial Rome.20
They took to Rome the rich repertoire of Medici family imagery for-
mulated in Florence, which would be translated to a Roman setting, and
inflected for the papacy.21 The Medici had long fostered their family mythol-
ogy as clement peace-bringers, who could tame Mars and draw the generative
Venus to inhabit their realm.Their traditional messages of eternal return – as in
Lorenzo’s motto Le tems revient – echoed the cycle of time and the seasons, and
were transposed into the imagery of Leo as a new Augustus: the Rex pacificus
restoring the Golden Age to Rome.22 Leo’s horoscope was interpreted to have
predicted his elevation to the papacy, as was his escape from his captors during
the Battle of Ravenna. He was variously identified with Apollo, like his father
Lorenzo, and in particular with Apollo Musagetes and Sol-Apollo, as well as
with Jupiter. The Medici sought to “Romanize” the family history and even
Florence, and stressed the union of Rome and Florence, in part by emphasiz-
ing the ancient Etruscan roots of Tuscany and the Medici themselves. They
used the catalogue of family devices and imprese: laurel, the broncone, the yoke
with the motto iugum suave, the falcon holding a diamond ring, or a diamond
ring with feathers.23 The family allied themselves with the strength and power
of the lion and Hercules, symbols of Florence, as well as the regenerative power
of Nature, Pomona, or Venus Genetrix; the balls (palle) of the family device
were associated with the sour orange (mala medica), the golden apples of the
Hesperides (mala aula), and also the globe, the sun, and the stars.24 This reper-
toire of imagery is familiar to students of the Medici family; what is interesting
is how creatively and flexibly it was deployed, translated from one place and
project to another, and transformed for new environments – as indeed, we shall
see was the case for their papal villa.
Drawn by the promise of Leonine largesse, humanists from all over Italy and
beyond flocked to Rome, contributing to the city’s character as a cosmopolitan
cultural capital.25 They held “day jobs” – sometimes many small ones at once –
working in the papal Curia or for cardinals and other high-ranking patrons,
but, like modern scholars, they also produced their own work.26 Poetry was
their most important mode of expression, deployed for a remarkable range
of purposes: professional, social, and creative. Humanists in early cinquecento
Rome convened in two major literary groups: the circle of Johannes Goritz
(c. 1455–1527), the Luxembourgian prelate and legendary patron of artists and
letterati, who used the name Corycius,27 and the loosely configured Roman
Academy, then headed by Angelo Colocci (1474–1549).28 Unlike later, organ-
ized academies, these open societies and other overlapping circles of humanists
interacted in fluid groupings, meeting for occasions from informal walks and
dinners to more elaborate, choreographed contests and banquets. Best known
are the convivial gatherings hosted in the villa gardens of Goritz, Colocci, and
later Blosio Palladio (1475–1550), where humanists dined, recited their newest
works, and engaged in erudite, barbed Latin banter.29 At Goritz’s feasts, poets
literally decked the halls with their verse, which they posted not only on the
walls of the villa, but on its wells, statues, and trees.30 Thus, written and oral
modes of communication were intertwined.31 Central to their fellowship was
the notion of sodality. As Pierio Valeriano noted:
No form of association produces a greater bond of friendship than din-

ing together, than being nourished and fed together – whence the terms
‘close friends’ (sodales) and ‘fellowship’ (sodalitium) for a gathering of those
friends who often dine together. You know this sort of fellowship at
Rome, the sodalities of Sadoleto and of Giberti, Goritz, Colocci, Mellini,
Corsi, Blosio, and the rest.32
Friendship and competition were both essential elements of this performative

environment, in which humanists variously engaged in collective emendation
of their drafts, traded manuscripts, and recited their works to each other.33
At the same time, humanists needed sharp elbows to survive in Rome’s intel-
lectual labor market, as they competed for commissions in the zero-sum
patronage game, as Julia Haig Gaisser has characterized it, and sharpened their
skills through these interactions.34
Roman humanists in the service of the Curia and beyond were instrumental
as papal image-makers, formulating and conveying Vatican messages. Coryciana
poets explicitly paralleled the Rome of Leo X to Augustan Rome, proclaiming
Leo as the Rex pacificus and themselves as new Virgils in the new Christian era
that was truly the Golden Age.35 These letterati no doubt ranged from reluc-
tant to genuine advocates of the encomiastic and ideological messages they
promoted; as Ernst Gombrich noted apropos of Medici Golden Age imagery,
“propaganda need not be cynical. Those who propound it may be its first
victims.”36 But there were tensions inherent in their roles as dependent scholar-
courtiers jostling for work and payment. John D’Amico analyzed the Curia’s
exploitation of humanists who served as the mouthpiece for political and reli-
gious ideas, noting the “moral ambiguities” inherent in humanist careerism
in Rome; and Gaisser has traced the frustration of often disaffected scholars
who were valued not for their literary products, but for their roles as Curial
administrators and propagandists.37 The Dialogo contra i poeti of Francesco Berni

(1497–1535), a satirical exposé of contemporary literary mores written by 1525,
provides a gimlet-eyed account of the careerist jockeying in this milieu.38 But
despite these drawbacks, Leo’s extravagant patronage of humanists offered
unrivaled opportunity. After the Sack of Rome in 1527, many letterati indeed
looked back wistfully at the Leonine pontificate as a golden age for sponsor-
ship and fraternity.39
The discourse of this intellectual elite in Leonine Rome was dominated
by debates over language, which came to a head during the years when the
Medici villa was being designed. Foremost among the players was Pietro
Bembo (1470–1547), the leading advocate of Ciceronian Latin as the most
perfect model of prose, rather than the imitation of many authors. As author
of Leo’s papal briefs (along with Jacopo Sadoleto, 1477–1547) Bembo thus set
the linguistic tone for the papal court. When he turned his attention to the
vernacular, he connected linguistic questions to political issues including the
Italian wars, advocating a sort of cultural and linguistic Italian unification. His
Prose della volgar lingua, which he worked on throughout his time in Leonine
Rome, was more than a grammar; it was a political statement valorizing
the Italian linguistic and literary tradition.40 Pierio Valeriano (1477–1560)
expanded on these issues about the vernacular in the form of a dialogue
describing the discussion at a dinner party supposedly held at the Medici
villa: his Dialogo della volgar lingua.41 Baldassare Castiglione (1478–1529), draft-
ing his Cortegiano c. 1513–18, took issue with Bembo’s Ciceronianism in his
discussion of the questione della lingua. These debates reached a dramatic cli-
max early in 1519, with the affair of the Belgian humanist Christophe de
Longueil, who, despite his mastery of Ciceronian Latin that had just earned
him Roman citizenship, was run out of Rome for treason for having deliv-
ered a Francophile, anti-Italian panegyric many years earlier. This tempest
that pitted northern humanists against the papal court was evidently a
trumped-up academic tiff that veiled deeper xenophobic anxieties about the
threats of Lutheranism and northern political powers, reflecting the intersec-
tion of literary and political concerns;42 as Gaisser put it, “they transposed the
real schism into the key of humanism.”43 Indeed, humanism was the mode
for effecting action in this milieu.
This culture was the setting for the humanists engaged in the Medici villa
project. Among them was Mario Maffei (1463–1537), the Curial humanist
with a practical bent for project management, who became an overseer of
Villa Madama’s construction.44 Paolo Giovio (1483–1552), who was awarded
several benefices by Leo and served as a physician and member of Cardinal
Giulio’s household, was also engaged in the Roman academies as a historian
and poet, and taught natural and moral philosophy in the Studio Romano (as
the Università di Roma was then known.)45 This cohort is well known for
their works in the Coryciana anthology of Latin poems by humanists in Goritz’s

circle, published in 1524. Francesco Arsilli’s De poetis urbanis, a catalogue of
Roman poets dedicated to Giovio in the Coryciana anthology, included Maffei,
along with fellow humanists Colocci, Castiglione, and Valeriano, and praised
each for his specialties and talents.46
Several of these humanists owned villas and were personally interested in the
ideology and literature of villeggiatura, as well as enjoying actual villa life. Maffei
actively managed his villas in Volterra and Rome, where he occasionally hosted
academy members, and made his villas the subject of his poetry; Arsilli mentions
Maffei’s verses, noting his love of nature and his vigna (presumably one of his
two Roman villas on the Aventine) to which he often summoned the Muses.47
Pietro Bembo was devoted to a family villa near Padua; Giovio wrote about his
family Villa Lissago near Lake Como;48 and Tommaso Inghirami (1470–1516),
the humanist-impresario, had a Roman villa on the Palatine, probably built into
ruins with ancient frescoes, to name just a few.49
Perhaps the least-known humanist in this circle was our poet Sperulo (aka
Sperulus, Spherulus, Speroli, Sferolo, 1463–1531), who had a successful career
as a poet, orator, priest, and diplomat, much of it in the service of the papal
Curia.50 Born in Camerino in the Marchigian Apennines, he studied rhetoric
in Bologna and canon and civil law in Perugia before coming to Rome. He
was first active at the papal court under Cesare Borgia, whom he accompanied
on traveling campaigns and honored in a panegyric.51 Sperulo also had fruitful
associations with both Medici cousins, an important point for this narrative.
For Leo X, and later Adrian VI, he served as a chamberlain (cubicularius), a post
that entailed rendering some kind of personal service to the pope, and thus
typically carried the privilege of proximity and influence, as well as dignity and
legal benefits.52 In a 1515 brief, Leo made Sperulo the prior of San Salvatore di
Aquapagana, a Camaldolese monastery near his home town of Camerino.53 In
April 1518, Sperulo was recorded as a diacono responsible for Greek readings in
the papal chapel (at a salary of five gold ducats monthly),54 and thus he must
have been instrumental in the revival of Greek scholarship in Leonine Rome.55
He also had some diplomatic responsibilities for Leo X following the Villa
Madama poem.56 His ordination to the priesthood came under the auspices
of Cardinal Giulio;57 and under Clement, he became the bishop of San Leone
in Calabria,58 and delivered several sermons, including one urging European
peace.59 His dedication of a book of his writings to Cardinal Ercole Rangone
in 1520 reflects his connection to that cardinal,60 and he became a nuncio to
the Gonzaga under Pope Adrian in 1522. Thus, this educated humanist earned
a living from various Curial posts and benefices, as well as his writings, as was
common practice for the many humanists competing in the intellectual labor
market in Rome. On his death in 1531, Sperulo was interred in Sant’Onofrio
in Rome. Until recently, only a handful of his short poems and letters had been
published, notably a poem on the finding of the Laocoön,61 several poems in

the Coryciana anthology,62 an encomium of Cardinal Ercole Rangone,63 and an
elegy about Pope Leo’s clemency, included here as Appendix iii.64 Many more
of Sperulo’s works survive in manuscript form,65 and are now published in a
monograph.66 Arsilli noted that Sperulo was celebrated for writing all types of
poetry – elegiac, epic, and lyric67 – a point also noted by Lilio Gregorio Giraldi
in his De poetis suorum temporum.68 Despite this range, it seems that much of
Sperulo’s oeuvre consisted of efficacious poetry, such as the Medici villa poem,
rather than work valued principally for its literary merit (by his contemporar-
ies or later critics), as were those of his contemporaries Bembo, Castiglione,
and Ariosto.69 Sperulo was perhaps most valued as a Leonine papal courtier for
applying his philological expertise, as well as other skills, to a variety of practi-
cal tasks at hand, such as contributing ideas for the rising Medici villa.
Raphael’s close associations with the most influential humanists and letterati
of the era fostered a verbal as well as visual approach to art and architecture.
In fact, he may have been raised on a diet of poetry and painting; although
evidence for his early education remains elusive, his childhood as the son of
Giovanni Santi (c. 1440–94), court painter and also poet in the sophisticated
court of Urbino, suggests that Raphael absorbed many powers of expression
expected of a courtier, which were later articulated by his friend Castiglione.70
Santi’s epic Cronaca rimata in terza rima had thematized notions of ut pictura
poesis, comparing the powers of painting and sculpture to poetry and history,
presumably a powerful lesson for the young Raphael. Bramante may also have
been a mentor in this regard; the elder artist’s intellectual formation in Urbino
was then sharpened by immersion in the Florentine and Milanese visual–
verbal culture at the Sforza court, where he was esteemed for his own learning
and poetry; and he would later be described as an “architecto doctissimo” for
these traits in Julian Rome.71 Raphael’s own accomplishments as a poet were
modest, judging from his surviving sonnets, which he jotted on the drawings
for the frescoes of the Disputa and Parnassus while working on the Stanza
della Segnatura.72 Nor did he master reading or writing in Latin. But the very
fact of his composing vernacular literature – poetry and, later, literary epistles,
notably one to Leo X about Roman antiquities and another describing plans
for Villa Madama – was a significant marker of his ambition to be valued as an
intellectual and visionary creative power.73 Even if his primary education and
genius lay in the visual and spatial realms, and he was busy with a crushing load
of design work during his Roman years, he nonetheless felt the necessity to
record important ideas in words, reflecting the verbal engagement fundamen-
tal to elite culture. His works in many media reflected this engagement with
literary and rhetorical sources.74
Without mastery of Latin, Raphael could not participate fully in human-
ist sodalities, but he nonetheless expanded his range and elevated his role
Patrons , humanists , and artists in leonine rome 25
4. Marcantonio Raimondi after Raphael, Quos Ego (Neptune calming the tempest which
Aeolus raised against Aeneas’ fleet, surrounded by other scenes from book i of the Aeneid),
engraving.
5. Raphael, Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, 1514–16 (debated), Paris, Louvre.
through his collaboration with letterati on projects related to the study of

ancient architecture, sculpture, and texts.75 Among these ventures was an
annotated translation of Vitruvius on which he collaborated with Colocci,
probably with the participation of antiquarian Andrea Fulvio (c. 1470–1527)
and other artists in Raphael’s equipe.76 He may also have been involved
in preparing an illustrated edition of Virgil’s Aeneid; his brilliant design for
the Quos Ego engraving (Figure 4) gave visual form to scenes from book
I and displayed an extensive knowledge of philological and archeological
prototypes, distilled into a sophisticated representation of fictive media. It
has been debated whether this print was a standalone invention and calling-
card for the artist, or intended for a new edition of the Aeneid he would
illustrate, but, in either case, it exemplifies Raphael’s talent for working at
the nexus of literary, artistic, and archeological interests.77 He also worked
closely with Pierio Valeriano to puzzle out the identification and meaning
of ancient sculptures.78
Beyond professional working relationships, Raphael’s close friendships
with humanists with whom he shared intellectual interests afforded infor-
mal opportunities for the exchange of ideas. His famous 1516 field trip to
explore the sights of Tivoli in the company of his humanist friends Pietro
Bembo, Baldassare Castiglione, Andrea Navagero (1483–1529), and Agostino
Beazzano (d. 1549) was one such example. The so-called buddy portraits
6. Raphael, Andrea Navagero and Agostino Beazzano, 1516, Rome, Galleria Doria Pamphilj.
Raphael painted of and for this group – a portrait of Castiglione and the one
of Navagero and Beazzano that Pietro Bembo owned – attest to Raphael’s
affection for these friends, and to their swapping of favors (Figures 5, 6).79
Bembo, in fact, expressed his jealousy that Raphael had not yet painted his
portrait.80 Raphael and Bembo had met in Urbino, and when both were at
the Vatican, they worked together on projects including the decorations of
the Vatican stufetta for Cardinal Bibbiena (1470–1520).81 Raphael paid tribute
to Tommaso Inghirami, with whom he had worked closely on the program
of the Stanza della Segnatura, in a number of portraits, most importantly in
the remarkably vivid image of Inghirami at the moment of receiving inspira-
tion (Figure 7).82 Another friend who merited such treatment was Antonio
Tebaldeo (1463–1537), famous for his improvisation and performance of
verse, whom Raphael represented in a famous portrait, now lost, but known
through old photos (Figure 8), and whom he may have included among
the poets in the Parnassus fresco.83 Raphael’s collaboration with Ludovico
Ariosto (1474–1533) on the apparato for staging I suppositi in the Vatican was
the talk of the Curia in early 1519 (Figures 9, 10).84 During this period,
Ariosto was also working on revisions to the first edition of his Orlando furioso,
parts of which were read aloud, so ideas from this epic were topical among
this cohort, too. But Raphael’s most significant literary friendship was with
Baldassare Castiglione, with whom he engaged in mutual self-fashioning in
7. Raphael, Portrait of Tommaso Inghirami, c. 1510–11 (debated), Florence, Pitti Gallery.
word and image; if Raphael’s portrait of Castiglione created the visual image
of his friend as the ideal courtier, Castiglione crafted a verbal portrait of his
friend in writings, some of them joint projects, as well as through his poems
at Raphael’s death.85 The pair collaborated on the famous letter to Leo X
about the antiquities of Rome (with input from Pietro Bembo and perhaps
other humanists),86 and Raphael’s letter describing Villa Madama was also
probably intended for Castiglione’s editorial treatment.87 The elements of
visual–verbal collaboration, social interchange, and competition among art-
ists and humanists were fundamentally important in this cultural milieu,
significantly for my story.
These humanists and artists operated in an intellectual environment charac-
terized by intensive literary, archeological, and topographical studies. Roman
topography was fundamental to much of the imagery these humanists formu-
lated for the papal renovatio, and under Pope Leo and Raphael a new archeo-
logical approach was also reflected in visual forms.88 Raphael, working as an
antiquarian and also an archeologist, was preparing a map of the ancient ruins
of Rome, a project for which he was as renowned at his death as he was for his
work as painter and architect – if not more so.89 (The letter to Leo X was per-
haps intended as a dedicatory letter to this project.90) In 1515, he was appointed
Leo’s Prefect of Marbles (Praefectus marmorum et lapidum omnium), a responsibil-
ity that has sometimes been misunderstood either reductively to apply only
8. Raphael (or copy after), Portrait of Antonio Tebaldeo, c. 1515, location unknown.
to inscriptions, or anachronistically to make Raphael a superintendent with

wide-ranging powers.91 Leo’s brief, reproduced here in full, clearly states that
Raphael’s primary task in this regard was acquiring marbles and stones for the
construction of St. Peter’s:
To Raphael of Urbino: Since it is greatly in the interest of the construc-

tion of the Roman temple of the Prince of the Apostles that the supply
of stones and marble, of which we need an abundance, should be had
at home, rather than brought from afar; and [since] I have determined
that the City’s ruins suffice as an ample source for this material, and that
stones of every kind are dug up here and there by practically everyone
who in Rome, or near Rome, undertakes to build, or simply to turn the
earth. You, whom I employ as master of this building project, and whose skill
in your craft and trustworthiness I have inspected and tested in many affairs, I
appoint as overseer of all marbles and stones which henceforth shall be dug up in
Rome, or within ten miles of Rome, so that you purchase for me what is suitable
for the building of that temple. Accordingly, I order all men, of middle, high
or low rank, with regard to those pieces of marble, and stones of every
kind, which they shall dig up within the area I have mentioned, that they
should, as soon as possible, inform you as overseer of these things of each
piece dug up. Whoever does not do so within three days shall be fined as
you see fit, from a hundred to a thousand gold coins. Furthermore, since
I have been informed that much of the ancient marble and stone, being
9. Cristofano dell’Altissimo, Portrait of Ludovico Ariosto, c. 1552–68, Florence, Uffizi.
inscribed with written records which often display some outstanding

information, the preservation of which would be worthwhile for the
cultivation of literature and for improving the elegance of the Roman
language, is randomly cut up by stone-masons using it as raw material,
with the result that the inscriptions are destroyed, I order all those who
exercise the craft of stone-cutting in Rome that they should not dare to
destroy or cut any inscribed stone without your command or permission,
the same fine being imposed on anyone who acts contrary to my order.
Issued on 27 August, the third year, at Rome.92 [author’s emphasis]
That confiscated ancient Roman marbles would be used for St. Peter’s sup-
plied an unassailable justification for seizing them, for reasons both practical
and symbolic. But Leo surely extended this mandate to collect works for other
papal projects, including the Medici papal hospitium once begun, even if the
mostly private nature of the villa project would have precluded announcing
that fact.93 Indeed the Medici were collecting ancient sculpture and spoils
while the villa was on the drawing board, and Sperulo’s poem reveals that
ancient sculpture and spoils were essential components of the villa’s design, as
the following chapters will demonstrate.
10. Raphael, Project for a Stage Design, probably Ariosto’s I suppositi, staged in the Vatican on 6
March 1519. Florence, Uffizi, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe, U 560ar.
Of course, the nostalgia for the past glory of Rome and advocacy for its preserva-
tion and reconstruction were at once idealistic, pragmatic, and paradoxical, as Raphael
himself continued to pillage ancient sites for the building supply of new Rome.94 His
11. Raphael, A Landscape with Figures and the Ruins of a Column, c. 1512–13, Windsor, Royal
Library Inv. rcin 990117.
Raphael’ s laz arus : the medici villa pro j ect 33
dual mandates to preserve and build anew necessarily came into conflict. But
what has been called his “proto-archeological” approach signaled a new atti-
tude, articulating a grand-scale, programmatic approach to Rome’s ruins, and
also embracing their study for study’s sake; and his letter advocates using the
tools of architectural design – plans, sections, and elevations – to study ruins,
part of the ongoing dialogue among antiquarian studies,Vitruvian studies, and
contemporary practice.95
RAPH AEL’S L A Z A RU S : T H E M E D IC I V I LLA PRO JEC T
Just as Curial humanists revived Ciceronian Latin as a fundamental tool of

verbal communication, Raphael forged a new visual language for the build-
ing of St. Peter’s and the decorations in the Vatican Stanze and Logge.96 Villa
Madama was a manifestation of the same enterprise. At the villa, the Medici
papacy would perform its power and authority in a microcosm of Leo’s earthly
kingdom. It was, in effect, a pastoral Vatican, whose architecture and decora-
tions would be freighted with Medicean dynastic messages, modulated for a
Roman papal environment. The villa complex was a utopian conception, and
an environment for living all’antica, designed on an ambitious scale that was
unprecedented in modern Rome, and intended to rival and surpass the villas
of antiquity.97
Two surviving ground plans, U 273a and U 314a (Plates v, vi), provide the
basis for reconstructing the grandiose scheme for the uncompleted Medici
villa, along with additional plans detailing the gardens and outlying areas of
the complex. U 314a is much closer to the design that was constructed, and is
generally understood to have been a reworking of the earlier U 273a. These
plans have been thoroughly analyzed, from early studies of Geymüller to the
work of Frommel and David Coffin, among other scholars, who have used
them to conceptualize elevations as well.98 From these plans, we may imagine
the grand complex envisioned by Raphael and Antonio da Sangallo: a long
rectangular corps de logis set against the steep rise of the hillside, surrounded on
three sides by an extensive network of gardens terraced down the gentler slope
to the Tiber below. Geymüller’s somewhat fanciful reconstruction in Figure 12
gives a good sense of the planned scope of the complex, if not its exact con-
figuration. The wooden scale model of the building designed by Dewez for
the Capitoline exhibition of 1983 is helpful in visualizing details of plan and
elevation, albeit with some necessarily speculative elements (Figures 13, 14).
Raphael drafted a letter describing his plans for the unbuilt villa, a literary
effort modeled closely on Pliny the Younger’s descriptions of his Tuscan and
Laurentine villas. Raphael’s epistle contains elements of both ground plans,
and thus must have been written during the time that U 314a was being for-
mulated. No finished copy of this letter has emerged; the surviving draft was
12. Heinrich von Geymüller, reconstruction of the Villa Madama complex, showing the
northern half of the gardens.
probably intended to be polished by Castiglione,99 and it was surely directed

to Cardinal Giulio.100 Raphael takes the patron/reader/listener on a virtual
walk through the planned complex, giving a dynamic, bodily experience of
the site and the space, and a vivid sense of the extraordinary amenities planned
for the villa. He begins with the siting of the villa on the northeastern slope
of Monte Mario, explaining the disposition of the building along a south-
west-to-northeast axis as function of the winds (a literary formulation heav-
ily indebted to Vitruvius and Pliny; in reality, the villa’s siting was a function
of the geography of the hillside, water sources, and symbolic topography as
well).101 Similarly, Raphael describes summer and winter quarters conceived
for the comfort of visitors in all seasons; his letter entices the reader to imag-
ine the pleasure of sitting on shaded benches next to a splashing fountain on
a hot day, or in a southern-facing room with many glass windows on a cool
one. These seasonal considerations were at once real, and also drew on long
literary tradition, notably Pliny’s villa descriptions.102 Raphael details the three
entrances to the villa (indicated on Figure 15): the main one from the Vatican
road, into a magnificent courtyard with ceremonial stairs; another proposed

road leading from the Rome–Viterbo road, which would bring visitors down
the steepest part of the hillside into the theater; and a proposed road lead-
ing straight from the Milvian Bridge to the villa’s central Tiber loggia. This
emphasis on approaches was not a Plinian borrowing, and instead reflected
the importance Raphael and his patrons assigned to roads and sight lines in
determining the villa’s siting.103 Among the villa’s highlights, he describes the
many grand halls; the round central courtyard (one of the major innovations
in U 314a); a semi-circular amphitheater terraced into the steep hillside; round
towers at the corners, one a winter diaeta (a pleasant place for conversation)
ringed with glass windows and another to house a chapel;104 an enclosed gar-
den with bitter orange trees;105 numerous fountains; a fishpond surrounded by
cool retreats for strolling and dining; a bath complex with hot, tepid, and cool
baths; stables for 400 horses with water running through the mangers; a hip-
podrome running the length of the villa for equine exercise and displays; and
gardens filled with trees. (Relevant locations are identified in the schematic
plan of the villa in Figure 15; the bath complex was to be on the floor below.)
13. Villa Madama, model of the reconstructed plan of the building, 1983; view as if looking
downhill from the top of the site.
14. Villa Madama, model of the reconstructed plan of the building, 1983.
Construction of the villa probably began in 1518, and the work on the build-
ing and gardens continued intermittently for at least a decade, which also saw
the deaths of Raphael in 1520 and Pope Leo the following year, the elevation
of Cardinal Giulio to the papacy in 1523 as Pope Clement VII, and the Sack
of Rome in 1527. 106 Characteristic of construction practices for large projects,
the villa was to be built in phases, in this case beginning with the northeast
half of the corps de logis housing the summer quarters, which would constitute
a habitable nucleus of the grand plan. As it turned out, the first phase was
the only one executed, consisting of half the circular courtyard, half the long
building, the enclosed garden, the outer hippodrome-shaped garden, and the
fishpond, visible in an aerial photograph in Figure 16. Despite the deaths and
interruptions that plagued the project, this wing and the adjacent gardens were
mostly completed and abundantly ornamented. We do not know when hopes
of finishing the entire grand plan were abandoned, or when work ceased at the
villa; payments to two overseers at the villa site in 1528 and 1529 could be for
continuing work, or simply for maintenance,107 but the terminus ante quem of
the initial Medicean phase was the death of Clement on 24 September 1534.108
The villa’s rich post-Medici history includes its ownership by the Farnese
family and then the Bourbons, several private owners, and finally its acquisi-
tion by the Italian government in 1937 as the seat of the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs, thereby restoring the complex to its original function as a theater of
diplomacy to receive visiting heads of state, a function it still serves today.109
15. Villa Madama, schematic plan based on U 314a identifying areas of the villa discussed, with
Raphael’s vocabulary for the spaces described in his letter, and a reference to the correspond-
ing section of his letter in Raphael/Dewez.
It is known today as Villa Madama, after its owner later in the cinquecento:
“Madama” Margarita d’Austria, natural daughter of Emperor Charles V. She
married first Alessandro de’ Medici and then, after his death, Ottavio Farnese,
thereby transferring the villa into that family. But during the Medici pontifi-
cates, the villa was variously known as the vigna del papa, the vigna sotto la croce
di Monte Mario (a toponymic reference discussed in Chapter 5), and the Villa
Falcona, for the Medici falcon impresa as well as for the surrounding woods, the
Prato di Falcone, as Sheryl Reiss discovered.110
The villa we see today, though just a kernel of the grandiose complex envi-
sioned, is still an extraordinary place; the seeming remoteness of the verdant site,
the grand scale of the rooms, the sparkle of the crystalline stucco revetments,
the quality of light, and the views to the distant hills and Rome below are just
a few elements that have prompted centuries of visitors to record the sense
of wonder experienced during their visits. Although the focus of this book is
not the villa as built, a brief overview of its major spaces will serve to orient
the reader to the plans being formulated by our protagonists. Throughout the
villa’s history, the hemispherical half of the round courtyard that was built has
served as an unlikely entry façade (Plates xvi, xvii). This entrance leads into
an all-white vestibule; walls and vaults are articulated by low-relief stucco in
a variety of forms, a tour de force of this new material recently revived after
antiquity by the Raphael school (Figure 17).111 The vestibule leads into the
16. Villa Madama, aerial view showing the portion of the design that was built.
most important representational space constructed within the villa building:

the garden loggia (Figures 18, 19), an extravagantly scaled room with soaring
vaults that evoke an ancient bath complex or basilica. This tripartite loggia is
capped by two groin vaults flanking a central dome vault. The long loggia is
asymmetrical in plan; there is an exedra at the head of the loggia, while its tail
end terminates in a flat wall (visible in plan in Figure 15 and in elevation in
Plates xviii, xix). One long wall is punctuated with three arched openings
to the garden, now glazed but originally open. On the opposite long wall,
exedrae protrude from the two side bays, and the central bay leads back into
the vestibule. The hall is decorated with richly interwoven frescoed and poly-
chromed stucco decorations, which blanket the vaults, dome, pendentives, and
walls.The loggia’s walls and exedrae are also lined with niches for sculpture, and
indeed the villa was once filled with antiquities, as we may see in eighteenth-
century views (Plates xviii, xix), before the villa was stripped of its sculpture
later in that century. The loggia was originally open to the rectangular inner
garden, which Raphael labeled the xystus after Pliny (Figure 19). The sight
line from the main entrance through the vestibule bisects the garden loggia,
leading directly through the inner garden on axis (Figure 20). The interpen-
etration of building and garden is striking; the architecture encloses the inner
garden, which is an extension of the open loggia. This ensemble of loggia and
garden exemplifies the Renaissance dialectic of art and nature.112 The garden is
17. Villa Madama, vestibule.

R aphael’ s lazarus : the medici villa pro j ect 41
18. Villa Madama, garden loggia.

19. Giovanni Volpato (1738–1803),Villa Madama, garden loggia opening to the inner gar-
den; view from the southwest end. Engraving with watercolor, Kunstsammlungen der Veste
Coburg, Inv. xii. 252.1.
surrounded by architecture on three sides: the loggia and two enclosing walls.
The long garden wall is punctuated by three niches; two were originally filled
with colossal statues, and the central one still houses the well-known Elephant
Fountain.113 The short garden wall opposite the garden loggia has at its center
a classical portal that separates this space from wilder nature in the hippodrome
garden beyond.The door is flanked by two crumbling stucco colossi by Baccio
Bandinelli (1493–1560) that remain from the era of Raphael and the Medici.114
Stairs from either end of this garden lead down to the fishpond (peschiera),
and to an ambulatory behind the pond with three grotto-like exedrae tucked
beneath the hanging garden (Figure 21). These spots offer stunning views of
the distant hills and the Tiber valley below.
The decorations were carried out after Raphael’s death by his closest associ-
ates, notably Giulio Romano (c. 1499–1546), Giovanni da Udine (1487–1564),
and Baldassare Peruzzi (1481–1536). Giulio and Giovanni battled each other
for control of Raphael’s workshop, and specifically for the villa project, as we
know from a letter of Cardinal Giulio’s referring to their squabbles in a tone
of wry exasperation.115 Nonetheless, they created an extraordinary decorative
ensemble integrating painted and stucco decoration all’antica with figural and
relief sculpture, both ancient and modern. The decorative complex incorpo-
rated architecture, multimedia decorations, and garden elements into a net-
work of meanings alluding to ancient literature, cosmology, Medici dynastic
propaganda, papal foreign policy, and antiquarian interests. The villa’s imagery
would reflect its hybrid character, combining the pomp of a Vatican hall of state
with the license of a private villa. The decorative ensemble was also remark-
able for its union of classical pastoral imagery with Christian Golden Age
material. In particular, imagery of Venus and related notions of peace, concord,
and eternal spring under the Medici would appear throughout the villa in
painting, stucco, and sculpture (Plate viii). Such imagery translated Laurentian
conceits to a Roman papal mode apposite for this villa. No evidence has yet
emerged to show whether Raphael had a hand in conceiving the decorative
scheme, even in broad outline; nor does his letter, perhaps following Pliny,
devote much attention to decorations. However, the evidence laid out in the
following chapters suggests that Raphael was indeed thinking ahead to certain
aspects of the decorative complex.
Raphael and his associates drew on a rich list of formal sources for the
design of the villa complex: the towers of the Ducal Palace in Urbino, the
fishpond of Villa Poggioreale in Naples, the tripartite loggia of Bramante’s
Colonna nymphaeum at Genazzano, and the disposition of sculpture at
Hadrian’s Villa in Tivoli, to name just a few citations. The plentiful ruins of
other suburban villas dotting the hillsides of Tivoli (including the Sanctuary
of Hercules Victor, then understood to be a villa) offered powerful models
for the siting of a terraced villa on a steep hillside with views – the so-called
prospect villa – as well as ideas for the fishpond, water theater, grotto, and the
use of calcareous materials. Earlier Medici villas served as especially impor-
tant formal and conceptual models, from the form of a garden loggia open to
an enclosed garden near the crest of a steeply terraced hillside, as in the Villa
Medici at Fiesole,116 to Laurentian ideas of villeggiatura embodied at Poggio
a Caiano.117 Pope Leo and Cardinal Giulio were involved in completing the
decorations at Poggio a Caiano at the same time they were building their
own villa in Rome, so they were closely attuned to parallels with Lorenzo’s
villa,118 also conceived to serve the dual function of hospitium and private
villa; and there was surely a crucial exchange of ideas among patrons, artists,
and advisors for these contemporaneous projects for Florentine and Roman
Medici villas. Medici patronage had long been characterized by an extensive
interest in archeological and literary models, especially in connection with
villas.119 In her analysis of notions of the humanist villa, Amanda Lillie noted
that the first Renaissance villas whose architectural form was in some way
guided by humanist notions or ancient prototypes were the Medici villas
at Fiesole and Poggio a Caiano,120 so this Medicean emphasis on the rela-
tion between villa architecture and literary conception was long-familiar to
20. Photomontage reconstructing the view through the garden loggia when it was still
unglazed; the vista from the entrance bisects the garden loggia, continuing through the inner
garden on axis to the garden portal. From Mario Bafile, Il giardino di Villa Madama,
Rome, 1942.
21. Villa Madama, view of the inner garden and fishpond from the building.
Pope Leo and Cardinal Giulio. Diplomatic and cultural exchange between
Laurentian Florence and Aragonese Naples fostered another influential node
of villa culture at the late quattrocento Aragonese villa of Poggioreale in
Naples.121 Lorenzo sent the Florentine architect Giuliano da Maiano to
Naples with plans that were fundamental for Poggioreale, thus it featured the
latest in Florentine as well as Aragonese/Neapolitan design. It also remained
a beacon for the next generation; Raphael’s close associates Fra Giocondo
and Peruzzi visited and sketched the Neapolitan villa, so its architectural
features were familiar to the Raphael school at first hand.122 A thorough
analysis of architectural sources is beyond the scope of the present study, but
it is important simply to note this citation of significant models, ancient and
modern.
This selection from many sources was, in fact, understood as a marker of
the highest form of artistic creativity. The citation of many models at the
Medici villa reflects the practice of creative selection of earlier prototypes
and their transformation into an innovative assemblage, shared by artists and
letterati. The Latin term inventio encompasses the meanings of the modern
English words invention and inventory – the latter being necessary for the
former.123 The famous letter ostensibly written by Raphael about his “cer-
tain idea of beauty” presents the composite process of selection as his artistic
manifesto. Whether one accepts this letter as representing Raphael’s own

ideas polished by Castiglione, or as Castiglione’s literary portrait of Raphael,
it represents contemporary perceptions of Raphael’s artistry.124 Significantly,
the letter stresses the importance of selecting elements from many models
in architecture as well as in painting; as an architect, Raphael says he had to
look beyond Vitruvius to consider other models in the ruins of Rome in
order to find “le belle forme degli edifici antichi,” while as painter of the
Galatea, he needed many models of female beauty, an allusion to the topos of
Zeuxis and the maidens of Crotona.125 Of course, the point of the letter was
that even more important than Raphael’s models was his own “certa Idea.”
Eugenio Battisti first suggested that the Idea was not an internal image, but
rather an instinctive criterion of selection, further noting that the “certa Idea”
is a translation of Giovanfrancesco Pico della Mirandola’s “Idea quaedam,”
which Pico connected with the Zeuxian topos as a model of eloquence.126
Thus, the Idea itself evokes the selection method, and the letter suggests
the importance of the creative practice of selection for various modes of
Raphael’s expression.127 In addition, the letter’s parallel between Raphael’s
composition from ruined buildings and from beautiful maidens reflects the
architecture–body metaphor, appropriate for this collective enterprise to
re-member the corpse of Rome and its buildings.128
At the same time Raphael and his Medici patrons were assembling plans for
the extraordinary villa on Monte Mario, Roman humanists occupied themselves
with the project, too; the following chapter turns to the poets who visited the
construction site of the rising Medici hospitium, and their rich literary source-
book on the theme of the villa.
CHAPTER TWO
WRITING ARCHITECTURE
S i nc e antiquity, the vi l la had b e e n th e bui l di ng ty pe mo st

closely associated with literary production, consonant with the ideology of
the villa to foster otium, or the contemplative life.1 A long tradition of literature
celebrated villa life, design, and decoration in a variety of forms, notably poetry
and prose panegyrics, ekphrastic set pieces, letters, dialogues set in villas, archi-
tectural treatises, agricultural and husbandry texts, and rhetorical exercises.2
This chapter traces the rich sources of classical and earlier Renaissance villa
literature, as well as other literary forms and practices that provided important
models for early sixteenth-century humanists, before turning to the descrip-
tions of Villa Madama itself. It considers the poets who visited the Medici
construction site, their proleptic villa descriptions, and their practices for
composing and disseminating these works.
TH E TEX TUA L V IL L A
Among the classical sources on villas, the letters of Pliny the Younger describ-
ing two of his estates provide the fullest descriptions, which served as touch-
stones for the literature, design, and conception of villas down to modernity.3
Raphael was not the first to draw on these letters for literary and architectural
inspiration; among his models were Paolo Giovio’s description of his family’s
Villa Lissago at Como written in 1504, also a Plinian pastiche that borrowed
terms such as xystus, cryptoporticus, and coenatio. Giovio additionally relied on
47
48 WRI TI NG A R CHI T E CT U R E
22. Pliny the Younger, Epistolarum libri IX, Treviso: Ioannes Vercellius, 1483. First folio of
Bernardo Bembo’s copy of Pliny’s Letters.
TH E TE XTU AL V I L L A 49
23. Francesco Zucchi, Pietro Bembo in Villa Bozza, in Opere del cardinale Pietro Bembo,Venice,
1729. The younger Bembo is visualized at Villa Bozza, the Bembo family villa in Santa Maria
di Non outside Padua, at the meeting of the rivers Piovego and Brenta.
Grapaldo’s De partibus aedium, a text of 1494 that interpreted such Plinian

vocabulary.4 Bernardo Bembo (1433–1519), the Venetian humanist/diplomat
who spent time in the circle of Lorenzo de’ Medici, owned a 1483 edition of
Pliny’s letters (Figure 22), as well as a villa outside Padua, and was deeply influ-
enced by Pliny’s notion of villeggiatura; these interests were shared by his son,
Raphael’s friend Pietro Bembo, as demonstrated in writings from his earliest
work, De Aetna, to his autograph comments on the family copy of Pliny’s let-
ters, and his own letters describing the family villa, which he inherited at the
death of his father in May 1519 (Figure 23).5 Pliny’s letters were already essen-
tial sources for the Renaissance villa in 1430s Ferrara, notably for the Este villa
of Belriguardo, the first Renaissance seigneurial residence to attempt to rival
the magnificence of the ancient villa; and the Plinian panegyrics produced by
humanists in the Este circle must have been known to later humanists.6
But despite the fundamental importance of Pliny’s letters for Renaissance
readers and villa builders, their renown has overshadowed the abundant ancient
villa literature read by Renaissance humanists such as Sperulo and his contem-
poraries, who looked to an extensive range of models for content, as well as
language and form.7 Renaissance humanists embraced the overlapping genres
of poetry and rhetoric, and the associated forms of panegyric and encomium,
all of which shared the technique of ekphrasis and an emphasis on praise and
display.8 In fact, the combination of genres and techniques to forge new liter-
ary modes is an important part of this story, a point that will become clear
in Chapter 4. For form and diction, Virgil served as a fundamental model for
cinquecento poetry, much as Ciceronian Latin provided the gold standard for
Curial communiqués in prose.9 Although the content of villa panegyrics dif-
fered markedly from Virgil’s epic subjects in the Aeneid or his bucolic Eclogues
and Georgics, Renaissance poets adapted Virgilian epic and pastoral themes and
language for their own uses.10
As we shall see, what has been disparagingly dismissed as the “shamelessly
encomiastic” tone of Sperulo’s poem is in fact a function of its most direct lit-
erary model: the Silvae of Statius, the first-century ce poet who heaped hyper-
bolic praise on the Emperor Domitian as well as private patrons by describing
their accomplishments, from building palaces and imperial roads to erecting
statues and hosting lavish banquets. Statius had raised the art of panegyric to
a new level:11 he was the first poet to describe a work of art as the subject of
a full-length poem rather than a digression in a longer work, and two of his
Silvae were devoted to the building of villas.12 His Silvae became the model for
late antique and Renaissance poets for the novel combination of an encomium
to a patron, which included standard panegyrical tropes of praising his family
and origins, with an extended description of one of his works, showing how it
reflected the character and values of its builder. Along with Pliny’s villa letters
in prose, Statius’ villa poems provided the first villa descriptions as the subject
of a full-length text.13 Furthermore, Statius’ choice of the title Silvae, plural
of the Latin silva – variously interpreted to mean wood, woodlands, forest,
pasture, or metaphorically, the raw material of composition or construction –
established a poetic tradition that would have rich associations for Renaissance
pastoral poets.14 His villa poems were a potent model for later villa writers,
from Pliny himself to late-antique villa panegyrists.
Statius once again became popular at the time of Dante (for his osten-
sibly Christian-themed Thebaid), but his Silvae were not discovered until
the early fifteenth century by Poggio Bracciolini, and the work was popu-
larized in quattrocento Italy and beyond by Angelo Poliziano.15 The first
course Poliziano taught at the Studio Fiorentino in 1480–1 was on Statius’
Silvae (as well as Quintilian’s Institutio oratoria), and he prepared a com-
mentary on the Silvae that was widely known in manuscript, although it
remained unpublished.16 The Silvae became important in Laurentian culture
as sources for Poliziano’s Stanze, Botticelli’s Primavera, and Lorenzo’s motto
Le tems revient.17 Statius’ poems were also popular among Roman humanists
in the late quattrocento and early cinquecento, including Niccolò Perotti,
Domizio Calderini, who published an edition of the Silvae in 1475, and
Parrhasius, who gave a course of lectures about the poems in Rome in
1514.18 Angelo Colocci copied snippets of Statius’ works in a manuscript
collection interspersing the writings of ancient and Renaissance authors
(BAV, Vat. Lat. 3353). Statius’ popularity may even have landed him a privi-
leged place in Raphael’s collection of laurel-crowned ancient and mod-
ern poets in his Parnassus fresco; some scholars have proposed that Statius
appears in the grouping of Homer, Dante, and Virgil – perhaps even as a
self-portrait of Raphael (Figure 24).19
24. Raphael and associates, Parnassus, detail depicting (left to right) Dante, Homer,Virgil, and
Statius(?), perhaps as a self-portrait of the artist; 1509–11, Stanza della Segnatura,Vatican Palace.
Another reason for the prominence of Statius’ villa poetry in this circle may
have been archeological. Raphael and his humanist friends who journeyed to
Tivoli probably visited the ruins of one of the villas described by Statius: the
Tiburtine villa of Manilius Vopiscus, or ruins they identified as such. Although
no evidence for their itinerary has emerged, other cinquecento antiquarians
specifically described the remains of Vopiscus’ villa, and Antonio da Sangallo
later described the fountains there, encrusted with sponge stones and stalactites.
(This further suggests that Vopiscus’ villa may have been a source of inspira-
tion for the novel naturalistic grotto and fishpond at Villa Madama, discussed
in Chapter 5.) The rare confluence of surviving physical and textual evidence
surely made Vopiscus’ villa a powerful model, in word and image.
Using Statius as a model, Poliziano and other quattrocento humanists had
written silvae themselves, which popularized the silva throughout Europe.20
The renaissance of the silva coincided with the development of the so-called
humanist villa on the Italian peninsula;21 this conjunction surely fostered the
flowering of villa poems – many identified as silvae – throughout the Italian
peninsula during the late quattrocento and early cinquecento.22 Notable among
them for our story were many poems celebrating Medici villas, in addition to
letters and prose panegyrics about villas.23 These villa descriptions were part of
a broader tradition of architectural panegyrics long favored by the Medici, espe-
cially Cosimo and Lorenzo.24 The Medici villa poems included descriptions
of Careggi by Alessandro Braccesi and Alberto Avogadro,25 Poliziano’s silvae
celebrating the Fiesole villa,26 and many poems about Lorenzo de’ Medici’s
villa at Poggio a Caiano by poets including Poliziano and Lorenzo himself,27
which hold special importance for this account of Sperulo and his Medici
patrons. Non-Medicean examples abound, too. Poliziano’s disciple Pietro
Crinito wrote a silva about the Orti Oricellari, the Florentine garden villa of
Bernardo Rucellai well known as the site of intellectual gatherings of eminent
contemporary politicians and humanists, including Niccolò Machiavelli. This
wooded garden itself became known as a sylva – a physical counterpart of the
poetic silva.28 Also in Florence, Sassetti’s Villa di Montughi (now La Pietra)
was the subject of poetry by Ugolino Verino and Bartolommeo Fonzio.29
In the influential humanist center of Naples, Giovanni Pontano produced
poems about Neapolitan villas including Poggioreale, the villas of Baia, and
his own modest estates,30 and Jacopo Sannazzaro later composed an epigram
about his Villa Mergellina, where he wrote many of his all’antica eclogues.31 In
Bologna, the plague of 1478–9 dispersed humanists including Battista Spagnoli
Mantuanus to the countryside, where he praised the virtues of his patron’s
villas.32 In Rome, just a few years before the Medici villa was begun, Sperulo’s
colleagues Egidio Gallo and Blosio Palladio each wrote a long panegyric
about Agostino Chigi’s villa, now known as the Villa Farnesina. Both of these
works were accompanied by a number of shorter poems by fellow Roman
academicians praising either the villa itself or the main author’s poem about
it – an important precursor to the Villa Madama poetry.33 Other poets drawn
to Julian and Leonine Rome participated in this culture of the villa, including
Neapolitan humanist Girolamo Borgia who wrote a panegyric eclogue about
Angelo Colocci’s popular villa garden near the Trevi fountain, which he dedi-
cated to Colocci, Julius II, and his daughter Felice, who is cast as the nymph
of the site.34 Poems devoted to the Roman villa of Pietro Mellini include a
Pindaric ode by the Cremonese poet Benedetto Lampridio (1478–1539), and
others by Tebaldeo.35
There were close connections among these humanists and patrons from
Rome, Florence, and Naples, as we know from their correspondence and dip-
lomatic travels.36 Since Lorenzo de’ Medici and the rulers of Naples traded
architects and villa ground plans at a time when Pontano was a diplomatic
attaché, it would be surprising if villa poems were not exchanged as well.37
Moreover, Bernardo Rucellai visited Pontano at one of his Neapolitan
villas, and the Florentine Crinito addressed villa poems to Neapolitan patrons,
a significant example of Florentine–Neapolitan cultural exchange on the
theme of villeggiatura.38 Agostino Chigi also had property in Naples, and close
ties to its rulers and humanists including Pontano and Sannazzaro, fostering
exchange with Roman humanists and artists in his circle, from Blosio Palladio
and Colocci to Raphael.39 (We may also speculate that the poets in Aragonese
Naples were aware of the tradition of the rawdiyyāt, the form of garden poetry
that flourished in Spain as well as Sicily, and the Islamic tradition of poetic
competitions held in gardens.40) So, Sperulo and his Roman colleagues were
certainly familiar with villa poetry from all over the Italian peninsula. In fact,
villa literature is notably intertextual, and Renaissance villa poets clearly
responded to each other’s works as well as those of their classical antecedents,
inserting their poetry into this lineage, and competing with their predecessors
and contemporaries.41
In addition to the rich tradition of villa literature itself, other literary models
provided inspiration and context for poets describing specific architectural situ-
ations or locations.Virgil displayed a contrast between describing the abstract or
utopian and the actual with his Eclogues and Georgics, the latter of which were a
model for praising the specificity of a place.42 Poetry about the ruins of Rome
further contributed an instrumental model for the combination of literary,
philological, and topographical tropes, from Petrarchan laments to Castiglione’s
early sonnet, Superbi colli e voi, sacre ruine. Other works provided models for
describing the imaginary as well as the real. The Hypnerotomachia Polifili, with
its rich archeological and philological sourcebook and fantastical conflation of
a dreamscape with real-world places (which scholars are still trying to distin-
guish), must have been a crucial spur to creative descriptions melding the actual
and imagined. If one accepts the interpretation that its author was Francesco
Colonna, a Roman nobleman who was Lord of Palestrina and a member of
the Roman Academy under Pomponio Leto, then this 1499 work takes on
fundamental importance for the early cinquecento Roman intellectual milieu of
Sperulo and the Medici.43 But whatever the work’s authorship and provenance,
its allusions to actual Roman sites and antiquities surely contributed to its impor-
tance among Roman humanists, including Colocci.44
Poetry dedicated to specific works of sculpture was another popular element
of Roman humanist-antiquarian culture that fostered ways of approaching the
material world that would be important for poets at the Medici villa. Indeed,
a significant amount of Renaissance poetry was devoted to sculpture, ancient
and modern, which was composed for special occasions. Most famously, the
copious poetry by humanists including Sperulo about the ancient Laocoön at
its excavation in 1506 served to complete and recontextualize the sculpture.
The Ariadne, then identified as a Sleeping Cleopatra, provided another impe-
tus for poets including Castiglione to use text to recontextualize antiquities.45
Goritz’s 1510–12 commission for the St. Anne altar in the Roman church of
Sant’Agostino, composed of a sculpture by Andrea Sansovino and a fresco by
Raphael, was praised by the foremost letterati in Rome, who produced several
hundred poems annually about the work. These were physically affixed to the
altar, becoming part of the display together with painting and sculpture, before
they were later collected in the 1524 Coryciana anthology,46 rendering the poets
“makers” of the physical installation, along with the artists and patron.47 This
tradition of praising sculpture and making a new context for it through words
will emerge as an important framework for the villa poetry I am discussing.
The power of the word to describe or invent places was based on long-
standing habits of mind. Perhaps the most essential tool was ekphrasis (Latin
descriptio), used since the ancient rhetorical exercises known as Progymnasmata
to bring a variety of subject matter vividly before the eyes, including build-
ings and works of art, real or imagined.48 Mnemonic practices also fostered
these skills in the exercise of locational memory, which had been linked to
invention from ancient oratory to medieval mnemonic methods. Aristotle,
Cicero, St. Paul, and medieval monks all engaged in the practice of making
fictive mental sites for remembering, and also for creative invention.49 The
trope of the poet as master builder in medieval literature reflected the inven-
tional nature of mnemonic building as a technique of composition, used to
construct everything from one’s own education to a building.50 Accordingly,
the notion of verbal description to invent new places was understood as both
metaphor and tool.
Thus, the poets praising the Medici villa drew on a rich array of literary
sources and rhetorical techniques. But it is important to distinguish that their
works did not treat the fantastical, the utopian, or the general, but rather the
proleptic vision of an actual building coming into existence.
PO ETS A N D M US E S AT T H E C ON STRU C TIO N SITE
As we saw from the outset of this book, the humanist Francesco Sperulo
claimed that he went for a walk at the site of the rising Medici villa and was
spontaneously inspired to write a poem about it (dedicatory letter, §1). This
conceit evokes the ancient notion of the ambulatio, or leisurely walk, for cul-
tured thought or conversation, which was celebrated from Plato to Pliny and
Cicero, and most appropriately done at a villa.51 In particular, the site visit
as the occasion for writing a poem was a device borrowed from Statius,52
although it emerges that Renaissance poets mobilized this trope in a literal,
practical mode. We turn now to a brief description of the fruits of these puta-
tive strolls by Sperulo and other poets who described the Medici villa, before
considering why these letterati actually were drawn to the construction site.
Sperulo’s Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata consists of 407 lines of hexameter,
preceded by a dedicatory letter addressing the poem to Cardinal Giulio. The
work is dated 1 March 1519, and preserved in a presentation manuscript in the
P O E T S A N D M US E S AT TH E C O N S TR U C TI O N S I TE 55
Vatican Library. It was bound as a standalone volume in an opulent, tooled-

leather pocket edition, and the two-page opening of the manuscript is illumi-
nated (Plates ix, x). The title page bears the poet’s address to Cardinal Giulio,
enwreathed in sprigs of myrtle and laurel, and the facing page is decorated
with a painted initial, foliate decoration, and the arms of Cardinal Giulio. The
high quality and inventiveness of the illumination, the use of Cardinal Giulio’s
arms, and the dedication all suggest that this manuscript was intended for
presentation to him, perhaps at his own request. The elegant chancery cursive
script of the manuscript was very likely the poet’s own hand.53 A new critical
edition, translation, and gloss of the poem appear as Appendix i; and an analysis
of the format of the booklet and its material properties, including the binding,
illumination, and handwriting, appears in Appendix ii. A short summary of
the poem here will reveal the scope of its ideas, and a discussion of the most
significant aspects of the work follows in Chapter 3.
The dedicatory epistle sets up several major themes of Sperulo’s poem. He
claims that he dashed it off quickly, expecting that the shortcomings of his verses
would be an inspiration for greater poetic talents – a commonplace apology,
and also a claim to poetic furor, which belies the labor evident in this carefully
crafted work.54 Most noteworthy for this poet claiming to build in verse, Sperulo
expresses the hope that the villa he creates will outlive the building itself, evok-
ing the Horatian Exegi monumentum topos – pitting words against monuments
in a competition for which will last longer and bring more lasting fame.55 This
imagery was a cliché in Italian humanist poetry, especially among the Coryciana
poets,56 but Sperulo acknowledges the trope, and further boasts that he will prove
the point: he hopes that with his poem, “it could finally become evident that the
Muses build in ink with greater tenacity and more enduringly than architects do
with their glue of lime and sand.”57 The poet articulates another paragone topos
central to the poem (and to the painted and stucco decorations of the villa itself):
that the villa and its patrons not only equal but surpass those of antiquity (§2).
Most of the poem is narrated by Father Tiber, the river god, whom Sperulo
deems to be taking charge of the villa’s construction. Tiber details the supplies
and ancient marbles he is ferrying to the villa, discussing the placement of
sculptures in the complex and their meanings. He further proposes the subject
of battle frescoes, relating long and intricate narratives that he says Raphael will
paint. Many of his proposed decorations are designated for specific areas of the
villa. The river god also praises the Medici family and their ancestors, real and
mythical, showing how each will be represented in an aspect of the villa. He
is also clear about which areas of the villa he will not discuss. It is remarkable
that the poet provides a detailed and specific description of the decorations for
the extensive villa complex, although it was still a very rough construction site.
Sperulo’s poem reflects his deep knowledge of ancient and earlier Renaissance
villa poetry. His poem is Virgilian in diction, and rich with allusions to ancient
sources including Homer,Virgil,Vitruvius, Pliny, and above all Statius. (Statius’

importance for Italian Renaissance art is less widely known than is deserved,
a neglect perhaps reflecting the long-standing disregard for Silver Age Latin
poets that has recently begun to change.58) The whole conception of Sperulo’s
poem praising the patron through his work is Statian. Sperulo further makes
pointed references to the imagery and language of Statius’ Silvae, from the
ruling conceit of a site visit to a villa as the inspiration for writing a poem
(as in Silvae, i, 3), to the description of the noise at the villa’s construction
site, which evokes Statius on the clamor from Domitian’s rising equestrian
statue.59 Sperulo’s poem also reveals an extensive knowledge of earlier Medici
encomia by Florentine poets, and it is larded with references to Medici imprese
and topoi.60 Such literary citations reflect the deep familiarity Sperulo and his
audience had with classical and contemporary sources, and the intertextual
discourse that flourished in the antiquarian culture of humanists, artists, and
patrons in the context of the Roman sodalities.
Several other poems were written about Villa Madama, although none
so lengthy or specific as Sperulo’s has emerged. The renowned poet Marco
Girolamo Vida (1485–1566) wrote a panegyric titled “The Genius of the Villa
Falcone” (Genius Falconis Villae) that was surely written about Villa Madama,
sometimes called Villa Falcona, rather than the neighboring villa of Falcone
Sinibaldi, as it has sometimes been interpreted.61 Vida, later dubbed the
Christian Virgil, was generously supported by both Medici popes, and was
commissioned by Pope Leo to write the epic Christiad, which the poet was
working on throughout the period of Villa Madama’s construction.62 However,
his villa poem provides only a brief and relatively uninformative description of
the Medici villa as prelude to an encomium of the patron Corycius, who,Vida
tells us, had just visited the villa on the Monte Mario:
The stranger, coming here from diverse parts of the world, wonders at so
sudden a work: the stones gathered together, the masses of rock, quarried
from cliffs, rising up to the stars, the learned hands of craftsmen, the var-
ied labor. And deservedly, for who, seeing the situation, the green leafage
of the forests, the copious wealth of the perennial spring, the sky kind to
the accommodating territory, would not believe that the gods, and the
king of the gods, often exchange their starry homes, the golden regions
of the sky, for these? Fortunate seat, your fame will live forever, and the
ages will praise your eternal name. Often coming from all over to visit
you, noble princes and kings clad in purple honor your threshold. Happy
seat, blessed with many good things.Yet I will never consider you happier
than in this one thing, Corytius, that the father and leader of the Castalian
sisters has lately deigned to visit your house, for who, fortunate old man,
could hope to equal with singing, you and the outstanding honors of
your virtue? Join in songs with me, you surrounding mountains, and pay
heed, you nymphs of the Tiber.63
The poem is interesting for its reference to visitors from different parts of the
world, including leaders, and purple kings, which further bolsters Shearman’s
proposal of the hospitium function of the Medici villa. Moreover, there is a
marked similarity of imagery and language between the opening lines of Vida’s
and Sperulo’s poems (lines 1–7): both describe the visitor marveling at a build-
ing rising to the sky, the speed of the work, the massed stones, and the labor by
the hands of the workers. They may both have been emulating similar models,
notably Statius, or perhaps they were responding to each other’s descriptions.
Vida’s poem is undated; its July 1524 publication in the Coryciana anthology is a
terminus ante quem, although his reference to stones and labor suggest that he was
writing at the same early stage of construction as Sperulo. But Vida’s poem is
fundamentally different in conception and scope from Sperulo’s, both in length
(Vida’s is sixty-seven lines, Sperulo’s is 407) and in its lack of specificity about the
Medici villa; after the scant fourteen lines of mostly formulaic description of the
site, Vida turns his attention to praising his patron Corycius for the remainder
of the work. Perhaps the poet was trying to court two patrons at once with this
poem, suggesting that it may have been conceived for performance before both
of them, perhaps at the Medici villa site (a point to which I will return).
The rivalry between two other Coryciana poets provides evidence of another
poem about the Medici villa: Mario Equicola (c. 1470–1525) wrote a stream of
poetic invective against Antonio Tebaldeo, charging that his bad poetry about
the Medici villa was an affront to the noble building:
Away, if you will, swiftly take away from here the most inauspicious verses
of the worst poet, perversely composed for the praise of the noble villa
which Giulio de’ Medici had begun to construct by the banks of the
Tiber, of nearly regal magnificence. I call upon you, immortal gods, and
your protection. Is that man so lost in a cloud of audacity that he would
dare while you are still alive to befoul such a noble work with filthy
verses? That man, that Teobaldi, whom only girls in charge of feeding
little geese approve in the awful smelling swamps of Ferrara, while they
sing his insipid dirges.64
Equicola’s harangue has come to light, whereas Tebaldeo’s maligned pan-
egyric on the villa unfortunately has not, despite efforts to find it by several
scholars of the poet and the villa.65 Equicola’s criticism reflects his bitter and
long-standing enmity with Tebaldeo; they had been on opposite sides of a
barbed polemic about the use of the vernacular and Ciceronian rhetoric in
1512–13, when they were in the service of Isabella d’Este, and they traded
other vicious communications.66 In reality, the works of both these poets were
highly esteemed in papal circles, especially those of Raphael’s friend Tebaldeo,
who was also favored by the Medici: Pierio Valeriano later named Tebaldeo
among the interlocutors in his dialogue on the vernacular set at the Medici
villa, reflecting his status in this cohort.67
It is not immediately clear whether the writing of poems about the Medici
villa was coordinated. There is no clear evidence connecting the poems, and
the scant information we have about their patronage does not clarify the ques-
tion.68 Sperulo suggests that he hopes Cardinal Giulio will reward the speed
with which he completed the poem (dedicatory letter, §3), indicating that the
poet indeed hoped for some recompense, or perhaps that the patron had set
the timetable.69 Sperulo could have taken the initiative to write the poem, or
he could have been asked to do so. In either case, he was not an independ-
ent poet seeking patronage, but rather was an insider in the Leonine Curia, as
noted above, and he was close to the circle of patrons and artists planning for
the villa, as the following chapters will demonstrate.
There was a humanist tradition of composing numerous poems about a
single building for a specially planned campaign or event, following the practice
of Statius for the Emperor Domitian.70 For example, Giannantonio Campano’s
poems record late quattrocento convivia hosted in Rome by Pietro Riario
(1445–74).71 The poems on the Chigi villa were probably coordinated to pro-
vide the theme of a dinner gathering, or a series of such convivia.72 Filippo
Beroaldo the Younger sketches this scenario in his tongue-in-cheek introduc-
tory ode to Blosio Palladio’s poem, in which Beroaldo begs Chigi to cut short
his tour of the villa and serve the dinner and wine so that he (Beroaldo) will
be drunk when Blosio sings his poem – a witty twist on ancient symposiastic
literature:
While you lead us around your villa’s dining rooms

And stroll through all the gardens, my dear Chigi, the
Time goes by and my guts are
Shuddering from starvation.
Don’t dare think that my stomach feeds on painting,
Noble though it may be: come on, get on with it.
Leave admiration until we’re drunk;
It’s no use till I’m plastered.
Then by all means let Blosius sing his poetry
Thus your villa’s esteem will grow but the villa
Will proclaim your name more
Brilliantly to the future.73
The coordinated presentation and publication of all the Chigi villa poems may
reflect their origin in a commission from Chigi himself.74 Tebaldeo’s poems
about the Villa Mellini refer to Lampridio’s Pindaric ode about the same villa,
suggesting another such scenario.75 At these convivia, poetry was often recited
to the addressee, surrounded by others who constituted the audience for it.
In the case of a powerful patron such as Giulio de’ Medici, the venue would
surely have been suitably distinguished and convenient to him, perhaps in
the Cancelleria, the Vatican, or his villa. Valeriano’s Dialogo della volgar lingua,
written during the period of the villa’s construction and describing a dinner
party there hosted by Cardinal Giulio, reflects the actual practice of holding
gatherings at the unfinished villa site. His inclusion of contemporary human-
ists such as Colocci and Tebaldeo among the invitees further fixes this portrait
of a humanist gathering there;76 and one of the interlocutors comments that
Cardinal Giulio is not wont to invite sycophantic guests, but rather favors
conversation with letterati that would bear fruit.77
The Villa Madama poems were likely part of a coordinated campaign, and
were perhaps even composed for an event at the villa’s construction site. In
any event, given the common practice of circulating manuscripts, interacting
on collaborative projects, and performing works for each other at gatherings,
Roman humanists certainly anticipated that their poetry would be read or
heard and criticized by their colleagues. As noted, Sperulo anticipates such
competition in his dedication to Cardinal Giulio:
If you shall receive my work favorably … you will perhaps see to it that
anything unsuccessful in my efforts will turn me into an inspiration for
greater talents. Nothing would please me more; I want to be surpassed in
praising you, so long as I may be judged to have competed to the best of
my ability. (§4)
Perhaps Sperulo hoped that other humanists would write poems praising his
own, as they had done for the Chigi panegyrists. Thus, Sperulo suggests that
he anticipated an audience for the poem beyond Cardinal Giulio, which is
consistent with humanist practice.78
The element of competition is fundamental to these literary exercises. Each
poet competes with the others; the poet building with words competes with
the architect, as Sperulo also mentions in his dedicatory letter, and they all
seek to best their ancient predecessors. Their discourse of verbal sparring was
in part a revival of ancient custom, but also reflected the reality of rivalries
and competition for patronage.79 Lampridio made explicit this culture of
poetic competition by comparing humanist performances to Olympic ath-
letic competitions.80 Some poetic competitions were actually staged, such
as the annual contest arranged by Goritz, which Paolo Giovio credited as
the main attraction that drew humanists to Rome after Leo’s magnanimity.81
This environment accounts for some of the boastful tone of the works; in their
villa poems, Blosio and Sperulo emulate Statius’ bravura declaration of poetic
furor, claiming that they, too, dashed off these long and complex works in just
a day or two.82 Indeed, Renaissance villa poems, and the silva form in general,
became demonstrations of poetic facility and sprezzatura, at times associated
with improvisation and a performance context.83 The intertextual nature of
the Renaissance poems reflected this competition. The poets’ creative appro-
priation and transformation of numerous ancient sources was another funda-
mental aspect of this poetic culture of one-upmanship. If literary competition
had a distinguished provenance, it was also a practical exigency of survival in

Renaissance Rome, as poets bolstered their reputations, jockeyed for favor, and
vied for commissions.84
Thus, Sperulo’s poem, far from being merely the inspired product of his
afternoon walk, is a carefully crafted rhetorical demonstration, and part of a
long tradition.85 Remarkably, however, Sperulo’s poem stands apart from tra-
ditional villa descriptions, as well as the other poems on the Medici hospitium,
for its specificity to an actual villa; and he eschews the traditional tropes of villa
literature, such as the opposition of city and country life, or the ideology of la
vita in villa, presumably irrelevant to this as-yet-uninhabited construction site.
Instead, the poet tells us what the Medici villa will look like. Part ekphrasis of
the actual villa complex to date, part proposal, part poetic topoi, and part expo-
sition of meta-themes for the villa’s landscape, architecture, and imagery, the
work challenges the modern reader to distinguish its various levels and literary
codes – a challenge taken up in the chapters that follow.
CHAPTER THREE
SPERULO’S VISION
T h e c uri al h umani st f ranc e sco spe rulo c lai m e d to

build the Medici villa in verse, constructing the edifice in 407 lines of
hexameter, preceded by a prose letter dedicating the work to Cardinal Giulio
de’ Medici. The poet praises his patron and Pope Leo, as well as their Medici
ancestors, but most of all he talks about the villa they are just beginning to
build on the Monte Mario, describing it as if he can already see it. As we have
seen, Sperulo’s poem was one of several works written about the Medici villa,
and was based on a long and rich literary tradition of villa panegyrics. Yet his
poem was highly unusual for its length, its specificity to the actual villa, some
of its subject matter, and the very fact of praising an actual building not yet
built. Here, we take up the poet’s vision of the villa, examining it in the con-
text of literary tradition and Medici dynastic ideology, beginning with a brief
synopsis of the poem’s scope and structure.
TH E P O ET A S ME D IC I VAT E S
Sperulo attributes almost all of his poem to Father Tiber; the first eleven
lines of the poem establish that Tiber is managing the villa’s construction,
and line 12 through the penultimate line 406 is an extended quote from
the river god. His tasks include supplying materials on rafts, encourag-
ing the workers to best the ancients (8–14), and excavating ancient mar-
bles and transporting them to the villa (44). Father Tiber lavishly praises
61
62 SPERULO ’ S VI S I O N
the site (14–21) and extols Cardinal Giulio for using art to elevate a site
graced by Nature (22–32). Tiber commences his description of the villa
by pointing out ancient marbles that he is placing there (47–77). He then
praises at length the Medici ancestors beginning with Giovanni di Bicci
(78–204), tracing the family back to the Etruscan king Porsenna, drawing
on traditional imagery of the Etruscan origin of Tuscany and the Medici
family.1 (Figure 25 contains a tree of Medici family members mentioned
in the poem; and as seen in Figure 28 below, Raphael’s associates later
gave visual form to the notion of Etruria as the home of the Medici in a
Vatican fresco.) The river god proclaims that statues of many of the Medici
forebears are to be in the villa, and he specifies the location of most of
these sculptures in the coenatio, or dining room, as he refers to the garden
loggia (206–8). He proposes that a Parian marble sculpture of Lorenzo the
Magnificent be placed among the Muses for an unspecified site (189–92),
and he challenges Raphael to determine where in the house he will place it
(160–4). Tiber then turns his attention to the living Medici. He assigns parts
of the villa to living Medici family members as figurative seats: to Lorenzo,
25. Tree of Medici family members mentioned in Sperulo’s poem.

TH E P O E T AS ME D I C I VAT ES 63
26. Schematic plan of U 273a showing specific areas of Villa Madama for which Sperulo
proposes decorations: (a) the garden loggia, to contain the proposed sculptures of Medici
ancestors (lines 206–8); (b) tower overlooking the south and the Tiber, to be decorated with
paintings of the Triumph of Clemency (lines 226–44); and (c) the central loggia overlooking
Rome – the figurative seat of Pope Leo – to be decorated with battle paintings (lines 270–340).
Duke of Urbino, he allots an unspecified atrium (245–59), and for Pope

Leo he designates the privileged central Tiber loggia, with the view of the
Milvian Bridge and Rome, as a kind of papal benediction loggia (270–3).
(See the plan in Figure 26 for this loggia and other areas mentioned by
Sperulo.) Whereas each of the defunct ancestors would be represented in
sculpture, each of the living family members would be immortalized in
paintings. Murals celebrating Leo’s clemency were to be in the east tower
(226–44), identified in plan in Figure 26. For Leo’s loggia, Father Tiber
proposes painted scenes in which his brother river gods allegorically rep-
resent sites of Leo’s triumphs, historic and imagined, which he delegates to
Raphael to paint. One mural would depict battle columns urged on by the
Ebro, Rhône, and Po rivers, representing a historic battle in the Italian Wars
(278–340). Another scene would prophesy Leo’s defeat of the Ottoman
Turks, represented by eastern river gods and rulers chained as prisoners of
war and brought back to Leo’s peaceful empire (341–56). Tiber suggests that
Cardinal Giulio and Duke Lorenzo should also be depicted participating in
this battle (357–71). The Tiber concludes his description of these paintings
by exhorting Cardinal Giulio to be inspired by the scenes (372–7). He then
passes quickly over the remainder of the estate, merely listing the theater,
baths, gardens, fishpond, hippodrome, and stables (378–91); and he insists
once more that he is busy with pressing tasks, such as searching out marbles
and other decorations for the complex (391–6), although for his patron the
burden is light (403–5). He notes that Pomona herself will be the gardener,
contributing marvels of nature, and he closes the poem as he opens it, with
more imagery of a pleasant, verdant site (398–402).
Sperulo couches his poem as a series of walks; he claims at the outset that
his walk at the villa site inspired him to conceive the poem (a Statian conceit,
as noted), and he further refers to Cardinal Giulio himself strolling through
the villa (spatiatus, 221 and gloss notes 84, 88). The poet also points to specific
places for his proposed decorations (128, 156–8 and gloss note 54), suggest-
ing that the poem was conceived as a walk-through with Cardinal Giulio,
whether metaphorical or literal. However, the poem does not represent a
logical itinerary, as it jumps around from one end of the compound to the
other and back again.
Beginning with the title and dedication of the poem, Sperulo addresses
the important issue of the villa’s patronage, which is significant to historians
because the relative contribution of Leo and Giulio has never been clear.2
Sperulo designates the villa as Cardinal Giulio’s in the poem’s title – the
Villa Iulia Medica – and with his dedication to Cardinal Giulio, as well as
in the illumination of Giulio’s arms (Plate x). The first sentence notes that
the villa is being constructed at Giulio’s expense (dedicatory letter, §1).
The poet refers to Giulio as the author (singular) of the villa (94) and as
Tiber’s master at the villa (404), and also says the site waited for Giulio (29).
Although Sperulo assigns specific areas of the villa as the figurative seats
of Pope Leo and Duke Lorenzo, the poet addresses Giulio as if the entire
villa is his, describing how Giulio will stroll among the ancestor sculptures
in the garden loggia (221–5) and regard murals in the tower overlooking
the south (226–44). Equicola, in his harangue, had also referred to Giulio
as building the villa. Cardinal Giulio was certainly well suited to run the
project for several reasons. As the vice chancellor of the church, he had
responsibility for diplomatic affairs, so the construction of a hospitium to
welcome visiting dignitaries fit squarely within his responsibilities. Giulio
was further an experienced patron of architecture, with proven abilities
and interests in many aspects of construction.3 Sperulo’s goal here was
surely to accentuate the Medici ownership of the villa beyond a Medici
pontificate; putting the villa in Giulio’s hands would ensure that the villa
was designated as part of the family’s patrimony rather than a papal pos-
session. So, the poet’s emphasis on Giulio’s patronage – and specifically his
financing – surely reflected this Medici strategy. The illumination of the
presentation manuscript further suggests the pragmatic goal of promoting
the villa as a Medici family endeavor; blazoning Cardinal Giulio’s arms
along with other family emblems on this “villa constructed in verse” was an
overt claim of family ownership, akin to placing arms on the actual family
palace and villas (discussed in Appendix ii). But Sperulo also gives a more
nuanced image of the villa’s patronage. He provides an intriguing view
of how the pope and his cousin shared power in this Medici pontificate,
describing that Leo rules the world, while Giulio is the agent of his mate-
rial business:
He has an unfraternal love of your intelligence and your heart, ripe for
responsibilities, yet he fraternally takes the reins of the city with you
as deputy: to you he leaves the weight of affairs. He exercises his will
and pacifies the world through your labors. Himself intent on sacred
duties, he disposes and approves all things through your agency, and each
decision is brought to fulfillment by your command. (72–7)
Sperulo’s conceit suggests the involvement of both Leo and Giulio in conceiv-
ing and executing projects. It is perhaps telling that the decorations Sperulo
prescribes for the villa feature both Leonine and Giulian imagery.4 This con-
ception is consonant with the long-standing Medici tendency toward joint
endeavors.5 Sperulo suggests that Leo gave the impetus to this project, but
that the villa was built through Giulio’s agency – a notion that fits well with
known facts.
The poem is dense with Medicean imagery. As noted, Medicean dynastic
and ideological constructs formulated in the Florence of Cosimo il Vecchio
or Lorenzo reappeared in Leonine Rome, where they were adjusted for a
Roman, papal environment;6 and Sperulo reveals his familiarity with the fam-
ily’s traditional repertory of imagery, as well as Leonine papal panegyrics. He
emphasizes notions such as the eternal spring associated with the Medici (127,
167, 208, 228), Medici astrological and cosmological themes emphasizing the
stars, sun, and the globe (22, 70, 109–10, 116, 182, 211, 219, 370, 406, and gloss
notes 15, 35, 51, 80, 83), Leo as bringer of peace (75, 184), and the Medici res-
toration of a new Golden Age to Rome (340). (These themes would indeed
be central to the decorations later executed at the villa.7) For example,
Sperulo, addressing Pope Leo, calls for the paintings in the villa to depict how,
“governing the earth with restful peace, you restore to Rome the Golden
Age of Saturn” (339–40). The gloss in Appendix i details many more of these
Medici tags, from botanical symbolism to imprese.
Sperulo dates his poem 1 March 1519, providing a terminus for its actual com-
position, although the date was undoubtedly chosen for symbolic reasons that
reflect these Medicean themes. The kalends, or first of March, was the first day
of the Roman year when, according to ancient tradition, Mars laid down his
arms to promote the cause of peace.8 March marks the end of winter in Italy,
so this month also represented the coming of spring and the associated rebirth
of nature; Cato the Elder specified that farmers pray to Mars in this month for
the revival of their land and crops.9 The arrival of the new year and the cyclical,
regenerative power of nature were associated in Medicean iconography with
the eternal return of the Medici family, and their restoration of a new Age of
Gold.Thus, the return of the Medici was celebrated by this date associated with
the flowering of springtime, and with peace. It remains less clear when Sperulo
actually composed his poem. It certainly could not have been much later than
the dedication date, for in the poem Sperulo refers to Lorenzo, Duke of Urbino,
as a great leader and a vital force in the Medici dynasty,10 when in fact he
was gravely ill with tuberculosis from mid-November 1518 until his death on
4 May 1519. Presumably, Sperulo composed his poem before the severity of
Lorenzo’s illness was known or communicated – perhaps in January – and he
later recorded it in the presentation manuscript.11
Fundamental to the structure of the poem is the romanitas of the Medici,
and their place in Roman history. As noted, a prime function of Medicean
rhetoric in the Leonine pontificate was to Romanize the Florentine Medici,
emphasize the union of Florence and Rome, and thus legitimize their tempo-
ral power in the Eternal City.The 1513 theatrical celebration on the Capitoline
to bestow Roman citizenships on Giuliano and Lorenzo de’ Medici is the best
known and most elaborate example of this strategy.12 Leo’s commission to
decorate the Palazzo dei Conservatori on the Capitoline, with a seated statue
of the Pope by Domenico Aimo (c. 1470–1539) and battle frescoes by Jacopo
Ripanda (c. 1465–c. 1516), was another contemporary example of visual propa-
ganda on this theme.13 Sperulo’s poem shows that this issue was still relevant in
1519. He uses several methods to Romanize the Medici by establishing dynas-
tic links – real and mythical – to ancient Rome.Virgil had codified the mythi-
cal origins of the Julian house for his patron Augustus in the Aeneid, in which
the poet describes Venus and Aeneas as ancestors of Julius Caesar and his son
Augustus, thereby tracing the whole history of Rome from its origins to the
Golden Age of Augustus.14 Sperulo, in his effort to Romanize and legitimize
Medicean rule, co-opts the very structure of Virgil’s Augustan propaganda.
Both poets articulated a vision of the new world order for their patrons, who
surpass their predecessors by restoring peace to the world. Like Virgil narrat-
ing the career of Aeneas, Sperulo traces the past adventures of Medici family
members, looking back at their history, and forward to adumbrate the villa
as the microcosm of a new Christian empire they are founding under Leo.15
Sperulo evokes the ancient/modern paragone, declaring that the marvelous
villa, and the victorious campaigns of Leo and Giulio, will supersede even the
pinnacle of the ancient Roman empire.16 He casts Leo and Giulio as the meta
phorical heirs of the peace-bringing Venus because of their gift of Christian
peace to the world. Just as Leo was styled as a new Augustus, Cardinal Giulio
was linked to Julius Caesar.17 Thus, Sperulo traces the arc of Roman history
from the founding of Rome to the Golden Age of the Medici.18 Significantly,
the poet achieves this feat by claiming the role of Medici vates, or poet-seer,
composing his vision of the villa’s decorative complex.
Sperulo ascribes his vision of the unbuilt Medici villa to his narrator,
Father Tiber. This choice of spokesperson is richly symbolic.Virgil and earlier
Renaissance poets had used the personified Tiber for brief passages, most nota-
bly to foretell Aeneas’ founding of Rome.19 But Sperulo uses the river god’s
voice for virtually the whole poem, which served his goals in several ways. First,
the Roman voice of the Tiber was central to Sperulo’s strategy of Romanizing
the Medici. He introduces his poem’s narrator saying, “Father Tiber himself,
hastening in his Tuscan stream” (8), which stresses the fact that this most con-
spicuously Roman of symbols had its source in Tuscany. The Tiber had been
frequently described by ancient Roman poets and geographers as being Tuscan
or Etruscan, an allusion to the source of the river in the Tuscan Apennines and
to its function as the eastern border of Etruria.20 Even before Sperulo, Medici
image-makers had made much of this fluvial geography. In the 1513 Capitoline
festivities, a personification of the Tiber spoke to the Arno saying:
O Arno, since we were born together from fraternal waters, which rise
almost from the same source, and we both flow into one sea, the fates
intend that your people will be called mine, which from Leo you can
expect. He will give the Italians eternal peace and will calm the current
turmoil; kings will look here to seek peace, and will want to follow his
commandments.21
River imagery also dominated the speech of Clarice Orsini, another char-
acter in this 1513 theatrical scene who, as a descendant of the noble Roman
Orsini family and the mother of Pope Leo and Giuliano de’ Medici, was
prominently featured for her contribution to Medici romanitas. She addressed
her son Giuliano and grandson Lorenzo saying, “Rome wants to gather you
in her blessed lap and to make you her own; by nature you are Tuscans, but
Roman by privilege. In any case, both peoples are united by blood, just
as the Tiber is said to be Tuscan.”22 The climax of the Capitoline enter-
tainment featured soavissima musica with the nymphs of the Tiber and the
Arno singing in unison.23 These intermezzi had been devised by members
of the Roman Academy, notably Inghirami, and served as the basis for later
Leonine imagery, so it is no surprise that Sperulo was closely familiar with
this Tiber construct.24 Andrea Fulvio utilized the same information in his
1513 poem on the antiquities of Rome that was dedicated to Pope Leo,
emphasizing the Tuscan source of the Tiber.25 The 1512 discovery of the
ancient reclining statue of the Tiber in Rome had prompted new human-
ist study of river gods in this decade, and a new emphasis on their inclusion
in visual as well as verbal imagery.26 Raphael had already depicted Father
Tiber and his brother river gods as locative deities in the borders of the
Sistine Chapel tapestries for Leo X, pairing the reclining Arno and Tiber
to bookend the scene now believed to depict Cardinal Giovanni’s arrival
27. Raphael, woven by Pieter van Aelst, The Arrival of Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici in Rome in
1492, Flanked by the River Gods Arno and Tiber, from Scenes from the Life of Leo X, borders to the
Acts of the Apostles tapestries for the Sistine Chapel, 1516–19,Vatican Museums.
in Rome in 1492 (Figure 27).27 Sperulo proposed that river gods be pro-
tagonists for frescoes in the Medici villa, and although these paintings were
never executed, river gods would be depicted at the villa in stucco reliefs
instead: an exedra in the garden loggia intersperses figures of the Tiber, Arno,
Nile, and Tigris with fictive cameos of Venus Victrix, alluding to Medici
triumph in different parts of the world. (Visible in Plate viii; underneath
five hexagonal stucco cameos of Venus are four elongated hexagonal com-
partments containing the river gods.) Within a short period of time, river
gods would figure prominently in other Medici commissions in Florence
and Clementine Rome, from the New Sacristy to the Sala di Costantino
(Figure 28).28 So Sperulo chose as his narrator Father Tiber, whose essential
romanitas belies his Tuscan origin, like that of the Medici, and whose eternal
flow symbolizes the Medicean theme of eternal return.
Perhaps the most compelling reason Sperulo put most of his poem in the
mouth of Father Tiber was his role as a prophet. Sperulo says it was the river
god and his nymphs who foresaw that the (Tuscan) Medici would add this villa
to his (Tuscan) riverbank, so the whole poem becomes an extended prophecy
and ekphrasis by Father Tiber:
But the nymphs – my charges – who born in Apennine rivulets strive so
much on their wanderings from this source and that to combine them-
selves with me, so that our mixed and combined waters may wash the
sacred walls of queenly Rome … These goddesses decreed that the man
who would cherish the spot would be from among the foremost men
of Tuscany, and that he would proceed to add this embellishment to the
Tuscan river-bank. Nor did my spirit, which pondered this decree long
ago in its prophetic heart, deceive me. And having long sought marks of
honor for so magnificent a Lar, I carry hither numerous marbles pulled out
of ancient ruins. Come, men, learn how each of them should be disposed
in its specified place! Let this work rise under my auspices! (33–46)29
Like Virgil, Sperulo uses the Tiber to foretell the future glories of Rome. In
the Aeneid, when Aeneas reaches Latium, Father Tiber appears to him in a
28. Associates of Raphael, Etruria, Home of the Medici, c. 1523, frescoed west window embrasure,
Sala di Costantino,Vatican Palace. This visualization of the topography of Etruria portrays
the joint source of the Arno and Tiber in Tuscan Etruria, reflecting contemporary imagery
emphasizing the Etruscan origin of the Medici, and the close connections between Rome and
Etruria/Florence. Left to right are: the Apennine; Ceres; Fluentia/Florence bearing the Medici
impresa of a falcon and diamond ring and flanked by water nymphs; a rider; and the Tiber
holding a cornucopia of wheat and laurel.
dream, telling him of the site where Rome will be founded by his descend-
ants (Aeneid, viii, 36–65), a literary set piece later given visual form by Salvator
Rosa (Figure 29).30 Likewise, Sperulo’s Tiber says he had long foretold that
Leo would be father of the world (105–6), and that he and his nymphs had
decreed that the Medici would raise a villa on this site (39–42). In addition,
just as Virgil uses the legendary ekphrasis of the shield of Aeneas to foretell the
great deeds of his descendants (Aeneid, viii, 102–11), Sperulo creates ekphrases
of the villa’s proposed paintings to prophesy the future heroic deeds of the
Medici (278–373). Each poet portrays his patron’s reign as a predestined age
of gold, and as the culmination of Roman history.31 But unlike Virgil, Sperulo
has Father Tiber narrate the whole poem – including the ekphrases and proph-
esies – thereby invoking the ancient authority of Tiber’s oracular pronounce-
ments to validate the poet’s own prediction of a Medici reign of gold, centered
at their Tiber-side villa. Thus, Father Tiber is Sperulo’s authorial voice – and
Sperulo is Father Tiber. The abundant waters of the Tiber become a metaphor
for the copious inventive powers of the poet, as well as an analogy for the ora-
tor’s directed, persuasive flow of words.32
In the dedicatory letter with his poem, Sperulo identifies himself with
another prophet: Hephaestus/Vulcan, god of all artificers. Sperulo asks Cardinal
Giulio, “If you shall receive my work favorably, forged in my heart as though
on a kind of anvil by the hammer of devotion” (§4), suggesting that the poet,
as the blacksmith god, is forging the literary edifice. The opening lines of the
poem, evoking Statius on the clangor of erecting a bronze equestrian statue,
underscore another metalworking metaphor.33 This personification had been
used by poets from Homer and Virgil to Poliziano, and Sperulo alludes to these
sources for specific reasons. First, he combines elements of the lame god’s role
29. Salvator Rosa, The Dream of Aeneas, 1663–4, etching and drypoint, Metropolitan Museum,
New York.
in both Homer’s and Virgil’s accounts of the shield – the most famous ekphrases
in western literature. The contrast between Homer’s and Virgil’s treatment
of the shield had been noted as early as the fourth-century commentary of
Servius, and thus was surely familiar to Sperulo. In Homer’s epic, Hephaestus
is characterized as a deus artifex, and the account of his making the shield for
Achilles becomes a metaphor for the creation of the whole world and cos-
mos34 – a fitting association for Sperulo who is envisioning the Medici villa,
which is a microcosm of Leo’s realm. Virgil’s account of the shield of Aeneas
instead emphasizes Vulcan’s prophetic powers to foretell the history of Rome,
which is given visual form as narrative scenes on the shield.Virgil specifically
says of the shield, “There the story of Italy and the triumphs of Rome had
the Lord of Fire fashioned, not unversed in prophecy or unknowing of the
age to come.”35 Sperulo specifically adopts the tone of Virgil’s Vulcan – who
encourages his Cyclops-blacksmiths working in the vaults of Mount Aetna to
forge the shield – for the speeches of Father Tiber, who exhorts his men at
the Medici villa. Once again, by adducing the characters and speech associated
with prophecies that have already come to pass, Sperulo presents his own pre-
dictions as destiny. Sperulo combines the Homerian emphasis on the shield’s
production with the Virgilian emphasis on prophecy of the founding of Rome
and the triumphs of peace-bringing Augustus. By borrowing frameworks from
Homer and Virgil, Sperulo characterizes himself as a prophetic deus artifex for
the Medici, who are establishing a new peaceful Christian empire in Rome.
Other attributes of the god Vulcan were even more important to Sperulo’s
goals. As the smith of Jupiter,Vulcan was the divine artisan responsible for forging
the great god’s thunderbolts – an appropriate choice for a Curial image-maker
for Pope Leo, who was styled as Jupiter. In addition, significantly for a poet
claiming to build a villa,Vulcan was credited with erecting the first buildings, as
Vitruvius recorded,36 most notably Venus’ house and garden on Cyprus – a sort
of divine villa, as described in Claudian’s Epithalamium:
Vulcan, so it is said, purchased the kisses of his wife by offering her these
walls and towers. The fields within glow; unworked by any hand, they
flower eternally, content with Zephyr as their gardener … From afar
the house of the goddess shines, reflecting the green of the surrounding
grove.Vulcan also built this of precious stones, joining their golden worth
to art.37
Poliziano, who had also styled himself as Vulcan in his Medici Stanze, drew
on these conceits about Vulcan’s house for Venus, in which the workmanship
exceeds the precious materials and eternal springtime reigns, and he too forged
ekphrastic reliefs for the bronze doors of Venus’ palace.38
Sperulo expands on this traditional imagery of Vulcan and Venus by char-
acterizing the entire Medici villa as the realm of Venus Genetrix.39 This
represented an important step in Medici image-making, building on Laurentian

imagery.40 Poliziano’s commentary on Statius’ Silvae, i, 2 (the Epithalamium in
Stellam et Violentillam) had glossed the generative qualities of Venus in writ-
ings by Lucretius, Columella, and the Servian Virgil,41 and as Charles Dempsey
noted, a passage in this silva of Statius about the generative Venus bringing
eternally recurring spring was a fundamental source for the Medici imagery of
eternal return.42 Sperulo refers to the same Statian text to set up the Roman
Medici villa as the realm of Venus; in Sperulo’s poem, near the beginning of
Father Tiber’s speech, the river god introduces the Medici villa by specifically
echoing the passage of Statius’ poem in which Venus descends to earth to visit
the house of the poet Stella (14–18, and gloss notes 12, 13). Sperulo also evokes
the realm of Venus with his references to myrtle (31) and his imagery of the lil-
ies of Florence springing from the conches of Venus (126).The illuminated title
page of Sperulo’s poem features a cartouche of myrtle and laurel encircling the
title, revealing from the outset the centrality of Venereal imagery to the poem
(Plate ix). Most significantly, Sperulo proposes installing at the villa a relief from
the Temple of Venus Genetrix, which, as we shall see below, he uses to trace
Medici genealogy back to the goddess herself (60–3).Thus, Sperulo/Vulcan, as
the wordsmith/blacksmith, forges an earthly palace for Venus Genetrix, who
will find herself at home in the peaceful, bountiful, ever-verdant seat of the
Medici pontificate. Additionally, with this conceit, Sperulo declares his poem
to be a gift from the goddess Venus herself. In Virgil’s account, the shield is a
gift to Aeneas from Venus who bade Vulcan to execute it; likewise, Sperulo’s
literary villa is a gift to the Medici from Venus who will inhabit it, forged by
Vulcan/Sperulo, the amanuensis and villa-designer of Venus herself.
Sperulo’s use of spokespersons draws on rhetorical models, as well as poetic
models from Homer,Virgil, and Statius to Poliziano. Sperulo’s personification
as Hephaestus/Vulcan in the dedicatory letter uses the rhetorical technique of
ethopoeia; and his presentation of the poem itself as a speech by Father Tiber
is an example of prosopopoeia. As we have seen, unlike Homer and Virgil who
used this device in discrete set pieces for important speeches, Sperulo sets
nearly the whole poem in Tiber’s voice. Most basically, Sperulo invokes the
authoritative personae, voice, and style of these deities to valorize his own pro-
posals for the villa. Moreover, by adducing the characters and speech associated
with prophecies that have already come to pass, he presents his own predic-
tions as destiny. These mythological authorial personae are common devices,
but at another level they can reflect a poet’s voice in the real world.43 Thus,
Sperulo claims the mantle of the Medici vates.
Through these visionary authorial personae, Sperulo asserts his own pro-
phetic ability to envision the completed Medici villa before it is built – a
kind of prolepsis. Sperulo also claims to be an overseer at the villa, doing the
tasks he attributes to Father Tiber: choosing marbles from among the ruins,
S P E R U L O G I VE S ME AN I N G TO AN C I E N T MAR B L E S 73
transporting them to the villa site, directing their placement, managing the
work site, and proposing decorations. He says, “And having long sought marks
of honor for so magnificent a Lar, I carry hither numerous marbles pulled out
of ancient ruins” (43–5), suggesting that Sperulo was going to ancient sites and
pinpointing marbles and antiquities for use in the villa —which was actually
the job of Raphael himself as Leo’s Prefect of Marbles. Sperulo concludes
his description of the proposed murals saying, “These deeds, truly, I see with
foreknowledge of the fates, as if already done and I want them now added
to the belvedere by the painters” (372–3) – a startlingly imperious statement.
Elsewhere, Sperulo addresses Raphael in an apostrophe, challenging the artist
to place a proposed statue of Lorenzo the Magnificent in the villa (160–4).The
poet professes to be so busy with his pressing tasks at the house that he can-
not take time to say more about the Medici ancestors (188–9). A closer look
at his proposals for sculpture, spoils, and murals for the villa makes it clear that
Sperulo was indeed doing some of the tasks he claimed.
S PERU LO G IV E S M E A N IN G TO A N C IENT M ARB LES
Sperulo claims his main role is selecting ancient sculpture and spoils, transport-
ing them to the villa, and directing their placement. The poet cries, “Come,
men, learn how each of them [the ancient marbles] should be disposed in its
specified place. Let this work rise under my auspices!” (45–6). He proceeds
to describe specific spoils, enumerating the various types of colored marble
available to decorate the villa, and indicating pieces as “this” and “those” as if
he is pointing to them (53–66). For each one, he emphasizes, or if need be
invents, a provenance and proposes its use in the villa. The poet sums up his
task by stressing that, “Now, it is necessary to search out the different marbles
and the many columns to be placed around the planned courtyards … for no
part shall be without exotic marble, and the house shall incorporate noth-
ing cheap” (391–6). He ornaments his descriptions with topoi from ancient
authors including Pliny, Statius, and Suetonius, and some of the marble revet-
ments and columns he describes seem to have been poetic fiction.44 But I
do not believe he was just being allusive, for some of his descriptions can be
identified as specific marbles.
In fact, the Medici villa did boast extensive sculptural decorations, although
they have been dispersed and are little known today.45 The garden loggia and
the gardens were originally filled with sculpture and architectural spoils, mostly
antique and some modern, which included figures, colossi, reliefs, revetments,
altars, fountain sculptures, sarcophagi, and carved basins. Thirty-five niches
were built to be filled with figural sculpture and, at one point, the villa prob-
ably housed about sixty-five figural sculptures – a large number before even
considering the many other kinds of sculpture and ornament that made up
this collection. Plates xviii and xix depict the garden loggia when it was still
filled with sculpture, variously documenting or imagining specific works. (See
also Figures 74, 76, and 77.)
Sperulo’s formulation of visual imagery focuses extensively on the dispo-
sition of sculpture and spoils. Just as he linked the origins of the Medici to
ancient Rome in verse, he emphasized their lineage by tracing the provenance
of ancient marbles to be displayed in the villa. As noted above, the poet tells us
that Father Tiber himself has sought out ancient marbles to honor the villa, has
carried them there, and directs the workers where to place each piece. Tiber
describes several marbles of particular significance:
there [you can see] those [marbles] that were at the height of their beauty
in the Paphian sanctuary. Then, long afterwards, Caesar, when he ruled
the world, offered them to be part of the famous shrine of Venus Genetrix,
whom the Roman descendants of Aeneas used to worship with clouds of
incense as the author of their race and rule. (59–63)
This passage explains that Julius Caesar took a marble from Venus’ sanctuary
at Paphos (on the island of Cyprus) to install in the Temple of Venus Genetrix,
which he erected in his forum in Rome. This Roman temple honored his
mythical ancestress, who had granted him a great victory, and it was built as a
pledge of peace.46 As mother of Aeneas,Venus was the ancestress of all Rome.
Thus, the translation of the marble from Venus’ Paphian sanctuary to the Rome
of Julius Caesar, and finally to the Medici villa, was a powerful signifier that the
peace-bringing Medici inherited the mantle of Roman rule.
This account of marble translation sounds like a poetic conceit, but in fact
there was a marble from the Temple of Venus Genetrix at Villa Madama – a little-
known white marble relief now in Naples (Figure 30). At once an architectural
fragment and a relief sculpture, this Trajanic piece depicts two erotes sacrificing two
bulls on either side of a candelabrum – a so-called erotes tauroctonoi relief.47 This
rare theme was probably an adaptation of classical Greek prototypes of winged
Victories sacrificing bulls – the Nike tauroctona motif, familiar to Renaissance
antiquarians from the Basilica Ulpia – with both subjects symbolizing victory.48
Sperulo’s mention is unlikely to be a coincidence, for the relief was installed as
a focal point of the garden loggia: I believe that one entire wall elevation was
designed around it, as I determined from the visual evidence of a mid-sixteenth-
century drawing (Figures 31, 32), and by measuring the relief and the remaining
lacuna in the wall at the villa (Figures 33, 34).49 Since construction of the garden
loggia probably occurred in the winter of 1519–20,50 this elevation was designed
in Raphael’s lifetime, showing that he was involved in generating some elements
of the decorative program before his death. Additionally, the date of Sperulo’s
poem falls in between the design and construction dates of the loggia, so the poet
evidently knew of the plans for the sculpture, or even played a formative role in
featuring it so prominently.51
Sperulo’s mention of this relief is also significant because he specifies that

the creators of Villa Madama were aware of its provenance from the Temple
of Venus Genetrix, which is currently thought to have been correctly identi-
fied only in the nineteenth century. This temple had been the subject of early
sixteenth-century topographical research, as we know from the writings of
Andrea Fulvio, although I have found no evidence that any other Renaissance
architect or antiquarian correctly identified it. Sperulo suggests that the crea-
tors of the Medici villa knew the ruins of the Temple of Venus Genetrix, and
made use of its spoils for a precise ideological purpose: the relief was chosen to
be a focal point of the great garden loggia as a trophy of legitimate Roman rule
and of peace. Julius Caesar had dedicated his forum and the Temple of Venus
Genetrix on the last day of his triumph, glorifying the goddess as ancestress of
himself and all Rome.52 Sperulo’s assertion of the marble’s Paphian provenance
is probably a poetic invention,53 allowing the poet to trace the trophy directly
to Venus, ancestress of Rome and goddess of peace, just as Virgil had traced
the genealogy of Augustus. So with the Venus Genetrix relief, the Medici, too,
emphasized their romanitas as descendants of Venus and the Caesars.The relief ’s
association with Venus in her role as genetrix is also apposite for this villa desig-
nated as the realm of this goddess. Indeed, imagery of Venus Genetrix and her
attributes of fecundity, bounty, and peace-giving victory appear throughout
the villa; for example, see Plate viii for fictive cameos of Venus Victrix, and
oval painted depictions of Venus on the vault above based on reverse-ekphrases
from Philostratus.
The important evidence that Sperulo was proposing a setting in the villa for
an actual work of art leads us to consider the possibility that some of the other
set pieces he described involved real works, too. Sperulo mentions another
marble that he proposed installing in the villa, suggesting that it justified the
Medicean succession by their gift of peace to the world:
This Numidian marble column, inscribed to the fatherland in honor of
its father, the sons of Romulus set up in the middle of the forum as a
pledge of peace and empire devoted to Iulo. It is you, Giulio, who deserve
these marbles owing to the memorable gift of peace you have given to
your country and the world. (64–7)
These lines evoke a well-known passage from Suetonius, who described how
after the funeral of Julius Caesar, a solid column of Numidian marble was set
up in the Forum and inscribed parenti patriae.54 Sperulo may simply have
been making a literary reference, but it is also possible that the Medici had a
Numidian marble column, now lost, which Sperulo claimed to be the one
mentioned by Suetonius.55 In any event, Sperulo was certainly alluding to
Cosimo de’ Medici’s designation as pater patriae in Florence,56 emphasizing the
family’s inheritance of the power of the Caesars. According to Sperulo, the col-
umn had been installed in the ancient forum as a pledge of peace, and now would
30. Erotes tauroctonoi, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, inv. 6718; Trajanic relief from the
Temple of Venus Genetrix in Rome, formerly in Villa Madama.
31. Anonymous,Villa Madama, garden loggia, northeast wall; detail showing area where the erotes
tauroctonoi relief was installed, mid-sixteenth-century drawing, private collection.
32. Anonymous,Villa Madama, garden loggia, northeast wall; mid-sixteenth-century drawing,

private collection.
33. Romualdo Moscioni,Villa Madama, garden loggia, view of northeast wall c. 1885–9
showing black patch where the erotes tauroctonoi relief was removed.
34. Villa Madama, garden loggia, northeast wall.The relief was inset in the panel behind the cabinet.
E N VI S I O N I N G PA I N TI N G S : B ATTL E S AN D C L E ME N C Y 79
be installed in the Medici hospitium as a reward for peace achieved.Thus, the col-
umn was owed to the Medici as the true bringers of peace, demonstrating that
the pontificate of Leo X surpassed the ancient reign because of the Medicean
gift of peace to the world. As noted above, Cardinal Giulio was sometimes
styled as the inheritor of the mantle of Julius Caesar. With Sperulo’s concep-
tions for both the column and the Venus Genetrix relief, the poet emphasizes
the Giulio/Julius Caesar conceit, the romanitas of the Medici, the legitimacy
of Medicean rule, and the Medici as bringers of peace – surpassing even the
pinnacle of ancient Roman civilization.
With these spolia and throughout the poem, Sperulo underlines the central
role of sculpture and spoils at Villa Madama.57 His earlier participation in the
poetic campaign about the Laocoön takes on new importance in this context;
Sperulo was closely attuned to the essential role of marbles in the visual–verbal
matrix, as well as the power of poetry to create new meanings for archeo-
logical finds. Although the appropriation of ancient spoils by the papacy is a
familiar aspect of the Renaissance cultural romance with antiquity, Sperulo’s
villa poem provides precious and unusually specific examples of an ideological
construct and associated justification for such installations.
EN VI S I O NI N G PA IN T IN G S : BAT T L E S A ND C LEM ENC Y
The decorations Sperulo envisions in the villa also include murals that dis-
tilled the most significant contemporary political issues into teeming battle
scenes. These proposals build on a long tradition of battle imagery in word
and image. Virgil, Plutarch, and Livy provided the textual models, on which
contemporaries such as Ariosto were also riffing at this moment. Leonardo’s
Battle of Anghiari and his written prescription on how to paint battles were
both bibles for artists and patrons in this period, and they further served to
canonize the battle scene, long a staple of town hall decoration, as one of the
highest forms of narrative painting. Lorenzo de’ Medici had set an impor-
tant precedent for appropriating battle paintings for private domestic use
when he installed Paolo Uccello’s triptych depicting the Battle of San Romano
in his camera of the Palazzo Medici.58 Several other Leonine projects fea-
tured battle imagery at this moment, notably Jacopo Ripanda’s Roman battle
frescoes in the Palazzo dei Conservatori and Raphael’s Battle of the Milvian
Bridge in the Vatican Sala di Costantino (Plate xv). So, the content and form
of Sperulo’s proposed frescoes for the Medici papal hospitium had rich and
timely associations.
Sperulo calls for two battle scenes to be painted by Raphael in the cen-
tral Tiber loggia of the villa, which the poet designates as Leo’s seat in the
villa (sedes),59 identified in plan in Figure 26. The first scene, which the poet
describes in exceptional detail (278–340), refers to the historic Battle of
Ravenna in 1512.60 One of the most significant and bloody confrontations in

the Italian wars, the battle involved French, Spanish, and Italian troops, which
are symbolized in the poem by personifications of the Ebro, Rhône, and Po
rivers. Leo (at the time of the battle still in minoribus) had been the commander
of the papal troops and was captured; his subsequent escape had been con-
strued as the miraculous product of divine intervention, and a harbinger of
his pontificate. Leo later stressed the importance of this portent, and Raphael
included the narrative among his scenes from the life of Leo in the fictive relief
borders for the Sistine Chapel tapestries (Figure 35).61 Thus, Sperulo casts this
important battle as foretelling Leo’s restoration of peace to the world and the
Golden Age of Saturn to Rome.
Sperulo’s second painted scene for Leo’s loggia was to feature an imagined
battle against the Ottoman Turks and the ensuing triumph of Leo and Giulio
drawn on golden chariots, with the Tigris, Euphrates, and Hydaspes (pre-
sent-day Jhelum) rivers in chains, together with the captive Ottoman rulers
(341–71). This imagery reflected the contemporary preoccupation with the
perceived Turkish threat to Europe and Christianity. The exhortation for a
Christian peace and a united crusade against the Ottoman Turks had been a
humanistic and diplomatic cliché since the fall of Constantinople in 1453.62
But the issue took on new urgency between 1516 and 1520, with Ottoman
victories in the east, the sporadic appearance of Turkish ships off the coast
of Italy, and intelligence reports about the rapidly growing Turkish fleet.63
Letters of Cardinal Giulio and his diplomatic liaisons are full of references
to the movements of Turkish ships off Civitavecchia, suggesting the immi-
nence with which the threat was felt.64 In January 1518, Egidio of Viterbo,
a Curial humanist and leading papal advisor, wrote of the Turks, “We are
35. Raphael, woven by Pieter van Aelst, The Capture of Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici by French
Troops in the Battle of Ravenna in 1512, from Scenes from the Life of Leo X, borders to the Acts of
the Apostles tapestries for the Sistine Chapel, 1516–19,Vatican Museums.
terrified … We fear that Italy and Rome are about to be destroyed.”65 The
extent to which religious, political, or financial issues were behind talk of a
crusade against the Turks is debatable, but papal appeals to European pow-
ers for financial and military support for this cause were a central point of
diplomatic exchange at this time. Thus, Sperulo’s suggestion to depict such a
crusade in the papal hospitium to welcome foreign dignitaries was not tired
rhetoric, but rather reflected a key political issue of the day. This issue was
also directly related to the ideology of Leo as Rex pacificus, for the precondi-
tion of a crusade against the Turks was a truce among European nations.66
Sperulo expresses the same paradoxical conceit equating an anti-Turkish
crusade with peace when he refers to Leo, “by whose command discord-
ant Strife has bowed its head to peace, and it threatens only easterners”
(183–4). Here, Sperulo and other Leonine image-makers drew on Augustan
tropes of peace at home that freed the emperor to wage war against east-
ern “barbarians.”67 This subject also figured in decorations in several of the
Vatican Palace Stanze, including the Sala di Costantino murals that present
Constantine as a model for Leo’s crusade against the Turks.68 The imagery
of Raphael’s Transfiguration has also been interpreted in connection with
the “Turkish peril” and the Medici handling of it, as healers of the world’s
sickness.69 Sperulo specifically sets this imagery at the papal hospitium in
the loggia he designates as Leo’s seat, which looks directly to the Milvian
Bridge, the famous site of Constantinian victory, further underscoring this
Leonine-Constantinian imagery.70 Moreover, Sperulo’s proposal for this
papal loggia was surely a reference to the earliest papal benediction loggia,
that of Boniface VIII at the Lateran, which was decorated with frescoes of
Constantine’s baptism and founding of that basilica.71 Thus, we see the coeval
formulation of Constantinian imagery for the Medici papal villa and Vatican
halls of state, as well as the formulation of battle imagery for projects in the
villa, the Vatican, and the Palace of the Conservators on the Capitoline. The
confluence of this imagery surely reflected coordinated discussions among
papal image-makers for all these projects.
Sperulo proposed another highly topical issue as a subject for wall paintings:
the Triumph of Clemency, specifically the clemency of Leo in the face of the
recent conspiracy against him (226–44). The poet intended these murals for
one of the villa’s towers; although his description of physical space is charac-
teristically vague, he probably meant the east tower, which would place the
paintings in Raphael’s proposed winter diaeta (see plan, Figure 26).72 Sperulo
says, “the divine Clemency of Leone, which is embodied by the pigments of
Apellean art, will breathe upon me” (231–2), noting Leo’s mercy to the con-
spirators. He describes how Clemency should be depicted on a chariot drawn
by the symbols of the four Evangelists (233–44), an image that evokes the
divine throne prophesied by Ezekiel (and also surely depends on Raphael’s
recent design for the Vision of Ezekiel).73 If this triumph was envisioned for
the glazed diaeta – perhaps as a band of murals above the windows, or else in
the six sections of wall between the windows in a progressive series akin to
Mantegna’s Triumphs of Caesar – it would constitute a spectacular proposal for
one of the villa’s largest and most novel spaces.74
The notion of praising a ruler’s clemency is an ancient topos, which had
been exploited by the Medici since Cosimo il Vecchio.75 Leo had been hailed
for his clemency while still in minoribus in Florence, an important factor in
his subsequent election to the papacy;76 and the alleged conspiracy of cardi-
nals to kill him in 1517 had represented another opportunity for a prominent
display of this virtue. The real motivation for Leo’s clemency in this situation
has been questioned since Leo’s time, when there were allegations that the
pope had pardoned the conspirators to extort money from them; and most
recent scholars believe that the conspiracy never actually occurred at all, but
rather was spuriously devised by Leo to extort money from his rivals, squash
their power, and stack the College of Cardinals.77 In any case, the subject of
the conspiracy consumed the Curia in 1517–18, and it continued to be dis-
cussed throughout the following year. Several humanists wrote poetry and
letters about the event, including Colocci, Tebaldeo, and possibly Egidio of
Viterbo.78 Sperulo himself had written the elegy Ad Leonem X de sua clemen-
tia elegia xviiii celebrating the final pardon accorded by the pope to Cardinal
Raffaelle Riario.79 (The poem, BAV, Vat. Lat. 1673, fols. 102v–103r, appears
in Appendix iii.) This elegy was probably written around Christmas of 1518,
right after the pardon and just a few months before the poet’s description of
the villa.80 Sperulo praises Leo as a powerful and noble lion, capable of right-
eous fury as well as the peaceful clemency to spare traitors.81 The work draws
on such literary models as Cicero’s For Marcellus, a panegyric praising Caesar
for his clemency to Marcellus who had backed Pompey in the civil war, and
Seneca’s On Clemency, written to Nero and modeled on Hellenistic king-
ship treatises (and these works were also models for Sperulo’s villa poem).82
Taken together, Sperulo’s poem about Leo’s clemency and his proposal for
murals of the Triumph of Clemency in the Medici villa provide an interest-
ing example of a humanist at work, in this case forging Curial propaganda as
well as Medicean ideology, and its translation into visual imagery. (Thereafter,
the continued importance of this imagery of clemency may be seen in the
Sala di Costantino imagery, where the enthroned figure of Clement I is
given Leo’s features [see Figure 65 below]; and in Cardinal Giulio’s choice
of a papal name.)
The murals Sperulo envisions thematize the poet’s powers of prophecy
(although these powers would turn out to be more successful for the marble
set pieces he proposed for the villa than the murals, as his ideas for paintings
were soon made obsolete by shifting political conditions).83 In his proposals
for all three murals, Sperulo/Father Tiber encapsulates Leonine history as

a vision for painted decorations at the villa in the same way that Virgil’s
Tiber foretold the history of Rome as scenes for Aeneas’ shield. In each
case, the narrator interweaves historical battles and triumphs from the past
with imagined ones in the future to reify his vision of a triumphant and
peaceful empire under his patron.84 At the same time, Ariosto was work-
ing with tools of ekphrasis and prophecy in connection with battle imagery
in the Orlando furioso, at that moment undergoing revisions and topical for
Curial humanists.85 His famous set piece (Canto 33, 5–58) was a Virgilian
ekphrasis of battle murals that conflate past and future events to predict the
outcome of the French–Italian wars. Ariosto proclaims that no artist, ancient
or modern, has this power to paint the future; it is instead the work of magic
demons, summoned by the prophet Merlin. Sperulo declares that he indeed
has such visionary powers, and that Raphael is to execute the poet’s vision.
Christian Kleinbub has suggested a connection between this passage in the
Orlando and Raphael’s thematization of the visionary in paintings such as the
Transfiguration.86 Sperulo places himself directly in competition with Raphael
through these mural proposals, especially his description of Clemency’s char-
iot that conjures Ezekiel’s vision, to which Raphael had recently given visual
form.87 So, this power to see what does not exist – the future outcome of
a war, a villa still on the drawing board, or the godhead itself – emerges as
a contemporary marker of the creative power of the artist. This paragone
among visual artists, wordsmiths, and even supernatural powers is central to
Sperulo’s conceit that he is building the villa in verse, and evident in his chal-
lenges to Raphael in the poem. The illumination of the presentation manu-
script further engages these issues, suggesting that the poem is a portrait of
the villa; or a building medal in verse (as shown in Appendix ii).
With his proposed battle scenes and throughout the poem, Sperulo places a
strong emphasis on notions of poetic and artistic invention, and he evokes the
paragone of art and nature, of modernity and antiquity, and especially of word
and image. He declares that the painted and sculpted decorations he foresees
will breathe with life (spirare, 192, 232, 342 and gloss notes 73, 90, 122); and he
repeatedly suggests that living Medici family members will engage with their
ancestors, represented in marble (gloss notes 73, 76, and 102). Sperulo declares
from the outset that his villa will outlast that of the architects (dedicatory letter,
§2).88 The poet praises Raphael as a superlative painter who rivals and will here
surpass Apelles (161, 275), but tells him what to paint and where to paint it; and
he chooses sculptures, and specifies where to place them, too. Most remarkably,
Sperulo never recognizes Raphael’s role as architect of the complex. The poet
even mentions measurement, traditionally the domain of the architect, declar-
ing that he (Sperulo) was engaged in measuring columns, and he exhorts the
architects to plan the dimensions of rooms around his choice of sculpture and
spoils (commensa, commetior, 79 and gloss note 40; dimensa, dimetior, 392 and gloss
note 136). It is striking that Sperulo claims to be directing important aspects
of the work, and suppresses Raphael’s responsibility and creative powers. The
poet’s emphatic declaration of his prophetic powers to envision the new villa
and “construct” it in verse is a bold claim for the power of word.
From these literary boasts, we turn next to consider the relation between
the poet’s and architect’s writings and the architectural planning for the villa
at this time, and to assess the actual agency of Sperulo’s literary villa in the
development of the physical one.
CHAPTER FOUR
ENCOMIA OF THE UNBUILT
W h i l e s p e r u l o wa s m a k i n g c l a i m s f o r t h e p o w e r o f
the poet based on his prophetic ability to see the villa before it existed,
the architects designing the villa were obviously envisioning the unbuilt
complex themselves. Raphael recorded his ideas for the villa using tradi-
tional architect’s tools such as ground plans, and also in words. As discussed in
Chapter 1, his letter describing Villa Madama is a verbal analogue of a master
plan, tracing a Plinian percorso through the grand villa complex. This chapter
considers the relation between these two proleptic descriptions of the villa,
analyzing the literary modes in which both authors were working, and the
functions of their descriptions.
BU I LDI N G T HE V IL L A IN V E R S E A N D PRO SE: SPERU LO ’ S

AND RAP H A E L’ S D E S C R IP T ION S
There has been disagreement about the relative chronology of Sperulo’s poem
and Raphael’s letter (Figure 36). The poem is dated 1 March 1519, although
it may have been composed a little earlier; and the letter is generally thought
to have been written some time in winter 1518–19 (although this date has in
part been based on the relative chronology with the poem). Shearman insisted
that Raphael’s letter was the earlier text and the source for Sperulo’s poem,
remarking that, “It seems inherently unlikely that Raphael would think the
relatively incidental, descriptive parts of this shamelessly encomiastic poem
85
86 ENCOM I A O F T HE U N B U I LT
36. Raphael (in the hand of a copyist), Letter Describing Villa Madama, Florence, Archivio di
Stato, MAP 94, letter 162, cc. 214r.
B U I L D I N G TH E V I L L A I N V E R S E AN D P R O S E 87
worth imitating; his creativity has its own resources of a very different, and
as it were professional, nature … Moreover, to give precedence to Sperulo is
implicitly to attribute to him deeply meditated philosophical-hygienic aspects
of Raphael’s design, fundamentally controlling it.”1 But the assumption that
primacy of writing reflects the invention of every idea in the description
emerges as faulty logic, as this analysis will show. Shearman also argues for
the primacy of Raphael’s letter on the grounds that Sperulo copied Raphael’s
discussion of siting according to the sun and the winds; but in fact, Sperulo’s
description is much more directly indebted to Statius than to Raphael or his
models for this passage, Pliny and Vitruvius. The same point can be offered
for Sperulo’s discussion of how the building would be protected from the
extremes of weather – another topos. Although the architects actually did have
to think about winds and seasonal comfort in their siting and design, when
it came to writing about it, architect as well as poet looked to literary mod-
els rather than the site itself. Unlike Shearman, Frommel, followed by Jacks,
Camesasca and Piazza, and Di Teodoro, take the view that Sperulo wrote first.2
In fact, the only part of Sperulo’s poem that bears any resemblance to
Raphael’s letter is a fourteen-line section near the very end of this 407-line
poem – and it is a simple list of items that Sperulo says he will not discuss.
Significantly, Sperulo glosses over elements such as the theater, baths, gardens,
and stables in a simple list, saying, “The other elements of the great house,
above and below, I pass over in silence … All this better anon” (378–91). Of
course, these were the areas built in a later phase or, in many cases, not at all;
but more importantly, these elements that Sperulo leaves aside are the exact
items Raphael focuses on in his letter. These items are set apart in a praeteri-
tio – an ironic rhetorical device by which an author claims to ignore a subject,
while actually bringing it to the reader’s attention.3 Sperulo calls attention to
this device by introducing the passage with the words praetereo tacitus – “I pass
over in silence” (379; Figure 37). He could not possibly have chosen to set aside
in this pointed way the very subjects the architect discussed without some
knowledge of Raphael’s letter. This observation is the most telling indication
that Sperulo knew Raphael’s epistle.4
However, there is no compelling evidence in the two texts that Sperulo
necessarily read Raphael’s letter; it is plausible that the poet compiled a list of
the villa’s highlights in conversation with Raphael or an associate, who could
have described his letter project to Sperulo and sketched a plan, labeling
important spaces. Or, he might have heard it read aloud. Thus, while I agree
with Shearman that Sperulo alludes to Raphael’s design for the villa, I do
not subscribe to his assumption that one text depends directly on the other.
At best, Sperulo may have seen the letter briefly without taking notes or
copying it – a practice of restricted access sometimes imposed by humanists,
including Pietro Bembo.5 Such a scenario would explain why Sperulo’s list
37. Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519. BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, fols. 15v–16r:
the praeteritio listing items the poet sets aside.
includes some of the same unusual Plinian vocabulary used by Raphael (such
as xystus and hippodrome6) and details dear to the architect, such as run-
ning water in the stable stalls and recycled water in the baths; but also why
Sperulo’s list follows a completely different order from the letter;7 why he
uses some unusual words completely differently than Raphael (e.g. Sperulo
uses coenatio to describe the garden loggia, whereas Raphael uses cenatione to
designate an outdoor dining area flanking the fishpond);8 and why Sperulo
proposes battle paintings for the central Tiber loggia, an impossible setting
for murals because its walls were broken up by doors, niches, columns, and
open arches, as Raphael’s letter clearly describes and the plans show.9 These
discrepancies suggest that the poet did not study Raphael’s letter in much
detail, if he saw it at all. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine why Raphael would
care to circulate an unfinished draft – unless there was a more finished ver-
sion that has not come down to us. Sperulo’s list reads almost as an after-
thought, and the tone at the end of his poem is disjointed, suggesting the
possibility that he learned about the contents of Raphael’s letter just as he
was finishing the work. The poem would thus provide a terminus ante quem
for the letter – if one can speak of a terminus for a letter for which no finished
version has ever emerged. The most plausible scenario is that the two works
were being written around the same time.
B U I L D I N G TH E V I L L A I N V E R S E AN D P R O S E 89
Revealingly, the very fact that Sperulo was privy to Raphael’s ideas, whether
on paper or in person, is crucial evidence because it shows that the poet was
engaged with some of the villa planners, in addition to his connections to its
Medici patrons. Sperulo may also have seen a master plan for the villa, presum-
ably U 273a; his description of some places in the villa fairly accurately reflects
the plan of the complex, although he is vague about other spaces, he does not
grasp the relation of plan to site, and he seems to misinterpret the plan to rep-
resent the fishpond as adjacent to the xystus, whereas the pond was to be one
storey below, as indicated by the stairs in the plan and specified in Raphael’s
letter (see Plates iii–v and Figures 52, 57).10 Sperulo’s presence in this milieu
further suggests that his poem may have been commissioned, rather than writ-
ten independently in the hope of additional patronage.11 It is also noteworthy
that the poet evidently knew Raphael’s letter, but did not choose to praise
the many extravagant and unusual all’antica features that the villa’s architect
and designer thought most important. Rather, Sperulo discusses completely
different material than Raphael does. Sperulo’s pointed praeteritio reads as an
insider’s reference to Raphael’s letter, with no need to duplicate the architect’s
content. Moreover, what immediately follows the praeteritio is the line sum-
marizing what Father Tiber/Sperulo says is his main task: “Now, it is neces-
sary to search out the different marbles and the many columns to be placed
around the planned courtyards” (391–3).Thus, the poet is summing up his own
responsibilities at the villa, and distinguishing them from those of the architect.
Certainly, the two works reflect very different literary forms, functions, and
authors. Raphael’s vernacular letter walks the patron bodily through the villa,
giving a specific and concrete description of the ground plans. Although he
cloaked his description in Plinian language, Raphael’s draft reflects scant atten-
tion to literary craft; Shearman noted the “semi-literate nature of this raw
text,” and Frommel identified entire passages lifted directly from Vitruvius.12
These flaws surely reflect that what survives is a rough draft of the architect’s
ideas, before he or Castiglione had a chance to polish it,13 but also a lack of
range and sophistication at literary bricolage. As Shearman noted in a discus-
sion of Raphael’s literary range in his sonnets, to which he compared the Villa
Madama letter, “his reading seems occasioned by the job in hand, making
Petrarchan sonnets in the one case or a Plinian letter in the other, and is scarce
evidence of a structural part of his culture.”14 By contrast, Sperulo’s poem is
a literary exercise in neo-Latin hexameters involving concepts, ideology, and
decorations; the poet displays an extensive knowledge of ancient literature and
a highly sophisticated ability to evoke and transform his models. His sloppy
use of architectural vocabulary and misunderstanding of the plan, on the other
hand, reflect his lack of expertise in that area.15
One fundamental similarity between Raphael’s letter and Sperulo’s poem
is vital: both were written to describe a villa that was not yet built. Scholars
have long accepted Raphael’s letter as a proposal of the artist’s ideas. I believe
that Sperulo, too, was proposing ideas for the villa complex. Although the
letter and poem are very different products, they may well have been con-
ceived in the same milieu and timeframe, and for similar purposes. Both texts
function as proleptic memory palaces, which present their author’s visionary
ideas for specific aspects of the villa. Sperulo’s praeteritio concludes with the
phrase “All this better anon” (391), further suggesting that the listener will hear
about these items from Raphael later, and thus that the two descriptions were
intended to be read for the same audience. Humanist gatherings could be the
occasion for poetic correspondence, a literary practice involving works that
reply to each other in a pseudo-exchange.16 One can visualize Sperulo and
Raphael performing these works as an intertextual discourse before Cardinal
Giulio, perhaps at a construction-site convivium on the Monte Mario that
also included Tebaldeo, Vida, Equicola, and Goritz.17 As noted above, such an
event was probably the occasion for reciting poems about Chigi’s villa; and
Valeriano’s Dialogo presents just such a scenario at Villa Madama.18 This would
explain the composition of all these written works describing the unfinished
Medici villa, including Vida’s reference to Goritz visiting the construction site.
Rugged banquet settings were not uncommon in this circle; some of the same
people famously picnicked in the ruins of the Domus Aurea and of Hadrian’s
Villa, and banqueted in villa gardens and in Agostino Chigi’s unfinished stables
(the latter admittedly camouflaged with luxurious tapestries as a joke). Other
gatherings are recorded at the Medici site itself, even when the villa was in
the very early stages of construction: just two weeks after Sperulo dated his
poem, Pope Leo passed the entire day at the site, just for pleasure,19 and he
hosted Baldassare Castiglione for dinner there three months later (in June),
and the Duke of Ferrara’s agent in October.20 In sum, what better place for a
convivium than the site of the rising villa conceived as the Leonine utopia for
living all’antica? If such an event actually happened, Raphael’s “walk-through”
could have functioned not just as verbal metaphor, but also as a performative
experience, as he led his patrons and listeners physically through the site – a
point to which I will return in Chapter 6.
H O RTATORY E K P H RAS IS
At this point, we may return to the issue raised at the outset: the function
of poetry celebrating a villa that did not yet exist. It is striking that many of
the Renaissance poems discussed in Chapter 2 were written while the villas
were still in construction, including those about Villa Madama, Chigi’s Roman
villa, and Poggio a Caiano21 (although I do not believe that Poliziano’s poems
about Poggio a Caiano were descriptive or prescriptive in the same way as
those of the Roman poets). There were surely compelling reasons for Roman
H O RTATO RY E KP H RA S I S 91
humanists to produce numerous full-length poems praising non-existent or

partially built villas.
The most obvious purpose of such Renaissance villa poetry was to advertise
the goals of the builder and frame the reception of the building. It is well known
that humanists functioned as propagandists for the papal Curia, as well as for
wealthy patrons like Agostino Chigi (who as a papal banker moved in the same
circles).22 Villa Madama was surprisingly familiar to contemporary patrons and
artists, although it is less so to us because of a variety of later circumstances. The
villa poetry of Sperulo and others may have contributed to the reputation of the
villa in its own day. Certainly words could be produced very quickly relative to
buildings, and they were impervious to the risks of delay and non-completion
that plagued physical construction. Thus poetry could announce a project, and
proleptically shape its reception. (In Sperulo’s case, the fact that only a single
pocket-sized manuscript copy of his poem is known to exist suggests the target
audience was local and that they experienced the poem through performance; it
could have been held and read aloud, or passed around to a select group, but it
evidently was not intended to announce the villa to a broad audience.)
More importantly, the basic function of these proleptic villa poems by Sperulo
and his contemporaries was to serve as conceptual proposals for villa architecture
and decoration. Blosio Palladio, in the dedication to his 1512 panegyric about
the Chigi villa, identifies his work as a sylva, and, like Statius, Blosio plays with
the meaning of the word as a piece of wood or raw material ready to be worked
up.23 This imagery goes further than the proverbial apology/boast about a liter-
ary work tossed off quickly, a device also used by Statius, Blosio, and Sperulo.24
Blosio offers his patron an axe to cut, prune, purify, and refine the work, and he
goes on to specify that he sings of things unbuilt but planned or in the patron’s
mind.Thus, unlike Statius who wrote of completed buildings, Blosio parallels the
notions that his poem and the Chigi villa plan are works in progress. He subtly
suggests that he presents the patron with much material with which to work,
while preserving the appearance that the patron is the author.25 We have seen
how Sperulo, in the voice of Father Tiber, says, “Let this work rise under my
auspices!” (46), challenges Raphael about the placement of the sculpture (160–4),
and directs what the artist should paint (372–3).These are poetic devices, but they
suggest the poet’s role in formulating and proposing ideas. Sperulo’s frequent use
of the hortatory subjunctive in his poem also emphasizes this role.26 The poets, at
the same time they were celebrating a villa and its patron, were offering ideas to
the patrons and artists, in a mode I would like to call hortatory ekphrasis.
I have found no direct antecedents in ancient literature or rhetoric for this
mode: an extended and specific description of an actual place that does not yet
exist, and an exhortation to realize it. Instead, Sperulo’s work draws on many
models, none of them an exact template. As we have seen, his principal model
was Statius, the first to devote an entire poem to the description of a work of
art, whose Silvae provided an appropriate model in their novel combination

of the encomium of a patron and a description of his artistic patronage. But
unlike Sperulo, Statius had described extant works, including villas – as did
Pliny, the preeminent model for prose villa descriptions, and most other writ-
ers describing actual villas, from Horace to Fortunatus.
One interesting example of ancient proleptic villa description can be found
in the letters of Cicero to Quintus. These epistles served the ostensibly practical
function of updating Cicero’s brother on the construction of his villa while he was
away at war, but they were also literary narratives of the coming-into-existence
of a villa, as Ann Kuttner interprets them.27 This mix of hands-on details at the
construction site with a literary portrait of the villa as a site of imagination was
surely a stimulus for Renaissance villa writers, although Cicero’s letters do not
seem prescriptive in the sense of Sperulo’s work.28
The long and rich history of ekphrasis does not provide a direct model for
Sperulo’s work either. Ekphrastic descriptions of architecture and works of art
appeared in the overlapping genres of poetry and rhetoric, both embraced by
Renaissance humanists for their shared emphasis on writings of praise.29 As is
well known, the Greek and Byzantine traditions of architectural ekphrasis had
been introduced to Italy by Manuel Chrysolorus in the early quattrocento.30
Interestingly, Chrysolorus was a close friend in Rome of Poggio Bracciolini,31
who had rediscovered Statius’ Silvae; one can imagine their discussions of con-
verging ekphrastic models, which were important for later Roman humanists.
(Curiously, however, the importance of Statius’ work has been virtually ignored
in the voluminous modern literature devoted to ekphrasis.32) Because Sperulo
describes not only the villa building itself, but its painted battle scenes, sculp-
tures, and grounds, the poet draws on a range of ekphrastic models from ancient
rhetoric and literature. But ancient ekphrases/descriptiones, unlike Sperulo’s poem,
describe either real, extant structures such as the villa panegyrics discussed, or
fictional visions. The latter tradition of describing the imaginary – sometimes
called topothesia or notional ekphrasis33 – has been traced to Homer’s Shield of
Achilles, and the key model for our Renaissance villa poets was surely Virgil’s
well-known description of the unbuilt Carthaginian Temple.34 As we have
seen, Ariosto was working in this mode, too. Imagined and real environments
had been interwoven in literature from ancient rhetorical exercises in the ars
memoriae tradition to the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili’s notional ekphrases of archi-
tecture.35 Philostratus’ Imagines served as an important set piece of ekphrasis, in
particular of paintings in a villa (which may or may not have existed – and it is
unclear which option Renaissance readers believed); these ekphrases would come
to be used as the source of decorations in the Medici villa. Filarete’s descrip-
tion of the imaginary utopian city of Sforzinda blurred the lines between the
visionary, the fantastical, and a plan for action.36 Other quattrocento fantastical
descriptions of gold-, gem-, and pearl-studded palaces, from St. Peter’s to the
real Medici palace in Florence, served as allegories of the Heavenly Jerusalem or
THE I NV E N T I VE A S S E M B L A GE O F L I T E RARY AN D RH E TO R I C AL G E N RE S 93
38. Fra Carnevale, The Ideal City, c. 1480–4. The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore.
Temple of Solomon, or simply as extravagant praise of a patron, but not as literal

description.37 The notion of an actual villa that existed first in the humanist’s
mind may be found in a 1488 letter by Marsilio Ficino, who described his walk
in the Fiesolan Hills together with Pico della Mirandola discussing their imagi-
nary ideal villa, only to see it suddenly materialize before their eyes; but Ficino
used this conceit to praise an already-extant villa, as he himself makes clear.38
We may even think of a visual analogue, such as the so-called Ideal City panels
(Figure 38), which Richard Krautheimer proposed served a hortatory function,
although these panels were more likely utopian models than plans for specific
action.39 All these examples, therefore, are different from describing an actual
building that was not yet completed. Sperulo’s ekphrasis of the Medici villa is
neither mimetic nor fictional nor allegorical: it is proleptic, and hortatory.
TH E I NV EN T IV E A S S E MB L AG E OF L IT ERARY
AND RH ETOR ICA L G E N R E S
It emerges that there was no direct model for Sperulo’s proleptic and hortatory
verse. Further, it did not fit neatly into any literary category; rather, Sperulo’s
poem represents an inventive assemblage of literary and rhetorical genres.
Panegyric is the closest mode to Sperulo’s poem, without providing a direct
model. Sperulo incorporates the classical topoi of panegyric literature – praise
of illustrious ancestors and valor in battle – in his proposed decorations for the
Medici villa. Since the Hellenistic period, panegyrics, or encomia, of patrons
had been composed in verse and prose;40 and significantly for our subject, it was
Statius who provided the model for encomiastic, or epideictic poetry – that is,
poetry that adapts elements of epideictic rhetoric, the branch of oratory related
to praise and blame.41 (This perhaps suggests another reason for the appeal of
Statius’ Silvae to Renaissance humanists, for epideixis dominated Renaissance
humanist discourse and sermons and was a crucial tool of Curial propaganda.42)
Panegyrics could encompass architectural ekphrasis as one element of praise.43 As
noted, Statius’ villa poems expanded on this tradition.44
A few Renaissance panegyrics were surely well-known examples for Sperulo

and his contemporaries, if not direct models. Manetti’s panegyric of Nicholas V,
written after the pontiff ’s death, included an ekphrasis of new St. Peter’s as if
it were already complete, although his digression on the basilica was not at all
specific to the building, instead comprising tropes of praise to provide a wor-
thy backdrop for his culminating narrative of imperial coronation.45 Likewise,
Francesco Albertini’s guide to Rome, published in 1510 and dedicated to Pope
Julius II, was effectively an encomium of the pope’s architectural and urbanistic
projects; but Albertini’s descriptions are relatively brief and formulaic, praising
even St. Peter’s primarily for the magnificence of the project as measured by
its scale and columns.46 Such panegyrics provided essential models of archi-
tectural ekphrasis of an unfinished, real building – and specifically of St. Peter’s,
addressed to its papal patrons – but these prose works did not provide the tem-
plate for Sperulo’s long and detailed descriptive poem, or its hortatory aspect.
The prescriptive aspect of Renaissance poetry such as Sperulo’s derives from
protreptic discourse, a late antique form of panegyric combining praise of a
living ruler with hopes and exhortations for his future actions.47 Such works
were often written by advisors to young rulers who did not yet have a track
record to praise, and thus the writers incorporated predictions and prescrip-
tions for a future program of great deeds. Such speeches of advice, or suasory,
also drew on the deliberative branch of oratory, which provided a model for
prescribing a course of action.48 This kind of protreptic praise was known
to Renaissance readers in works by Cicero praising Caesar, Pliny on Trajan,
Seneca to Nero, and even Statius to Domitian.49 Some of these protreptic
works emphasizing the virtue of clemency – notably Cicero’s praise of the
clementia Caesaris and Seneca’s treatise De clementia – were Sperulo’s very mod-
els for his earlier elegy on the clemency of Pope Leo; so Sperulo was intimately
familiar with their advisory, protreptic, hortatory mode. Sperulo’s villa poem
augments the traditional scope of late antique protreptic panegyric to pre-
scribe the program for his patron’s artistic and architectural achievements. And
although he was not the first Renaissance writer to exhort a pope to build, his
prescription was unusually specific and detailed.50 Most importantly, Sperulo
shifts the emphasis of traditional panegyric; the primary focus of his poem is
not praise of the patron, but rather extended ekphrasis and exhortation. Neither
is it conventional metonymic praise of the patron via description of his com-
mission, for Sperulo composed detailed ekphrases of unexecuted architecture,
landscape, sculpture, and paintings, and he used the rhetoric of persuasion to
urge his patron to realize the poet’s own ideas.51 As we have seen, the villa he
describes and praises is not the work of the patron or even the architect, but
the poet’s own vision, which he exhorts them to follow.
Therefore, there are parallels for the various elements of Sperulo’s poem, but
no genre or example fully corresponds to his synthesis of elements. Although
THE I NVE N T I VE A S S E M B L A G E O F L I T E R ARY AN D RH E TO R I C AL G E N RE S 95
he never uses the word silva (curiously!), Sperulo follows Statius’ example in
creating a genre-bending fusion of literary and rhetorical modes.52 As we have
seen, Sperulo’s encomiastic poem takes from epic poetry its form, diction, and
narrative and temporal structure: heroic hexameters are placed in the mouths
of mythological spokespersons, who describe the past and future glories of
the Medici. Additionally, Sperulo adapts the device of notional ekphrasis, per-
haps via Cicero, to describe the real-but-not-yet-built; and he transposes his
description to the prescriptive tone of protreptic panegyric. That is, Sperulo
combined elements of epic poetry, protreptic panegyric, and notional ekphrasis
in the mode that I am calling hortatory ekphrasis.
Thus, the panegyric describing an actual but unbuilt villa, in verse or prose,
seems to be a sub-genre, and one that flourished in Renaissance Italy. Sperulo
did not invent this genre; his Roman colleagues Blosio and Gallo seem to have
done something similar in the Chigi villa panegyrics a few years earlier,53 and
future research may present earlier examples, perhaps in the circle of quattro-
cento humanists such as Poliziano or Pontano.54 But Sperulo made brilliantly
effective use of this mode, and claimed for himself unusually explicitly the roles
of inventor and site boss – the embodiment of the poet as master builder.55
Through his prophetic personae and his use of hortatory ekphrasis, Sperulo
characterized himself as a visionary vates for the Medici. His sophisticated cita-
tion of a rich array of sources and genres displayed his copious erudition and
established him as a poeta doctus. He also claimed the mantle of the deus artifex,
who envisions and actually builds the villa. In all these ways, he presented his
ideas to Raphael and to his Medici patrons, along with a heavy dose of self-
promotion. Sperulo’s writing aimed to be persuasive at multiple levels: to forge
decorative imagery that would convincingly present Medici messages to the
villa’s distinguished visitors, to persuade the artists and patrons to adopt and
execute his ideas, and to convince them of his importance as a poet, humanist,
and advisor in the Curial equipe.
We may see one response to Sperulo’s bombastic claims in a wickedly
pointed satire of Roman literary culture written just a few years after Sperulo’s
villa poem. In his Dialogo contra i poeti written by 1525, Francesco Berni attacked
“professional” poets, excoriating them as vicious slanderers, inept and deriva-
tive versifiers, and time-wasting sycophants.56 As secretary to the papal datary
Giovan Matteo Giberti living in the Vatican, Berni had ample opportunity to
sort through these poets’ offerings, which he notes were often recorded in
lavish, gilt-edged small volumes that included prefaces written in capital let-
ters, polished prefatory letters, and illuminated capitals – a description that is
markedly similar to Sperulo’s libretto.57 Although Berni was primarily targeting
hopeful, would-be courtiers, unlike the Medici Curial insider we have seen
Sperulo to have been, Berni’s withering assessment reflects some humanists’
fatigue with the exaggerated rhetoric and backbiting tactics in this competitive
milieu. Significantly for this narrative, Berni caricatured the conceit of the
poet as builder by likening poets to masons and manual workers (muratori o
manovali) with Apollo as their foreman (capomaestro), at once recognizing and
subverting the master builder topos and poetic claims to architectural inven-
tion.58 Berni’s satire suggests the prominence of this trope in the early 1520s;
his dialogue may reflect a response to poems such as the Chigi and Medici villa
descriptions, and in particular to Sperulo’s poem that so prominently features
the conceit of building in verse, and the poet’s role as site boss.
PO ETRY A N D P L A N N IN G
However inflated Sperulo’s claims, his hortatory ekphrasis was indeed written at
the right moment to serve as a proposal for certain aspects of Raphael’s Medici
villa, as we may determine by considering the poem within the design and con-
struction timeline. Frommel’s study of the villa’s construction remains the stand-
ard narrative.59 Fine-tuning the chronology has long been problematic since so
few of the surviving plans or documents are dated – Sperulo’s being a rare excep-
tion – and there is still little agreement over the dating of the manuscripts of
the letter to Leo X and the letter on Villa Madama.60 Construction at the villa
probably began in the late summer of 1518, when materials were ordered for the
site.61 The transition between the two major surviving plans for the villa, from
U 273a to U 314a, has been dated beginning from late 1518 to mid-1519, using
Sperulo’s poem dated 1 March 1519 as a terminus ante quem for Raphael’s villa
letter that contains elements of both plans. If we accept the hypothesis proposed
here that Raphael’s and Sperulo’s descriptions were roughly coeval, then funda-
mental changes to the basic plan were evidently being worked out in the first
quarter of 1519 – changes that would result in U 314a. It remains unclear when
U 314a was stabilized; Frommel has interpreted the additions and corrections
to the plan to represent changes after Raphael’s death, although in light of the
iterative design process during Raphael’s lifetime proposed here, those changes
seem equally plausible while he was alive.Whenever this master ground plan was
finalized, it was certainly well after Sperulo wrote his poem, and thus construc-
tion could not have been very far along at the time he was writing; at most the
foundations and basement storey were in progress, but the rooms he described on
the piano nobile were probably determined but unbuilt. So, important changes
to the basic plan were probably being worked out in the first months of 1519.
It is striking that the general ideas and themes for the decorative imagery were
being sketched out at this early stage – when ground plans were still being set and
before walls were even erected. It is also notable that these proposals were for the
entire villa complex, not just the wing built in the first and, as it turned out, only
phase of construction. For example, Sperulo proposes murals for the central and
southernmost parts of the villa, which were never built (Figure 26). The garden
P O E TRY AN D P L AN N I N G 97
loggia is the space Sperulo describes most vividly and concretely, suggesting that
there was a certain focus on this section, or perhaps that it was already beginning
to take form. Frommel puts the start of the loggia’s construction between spring
1519 and winter 1519–20.62 Sperulo’s description accurately evokes the plan of
the loggia from a vantage point under its central dome vault looking northeast
(visible in Figure 18), “which on the right looks onto the grand vestibule, on the
left onto ever blooming gardens” (207–8). (Like Raphael’s description rooted
in the ground plan, this language also calls to mind the scenario of patrons and
designers at a construction site convivium, with the poet performing these lines
while gesturing at the muddy fields that would be verdant gardens.) In contrast
to Sperulo’s sharply defined description of the garden loggia, his references to
other areas of the villa are vague. His setting for some of the proposed murals in
Leo’s planned central loggia, designed with almost no wall space, was particularly
improbable. Sperulo could have been confused, or he might intentionally have
fudged the designated location in order to set his triumphal battle paintings in
Leo’s figurative seat in the villa – the central loggia, with significant views of the
Milvian Bridge, site of the Constantinian victory and symbolic of the source
of papal temporal power. Or perhaps he was urging the architects to reconfig-
ure the elevations of Leo’s loggia to accommodate his proposed murals, which
would indeed have contributed to a richly symbolic set piece.63 Alternately, his
proposal could simply reflect that variant ideas were on the table at once. This
loggia was not fully constructed, so the mismatch of Sperulo’s suggestions and its
features may simply have reflected that it was being planned in less detail by all
concerned. Thus, it was probably around the time of Sperulo’s poem that plans
for the garden loggia were the focus of major revisions.
It is not always clear when, and to what extent, Sperulo was generating his
own ideas rather than compiling and articulating the ideas of others. We lack
drawings or other evidence to date the development of particular wall eleva-
tions. In certain cases, Sperulo was surely describing already-established plans
made known to him by Raphael or his fellow architects. However, it is clear
that Sperulo was not just passively transcribing others’ ideas – he was pitching
many of his own.The many wide-ranging literary sources for much of his pro-
posed villa imagery are the contribution of a sophisticated letterato. Sperulo’s
poem is analogous to a modern white paper – that is, a position document
prepared by a policy expert for a government or corporation to formulate the
organization’s position on an issue. Often such a work is an amalgam of execu-
tive directives, expert testimony, and the writer’s own ideas, integrated into a
single document. This is not to diminish the author’s importance by suggest-
ing that every idea in the work is not original. Sperulo’s gathering of ideas,
contribution of new ones, citation of ancient literary prototypes, and synthesis
of all these elements into a cohesive whole constituted valuable work – a prac-
tice acknowledged in discussions of authorship from medieval scholasticism to
postmodern theory.64 The frequent association of villa poetry with the silva is
particularly appropriate to this kind of task, as silvae, since antiquity, designated
compendia of miscellaneous, varied, and sometimes even disordered content.65
In fact, contrary to our modern notions of originality and literary merit, this
amassing and arranging of varied content was considered a badge of the copi-
ous erudition and even ingenium and furor of the poet.66
In short, Sperulo’s work cannot simply be dismissed as derivative poetry, as
empty flattery, or as a string of conventional tropes; rather, it was efficacious
poetry, written for a specific purpose. His poem “constructing” the Medici
villa lays out a detailed set of ideas, and exhorts Cardinal Giulio and Raphael
to enact them. John D’Amico showed how Curial humanists employed neo-
Latin as an effective tool to advance the religious and political ideals of the
papacy;67 Sperulo’s poem suggests that neo-Latin could further be used as a
tool for proposing and critiquing architectural and visual imagery. Renaissance
poetry served a crucial social and communicative function, which necessi-
tated that poets use familiar forms, diction, metaphors, and models that would
be clearly understood by their literate audience.68 The coding in Sperulo’s
poem was readily apparent to its target audience, even if it seems abstruse and
overly elaborated to us today; the literary quotations, Medici tags, references to
the ideas of colleagues, challenges to Raphael, and the poet’s own ideas – all
wrapped in Statian structure and couched in Virgilian hexameter – constituted
clear communication with the required authority and scholarly apparatus.
Sperulo was engaged with the inner circle of the villa’s planners, as we
have seen from the fact that he was privy to some of Raphael’s ideas, as well
as the ground plans. Likewise, Sperulo’s knowledge of antiquities and marbles
available for use in the project certainly came not from a stroll through the
construction site, but from access to the Medici collections. His post as papal
chamberlain meant he was a valued member of the Medici Curial famiglia, and
his earlier elegy on Leo’s clemency shows that he had already been instrumen-
tal to the Medici in crafting the papal response to the alleged conspiracy. With
his villa poem, he applied his literary skills to the task of proposing ideas for
the design and decoration of their villa project. In this way, he deployed poetry
as a design tool: his “building in verse” took the form of hortatory ekphrasis.
The poet further emphasized his participation in this endeavor by writing the
presentation manuscript of the villa poem in his own hand, a signal of autho-
rial presence (for which see Appendix ii). We generally think that the tools of
the Renaissance architect were drawings and models; in this scenario, text was
also a tool, and Raphael himself joined the poets in envisioning the villa in
words. Considering the poems of Sperulo and other humanists together with
the letter of Raphael opens a new context for looking at the role of text in the
design process. The following chapters further examine what they were actu-
ally designing with words, and how text could be a tool of design.
CHAPTER FIVE
METASTRUCTURES OF WORD
AND IMAGE
M U LTI VALE N T C ON C E P T UA L P ROG R AM S
We have seen poets working with architects to build the villa with words, but
what exactly were they constructing? Historians of art and architecture usu-
ally speak of the program for an ensemble or building, typically in the sense of
a description of ideological or iconographic subject matter to be expressed in
the work. This notion is problematic for several reasons, beginning with the
anachronistic term program itself, which first came into use in the eighteenth
century, and in a different context. Sixteenth-century writers referred instead
to the notion of invenzione, a term drawn from rhetoric and, confusingly, used
to designate conceptual, verbal, or visual ideas.1 Much of the literature about
programs or inventions has focused on painting, and occasionally sculpture,
the media most closely associated with the visual formulation of text-based
narratives.2 Our limited knowledge of such programs is based on extant writ-
ten examples. The survival of a number of programs from the mid-sixteenth
century coincides with the taste for increasingly complex, recondite imagery,
although this obviously varied by patron and the nature of the commission.3
Contemporary sources earlier in the century are scarce, and varied in their
appreciation of such complexity.4 Paolo Cortesi, writing in 1510, advocated
learned and abstruse decorative schemes for the erudite audiences visiting
a cardinal’s palace.5 Although Cardinal Giulio knew Cortesi’s work, he spe-
cifically expressed his wishes that the imagery for his villa be familiar and
99
100 M ETASTR U CT U R E S O F W O R D A N D I MAG E
straightforward – “so that it is not necessary for the painter to add: ‘this is a
horse’.”6 (Of course, this statement needs to be interpreted in the context
of the jocular repartée between the Cardinal and his agent Mario Maffei in
Rome, with the understanding that what constituted straightforward imagery
for Cardinal Giulio could still seem complex by modern standards.) But there
is little evidence about the generation of programs or inventions for the first
half of the sixteenth century in general, and for the Raphael school in particu-
lar, which may partly reflect a culture of orality, and of collaborators working
together face to face.
The notion of a program for architecture is necessarily somewhat different
than in representational media; the subject of whether and how verbal ideas
could be translated into architectural design has proved to be problematic.7
Nor has much information emerged to clarify the contribution of humanists
to architectural projects; even the role of Alberti at St. Peter’s, to take perhaps
the best-known example, remains the subject of considerable speculation and
disagreement.8 Manfredo Tafuri addressed how the production of meaning
was conceptualized in architecture in early cinquecento Rome, and while he
acknowledged the shared mindset of architects and humanists, he cautioned
against “naively” assuming any direct “influence” of humanist ideas on painters
or architects.9 In an essay published in 1982, James Ackerman challenged archi-
tectural historians to consider what he called programs that “bring architecture
into being”; in his view, such programs were framed by the visions, needs, and
desires of patrons operating in a specific social and cultural context, their ideas
springing from ideologies of which they often were not even conscious.10 Of
course, attention to socio-political, economic, and cultural aspects of architec-
ture have augmented formal and technical approaches to architectural history
throughout the last half of the twentieth century, spurred in part by Tafuri.
But the notion of an architectural program in Renaissance building remains
elusive. The masterful analysis by Christine Smith and Joseph O’Connor of
Giannozzo Manetti’s descriptions of Florence Cathedral and his biography of
Pope Nicholas V as a builder demonstrate the power of architectural ekphrasis
to convey a patron’s goals and visitors’ reactions, and thus to give a building
meaning.11 Marie Tanner has considered what she calls “programmatic anti-
quarianism” in the formation of plans for St. Peter’s, looking at symbolism or
iconography of architecture in the sense that Panofsky or Krautheimer used the
terms, and Nicholas Temple has traced “paradigmatic themes” in many projects
of Julius II.12 But these notions of program or meaning in art and architecture
do not correspond exactly to the scenario proposed here for the Medici villa,
where the planners generated what I see as early-stage frameworks that could
simultaneously involve conceptual, functional, and spatial aspects of architec-
ture and decoration. Sperulo was considering ideas that could be represented
in paintings, the placement of sculptures, and larger spatial constructs; and
M U LT I VAL E N T C O N C E P TU AL P RO G RAMS 101
Raphael’s planning vision encompassed conceptual ideas in addition to tradi-

tional architectural concerns of structure, spatial relation, and style.
This chapter analyzes these frameworks proposed for the Medici villa from
the earliest design phases, which I am calling metastructures of word and
image. (A discussion of the relative roles of advisors, artists, and patrons in gen-
erating them will follow in the next chapter.) The Medici villa was designed to
convey messages of papal primacy and Medici “dynasty and destiny,” inflected
for a verdant locus amoenus.13 What emerges is a dense layering of conceits,
although each one is readily comprehensible. Remarkably, sculpture and spoils
were the impetus for many of these conceptual programs. As discussed in the
previous two chapters, Sperulo reveals that the choice and placement of sig-
nificant ancient sculpture and marbles was an important task, which received
concerted attention surprisingly early in the villa’s planning process. The poet,
in the voice of Father Tiber, says that rafts of ancient marbles and spoils were
taken up the river to the villa, and he repeatedly insists that his main role is
to choose marbles from the ancient ruins and direct their placement in the
villa; and indeed, we saw that one of his descriptions can be identified as a
specific marble. Sperulo wrote his poem during the redesign of the architec-
tural plans from U 273a to U 314a. Additionally, it will become clear in this
chapter that the placement of sculpture and spoils was a major consideration
in this redesign. We have also seen Sperulo at work as an image-maker craft-
ing Medici ideology, as in the case of his elegy on Leo’s clemency in response
to the putative conspiracy of cardinals. The examples that follow show how
Sperulo, Raphael, and the villa’s planners formulated conceptual metastruc-
tures for the villa (and beyond), weaving together ideological, philological, and
archeological notions that could be expressed in a variety of media. The final
section addresses the power of antiquities in generating these metastructures,
considering the implications of this practice for architectural design and the
notion of architectural program.
Topography of Christian Triumph

If the villa’s site near the juncture of via Cassia and via Flaminia was chosen
as an ideal spot for functional requirements of staging ceremonies of entry to
the Vatican,14 its proximity to two deeply symbolic Roman toponyms served
as the basis for a metastructure about the basis of papal authority: the cross
of Monte Mario and the Milvian Bridge. This construct turned on a cen-
tral element of Leonine papal ideology, which cast the Constantinian era as
a forerunner of Leo’s pontificate. This was part of an overarching construct
about papal sovereignty – the goal for a universal church uniting east and west,
as well as spiritual and temporal authority – in a microcosm of God’s king-
dom on earth.15 With plans for the Medici papal villa, Constantine’s victory at
the Milvian Bridge and his vision of the cross that inspired it were localized,
mapped, and represented in many media. This set piece would be embodied
in the disposition of roads, sight lines, architecture, and decoration to create a
network of meanings, in dialogue with the Vatican itself. If much of this infor-
mation is well known, its implications have yet to be fully explored.16
The Milvian Bridge symbolized the victorious entry of Constantine, and
thus of Christianity, into Rome.17 By association, it also symbolized the emper-
or’s subsequent Donation of temporal power to the papacy, the legitimacy of
which was once again a topical issue. As we have seen, the villa overlooks this
symbolic bridge; Raphael designed a straight road running from the bridge
to the main central entrance of the villa on axis, above which was the loggia
Sperulo designated as Leo’s seat in the villa (visible in the model in Figure 14,
and in plan in Figure 26). In his letter, Raphael drew attention to the view
from this loggia to the bridge, noting that, “From this spot, one may see the
road leading straight from the villa to the Ponte Milvio, the beautiful country-
side, the Tiber, and Rome.”18 So, from his loggia, Leo would be able to survey
the vast lands of the Papal States he controlled, directly above the historic spot
symbolic of Constantine – a striking example of the sovereign gaze.19 The
coeval planning of the Vatican Sala di Costantino decorations served to rein-
force this point. Among the murals designed for this room during Raphael’s
lifetime was the main scene on one long wall representing the Battle of the
Milvian Bridge, a subject new to the visual tradition of Constantinian imagery;
this fresco would include an image of Villa Madama under construction on
the hillside just above the Milvian Bridge, as it was sited in reality (Plates xv,
xvi), pointedly emphasizing the geographic and symbolic association between
the pope’s villa and this historic battle site.20 The proposed decoration of Leo’s
villa loggia was also related to this imagery. In Leonine ideology, Constantine’s
victory over the “tyrant” Maxentius was cast as a precursor to a contemporary
crusade uniting European powers against the Turks, considered the modern
enemies of the Christian faith – a central point of contemporary diplomatic
strategy; and Sperulo’s proposal for the decoration of Leo’s villa loggia called
for frescoes of Leo leading a crusade against the Ottoman Turks (discussed in
Chapter 3). Thus, with the plans for this loggia, its sight lines, and decorations,
Raphael and Sperulo both emphasized topical ideas about the basis of papal
sovereignty and Christian hegemony as a justification for current political
goals. Moreover, Raphael’s letter and Sperulo’s poem reveal that sight lines and
decorations were being considered at this stage, while plans were still in flux,
presumably in some sort of coordinated discussions. Clearly, plans for the villa
and the Vatican hall also evolved in tandem to express fundamental messages
about the unity of the church under Leo, the new Constantine.
The other nearby toponym, the cross of Monte Mario, would also be key
to this imagery. The villa was frequently called the vigna sotto la croce di Monte
Mario, a reference to a cross at the site of the fourteenth-century Oratorio della

Croce, just up the hill.21 In particular, Castiglione describes the villa this way
in a letter of May 1519, suggesting that this name was fundamental to the villa’s
identity.22 Beyond a physical locator, this cross was a symbolic toponym of
long-standing importance, as suggested by its frequent mention in diplomatic
sources.23 Visitors to the Oratorio della Croce had been granted indulgences
since 1470, and the cross at this site had been an important stop for collect
prayers – as was the Milvian Bridge – in the Roman Major Litany, a medieval
stational liturgy that was evidently deeply seated in Roman collective mem-
ory.24 The cross is visible on the mid-seicento map in the Catasto Alessandrino
(Figure 39), located just above Villa Madama on the Via Triumphalis. This
favored ceremonial and pilgrimage route into Rome and the Vatican traversed
Monte Mario and was punctuated by six crosses, including the cross of Monte
Mario, symbolizing the churches of Rome (the seventh being St. Peter’s itself,
the final destination of this road), and loosely evoking the Stations of the
Cross. The indulgences and crosses sacralized the hillside, and also made the
39. Arch. Francesco Contini, Strada per la Croce di Monte Mario; for the catasto of Pope
Alexander VII, leadpoint and watercolor, 1665–7; ASR, Catasto Alessandrino, b. 433, 41.
Detail showing the Villa Madama and the cross of Monte Mario just above it along the Via
Triumphalis. The legend includes: (19) [Oratorio di] S. Croce nella salita del Monte Mario;
(20) Signor Urbano Mellino (Villa Mellini); (22) Strade che vanno a Madama; (23) Bosco di
Madama; (24) Prati di Madama; (38) Strada che da ponte Molle va a porta Angelica Castello.
route along Monte Mario a prefiguration of Roman pilgrimage. Thus, the

sacred mountain that was home to the Medici papal hospitium symbolized
Roman pilgrimage and Christian triumph.25 Further, it emerges that the cross
of Monte Mario also came to be interpreted figuratively in connection with
Constantine’s vision. Early textual sources do not locate his vision chrono-
logically or geographically, but it became conflated with the cross of Monte
Mario in sources from the seventeenth century onward, possibly fostered by
the connection of cross and bridge in a coordinated ensemble at the Medici
papal villa.
Most significantly for this papal hospitium, embassies of obeisance to the
pope and retinues arriving for imperial coronations had traditionally traversed
the Monte Mario, from the time of Leo III and Charlemagne to Leo X and
ambassadors of Charles V, establishing the hill’s association with the submission
of the Imperium Christianum to the papacy. This imagery was also reflected in
Raphael’s Vatican Stanze frescoes.26 Thus, we see how the rich history of this
zone on the Monte Mario evoked traditions of various ceremonies of entry, in
a conflation of sacred and secular rituals.
So the Medici villa was sited under the sign of the cross and overlooking
the Milvian Bridge, evoking at once the sources of religious and temporal
authority of the papacy. Raphael’s proposed roads formed a straight line from
cross to bridge, and thus a direct connection from one toponymic symbol
of Christian triumph to another. They bisected the villa on axis, crossing the
other axis formed by the road from the Vatican Palace and St. Peter’s, at the
center of the unusual circular courtyard – which itself had a dual spiritual
and temporal significance.27 This crossing suggests the omphalos or umbilicus
mundi (navel of the world), understood to have been transferred from Greece
to the ancient Roman Forum, and then to the medieval Capitoline;28 per-
haps the villa’s planners thought it then belonged at the center of the Medici
papal hospitium, a microcosm of Leo’s papal realm and entry point to Rome
and the Vatican.
This geometry would be clear not only in plan, but experientially. For a
ceremonial entry to Rome and the Vatican, visitors were intended to follow
the route from the Milvian Bridge up the hillside along the straight road lead-
ing to the villa above and, after a respite and welcome at the villa, the proces-
sion would either proceed up to the cross of Monte Mario and into Rome
along the Via Triumphalis, or else descend from the villa to take the straight
road across Prati (later Via Angelica, visible in Figure 39).29 These roads were
designed to prescribe the motion of the visitors: royal and imperial embas-
sies ascending the hillside would perform their obeisance to the Medici pope
whose seat was above them, and witness the sign of the cross above the Medici
papal hospitium.30
After a stop at the villa, diplomatic visitors would ultimately reach the
Vatican. Those invited to the Sala di Costantino, at times used as a banquet
hall or as Leo’s throne room,31 would see the hospitium depicted on the hill-
side above the bridge – visual imagery orienting them and reinforcing the
significance of the journey they had made. In contrast to the fresco’s all’antica
representation of the Milvian Bridge (by then rebuilt), the realistic portrait of
the papal villa served to pinpoint the location.32 And when visitors looked out
of the window of this room, they could see across the Belvedere Courtyard
north to the Monte Mario, from which they had just traveled.33 Thus, this
historic Constantinian narrative of entry would be localized, and reenacted
by important visitors. Drawing on mnemonic methods used since Roman
antiquity that anchored memory to significant places,34 this construct would
marshal participants to create meanings through motion and vision, in a mul-
tisensory experience engaging different media, unfolding over space and time.
Thus, Raphael and his cohort organized the siting of the Medici villa, the
configuration of roads leading to it, the disposition of focused views, and
select decorations in the villa and the Vatican Stanze in a coordinated meta-
structure reflecting Leonine papal ideology. The Medici papal hospitium –
which would be joined to the Via Triumphalis, set under the physical and
conceptual image of the cross, and set above the site of Constantine’s victory
inspired by it – embodied these messages of Christian and Medicean triumph,
which were reinforced on arrival at the Vatican Palace. This design would
shape visitor experience, and even historical understanding. The multime-
dia, spatio-decorative construct was conceived to orchestrate the dynamic
ritual of entry into the urban fabric of the city; the kinesthetic experience of
visitors and their movement through the landscape would compose narrative
geography from the Milvian Bridge through the Medici papal hospitium, and
across the Monte Mario to the Mons Vaticanus. In so doing, this construct
marshaled the imagery of the papal hospitium and the Vatican Stanze into a
potent ensemble that spanned two hillsides.35
Although this construct was not fully realized, embassies did enter Rome
via the villa following part of this plan; and as in other aspects of the master
plan, Raphael’s methods of incorporating landscape and symbolic topography
in broad programmatic constructs were well known and would increasingly
come to characterize late cinquecento and seicento design practice.
Parnassus
Another metastructure drew on the rich symbolism of place on the Monte
Mario. In a seemingly simpler conceit, Sperulo proposes for the Medici villa
a figure of Lorenzo the Magnificent as Apollo, which he specifies should
be placed among the Muses. The poet addresses Lorenzo directly, saying:
“Come here and let this be the abode for yourself and the Muses … so that
I may see you breathing in Parian marble” (189–92). Of course, to make a
god breathe in marble, typically Parian, was a trope commonly evoked as a
demonstration of the sculptor’s skill; Sperulo instead draws on this conceit
to flatter Lorenzo with the status of a god. Lorenzo had traditionally been
styled as Apollo, with whom he shared the laurel device, and quattrocento
poets praised him as the glory of the Muses; Sperulo’s particular emphasis
on Lorenzo is consistent with the importance of imagery from Laurentian
Florence, especially Poggio a Caiano, throughout Villa Madama.36 Lorenzo’s
son Leo had also been associated with Apollo; in particular, he was charac-
terized as Apollo Musagetes in a 1517 poem.37 Sperulo’s proposal for a Parian
marble Lorenzo/Apollo among the Muses, beyond praising this important
ancestor, presented the Medici villa as Apollo’s realm: Parnassus. Since antiq-
uity, Monte Mario had been known as one of three hills that made up the
Montes Vaticani; in fact, the Monte Mario, Janiculum, and Vatican hills all
technically make up the Janiculum ridge.38 So the well-known Renaissance
designation of the Vatican hill as Parnassus, familiar from Raphael’s epony-
mous fresco in the Stanza della Segnatura (Figure 40), extended to the site
of the villa on the Monte Mario as well, an identification that Sperulo was
keen to play up.39
More than a poetic conceit, however, Sperulo’s proposal for a figure of
Lorenzo/Apollo among the Muses was probably a reference to the group
of nine ancient marble sculptures of the Muses that actually were at the
Medici villa. Pirro Ligorio described a group of seven Muses taken from
the Emperor Hadrian’s Villa in Tivoli to Villa Madama, and he specified that
they were of Parian marble.40 This group of seven Muses, some sitting and
some standing, came from a cycle called the Thespiades (Figures 41–7).41
Also at Villa Madama was one other Muse (the so-called Farnese Melpomene,
Figure 48) and a draped female figure that could easily have been restored
as a Muse (the so-called Niobide, Figure 49).42 This collection of figures sug-
gests that the Medici wanted to display a full complement of nine Muses.
No complete group of Thespiades had yet been excavated, and it has been
thought that no one yet knew that these ancient Muse groups combined
standing and sitting figures.43 But the Raphael school must have had some
ancient evidence, from Hadrian’s Villa or elsewhere, that the sitting and
standing Muses belonged together, for that was exactly how Raphael had
depicted them in his Parnassus fresco. No evidence has emerged for a figure
of Apollo at the villa, nor an ancient fragment that might have been com-
pleted as one; this was surely an important reason for Sperulo’s suggestion
to create a Parian marble figure of Lorenzo/Apollo.44
40. Raphael, Parnassus, 1509–11, Stanza della Segnatura,Vatican Palace.
We do not know whether the Muses were ever installed at the villa, or for
which part they were intended; but an invaluable group of nine monumental
Muses, some with a prestigious provenance from an imperial villa, would certainly
have inspired a significant setting. Heemskerck’s drawings of c. 1532–6 show the
Muses as unrestored and missing heads, arms, and attributes (Figures 50, 51), sug-
gesting that they had not yet been installed.45 (I believe papal taste and decorum
favored fully restored ancient figural sculpture whenever possible, in contrast to
some contemporary, fragment-filled sculpture gardens illustrated by Heemskerck
and described by Aldrovandi.46) A few hypotheses for the intended installation
of the Muses are relevant here. The figures were too large for the niches in the
garden loggia, and there is no space inside the villa that could accommodate a
large group of figures together, so they must have been intended for an unbuilt
area of the villa or for an outdoor setting. They may have been intended for the
villa’s theater, although there is no logical placement for a set of nine sculptures
(or ten counting an Apollo) in the theater as drawn in either U 273a or U 314a.47
Sperulo’s proposal for Lorenzo/Apollo among the Muses, and his challenge to
Raphael about where in the villa he would put Lorenzo, suggests that the villa’s
planners were considering the placement of this group when he was writing in
early 1519 (Sperulo, 164, 189–92). Perhaps they were considering another use for
the Muses, since the theater was not being built in the first phase.
41. Terpsichore, Museo del Prado, inv. 429. 42. Urania, Museo del Prado, inv. 436.
One of the major changes to the villa’s plan between U 273a and U 314a
was the configuration of the fishpond.The earlier plan called for a pond ringed
with tiered benches facing a niche-studded wall, similar to a scaenae frons. In the
later plan that was followed for the actual building, the seating was eliminated
and a tri-lobed ambulatory was added behind the fishpond, effectively creat-
ing grottoes under the garden, accessible by stairs at either end of the garden
(Figures 52, 53). Each of these three exedrae behind the pond contains three
niches (Figure 54).48 Spring water piped from the hillside flowed from above
the grottoes to fill the fishpond. Because Muses were traditionally associated
with grottoes and springs, and because these nine large niches are appropri-
ately scaled for the large Muse sculptures,49 this ensemble was very possibly
intended to be a grotto of the Muses – a musaeum all’antica.50
This waterside ambulatory allowed guests to stroll along the length of the
pond through cool, damp grottoes (Figure 55), with views across the pond
of the Tiber valley to Rome. From this ambulatory, one still sees the jet of
spring water arching from a spout above the central grotto, and hears it splash
43. Clio, Museo del Prado, inv. 401. 44. Thalia, Museo del Prado, inv. 373.
into the pond. These watery exedrae are reminiscent of the small conversation
niches in Roman imperial grottoes. Although there is no evidence these sites
were known in the early cinquecento, there were evocative literary descrip-
tions, notably that of Pliny, who specifically prescribed caves encrusted in pum-
ice for the Muses’ haunts.51 The fishpond niches were indeed decorated with
spugna (spongestone) when Charles Percier and Pierre F. L. Fontaine visited Villa
Madama in the early nineteenth century, although no evidence has emerged to
determine whether this decoration dated to the Medici era or later.52 Propertius
also described a cave of the Muses, through which Apollo leads him, and one
of the Muses instructs him to cease writing martial verse and write love poetry
instead – imagery that would have been consonant with the ambulatory as well
as the themes of peace and omnia vincit Amor at Villa Madama, and the peaceful
Leo as Apollo Musagetes.53 Ancient scholars and poets often claimed that they
gave their intellectual banquets at the gathering places of the Muses.54 Raphael’s
letter specifies a dining area at the northern end of this pond for just such a
purpose; his description of the fishpond conflates elements of both surviving
45. Melpomene, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, inv. sk4.
master plans,55 and this dining area appears only in the later one, which means
that this new conception of the area was under discussion at the time he was
writing (see Figure 56, and cf. plans in Figures 57, 58). Of course, in the early
cinquecento, a fountain designed as a grotto of the Muses was de rigueur for
the simplest villa,56 but monumental sculptural musaea did not yet exist; to pos-
sess a group of nine ancient Muses as well as abundant natural springs was a
rare, if not unique, combination at this time. In the Medici villa as built, there
is no other place that could accommodate a group of nine Muses, and no other
group of sculpture that would suggest a need for nine large niches behind the
fishpond. One flaw in this hypothesis is the lack of a spot for an Apollo, unless
it could have been placed in the dining area at the northwest end of the pond,
shown in U 314a with an exedra at its head (Figure 58). Or perhaps Leo in his
personification as Apollo Musagetes could complete the group as he strolled
through the grottoes (just as Isabella d’Este and later Christina of Sweden each
fashioned themselves as the tenth Muse). Alternatively, perhaps Sperulo was
drawing attention to this missing Lorenzo/Apollo as a hole in the sculpture
46. Erato, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, inv. sk7. 47. Muse with nebris, Stockholm
Nationalmuseum, inv. sk5.
collection, and the lack of a seat for it as a flaw in the architect’s plan. This
would explain his forceful apostrophe to Raphael (“where, in what part, will
you place the immortal glory of the house [Lorenzo]?,” 164) and his direct invo-
cation to Lorenzo to come inhabit the villa (189–90). Whatever their intention
for the Muses, it seems clear that the villa planners were grappling with ideas
for the installation of this prestigious group in some kind of musaeum in early
1519.57 This ambitious ensemble was apparently never fully executed, although
the fishpond ambulatory surely served as a refreshing locus amoenus, and it may
have received other decoration. Moreover, although the sculptures of the Muses
apparently remained unrestored and uninstalled, their presence at the villa was
known to contemporaries, as we know from the drawings of Heemskerck and
others, and these ideas for a musaeum probably were, too – like many other
uncompleted aspects of the villa complex. In fact, the popularity of musaea
in the following decades surely owed something to the unexecuted ideas of
Raphael, Sperulo, and their collaborators.58
48. Melpomene (so-called Farnese Melpomene), Museo 49. Muse, or so-called Niobide, Museo
Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, inv. 6400. Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, inv. 6391.
This ensemble would also have constituted an innovative and early instance
of a water theater, which is typically associated with much later villas, particu-
larly the seicento examples at Villa Aldobrandini in Frascati and Isola Bella.59
While U 273a and U 314a reveal significantly different ideas for this area,
both treatments of the pond reflect the notion of theater. In U 273a, the
fishpond was framed by a scenae frons-like screen for sculpture and facing
seating, while in U 314a the ambulatory behind the pond allows for a more
performative conception, in which the grottoes provided both stage and bel-
vedere; human and marble protagonists could mingle, and spectators could
watch this performance from the dining area adjoining the pool (Figure 56).
From the form of the niches, we can surmise that the sculptures would have
been placed at ground level, not elevated on pedestals, increasing the imme-
diacy of this connection.The configuration of this grotto recalls ancient com-
plexes with cool, damp caves for dining amid monumental sculptures such
as Sperlonga and Baia (although it is not clear that they were known to the
50. Marten van Heemskerck, Seated Muses at Villa Madama (left to right Urania and Terpsichore),
Berlin, Staatliche Museen Kupferstichkabinett, Inv. Nr. 79 d 2, Römische Skizzenbücher, i, fol.
34r.
51. Marten van Heemskerck, Muses at Villa Madama (left to right Thalia, Clio, Muse with
nebris, Niobide), Berlin, Staatliche Museen Kupferstichkabinett, Inv. Nr. 79 d 2, Römische
Skizzenbücher, i, fol. 34v.
52. Villa Madama, stairs from the inner garden leading down to the fishpond, and to the
ambulatory behind it.
53. Villa Madama, fishpond and tri-lobed ambulatory behind it.
Raphael school) and extant models such as the watery dining pavilion of
the Serapeum/Canopus at Hadrian’s villa, the nymphaeum-theater of a villa
near the Arcinelli, and perhaps the ruins of the Villa Vopiscus, all in Tivoli.60
Assuming the Medici grotto was intended as a musaeum gives this water theater
a specific charge. Muses and bathing nymphs were conflated in early cinque-
cento verbal and visual imagery, notably in Raphael’s Parnassus fresco;61 the
design of this grotto as a poolside ambulatory where Leo, Giulio, and guests
could walk among life-sized marble Muse-bathers at the water’s edge realizes
this conceit in particularly playful terms. Of course, the cave of the Muses had
been understood to be a gathering places for poets since Plato; and Raphael
designated this area as a setting for Leo’s and Giulio’s convivia at the villa.This
setting recalled Leo’s use of the Sala delle Muse at the papal hunting lodge, La
Magliana, which was decorated with monumental frescoes of Apollo and the
nine Muses, and used for dining and entertainment by poets and musicians.62
At the Medici villa, the fishpond dining area presumably was used, even if the
Muse sculptures were not (yet) installed; we may imagine diners at the end of
the pond, entertained by poets and musicians, who perhaps strolled through
the grotto.63 Had the Muses been in situ, the contemporary poets mixing
with the Muses in their grotto by a splashing spring would enact a tableau
vivant of Raphael’s Parnassus fresco.Thus, this novel ensemble – at once nym-
phaeum, belvedere, coenatio, and possibly musaeum – was surely an important
54. Villa Madama, fishpond exedra with three sculpture niches.
early contribution to the development of the water theater.64 Furthermore, it

constitutes another multimedia hospitium to the Vatican, its meanings activated
by human participation: in this case, staging the Parnassus.65
The Realm of Venus Genetrix

Sperulo expanded on Venus imagery familiar from Laurentian Florence and
cinquecento Rome to designate the Medici papal villa as the realm of Venus
Genetrix (as noted in Chapter 3). The poetic tradition of praising a site as the
garden of Venus, or as a place worthy for her to visit, was often connected with
her role as the goddess of conjugal love, notably at Agostino Chigi’s Roman villa.
At Villa Madama, as at Poggio a Caiano, the emphasis is placed instead on Venus
55. Villa Madama, ambulatory along the fishpond, with three grotto-like exedrae, each with
three sculpture niches.
in her role as genetrix, characterized by her fecundity, bounty, and peace-giving

victory.66 Venus Genetrix had been prominent in Laurentian visual imagery, as in
Botticelli’s painted poesie of the Primavera and the Birth of Venus, and reliefs on the
portico frieze at Poggio a Caiano.67 In particular, the association of the generative
Venus with the eternal return of the new year each spring was the basis for the
Medici metaphor of eternal return and political stability, as in Lorenzo’s motto Le
tems revient.68 Poliziano had formulated Venus imagery based on the newly redis-
covered De rerum natura of Lucretius, among other ancient sources on the subject
of Venus as a Nature goddess, associated with the fructifying power of earth and
gardens.69 Sperulo drew on this imagery of the generative Venus, and related it to
Leonine notions of peace and concord, thereby translating Laurentian concepts
for the Roman papal hospitium.
56. Villa Madama, view from the area adjacent to the fishpond described by Raphael as a din-
ing area (cenatione).
To incorporate this imagery in the villa, Sperulo proposed a new context

for the relief from the Temple of Venus Genetrix (Figure 30). As we saw, he
presents this relief as a spoil symbolizing the romanitas of the Medici via their
filiation from Venus and Aeneas, and as a trophy of just and peaceful rule.
He proclaims that the Medici deserved this and other antiquities as their just
reward for restoring peace to the world, evoking the ancient Roman under-
standing that sculptural spoils symbolized military triumph and the ensuing
pax romana. Sperulo’s proposed metastructure would indeed be embodied in
the architecture; this relief became the centerpiece of one wall of the gar-
den loggia (Figures 31, 32), which was designed around it, apparently during
Raphael’s lifetime.This imagery would later be deployed throughout the villa’s
painted and stucco decorations, which are filled with figurations of omnia vincit
Amor and images of peace-bringing Victory and Venus (Plate viii).
Temple of Peace
I believe the notion of peace was also encoded in the architecture; several
aspects of the garden loggia, like the fictive architecture in the School of Athens,
evoke what was then called the Temple of Peace, now identified as the Basilica
of Constantine and Maxentius. Étienne Dupérac recorded its appearance in
the mid-sixteenth century in an engraving, noting the remnants of stucco in
the ceiling coffers (Figure 59). Then as now, we see approximately half of the
57. Plan for Villa Madama, annotated detail of U 273a (Plate v) indicating the garden loggia
with fountain diaeta, inner garden, and fishpond.
58. Plan for Villa Madama, annotated detail of U 314a (Plate vi) indicating the garden loggia,
inner garden, and fishpond, as well as sculptures that would be installed in these areas.
59. Étienne Dupérac, The Basilica of Constantine and Maxentius, then identified as the Temple of
Peace, engraving.
60. Donato Bramante, Colonna Nymphaeum, Genazzano.

61. Villa Madama, garden loggia, watercolor, c. 1927. From W. E. Greenwood, The Villa Madama,
New York, 1928.
basilican structure, viewed from the Forum as if looking at a longitudinal section.

The villa’s garden loggia resembles several aspects of this basilica’s plan, eleva-
tion, and decoration, notably the scale, triad of arched openings, lofty stuccoed
vaults, and sculpture niches (Figure 61). Of course, the garden loggia’s plan was
directly indebted to several models, especially the earlier Medici villa at Fiesole
and Bramante’s Nymphaeum for the Colonna family at Genazzano (Figure 60),
which was conceived as a sort of villa-pavilion or early folly.70 But these works
were laterally symmetric, whereas the asymmetry of the Medici villa’s garden
loggia has bothered visitors since Serlio and Palladio: it is flat at one end (where
the Venus Genetrix relief is installed) but has a rounded exedra at the other.71
This detail evokes a modified basilican plan, roughly similar to that of the ruined
Basilica of Constantine and Maxentius, of which one aisle remained standing.
The symbolism of the so-called Temple of Peace made it a potent model
for Renaissance builders. Listed by Pliny as one of the eighteen marvelous
buildings in ancient Rome,72 it was believed to have crumbled the night
Christ was born. Thus, it symbolized the pagan order vanquished by the new
Christian era, and ruins evoking this legend often appear in the background
of Renaissance nativity scenes.73 It was famously a model for Bramante’s
St. Peter’s and, as Tanner proposes, was linked to the desire for a papal crusade
to recapture the Holy Land.74 For all these reasons, it was apposite for Pope
Leo’s program of peace and crusade.
Further, both the basilica and the Villa Madama loggia featured a seated-
ruler colossus in the exedra at the head: the seated marble colossus in the
Roman basilica had been discovered in the 1480s,75 and Villa Madama
would house the seated Jupiter Ciampolini (Figures 62, 63).76 One of
62. Marten van Heemskerck, Jupiter Ciampolini in the garden loggia of Villa Madama, detail;
Berlin, Staatliche Museen Kupferstichkabinett, Inv. Nr. 79 d 2, Römische Skizzenbücher, i,
fol. 24r.
63. Jupiter Ciampolini, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, s.n.
the major changes in the villa’s design between the two surviving ground plans –
eliminating a fountain and built-in seats at the head of the loggia and expanding
the exedra there – was probably done to accommodate this Jupiter (Figures 57,
58).77 It makes sense that this major design change was undertaken for a valid
reason; eliminating a prominent indoor fountain described by Raphael in his
letter, for which there were ample natural springs nearby, would surely have
been done only if the planners had another important focal point for this space
in mind. We lack evidence to show exactly when this Jupiter was purchased or
considered for the villa. The generally held view that the Medici had acquired
this figure by 1519 is based on a mistranslation of Sperulo, who does not, in fact,
mention it directly.78 Although Raphael’s letter describes the fountain diaeta of
U 273a rather than the Jupiter at the head of the garden loggia, he evidently
changed ideas by the time U 314a was drafted. Possibly, the figure was acquired
along with other Ciampolini works in September 1520,79 although the plans
to do so may well have been in the works earlier, and Raphael had probably
known the work for some time.80 Although Sperulo does not mention the
Jupiter, the preponderance of Jovian imagery he proposes, and the many ways
the sculpture fits neatly into the overall architectural and decorative scheme, do
suggest that it was the impetus and focal point for the redesign of this exedra.
The villa’s planners must have had it in mind, if not in hand, during the discus-
sions of new ground plans. In fact, the figure was broken in half and missing
a torso before coming to the villa, and it was not immediately apparent that it
represented Jupiter; I believe it was restored by the Raphael equipe to serve as
the head of this loggia.81 Although we lack specific evidence to date the acquisi-
tion of the Jupiter or the idea for its ultimate use, the weight of evidence suggests
that the decision to deploy it as a Jupiter was under discussion in early 1519.
Therefore, the grandest space of the Medici papal villa contained multi-
valent references to the majestic ancient basilica that symbolized Christian
triumph and peace – in plan, painted and sculptured decorations, and ancient
sculptures. These allusions to the Temple of Peace announced Villa Madama
as microcosm of the new order: the triumphant, peace-bringing Medicean
papal empire. This bold architectural statement of Medici power was all the
more emphatic because it translated sacred architectural forms to domestic
architecture (a strategy long used by the Medici, as in the novel temple front of
Lorenzo’s Villa Poggio a Caiano).Villa Madama’s garden loggia, with its central
domed vault over a modified basilican plan, may also have recalled Bramante’s
plan for St. Peter’s, famously dubbed the dome of the Pantheon over the vaults
of the Temple of Peace.82 Thus, in addition to Sperulo’s literary notions for the
garden loggia, archeological prototypes also served as models for this space.
Coenatio Iovis
At the same time Sperulo was among the planners positioning the garden
loggia as the Temple of Peace, the poet also referred to it as a coenatio, or din-
ing room. At one level, Sperulo was conceptually linking the major repre-
sentational space of the villa to the central social activity of villas celebrated
in ancient literature: dining.83 But his choice of vocabulary and description
evokes specific sources. Sperulo’s use of the word coenatio is curious. In his
letter, Raphael used the Italianized cenatione, after Pliny’s cenatio; but impor-
tantly, Sperulo isn’t directly copying Raphael here, for Sperulo uses the term
to designate the garden loggia, whereas Raphael employs it to designate the
outdoor dining area at the end of the fishpond. (Also, Sperulo uses the word
before his fourteen-line praeteritio of borrowings from Raphael’s letter.) Nor is
the poet studying Pliny, who uses cenatio for an informal dining room to enter-
tain his personal friends, and triclinium for the main dining room in his Tuscan
villa.84 Perhaps significantly, Columella uses coenatio twice in his discussion of
the three parts of a villa – the exact section that Sangallo copied onto one
of his drawings either for Villa Madama or an ideal villa, suggesting the pas-
sage was discussed by architects and humanists as they developed the plans.85
Sperulo also specifically evokes Statius’ ekphrasis of Domitian’s banquet hall
in his palace on the Palatine hill, which Statius compares to that of Jupiter.86
The emperor’s hall had one hundred marble columns, and Numidian marble
vied with Phrygian purple stone. In Sperulo’s vision for the Medici villa, he
also mentions numerous columns, one of Numidian marble (whether real or
imagined) and others of colored marbles. His ekphrasis further resonated with
dining halls of ancient rulers of Rome and Olympus.
The monumental, enthroned figure of the Jupiter Ciampolini later installed
at the head of the garden loggia would make this association explicit. There
were ancient architectural prototypes of long dining rooms with an apse at the
head for the enthroned emperor, although it is not clear if these remains were
known in the Renaissance.87 As literary metaphor, Sperulo’s concetto for the
Medici garden loggia would also have reminded his audience of the Loggia
di Psiche vault in Agostino Chigi’s Tiber villa, where the Raphael school
was engaged at that moment painting the banquet of Olympian gods hosted
by Jupiter, and the fictive pergola through which the Olympians seemed to
float in and out of the loggia. This concept had been celebrated in the earlier
Chigi villa poems, which announce that Jupiter would fly down to join Chigi
and his guests.88 Sperulo borrowed this image of the Olympians descend-
ing to dine, commonly invoked by his fellow Coryciana poets, and recast it
for the Medici papal coenatio where the figure of Jupiter himself would be
physically present in sculpture, and analogically in the person of Pope Leo,
often styled as Jupiter. This Leo–Jupiter connection was familiar from text
and visual imagery, most explicitly in the c. 1518 sculpture of Leo as a seated,
Jupiter-like figure by Domenico Aimo (Figure 64), which had just recently
been installed in the Palazzo dei Conservatori on the Capitoline, where it
was praised by poets – another example of visual–verbal set pieces involving
poetry and visual media in this Curial milieu.89 The contemporaneous fresco
in the Vatican Sala di Costantino depicting the enthroned Pope Clement I
with Leo’s features further conflated this imagery of the enthroned Leo–
Jupiter with the tradition of enthroned popes, after that of Roman emperors
(Figure 65). Thus, in plan as well as in sculptural decoration, the garden loggia
of the Medici villa could represent the dining room of Jupiter, as well as the
Temple of Peace.
The painted decorations eventually executed at the opposite end of the gar-
den loggia (Plate vii) may have cited another all’antica reference to imperial
dining, this time an archeological model. The sprawling pose and cave setting
of Giulio Romano’s painted lunette of Polyphemus are startlingly evocative of
ancient Polyphemus sculpture groups, such as those in the imperial dining grot-
toes at Sperlonga, Baia, and possibly even the Serapeum/Canopus of Hadrian’s
64. Domenico Aimo, Leo X, c. 1518, Santa Maria in Aracoeli, Rome.
Villa (Figures 66–9).90 The pose of Giulio’s Polyphemus is nearly a mirror image
of the ancient sculptural figure leaning back on a rocky outcropping, one arm
draped across the torso, another thrown backward across the rock, with the
head tilted back. There is no evidence that the Raphael school knew any of
these ensembles, nor do there seem to be any literary descriptions or other
imagery recording them, such as ancient gems known to the Renaissance, but
Giulio’s Polyphemus would suggest otherwise, as does the conception of the
fishpond as watery dining pavilion populated with monumental sculptures, dis-
cussed above. Thus, with metastructures for the fishpond as a musaeum-water
theater and the garden loggia as the Coenatio Iovis, the villa’s planners developed
multimedia spaces that could be used for papal dining, with multivalent ancient
references.
65. Raphael school, Pope Clement I, with the features of Leo X, Sala di Costantino,Vatican Palace.
Medici Ancestor Gallery

Sperulo made another proposal for the garden loggia of the villa as a Medici
ancestor gallery; in fact, his major proposal for figural sculpture at the villa is
for a group of about a dozen Medici ancestors to be represented in marble
there, beginning with Giovanni di Bicci. The poet addresses Cardinal Giulio
saying, “You, Giulio, having strolled among your mighty friends, fixing your
eyes on your father and regarding the serene face of your uncle, will admire
the palpable majesty of each, and although your evident virtue needs no spur,
you will want to seem to them to have done well” (221–5). Sperulo specifies,
“let empty places (sedes) be left throughout the proportionate halls for illustri-
ous statues (statuis) of your Medici ancestors, about whom their life-giving
progeny may justly boast” (78–81). His use of the word sedes could have meant
66. Giulio Romano, Polyphemus, fresco on the northeastern wall of the garden loggia
(opposite the Jupiter Ciampolini),Villa Madama.
67. Unknown sixteenth century artist, drawing, probably a copy after a lost preparatory
drawing by Giulio Romano for the Polyphemus fresco, Louvre, Département des Arts
graphiques, inv. 3672.
68. Polyphemus group from the grotto of Tiberius’ villa at Sperlonga, now in the Museo
Archeologico Nazionale, Sperlonga.
69. Grotto of Tiberius’ villa at Sperlonga; view from the platform where the Polyphemus group
was installed.
“places” (e.g. niches) as well as “seats,” so it is not clear whether he intended

seated or standing figures. There is no evidence that ancestor sculptures were
ever begun for the villa. Conceivably, the poet was simply using the concep-
tion of an ancestor gallery to frame his encomium of the family, or suggesting
the use of antique sculptures to represent Medici ancestors metaphorically;
but his words instead suggest that he intended physical sculptures, and literal
likenesses. (It is even possible that they considered sculpting Medici portrait
heads to be attached to headless ancient sculptures.91) Sperulo locates most of
these ancestor sculptures in the villa’s great garden loggia, and in fact this space
was being redesigned around the time of the poem with eighteen new niches
for sculpture – a point to which I will return. These niches average about 5½
feet in height, so the sculptures would presumably have been about life-size,
standing figures.
Sperulo’s proposal for an ancestor gallery all’antica drew on ancient tradi-
tions, including the display of ancestor images in the atria of homes.92 Foremost
among ancient prototypes was Augustus’ collection, familiar to Renaissance
readers from the descriptions by Virgil and Ovid. In the Forum of Augustus,
the emperor mixed figures of his ancestors with selected great men of Rome
to trace his authority back to Rome’s founders; and Virgil envisioned a similar
sculpture collection for him in a bucolic setting in the Georgics.93 Medieval
and earlier Renaissance depictions of uomini famosi sometimes mixed ances-
tors and great men, although such cycles in private palaces and villas were
typically composed of paintings or busts, and most often set in relatively small
rooms such as studioli or libraries.94 Several quattrocento fresco cycles provided
monumental painted models in domestic settings for the scenario Sperulo
was proposing in marble: frescoes in the Ducal Palace in Urbino by Giovanni
Boccati (well known to the young Raphael), in the Casa Panigarola in Milan
(sometimes attributed to Bramante), and in a loggia of the Villa Carducci in
Legnaia, outside Florence, where Andrea del Castagno’s Famous Men and Women
presented fictive sculptures of illustrious figures and ancestors engaged in dis-
course across their fictive niches.95 Sculpted ancestor busts were sometimes
placed in domestic courtyards; notably, Lorenzo had a series of ancient heads
of uomini illustri installed over the doors of the Palazzo Medici courtyard in
Florence.96 It is possible that the drawing for Villa Madama’s courtyard eleva-
tion, with the inset relief bust, represented such a scheme, and another idea in
play for commemorating the Medici forebears (Figure 70).97
By contrast, Sperulo’s proposal to create marble figural sculpture of about a
dozen ancestors was an extravagant one, in keeping with other aspirations for
the scale and scope of this villa, which was perhaps one reason why the figures
were not executed. Another reason was surely the death of Lorenzo, Duke of
Urbino, a couple of months after Sperulo’s poem – the second of the young
capitani whose early deaths dashed Medicean dynastic plans and prompted the
70. Collaborator of Raphael, project for the elevation of the circular courtyard of Villa
Madama, RIBA n. xiii–ii.
Medici to commemorate their family members instead via a funerary chapel

in Florence. As is well known, Cardinal Giulio redirected Michelangelo to
take on this project in the New Sacristy of the family’s parish church of San
Lorenzo in Florence later in 1519, to include tombs for several family members,
and possibly his own.The framework for Michelangelo’s famous ensemble and
the sculptures of seated Medici family members in niches has many significant
resonances with Sperulo’s ideas for the Roman villa (Figures 71, 72).98 A more
extensive Medici ancestor gallery of monumental figural sculpture in niches
and exedrae would be realized beginning c. 1540 in the Sala del Cinquecento
of the Palazzo Vecchio by Baccio Bandinelli and other sculptors (Figure 73);99
and indeed the Medici may have had Bandinelli in mind for the Villa Madama
ancestor gallery while that project was still in play.100 The Roman nobles’ tradi-
tion of displaying antiquities as markers of a family’s ancient lineage has been
contrasted with the emerging taste of Curial patrons for displaying ancient
sculpture for aesthetic and humanistic reasons in the late quattrocento and
early cinquecento.101 Sperulo’s proposal reveals that these two conceptions
could be made to commingle.Although his proposed ancestor gallery remained
unexecuted at the villa, his notion that the Medici should use antiquities to
Romanize themselves and trace their ancestry to the founders of Rome would
indeed be adopted there. Heemskerck documented one exedra of the garden
71. and 72. Michelangelo, Tomb of Giuliano de’ Medici, Duke of Nemours (left) and Tomb of
Lorenzo de’ Medici, Duke of Urbino (right), begun 1519; New Sacristy, San Lorenzo, Florence.
loggia when it was peopled with sculpture, some of which can be identi-
fied (Figures 74, 75); and Giovanni Volpato and Charles-Louis Clerisseau were
among the eighteenth-century visitors to the villa whose fantastical views of
the garden loggia evoke the richness of the sculpture decoration, if not an
accurate record (Figure 76, Plates xviii, xix).
§
Thus, humanists, architects, and other planners generated high-level con-

ceptual structures linking the Monte Mario to the authority of the cross
and Constantine; proposing the hillside as the seat of the Muses and a new
Parnassus; designating the villa as the realm of Venus Genetrix; and casting the
great garden loggia as the Temple of Peace, the dining hall of Jupiter, and an
ancestor gallery. The Monte Mario, the villa complex, or even a single log-
gia could represent multiple concepts simultaneously. And these conceptual
notions could be embodied in many media, from siting, roads, and views to
architectural plan and elevation, and the disposition of sculptures and painted
decoration.
It emerges that all these elements developed in an ongoing dialogue, and
this discourse began remarkably early in the villa’s planning process. Not sur-
prisingly, many of these concepts would evolve considerably throughout the
T HE G E N E RATI V E P O W E R O F MAR B L E S 133
73. Baccio Bandinelli, sculptures of Medici ancestors, Salone del Cinquecento, Palazzo
Vecchio, Florence.
course of planning and building, or fall by the wayside altogether. Sperulo’s

claim that he was involved in choosing antiquities and transporting them
to the villa while its walls were still rising reflects the fact that he actually
was contributing ideas about how to display sculptures and spoils, and per-
haps even searching them out. Consonant with the contemporary climate
of archeological and philological study of the antique, poets as well as archi-
tects and archeologists contributed ideas based on archeological as well as
literary sources. Sperulo’s hortatory ekphrasis of the villa provided a wealth
of ideas, some of which were implemented, such as the prominent instal-
lation of the relief from the Temple of Venus Genetrix, and some of which
were not, such as the ancestor sculptures. Although his proposal for ancestor
sculptures was not realized at the villa, his ideas may have taken root in the
family’s Florentine ensembles instead. And his emphasis on the continuity of
Medicean lineage from the founders and rulers of ancient Rome via their
inheritance of marbles was realized at the villa in the collection of ancient
sculpture and spoils gathered there. His emphasis on Medici romanitas and
rule is directly reflected in specific antiquities and the decorations that would
surround them.
TH E G ENER AT IV E P OW E R OF M A R BLES
Significantly, for many of these metastructures, important antiquities provided

a generative impetus. Considering Sperulo’s proleptic descriptions along with
the actual sculpture and spoils originally at Villa Madama reveals how antiqui-
ties were recontextualized in new ways by Raphael and his collaborators; and
how antiquities were generative for multivalent conceptual programs for the
74. Marten van Heemskerck,Villa Madama, garden loggia, exedra with sculptures including
the Genius Augusti in the center; Berlin, Staatliche Museen Kupferstichkabinett, Inv. Nr. 79 d 2,
Römische Skizzenbücher, ii, fol. 73r.
75. Standing Genius with Cornucopia (so-called Genius Augusti), Museo Archeologico Nazionale
di Napoli, inv. 6053.
villa complex, and for architecture and decoration. It is striking that Sperulo’s
poetic evocation of a marble from Venus Genetrix corresponded to an actual
relief from her temple, which would be the focal point around which an entire
elevation was designed at one end of the garden loggia; and that this loggia that
Sperulo described in terms of the Coenatio Iovis and Temple of Peace would be
reconfigured with an apse at its head to house a colossal enthroned Jupiter at
the opposite end. The Venus Genetrix relief is the most straightforward illus-
tration of this process, but the web of evidence for the other metastructures
suggests that these ideas were under discussion, and evolving rapidly.
These case studies provide valuable, specific examples of how the inclusion
of sculptures and spoils was an impetus for some of the major changes to the
villa’s ground plan. As we have seen, it was in early 1519, when Sperulo was
writing, that many changes to the basic plan were being worked out – changes
76. Charles-Louis Clerisseau, Interior of the Villa Madama, between 1750 and 1755, pen and
brown wash, brush and brown and gray wash, State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg.
that differentiated the two major surviving plans for the villa, U 273a and
U 314a. As proposed in Chapter 4, Raphael’s letter probably dates from around
the same time. Both Sperulo and Raphael discussed ideas that would appear in
the later plan. And true to Sperulo’s word, many of the significant changes in
U 314a involved areas that would accommodate specific sculptures. The gar-
den loggia Sperulo wanted to have filled with ancestor sculptures was indeed
being redesigned around this time with niches for eighteen sculptural figures:
two exedrae housing ten sculpture niches were added (Cf. Figures 57, 58),
although they would eventually be filled with antiquities rather than ancestors.
Also in the garden loggia, the fountain diaeta shown in U 273a and described
by Raphael was converted into an exedra probably intended to house the giant
seated Jupiter Ciampolini, corresponding to Sperulo’s imagery of the Coenatio
Iovis and the Temple of Peace. The Jupiter Ciampolini was probably the reason
for this change.The wall of the inner garden was also modified, replacing seven
small niches with three large ones; the left niche was probably designed to
house the colossal Genius, judging from the perfect scale of the niche for the
sculpture (Figures 77, 78). At the fishpond, the tiers of seating ringing the pond
and facing a proscenium-like wall in U 273a were replaced by the tri-lobed
ambulatory, creating grottoes for sculpture – perhaps to create a musaeum to

house the nine ancient Muses and characterize the site as Parnassus (Figures
53, 57, 58). It is remarkable that this level of attention was given to sculpture by
architects, and so early in the course of their planning.
The planners were therefore assembling sculptures and spoils for the villa,
and using them to generate set pieces of architectural plan, elevation, and
decoration. Some of these constructs were instrumental in formulating design
changes from U 273a to U 314a. What do we know about what sculptures
actually were at the planners’ disposal at this stage? A full treatment of the
problematic vicissitudes of the rich collection of ancient sculpture and spoils
assembled for the Medici papal villa is beyond the scope of the present study,
but a few observations can be brought to bear here.102 The collection was by
no means rich enough at the moment Sperulo was writing to allow them
to populate the plan fully. Beyond his oblique reference to the Muses and
Jovian constructs, Sperulo makes no mention of ancient figural sculptures
for the villa. (Assertions that he mentions figures of Jupiter and Silenus are
erroneous.103) This fact suggests that few significant ancient sculptures had
been collected or earmarked for the villa by early 1519. Neither does Raphael
mention figural sculptures in his description of the villa, although his omis-
sion may reflect epistolary convention, for Pliny’s villa descriptions do not
include figural sculptures either.104 They must have had the Jupiter Ciampolini
and colossal Genius in mind by the time U 314a was drafted, since that plan
seems custom-tailored for those figures. Thus, plans to populate the villa with
sculpture were in process in early 1519, and they were still ongoing in June
1520, as we know from Cardinal Giulio’s letter in response to questions from
Mario Maffei about whether to transfer to the villa sculptures stored at the
Palazzo Medici near Piazza Navona,105 or even make some out of stucco.106
Given Raphael’s papal mandate to collect ancient marbles and stones for the
construction of St. Peter’s, we may assume that as spoils became available they
were known to the planners of both papal projects – basilica and villa. There
was surely discussion of where certain spoils could best be used. These ideas
would have evolved with the changing vicissitudes of both grand projects, and
the availability of antiquities. Sperulo may well have been proposing installa-
tions in the Medici villa for specific spoils that were ultimately used elsewhere
because plans changed, or because he envisioned placing them in sections
of the villa that were never built. New finds and acquisitions must also have
forced changes in plans. I am not suggesting there was a single moment or
phase when plans were adjusted to accommodate sculpture; rather, it seems
to have been an iterative process. U 273a already indicated many niches and
spaces for sculpture, but their placement seems rather generic and does not
correspond to specific works that would actually be installed at the villa, as is
the case with U 314a.
77. Hubert Robert, Draughtsman Sketching at the Villa Madama, which records sculptures still in
situ, including the colossal Genius of the Roman People in the garden niche at right; red chalk
drawing, Thaw Collection, The Pierpont Morgan Library.
78. Genius of the Roman People, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, inv. 5975.
Just as specific sculptures and spoils were driving changes in architectural plan,
they were generative for elevations and for the decorative and iconographic pro-
gram, too. The elevation of the northeast wall of the garden loggia was designed
to accommodate the Venus Genetrix relief, which was embedded in the physical
fabric of the villa, and would later inspire the decorative scheme in the surround-
ing panels. Similarly, the Jupiter Ciampolini at the other end of the loggia was the
point of departure for the architectural plan, and also for the surrounding painted
and stucco decorations, which symbolize Medici rule and Leo as Jupiter.107
This generative use of sculpture and spoils to shape the design atVilla Madama
was clearly understood by Raphael’s contemporaries and successors, a point
later made explicit in the work of Bartolomeo Ammannati.The mid-sixteenth-
century Villa Giulia was the next great papal villa/hospitium built in Rome,
and its designers responded to Raphael’s Medici villa in meaningful ways. Like
Raphael, Ammannati wrote an epistolary description of his project, but this
time the architect went further to specify how the buildings were designed to
incorporate many specific ancient sculpture and architectural spoils.108
Antiquities held special importance for the papacy as signifiers of the continu-
ity of temporal power from the Roman empire to the Christian res publica. Pope
Leo’s brief stipulating that St. Peter’s should be built out of stones excavated from
the ruins of Rome, rather than with imported stones, arose from practical con-
siderations, but also functioned perfectly as metaphor.109 Sperulo’s poem assigns
the same symbolic resonance to the ancient marbles used at the Medici papal
hospitium. As we saw in Chapter 3, he attaches ideological constructs to mar-
bles, such as the antiquities “owed” to the Medici for their gift of peace to the
world; the marbles he uses to trace Medici ancestry to Julius Caesar,Venus, and
the founders of Rome; and the works whose provenances he embellishes with
literary and historical allusions. Moreover, spoils were crucial for the villa on the
Monte Mario because the site had not been built on in antiquity. Sperulo spe-
cifically notes this fact in his description of the site, saying, “I am amazed that no
one before, when great Rome was rising everywhere, chose such an ornament
for himself to augment his fame and provide solace for his existence” (24–6). His
mention of the marbles from the Temple of Venus Genetrix, among other sites,
dignified the villa by tying it to these ancient precincts. Sperulo also metaphori-
cally links the material permanence of marble with the “eternal return” of the
Medici family. Thus, the spoils symbolized not only political and religious vic-
tory, but also the Medicean conquest of time itself.110
But the private possession of sculpture and spoils could also be problematic.
Pliny claimed the recontextualization of important sculpture for public dis-
play to be the task of the benevolent ruler, specifically noting the example of
Vespasian (in contrast to Nero). He further declared the Temple of Peace as the
most appropriate site for them: “about the list of works [of sculpture] I have
referred to, all the most celebrated have now been dedicated by the emperor
Vespasian in the Temple of Peace and his other public buildings; they had been
looted by Nero, who conveyed them all to Rome and arranged them in the
sitting-rooms of his Golden Mansion.”111 Ironically, the Medici villa – which
Sperulo emphasized was being funded by the family – was the kind of private
residence Pliny was critiquing as a site for sculpture.112 Thus the conception of
the villa’s garden loggia as a new Temple of Peace for Leo, the Rex pacificus, and
Sperulo’s conceit that the Venus Genetrix relief was owed to the peace-bringing
Medici were surely conceived as rationalizations for this sculptural display.
Of course, the recontextualization of ancient sculpture and spoils was condi-
tioned by the practical issue of availability. Significant antiquities were not plen-
tiful at this moment, even for the pope with Raphael as his Prefect of Marbles.
The villa’s planners had to work with what they could get, and they rearranged
the pieces into a story about the Medici. Sperulo could recontextualize and
allegorize spoils on paper the same way he built a new sentence with famil-
iar words and literary references, thereby changing their meaning to forge a
Medici narrative, which could be designed into the physical complex.
This evidence that ancient and modern sculptures played a programmatic role
at the Medici papal villa is noteworthy, since scholars of early cinquecento antiq-
uities collections have debated whether or not the works were arranged to con-
stitute iconographic programs.113 In part, this practice followed papal precedent
in the Sculpture Court of the Vatican Belvedere, populated by the figures of the
Laocoön, so-called Cleopatra, and Apollo Belvedere in a loosely configured Virgilian
program.114 At the Medici villa, however, the sculptures and spoils were not limited
to a single-medium plan, but further served a larger purpose as generative impulses
for the metastructures involving architecture and decoration in all media.
This brings us back to the issue of what constituted a program or invention
in the early sixteenth century, discussed at the outset of this chapter. Discussions
of meaning in architecture, especially secular, are sometimes met with skepti-
cism by contemporary historians of architecture, who dismiss such readings as
old-fashioned, unsubstantiated, or impossibly arcane.115 Sperulo’s poem unam-
biguously shows that conceptual frameworks of meaning were being discussed
at an early stage of the villa’s design (whoever invented them, and whether or
not they were all eventually deployed.) His plan, once we decode the language
and references, has all the clarity of a modern corporate white paper, to reprise
the analogy of the previous chapter: it begins with fundamental messages such
as peace and just rule, and proposes specific ways to convey them in a variety of
media. Much of his imagery turns out to be surprisingly common: gods who
come to dine (especially Jupiter and Venus), the site as Parnassus, and the com-
memoration of ancestors. But he has invented many layers of meaning, couched
them masterfully with literary codes, inflected them for the Medici family and
papal Rome, and proposed some concrete ways of actualizing them in the villa.
Fundamentally important for this papal hospitium that functioned as an outpost
of the Vatican, the built environment and decorative imagery needed to convey
clearly these crucial messages – as popes relied on the visual arts to do in the
Vatican itself. The metastructures sketched above certainly would not prompt
any artist to point out a horse to Cardinal Giulio; this imagery was readily appar-
ent to elite viewers. The poet constructs a conceptual framework, and, together
with other planners, proposes set pieces to express a variety of meanings.
Thus, literary, archeological, and ideological constructs were embodied in
the villa complex, from architectural plan and elevation to sculpture, spoils, and
wall decoration. Significantly, these metastructures of word and image were
formulated from the earliest stages of design. The contribution of ideas from
different knowledge systems was the product of collaboration and negotia-
tion among a group of specialists; the next chapter examines the roles of these
various players, and the processes by which they generated these conceptual
structures.
CHAPTER SIX
DYNAMIC DESIGN
F r o m t h e a na ly s i s o f p o e t ry a n d p r o s e t e x t s , g r o u n d
plans, and antiquities, it emerges that the Medici villa was designed via
an intense collaboration and cross-fertilization of ideas among architects and
humanists. As we have seen, they conceived multivalent frameworks of word
and image that could be realized in the villa complex at many stages of design
and execution, from ground plans to decorations. It has long been recog-
nized that Raphael was assisted in the villa project by Antonio da Sangallo the
Younger, Giovan Francesco da Sangallo, Giulio Romano, and other talented
artists and architects whose drawings document their presence in Raphael’s
workshop. Likewise, their engaged Medici patrons certainly provided ideas.This
analysis of texts, notably Sperulo’s poem, reveals the involvement of human-
ists, who contributed to functional as well as visual and spatial constructs, and
did so surprisingly early in the planning process. This chapter reconsiders the
roles of architect and so-called humanist advisor, who were engaged in what
I characterize as an iterative, collaborative design process that extended over
the long time period such a building project required. This scenario of crea-
tive collaboration is at odds with the concept of a building or even a poem as
an autonomous work of art, which raises interesting questions of architectural
authorship and the nature of invention in the early cinquecento, a pivotal time
for the role of the architect.
142
Reconfiguring the roles of artists and advisors 143
REC O N F I G U R IN G T H E ROL E S OF A RTISTS AND ADVISO RS
Collaboration was a hallmark of Raphael’s working methods, as recent

scholarship has recognized – a necessity given the staggering array of colossal
projects he directed simultaneously; but there is a dearth of evidence about
the specific nature of his interactions with collaborators, within the workshop
and beyond.1 He had an extraordinary ability to attract and develop brilliant
artists, and he seemed comfortable giving some of them an unusual degree
of creative control, most famously his right-hand assistant Giulio Romano.
Raphael’s Louvre self-portrait with another man, perhaps Giulio, seems to
illustrate the nature of this dynamic with his younger associates (Figure 79).2
Celio Calcagnini (1479–1541), a humanist and former Ferrarese ambassador to
the Holy See, remarked of Raphael that, despite his astounding achievements,
“He is so far from preening because of it that, to the contrary, he spontaneously
makes himself accessible and friendly to all, shunning no one’s admonition or
discussion, since no one rejoices more readily than he that his plans are called
into doubt or dispute, and thinks that the reward of life is to be taught and to
teach.”3 This letter was written late in Raphael’s life (1519–20) and perhaps
amplified after his death, so we may take the tribute with a grain of salt, but
praise for taking constructive criticism is uncommon, suggesting that Raphael
actually did have a reputation for being receptive to his associates’ ideas and
accommodating criticism in the design process.
Raphael surely developed collaborative design processes suited to colossal
commissions from his earliest Roman papal projects in the Vatican Stanze, where
he worked with Inghirami, among other humanists, as well as Bramante, archi-
tect of the “new Rome” rising on either side of the papal rooms, and Pope
Julius himself. In fact, the painted imagery in Julius II’s private library was coor-
dinated with the partially built structures of new St. Peter’s and the Belvedere
Courtyard, views to specific topographic markers, and sculpture installations in
the Belvedere Statue Court – all of which proclaimed coordinated messages
of the Vatican as a new Parnassus, Pope Julius as Apollo, and his new Christian
Rome as the fulfillment of learning.4 Scholars have worked to tease out the
contributions of the collaborators in devising this scheme in the absence of
much hard evidence.5 In any case, this project was surely crucial in develop-
ing Raphael’s ability to work with a range of specialists to map ideas across
representational and spatial media. Beginning with this project, his brilliance in
visual–verbal collaboration and his aptitude for thinking in many media on a
grand scale were surely among the talents that powered his meteoric rise from
painter to Rome’s foremost artist-architect and impresario. Although Inghirami
died in September 1516, before planning for the colossal-scale Medici villa was
under way, he had been an essential mentor to Raphael, whose many por-
traits suggest the artist’s debt to his humanist friend.6 Inghirami was also an
144 DYNAM I C DE S I G N
79. Raphael, Self-Portrait (with Giulio Romano?), 1518–20, Louvre.
important image-maker for the Medici; he had spent time in Florence as a guest
of Lorenzo the Magnificent, where he perhaps absorbed the Medici penchant
for representing brilliant visual–verbal conceits in many media, from poetry and
song to paintings and festivals, and he put these talents to work conceiving the
Medici festivities on the Campidoglio in 1513.7
What is known about Raphael’s working process suggests that it varied by
project and collaborator.8 By the time he began work on the Medici villa,
in addition to managing his own workshop, Raphael had several years of
experience in the Fabbrica of St. Peter’s; there, despite his role as Chief Architect,
he had to collaborate with other architects and negotiate his way through a
large and hierarchical system run by the powerful project manager Giuliano
Leno (c. 1478–1530).9 The Medici villa enabled a very different style of working;
as Raphael’s one opportunity to design a freestanding building in its landscape
from its inception, the project allowed him greater creative and organizational
freedom than at St. Peter’s, although even here he had to contend with other
forces, as we have seen with the pugnacious Sperulo. The many ground plans
drafted by Antonio da Sangallo and Giovan Francesco da Sangallo document
their participation in the project, but leave unresolved questions about their
contributions to its ideation. In general, Raphael and Antonio da Sangallo the
Younger were a complementary pair, thanks to Raphael’s fertile inventiveness
and scenographic vision, and Sangallo’s precise draftsmanship and structural
expertise. Sangallo had been named co-adiutore of St. Peter’s in 1518, and thus the
two worked in tandem on both projects. At the villa, Sangallo evidently handled
the difficult, sloping site, which was prone to landslides, based on his execution
of U 314a and a number of studies preliminary to it, although the contribution
of each architect to the project remains unclear.10
For his part, Sperulo distilled a large dose of Medicean ideology into a gen-
eral program of sculptures, spoils, and mural paintings that would constitute a
Medici res gestae, layering their family history onto that of Rome. His task was
to devise overarching conceptual, decorative, and functional constructs, with-
out working them out in specific detail. His poem furnishes conceptual pro-
posals at a formative early stage of the design process, and it is no surprise that
these ideas would have evolved considerably during the execution of the villa.
As we saw, his most timely and successful proposals were his plans for sculptural
set pieces, formulated in tandem with evolving ground plans and elevations.
By contrast, his proposed mural paintings were never executed; changes in the
political scene would have rendered them obsolete by the time the villa was
built and decorated.11 Indeed, the iconography of paintings was often the last
piece of an ensemble to be worked out.12 The well-known letters of Cardinal
Giulio to Mario Maffei in June 1520 show that they were discussing specific
iconographic content a year after Sperulo wrote his poem – so the planning
was long and collaborative indeed.13
The idea that a minor humanist such as Sperulo was proposing ideas to his
patron and especially to an artist of Raphael’s stature challenges our assump-
tions about the creative process. In fact, Maffei, better known as a Medici
agent, provides concrete evidence of a minor humanist playing a similarly
important role, and in the same environment.14 Like Sperulo, Maffei was
also a humanist and occasional diplomat, active in the papal Curia and in
Roman humanist circles. The two surviving letters of Cardinal Giulio to
Maffei of June 1520 reveal that he served as a sort of project manager for
the villa during Giulio’s absences from Rome. Maffei’s responsibilities there
ranged from proposing iconography and managing artists – notably Giulio
Romano and Giovanni da Udine who were battling for control of Raphael’s
workshop after his death – to designing hydraulics and planting trees. Maffei
had an easy rapport with Cardinal Giulio, who looked forward to his witty
missives, and the two enjoyed an uneven amicitia,15 although Maffei’s per-
sonal letters reveal the ongoing anxiety of a courtier strategizing to please
his patron and secure his position, and hoping for favors in return, such as
rooms in the Vatican and a red hat. (Particularly interesting is Maffei’s ongo-
ing anxiety about appropriate symbolic gifts for his patron, from fruit and
candles to a pair of peacocks sent by his nephew from Volterra, one of which
falls ill, prompting a string of desperate reports on the bird’s health.16) Even
before his work at Villa Madama, Maffei had been valued in Roman circles
for his management of building projects, including work at St. Peter’s. And
as we have seen, Maffei devoted his poetry as well as physical energies to
his own villas in Rome and Volterra. His correspondence with his nephew
richly documents his practical experience renovating his family villa in
Volterra and his love of plantings, although, frustratingly, his letters make
no mention of his work on the Medici villa beyond a reference to planting
trees and some pruning.17 We lack sufficient evidence to frame the dates of
Maffei’s and Sperulo’s work at the villa.18 It is possible, though improbable,
that Maffei was Sperulo’s successor; more likely, since their strengths lay in
different areas, the two were active in different capacities.19
Other humanists and artists were surely involved in various capacities,
too. The simultaneous planning for projects by the same Medici patrons at
Villa Madama, the Sala di Costantino, San Lorenzo, and the villa of Poggio
a Caiano certainly fostered exchange among them.20 For example, Paolo
Giovio’s responsibility for the program of frescoes at Poggio begun in 1519
places him among the group of Medici image-makers at exactly the same
moment, and in a role similar to that of Sperulo and Maffei.21 Although
Giovio was away from Rome in early 1519 when Sperulo must have been
writing his poem, one can imagine that Giovio, with his long-standing
interest in villeggiatura and villa description, contributed to and benefited
from verbal and written interchanges of ideas about villa building – per-
haps while he was still in Rome, or when he was with Cardinal Giulio
in Florence.22 Ariosto was surely contributing ideas in both locations; he
visited the dying Duke Lorenzo de’ Medici in Florence in late February
1519, which prompted him to write a poem about self-renewing laurel that
would be used as the basis of decorations for Poggio,23 but during the
period of the papal villa’s design he was based in Rome, where he collabo-
rated with Raphael to stage I suppositi in the Vatican in early March 1519.
Pietro Bembo’s prominent position as Pope Leo’s Secretary of Briefs placed

him in the thick of Curial projects throughout this period; between his
friendship with Raphael, their collaboration on Cardinal Bibbiena’s stufetta,
and Bembo’s interest in villeggiatura, it would be surprising if he had not
been involved in conversations planning the Medici villa.24 Pierio Valeriano,
who served as Cardinal Giulio’s secretary and who set his dialogue about
the vernacular in the garden of Giulio’s villa, was likely among the let-
terati privy to its planning as well. Similarly, we may only hypothesize that
another contributor to this discourse may have been Raphael’s great friend
Baldassare Castiglione, who collaborated to present a literary portrait of
Raphael’s ideas in the letter to Leo X and the certa Idea letter, and who was
probably intended to polish Raphael’s letter describing the villa, of which
he owned a copy.25 Castiglione was absent from Rome from mid-1516 until
late May 1519, but he quickly got up to speed on Raphael’s projects at first
hand on his return and began promoting them; by mid-June, he had dined
with Pope Leo at the construction site of the villa and written to Isabella
d’Este describing the “excellentissima” villa project and Raphael’s superla-
tive new use of stucco in the Vatican Logge.26 We may imagine the mental
storehouse of Medici and papal imagery known to this cohort, who could
creatively trade and translate ideas for different projects and settings. And if,
in the initial stages of the project, the idea for a papal hospitium was under
consideration by the time of the April 1516 Tivoli field trip, then Raphael,
Castiglione, Bembo, and their other humanist friends may well have dis-
cussed archeological and textual remains of Tiburtine villeggiatura specifi-
cally in connection with the Medici villa.
This collaborative effort also included the close participation of its Medici
patrons. Pope Leo and Cardinal Giulio, raised in the sophisticated Laurentian
cultural milieu that included Poliziano, Botticelli, Bertoldo, Michelangelo, and
the Sangallos, were well versed in matters of collaboration among patrons,
humanists, artists, and architects. The erudite Leo was known for his facility in
neo-Latin discourse with elite humanist colleagues, and Cardinal Giulio was
an astute and unusually engaged patron of the visual arts, as Reiss has empha-
sized, further suggesting that he surely pored over the villa plans as he did
the better-documented Florentine projects of Michelangelo.27 Furthermore,
Giulio’s diplomatic responsibilities as vice chancellor of the church from 1517
made it his duty to ensure that the Medici papal hospitium would be “on mes-
sage” with the Vatican communications strategy, as well as family dynastic ide-
ology. Although Giulio’s responsibilities in Florence required him to spend
considerable time away from Rome during the villa project, his letters to
Mario Maffei document the remarkable extent to which the patron remained
involved in many aspects of the villa’s planning, down to practical matters at
80. Raphael school, Foundation of Old Saint Peter’s and Constantine’s Presentation of the Plan
to Pope Silvester (with the features of Antonio da Sangallo and Clement VII, respectively),
Sala di Costantino,Vatican Palace.
the construction site.28 Sperulo’s dedicatory letter evokes a technical passage in

Vitruvius about lime-slaking, which was certainly known to the visual artists
and probably to Giulio, who was so interested in the process of stucco facture
that he was even familiar with the stucco tools on site; this reference illustrates
the intersection of literary, conceptual, and artisanal aspects of this collabora-
tive process.29 The Raphael school’s monochrome dado painting in the Sala
di Costantino depicting Antonio da Sangallo presenting the plan of St. Peter’s
to Pope Clement (a visual analogue for Constantine presenting his plan for
the basilica to Pope Silvester) sets this presentation at the worksite – perhaps a
reflection of Clement’s engagement with the architectural process, at times via
site visits (Figure 80).
In addition to Sperulo’s carefully crafted poetic proposal, more informal
oral exchanges surely characterized the design process (and Sperulo’s poem
itself may have benefited from the input and emendation of colleagues).30
We may imagine a roomful of architects, humanists, and occasionally patrons
standing over the plans, discussing conceptual and spatial structures and their
literary and archeological sources.The well-known early seicento paintings of
Michelangelo presenting plans and models to Leo X and Paul IV (Figures 81,
82), despite being anachronistic inventions commissioned by the Buonarroti
family, probably reflect the general practice of such gatherings, often involv-
ing the participation of artist, patrons, and many advisors. That Antonio da
Sangallo jotted a significant passage about the parts of a villa from Columella’s
De re rustica onto a ground plan for an ideal villa, or Villa Madama itself, sug-
gests just such a scenario.31 The presence of so many of these players under
the Vatican roof fostered impromptu exchanges, too, as we see in a letter by
Pietro Bembo to Cardinal Bibbiena, in which he interrupts himself to say that
Raphael has just popped in asking for more historie to paint in the Cardinal’s
stufetta – which is additionally a fascinating snapshot of the piecemeal way

projects could proceed.32 When Cardinal Giulio assumed the papacy, Maffei
began lobbying for rooms in the Vatican, complaining in letters to his nephew
that he needed them to do his work; while he waited for them to become
available, he would take meals with the famiglia there during the day.33 The
role of verbal communication is noteworthy here; the sparse surviving docu-
mentation for the villa’s design may in part reflect the collaborative brain-
storming by planners who worked together face to face.34
This dialogic environment illustrates why the term humanist advisor can be a
misnomer, since it suggests a one-way flow of advice. In part, this is a function
of the surviving evidence, notably written iconographic programs from the
mid to late sixteenth century for complex, abstruse humanist schemes, which
suggest a clear split between the poetic invention of an iconographic advisor
and the execution by an artist.35 Many discussions of the roles of patrons, advi-
sors, and artists in this period characterize the design process in such one-way
terms, from the patron as the instigator and/or advisor as ideator, to the artist as
executant. Salvatore Settis discusses the roles of collaborators in terms borrowed
from the ars rhetorica, an analogy that builds on Alberti’s exhortation to use rhe-
torical models as the basis of pictorial composition, and Baxandall’s analysis of
it; and Settis posits, if not a specific parallel, an epistemological similarity in the
way orators and painters designate phases of creating. He simplifies this pro-
cess to the rhetorical categories of inventio, dispositio, and compositio, which he
loosely associates with the patron, advisor, and artist, respectively, although he
acknowledges that the “alchemy” of participants was in reality more complex.36
Building on this model, Antonio Pinelli associates the trio of patron, advisor,
and artist with intention, invention, and artifice, respectively.37 Reiss character-
izes the exchange between patron and artists as a “multi-lane highway.”38
81. Jacopo Chimenti da Empoli, Michelangelo Presenting Pope Leo X and Cardinal Giulio de’
Medici his Models for the Façade of San Lorenzo and the Cappella Medicea, and his Project Drawing
for the Biblioteca Laurenziana, detail, Florence, Casa Buonarroti.
Another instance of this sort of interchange among a network of collabo-

rators occurred in the circle of Raffaelle Riario during the planning of the
Cancelleria, as Margaret Daly Davis has shown. Humanists and architects
worked together on an edition of Vitruvius and the revival of ancient theater,
an enterprise with roots in the household of Girolamo Riario (where Luca
Pacioli described the collaboration among figures “de diverse faculta”) and
in the court of Urbino.39 In each of these cases, the humanists’ contribution
seems to have been directed toward clarifying and emulating Vitruvian formal
prescriptions, rather than generating the sort of conceptual ideas I have traced
at the Medici villa. Nonetheless, these examples suggest that such visual–verbal
collaboration in the architectural design process may have been a widespread
and varied practice.
Most cases of documented exchange between artist and advisor are lim-
ited to painting and sculpture, and to late-stage details of iconography.40
82. Domenico Cresti da Passignano, Michelangelo Presenting his Model to Pope Paul IV, detail,
Florence, Casa Buonarroti.
Federico Zuccaro, who worked with many illustrious humanists to develop

his painted schemes, illustrated this kind of exchange in a drawing of him-
self with the humanist Vincenzo Borghini working out inventions for the
cupola frescoes in the Florentine Duomo (Figure 83). Both figures point
at a book open on the table, and Borghini also gestures at the scale model
of one section of the dome – or perhaps at the actual Duomo just outside
the window, while Zuccaro holds a rolled drawing. They are accompanied
by a sketchy female figure, probably a personification of invention, and the
sleeping Giorgio Vasari, reflecting his contribution to the project until his
death. Thus, Zuccaro depicts the process of invention as a dialogue; but
unlike the scenario at Villa Madama, the building was built and the spatial
parameters were firmly in place, and the dialogue is about the comparatively
late-stage details of iconography.41 None of these scenarios or approaches is
exactly like the collaborative modus operandi we have seen among the plan-
ners of Villa Madama, who generated concept and design in an iterative
process, in ongoing dialogue with each other.
83. Federico Zuccaro, Federico Zuccaro and Vincenzo Borghini Discuss the Decorative Program for
the Dome of Florence Cathedral, Uffizi, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe, 11043f.
PO ETRY A S D E S IG N TOOL
This portrait of collaboration among architects and wordsmiths raises sev-

eral basic questions. What constituted architectural design in early sixteenth-
century terms? Would Raphael and his colleagues have distinguished between
what we might call an “intellectual” and “formal” plan for the villa? Can we
truly say that a poet was engaged in architectural design, and that poetry could
be a design tool? The evidence presented here for a dialectical design pro-
cess substantiates the conclusion that language and text were not ancillary to
Renaissance architectural design, but could be an integral part of it. It would
be artificial to separate the humanists’ formulation of conceptual structures
from the visual and spatial tasks of architectural design, since both occurred
in tandem. Although Sperulo could not literally “construct” anything, he was
doing more than contributing a metaphorical poem; his proposals were fac-
tored into the design process, so that architectural plans evolved in dialogue
P erforming the plans 153
with the poet’s ideas. Moreover, although Sperulo’s approach to ideation was
mediated by literature, his purview included physical as well as conceptual
aspects of the project: choosing and determining the placement of signifi-
cant marbles, which in turn drove changes to ground plans and elevations.
Of course, the poet was unconcerned with fundamental architectural issues
such as structure, the disposition of space, or the properties of materials. But
Sperulo’s claim that he was measuring columns and directing the architects
to plan the scale of rooms according to his selection of sculptures and spoils,
however exaggerated, suggests that he was aware of these issues, presumably
because he was present for discussions of them.42 In sum, the poet was engaged
in imaginative activity that contributed to architectural elements of design,
which is to say that he did indeed participate in the design process. This is not
to suggest that Sperulo was embedded in the project, nor to equate the signifi-
cance of his contributions with those of the architects. What these findings do
show is that Renaissance design was not an autonomous discourse exclusively
concerned with spatial, structural, and stylistic issues; rather, it could encompass
varied voices. Architectural planning, now as then, is a socially complex activ-
ity, involving a range of services, functions, and professionals.This study reveals
that Renaissance architectural design could be a collective process engaging
diverse practitioners and their tools of both word and image – text and draw-
ings – as complementary modes for proposing ideas, and for developing design.
PERF O RM I N G T H E P L A N S
This dynamic collaboration occurred in a performative arena. Much of the

evidence discussed so far – the internal evidence in the poems on the Medici
villa by Sperulo, Tebaldeo, Vida, and Equicola, and the context of contempo-
rary professional and social practice – points to the fact that these works were
intended to be recited at a convivium.43 That several poems and a letter by the
architect himself were all written in the early phases of construction suggest
the possibility of a coordinated campaign. The practice of coordinating poems
describing a building as the centerpiece of a convivium was familiar in Rome,
from the gatherings of Pietro Riario to those of Agostino Chigi, so it is difficult
to imagine that the works describing the prestigious Medici papal hospitium did
not merit a similar event. The interlocutors in Valeriano’s dialogue tell us that
Cardinal Giulio held such dinners at his unfinished villa, and that he preferred
his humanist gatherings to be productive.44 Vida praises the Medici construc-
tion site, and Goritz for visiting it, suggesting that Goritz was there with them,
and the poem served to flatter both patrons at once. Sperulo says to Cardinal
Giulio, “I want to be surpassed in praising you” (dedicatory letter, §4), implying
that other panegyrics will follow; perhaps, like the convivium at Chigi’s villa,
shorter poems responded to longer ones. Sperulo’s praeteritio setting aside the
very items in Raphael’s letter concludes by saying “All this better anon” (391),
which suggests that Raphael’s epistle would follow – an example of the practice
of poetic correspondence. These works were surely performed at one or more
convivia; perhaps held where Sperulo’s references to this or that marble could
have been spoken in front of the actual pieces, or at the villa’s site.
Indeed oral publication of poetry was one of its social functions.45 At
dinners and other social gatherings, poetry could be read aloud or recited
from memory, in its entirety or by presenting sections of longer works.46 The
epideictic and deliberative oratory favored by Sperulo traditionally had a
social function, presumably reflecting this role of poetry. Sperulo’s tasks prob-
ably ran the gamut from informal conversation to recitation, and eventually
the recording of his verse in a presentation manuscript. The intended audi-
ence of the poetry by Sperulo and others, and surely Raphael’s letter, too, was
Cardinal Giulio.47 Raphael and his artists did not read Latin, nor have time
to pore over proposals in hexameters; presumably the real exchange of ideas
and collaboration took place verbally in the workshop and in impromptu
corridor-chats in the Vatican, as well as in convivia. Sperulo’s poem could
have been recorded in writing before or after its performance; written and
oral publication often worked in tandem, or even as an iterative dialogue.48
Recording single poems in manuscript form was a typical product of such
events,49 and patrons sometimes requested a manuscript copy of verbal pre
sentations.50 That Sperulo’s villa poem was recorded in a luxurious leather-
bound edition as a high-quality illuminated manuscript with Giulio’s arms
would indeed suggest that the manuscript was a request from Cardinal Giulio
(see Appendix ii). That it was produced as a pocket-sized booklet surely
suggests it was intended for transport, like personal devotional books, con-
temporary guidebooks to Rome, or the novel libelli portatiles of classical and
contemporary literature that Aldus Manutius had introduced in 1501.
The composition and recitation of poetry often served to mark specific
events, as described in Chapter 2, just as Statius and fellow poets had been
invited to mark special occasions with poetry recitations at banquets at
Domitian’s court. Riccardo Pacciani speculated that Sperulo’s poem may have
been intended to mark the inauguration of work at the villa site, in his analysis
of a letter of 13 March 1519 by the Este agent in Rome reporting that the pope
planned to spend 40,000 ducats on his villa; Shearman later showed this to be
impossible, but Pacciani may have been on to something in linking the poem
to an event.51 The anniversary of Leo’s elevation (11 March) or the inaugura-
tion of a new phase of work at the villa related to the initiation of the new plan
U 314a could have been the impetus for composing verse and prose descrip-
tions, and for a gathering. Most likely, Cardinal Giulio convened a group when
he wanted to check on the progress of his villa or prompt the planners for
ideas and updates on the plans. An ambiguously worded letter reports that
Collaboration and competition 155
Giulio and/or Leo rode to the villa the morning of 15 January 1519;52 and just
a week later, Giulio left Rome for a few months to tend to the ailing Lorenzo
in Florence.53 Since the 1 March date of Sperulo’s manuscript is a terminus,
and since the poem refers to Duke Lorenzo as a vital force, it was probably
written before the gravity of Lorenzo’s illness was widely known; therefore,
the composition of the poem and a putative convivium may have occurred
by mid-January of 1519, and the manuscript have been produced thereafter.54
This performative culture was a direct revival of ancient poetic tradition, but
Renaissance artists and patrons evidently harnessed this practice for productive
purposes.55 Thus, design could be a performative, and even improvisational
process, involving poets skilled at presenting their ideas in silvae (representa-
tions of poetic inspiration and raw material ready to be worked up) and art-
ists generating ground plans, drawings for decorations, and even prose. That
poets often recited their works is well known; literary performance was not
a working habit for architects, although one could construe an architect’s site
walk-through as performance. If Raphael did recite his letter in an event on
the Monte Mario, then his epistolary walk-through of the villa was not only
literary metaphor but a schematic for embodied experience, which opens a
new interpretation of his letter as a script for performing the plans.
C O LLABO R AT ION A N D C OMP E T IT IO N
Sperulo’s poem also exposes a less convivial side of this collaboration: it could
be sharply agonistic.56 His authorial personifications as the prophets Tiber and
Hephaestus/Vulcan, also a sculptor-architect, proclaim his role as advisor, even
if they perhaps exaggerate his actual importance. This boastful rhetoric reflects
the aggressive climate of competition and self-promotion engendered by the
constant jockeying for patronage. Humanists likened their own professional
arena to Olympic competition,57 and indeed, multiple poets may have con-
tributed their ideas for the villa as competition pieces. Sperulo’s reputation
would be gauged by comparing his poem to the others describing the Medici
villa, as well as to earlier works of his Roman humanist colleagues, notably the
poems about the Palazzo dei Conservatori decorations and the Chigi villa.
This culture of competition was not limited to humanists; artists often crit-
icized and undermined their competitors to bolster their own reputations,
get jobs, or maintain creative control. Raphael did not have to worry about
getting work at this point in his career, but he did have other concerns. At
the same time he was designing the villa, he was facing a daunting challenge
from his rival Sebastiano del Piombo, who was aided by Michelangelo, for
the reputation of top painter in Rome. While Sebastiano and Raphael were
painting their scenes of the Raising of Lazarus and the Transfiguration commis-
sioned by Cardinal Giulio for the Cathedral of Narbonne, Raphael actively
campaigned to keep the two works from being seen together in the criti-
cal, discerning environment of Rome.58 (Michelangelo resorted to even more
underhand and shameless machinations to discredit competitors and even
collaborators to keep control of his projects.) Despite Raphael’s reputation
for collaboration and congeniality, his role as Chief Architect of St. Peter’s
required a shrewd ability to navigate the politics of the Fabbrica to advance his
ideas. Criticism was part of the ongoing design process at St. Peter’s, as Bram
Kempers reminds us; the response to plans, whether positive, neutral, or nega-
tive, had an important effect on subsequent rounds of plans, as well as on their
reception.59 Significantly, even artists at the level of Raphael and Michelangelo
had to fight for their ideas and control of their projects. Like other artists, they
enlisted powerful intermediaries, or even went to the patron directly to attain
their goals. Agosti has proposed that Giovio was actually the deus ex machina
behind the Raphael–Sebastiano rivalry, spurring Cardinal Giulio to pit them
against each other.60 Whether the idea came from Giovio or Giulio himself,
this intense competition not only was a fact of life among high-powered pro-
fessionals, but was actively encouraged and even staged by their patrons.
This ruthless arena is the setting for what I see as Sperulo’s challenge to
Raphael. Rather than the more familiar scenario of competing poets or
painters, here instead we have a notable instance of a wordsmith confront-
ing an artist. Sperulo’s abrasive challenges to Raphael suggest a certain anxi-
ety of influence. Surprisingly, the poet never acknowledges Raphael as the
villa’s architect, or as anything other than a painter; Sperulo’s poem relegates
Raphael to executing the directives of Father Tiber – that is, the poet himself.
Sperulo’s spokesperson Hephaestus – the rival of master craftsman Daedalus –
was another coded challenge that could not have been lost on his listeners.61
Additionally, Sperulo takes on the role of critic when he challenges Raphael
about where to place a sculpture of Lorenzo/Apollo among the Muses, which
highlighted a hole in the sculpture collection and perhaps one in the archi-
tect’s plan as well. In fact, there was a clear element of one-upmanship in the
very fact of writing apostrophes to Raphael in a language in which the art-
ist was not proficient. Perhaps Sperulo’s downplaying of Raphael’s authority
reflected the poet’s inexperience at working on such a large and complex
architectural project. More likely, it was a gambit to gain power in the project
and favor with Cardinal Giulio. Perhaps the poet was actually making a bid to
be chosen as site boss, like his poetic alter ego, although his skills were hardly
suited for the role. Whatever his motives, issuing directions to the architect
and critiquing flaws in his plan in a neo-Latin work directed to the patron
and other advisors reveal Sperulo as an opportunistic tactician.
Sperulo’s maneuver was not simply careerist jockeying, however, but
reflected a larger issue: the question of who should control the process of
invention. Devising conceptual invenzioni was traditionally a job of humanists,
A uthorship and building practice 157
and we have seen how Sperulo formulated metastructures of word and image
involving specific antiquities and proposed murals. But this practice of using
sculpture set pieces to generate architectural plan and elevation conflated
traditional roles of advisor and architect. (This crossover was surely compli-
cated by the fact that the poet was proposing ancient sculptural ensembles to
Raphael, the Prefect of Marbles.) Sperulo effectively petitions their mutual
patron to keep Raphael in his place as a painter-executor, and leave the
intellectual work formulating metastructures to the humanist. Therefore, his
poem tells us that the decision of who controlled the intellectual work of
invention – architect or humanist – could be open to debate; and that the
invention of the villa was understood to encompass verbal narrative as well
as visual/spatial plans. This challenge to control invention is a striking mani-
festation of the paragonal competition between word and image. But in this
scenario, the rivalry is not only theoretical, but real: poets claiming to build
with words actually were contributing ideas to the architects. Thus, Sperulo’s
challenge to Raphael provides a revealing episode in the long-running strug-
gle for primacy between the sister arts of word and image.
AU TH O RS H IP A N D BU IL D IN G P R AC T IC E
These tensions were intensified by the changing roles of artists and architects –
changes for which Raphael provided a notable impetus. Indeed, at this pivotal
time in the early sixteenth century, leading artists were increasingly understood
to be inventive creative powers, on an intellectual par with literary colleagues,
and appreciated for their ideas, which could be separated from execution.
The emphasis on theoretical notions of disegno led to a separation of idea and
facture in artistic practice: that is, the act of art could be equated with disegno
or Idea rather than execution.62 Raphael was instrumental in facilitating this
split; as noted previously, his solution to the burdens of success and the pres-
sure of many simultaneous projects involved giving more latitude to assistants
and associates than most artists up to that point. At the same time, architec-
ture was beginning to shed its image as a manual practice, and notions of the
architect as author were gaining ground.63 Of course, there have been various
types of architect-authors from Vitruvius to Aldo Rossi; Marvin Trachtenberg
has proposed that Alberti was responsible for the modern invention of
the architect as author, pointing out the affinity of Albertian thought and
modern architectural megalomania.64 Also, historians in recent decades have
problematized the notion of architectural authorship by contrasting individ-
ual and collaborative paradigms, drawing on studies of literature; many writ-
ings on modern architecture have rejected the model of the heroic architect,
which ignores collaboration as a sort of “family secret,” to shine a light on
collaborative modes of architectural practice that variously engage engineers,
builders, patrons, partners, and critics.65 Rather than thinking of authorship

and collaboration as dichotomous, this analysis suggests that individual and
collective paradigms of authorship could coexist, even in the same project.
Raphael claimed for himself the role of architect-author of the villa with his
Plinian letter description of his planned estate; and contemporaries includ-
ing Castiglione referred to the villa as Raphael’s, notwithstanding the num-
ber of contributors to its ideation.66 Yet Raphael participated in a collective
approach to design (either willingly or by necessity) at every stage of the
process. We may think of the villa as “a Raphael” in the sense of a product of
the Raphael workshop, as Renaissance audiences did, further acknowledg-
ing that multiple, not always harmonious voices were effectively part of the
enterprise.67 It is revealing that on the one hand, in the corporate environ-
ment of the St. Peter’s Fabbrica, designed to function over the long term
despite a revolving roster of chief architects, Sangallo took the novel step of
labeling drawings to distinguish individual architects’ ideas and contributions
to the project – a marker of emerging notions of the architect-author; yet at
the Medici villa, he did no such thing. Presumably, the collective process of
ideation and drafting for both projects was a given, as was the understanding
that the Medici villa was Raphael’s. In both cases, designs attributed to the
chief architect as author encompass input from many other people, eliding
boundaries between individual attribution and collective authorship.
This evidence for the dynamic planning process further suggests that we
should revise traditional notions of artistic intentionality in this environment,
again adapting methodologies from contemporary editorial theorists who
have called into question the notion of authorial intention in text.68 This study
focuses on discrete periods for which we have surviving evidence, but this is
not to suggest that any one moment was a determining point of the project.
Rather, there were many such instances, and the design of the villa was iterative
over the course of the project.Thus, rather than approaching ground plans and
documents as static decrees of “intention” fixed at an initial point or any other
given moment, we may think of a transformative model of planning, which
allows for the collective processes of design, construction, and decoration, with
evolving, even conflicting visions along the way.69 Moreover, ideation emerges
as a collective process of negotiation. Ackerman’s characterization of design as
a transactional field is apt here: an “open field system in which architectural
decisions are made through an unlimited number of transactions among a
variety of people … interested in the making of a particular building.”70
The transforming power of time is a fundamental factor in such a colos-
sal endeavor as the Medici villa complex. The planned scale and scope of the
project were enormous, encompassing the excavation of the rugged, steep
hillside, terracing of the landscape, planting extensive gardens, hydraulic engi-
neering to tap sources, and installing water and drainage conduits for baths,
pools, and fountains, as well as building and decorating the villa itself, with its
rich freight of decorations and marbles.Thus, the villa’s creators knew from the
start that this was a grand projet that would involve them for years. At a practi-
cal level, patrons and architects alike recognized they might not survive to see
the completion of such a large project. Building planners routinely ensured
that their ideas were recorded for posterity in plans, medals, and models, as
well as in descriptions, in the hope that these ideas would be carried forward
by their successors, and in any event would be known to future generations.71
The descriptions by Raphael, Sperulo, and other poets celebrating unbuilt or
half-built structures served this documentary function too, and were part of
the representational system by which architecture was presented. (It was fitting
that poets often evoked the poetic silvae symbolizing improvisation and unfin-
ished raw material as models for these ekphrases of the unbuilt or unfinished.)
Building over long periods of time had important implications for architec-
tural practice, as many scholars have analyzed.72 Ackerman proposed a biological
metaphor for the design process, musing that:
Perhaps the character of Renaissance architecture owes much to the
fact that its monuments started, not from a complete idea, fixed in the
symbolism of the blueprint, but from flexible impressions constantly
susceptible to change. The ultimate statement, like that of the sculptor,
evolved in the process of creating the mass itself. This way of conceiving
architecture explains also the peculiarly biological character of Italian
Renaissance building. The large monuments that took more than a
decade to complete seldom followed an original conception, but evolved
like a living organism in their growth.73
This characterization corresponds closely to Raphael’s process as it has emerged
in this study, although different architects favored different approaches. By
contrast, we may think of Alberti as architect-author, whose famous instruc-
tions to Matteo de’ Pasti, his site architect in Rimini, stipulated that the Tempio
Malatestiana be executed exactly as Alberti directed so as not to destroy all his
beautiful harmony; or later, Michelangelo, who famously raced to build St.
Peter’s to the point that his work could not be altered or even destroyed, as
he had done to the work of previous architects, including Raphael. Howard
Burns analyzed Michelangelo’s strategies to secure the integrity of his
St. Peter’s designs, which he called “building against time.”74 Trachtenberg
stepped back chronologically to examine different approaches to building over
time, distinguishing between what he calls building in- and out-of-time; the
first he defines as the longue durée process that characterized large, extended
projects of the Middle Ages and early Renaissance, and his second mode is
characterized by the Albertian architect-as-author who designs the entire
building before the start of construction, to be built exactly to his design with-
out changes.75 Of course, the reality of architectural practice did not change
overnight, as Trachtenberg acknowledges; in cinquecento building projects,

significant changes to the design continued to be made during construction.76
As Alexander Nagel and Christopher Wood note, the authorial mode of pro-
duction has come into and out of play in various periods; instead, they develop
the notion of a work of art as a “recursive structure.”77
The process of Raphael and his associates at Villa Madama was certainly a
hybrid encompassing aspects of different modes. Their design process combined
elements of individual and collective authorship, as discussed, and qualities of
building in- and out-of-time as Trachtenberg defined them. A comprehensive
plan was drawn up for the entire estate before construction began – not just
the wing constructed in the first phase – and construction indeed followed the
unifying vision set forth in U 314a, consistent with the Albertian authorship
model. However, this plan was the collective work of Raphael and Sangallo, with
contributions by many other participants, including non-architects.What is more,
they did not flesh out the plans of each part of the monumental complex in
equal detail.We glimpse how remarkably fluid and flexible the dynamic mode of
design was for this project in Raphael’s letter and Sperulo’s poem. For example,
Raphael stipulates some of the architectural orders, but leaves others to be deter-
mined later,78 and he suggests general types of decoration, but explicitly leaves the
details to be worked out, “secondo ch’è piaciuto allo art[e]fice.”79 Although both
writers consider the whole villa complex, they give more detailed and plausible
proposals for the areas of the villa that are in progress, and devote less attention
to elements that were not yet begun, such as gardens and stables; it appears that
they were not fully planned ahead of time. Thus, in this important independent,
ex-novo late project, we see that Raphael facilitated a flexible and open approach
to architectural design, consonant with his approach in other media, and in con-
trast to Alberti and Michelangelo. But if the villa emerged via a process of what
Trachtenberg has called “continual revision,” it did not exactly follow the cathe-
drals model. It had long been standard practice to leave technical challenges to be
worked out in the course of building, as in the collective planning of a monu-
mental building project with a committee of architect, builders, master masons,
and communal patrons that could extend over decades, if not centuries. But at the
Medici villa, significantly, the process of invention was collective from the outset.
Even in the initial phase of the project, when the original patrons and architects
were first planning the complex, the design process was iterative and dynamic.
It encompassed the ideas of a varied group of planners and different systems of
knowledge, which continued throughout the course of designing, building, and
decorating.This multi-epistemic process allowed for flexibility in design, and fur-
ther enabled the evolution of form and meaning in a dialectical exchange.
The iterative, collective aspects of design are represented in a drawing by
Jacopo Bertoja showing a group of architects and humanists at the construc-
tion site of a tempietto of Hercules (Figures 84, 85).The drawing is preparatory
84. Jacopo Bertoja, Construction of a Round Temple, study for fresco decorations, Sala d’Ercole,
Villa Caprarola; Louvre, Cabinet des Dessins, 10678r.
85. Jacopo Bertoja, detail of Figure 84 depicting Vignola with other architects and humanists
discussing plans for a temple at its construction site.
for a fresco he painted in the Sala d’Ercole of the Farnese villa in Caprarola,
c. 1566–9. (I illustrate the drawing, which is more detailed and legible than the
fresco.) The composition relates the Labors of Hercules to the surrounding
countryside and thus is self-referential to the design of the Farnese villa, so
we may read the figure of the architect as Vignola, and the humanists perhaps
as Fulvio Orsini, Annibale Caro, and/or Onofrio Panvinio.80 Construction is
already well under way, but the architect, bearing a drawing and compass,
strides toward the master mason who awaits instructions, sitting head in hand,
idly holding his hammer, slumped over a chunk of frieze in a thoughtful pose
recalling Heraclitus in the School of Athens.Vignola is at center, with perhaps a
fellow architect behind him wearing a similar hat, looking over his shoulder
at the foremost humanist, identifiable by his Plato-like beard and classicizing
garb and stance (visible in the detail in Figure 85).Vignola points to his draw-
ing of the base of an Ionic column; the humanist speaking to the architect
extends his right arm toward the drawing, too, with an open-palmed gesture,
perhaps signaling that he is asking a question.81 The architect behind them
M odern ruins and the culture of coming- to- be 163
points forward, either at the drawing or at the frieze, his hand just above the
humanist’s in a Leonardesque network of gestures. It is interesting that the
humanist follows traditionally Roman practice by gesturing with the right
hand and restraining the left with his garment, whereas both architects gesture
with their left hands, and the humanist faces and gestures in the same direc-
tion, as Quintilian stipulates, while the figure of Vignola strides and gestures
in a forward direction, looking backward at his speaking colleague. This may
simply reflect compositional necessity, but it may also suggest the architect’s
and humanist’s very different contributions via drawings and words. However
vague the gestures or artificial the scenario (not to mention how fantastical
the construction methods!), it is notable for our purposes that the artist placed
the focus on architects and humanists in animated dialogue over still-evolving
ideas while walking around a construction site.
M O DERN RUIN S A N D T HE C ULT UR E O F C O M ING-TO -B E
The predominance of lengthy building projects resulted in a landscape of

partially finished buildings. Renaissance attitudes toward the non-finito in
architecture were at odds with those toward unfinished works in the figurative
media of painting and sculpture. For Renaissance audiences, the completion
and perfection of a work were one and the same quality, and the goal.82 This
was certainly true of painting and sculpture at the beginning of the sixteenth
century, and Raphael’s associates were restoring and completing fragmentary
figural sculpture at Villa Madama to make it whole and perfect.83 In the case of
architecture, however, the many years necessary for building projects required
a certain tolerance for, and even appreciation of, the unfinished.
The fact that Villa Madama was frequented by its patrons and distinguished
guests during various stages of its completion supports this view. As we have
seen, Pope Leo spent the entire day there, just for pleasure, on 13 March 1519.84
Early visitors included Goritz, who went to the villa while the walls were still
rising, as Vida chronicled; Baldassare Castiglione, who dined there with Pope
Leo in June 1519; and the Duke of Ferrara’s agent, who also recorded going
there with the pope in October of the same year.85 As discussed, Valeriano’s
Dialogo of c. 1524 set at the Medici villa surely reflected the general practice
of literary gatherings there, if not a specific event. Many other documents
from 1520 to 1525 record visits, meals, and musical performances at the unfin-
ished villa, some of which provide valuable early testimony of the acceptabil-
ity of the unfinished and imperfect.86 In fact, these visits seem to have been
understood as privileged previews, described in letters to those outside Rome
eager for updates. In March 1524, Ludovico Cati described a dinner party he
attended at the villa with Baldassare Castiglione, Paolo Giovio, Mario Maffei,
and Carlo Ariosto (Ludovico’s younger brother); Cati raved that he had never
seen anything like the villa, however imperfecta.87 (Nor did the guests confine
their attention to finished areas of the villa, for Cati went on to describe the
wonderful water-spouting elephant in the garden – part of a fountain that
was not finished until two years later.) Isabella d’Este voiced a similar reac-
tion when she attended a dinner at the villa in May 1525: describing what is
presumably the garden loggia, she noted that this space pleased her most of all,
and that it was already filled with antiquities, even though it was still imper-
fecta.88 Such reports of building-in-progress served to publicize the structures
long before their completion and frame their reception; these accounts seem
to have been part of the fabric of protracted Renaissance construction.89 It is
significant that water flowed from a partially completed fountain, and ancient
sculpture had already been placed in the unfinished building. These indica-
tions of comfort with the partially built precede evidence for the acceptabil-
ity of the non-finito in other media, such as Vasari’s praise for Michelangelo’s
unfinished works of sculpture.90 This practice of frequenting partially built
sites lends further plausibility to the hypothetical construction site convivium
among patrons and planners.
Christof Thoenes has proposed that the image of Renaissance Rome came
to include not just ancient ruins but “new ruins” as well – unfinished building
projects, from the Belvedere Courtyard to St. Peter’s itself.91 Contemporaries
grasped the parallel condition of half-extant ancient and modern works,
both in ambiguous states of decay or growth, renovation or construction.
Bramante’s Prevedari engraving (Figure 86) of a partially built or partially
ruined structure exemplifies this ambiguity;92 and his fragmentary Genazzano
nymphaeum (Figure 60) may have been conceived as an artificial ruin, or
early folly.93 Mantegna and Leonardo called attention to this conflation of
building site and ruin in their paintings.94 Raphael frequently depicted this
new view of ruins, ancient and modern, as part of the image of urban daily
life, as in the background of the Vatican Stanza della Segnatura and Stanza di
Eliodoro frescoes (e.g. Figure 87).95 The slightly later image of Villa Madama
itself as a construction site in the background of the Vatican Sala di Costantino
mural, above the historic Battle of the Milvian Bridge (Figure 88), inserts the
Medici villa into this series of images of ancient/modern ruins. The images of
the raising of Lazarus set in front of the Medici villa, ambiguously depicted as
half-built or ruined, further demonstrate the understanding of the villa in this
context (Figures 1, 2). At one level, Sperulo’s encomium of a construction site
is a verbal counterpart of this visual tradition.
This equation of the non-finito with the ruin suggests that Renaissance artists
and architects perceived the generative power of buildings in both incomplete
states.96 Certainly in Rome, the fascination with ancient ruins was coupled
with the stimulation to complete them through an act of artistic imagina-
tion.97 Vasari claimed that “Brunelleschi became capable of seeing Rome in his
M odern ruins and the culture of coming - tobe 165
86. Bernardo Prevedari, after Donato Bramante, Interior of a Ruined Church or Temple with
Figures, engraving, 1481. The British Museum, v,1.69.
87. Raphael, Disputation over the Sacrament, detail of ruins and “modern ruins” in the
background, 1509–10, Stanza della Segnatura,Vatican Palace.
88. Raphael and associates, Battle of the Milvian Bridge, detail of the Villa Madama under
construction on the hillside of Monte Mario overlooking the bridge, Sala di Costantino,
Vatican Palace.
imagination as it stood before it fell.”98 The depiction of the partially built Villa
Madama in its scaffolding in the Sala di Costantino invites the viewer to do the
same. In fact, the choice in this prominent Vatican hall to represent the papal
hospitium this way, rather than painting a proleptic visualization of the grand
planned complex, was surely intended to emphasize the villa’s character as an
all’antica modern ruin.99 Thus, Sperulo’s description of the muddy construc-
tion site as a locus amoenus that inspired his poetry was, at one level, literally
true; the literary walkabouts and gatherings documented at the villa’s con-
struction site are reminiscent of the picnics in the crumbling ruins of Nero’s
Domus Aurea or Hadrian’s Villa undertaken by Raphael and his fellow artists
and literary friends. Wordsmiths and visual artists found inspiration in ruins,
ancient and modern. And these ruins became part of the verbal and visual nar-
rative of Rome that they jointly forged.100
The marked contrast between projects visualized and executed in early
sixteenth-century Rome was partially a function of the new gigantism
favored by patrons, seen in commissions from the Belvedere Courtyard to Villa
Madama, and notably in new St. Peter’s and Michelangelo’s ill-fated Julius
tomb. Naturally, this taste for the colossal fostered long-term projects, with
many major changes of plan along the way. As the sixteenth century increas-
ingly came to be characterized by the disparity between grandiose ideas and
feasible projects,101 these ambitious mega-projects engendered the perception
that conceiving great works could be a more valuable marker of artistic genius
than completing them. This appreciation of the unbuilt and the partially built
reflected changing attitudes toward the status of the architect, the separation
of idea and facture, and the understanding of architecture as idea.102 Although
a very partially executed villa complex was never the goal of Raphael or his
Medici patrons, the villa as constructed, and Raphael’s unexecuted ideas for
it, were assiduously studied and would have important echoes among the
designs of his contemporaries and followers. Thus, although the Medici villa
was not completed, its planners were eminently successful: Villa Madama as
it might have been has danced in the minds of architects from Raphael’s day
forward, as we may see especially vividly in the so-called reconstructions by
the nineteenth-century architect-scholars Percier and Fontaine, Henri Jean
Émile Bénard (Figure 89), and Geymüller, or even in the wooden model of
1983 (Figures 13, 14).
Additionally, the dialectical invention of conceptual ideas, text, and visual
elements became part of the art form; as we have seen, the iterative, collabo-
rative design process, more than a means to an end, was a valorized form of
cultural discourse in itself. In part, this emphasis on process was a pragmatic
adaptation to the extended timeframe of such a grand project. It was also a
function of the transforming power of time in a culture that was, by necessity,
fully comfortable with half-standing buildings, from construction sites to ruins,
89. Reconstruction of Villa Madama, after the drawings of Henri Jean Émile Bénard, 1871; hélio-
gravure, J. Chauvet.
and deeply attuned to the processes of building and renovation. At another

level, this focus on the process of architectural invention reflects long-standing
Aristotelian ideas about praxis. In his discussion of the distinction between art
(techne) and science (episteme) in the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle considers art,
and in particular architectural skill, to be concerned with making, stating that,
“All Art deals with bringing something into existence.”103 Although Aristotle’s
conception of techne or ars does not correspond completely to the Renaissance
or modern definitions of art, his emphasis on all arts, especially architecture, as
a process of coming-into-existence – or poiesis – was fundamentally important
for the Renaissance understanding of art.104 Michel Jeanneret has character-
ized what he calls the “metamorphic sensibility” or “transformist philoso-
phy” underpinning sixteenth-century culture, an outgrowth of both natural
philosophy and theology, consonant with the understanding of the world as
a microcosm of the continually gestating cosmos; and he relates this world-
view to the preponderance of unfinished Renaissance literary masterworks
presented as works in progress, from Leonardo’s notebooks to Montaigne’s
Essais.105 As he and other scholars have noted, even the introduction of the
printing press did not establish the equation of publication with a finished
work; rather, this deeply held understanding of work as poietic process was
reflected in the literary habit of continual revision, which was standard practice
among sixteenth-century humanists, and notably among Raphael’s humanist

friends.106 In particular, Castiglione seems to have revisited the three surviving
drafts of the Letter to Leo X over a several-year period, as he also did with the
manuscript of the Cortegiano, and his poetry.107 Ariosto was revising the princeps
edition of his Orlando furioso during the same period. Bembo continued to
revise some of his poems even after they were published in print; such activities
fostered the understanding that the process of revision itself could be valued
more highly than the product.108 Although the imperatives to complete a stone
and mortar building and a text necessarily differed, long and iterative processes
characterized building and writing projects alike. Thus, the poietic process of
invention was a mindset shared by architects and humanists, for whom process
and transformation were part of the art form.
Like a modern ruin, the partially built villa on the Monte Mario was a
stimulus to the imagination of architects, humanists, and patrons, who sought
to realize their visions for it. For reasons both cultural and practical, this cohort
collaborated to design, occupy, and celebrate the unfinished building in vibrant
and creative ways. They also reflexively recorded their own ideas and roles in
the process as part of the narrative. This account of the coming-into-being
of the Medici villa as an architectural and literary edifice turns on issues of
ut lingua architectura, which are drawn together in the Conclusion.
CONCLUSION: BUILDING WITH
MORTAR AND VERSE
T his narrative of the inte ractive inve ntion of ve rbal ideas,

architecture, and decorative forms at Villa Madama opens a window into
the inextricably linked visual and verbal culture of early modern papal Rome,
and into the working processes of Raphael at the height of his powers as archi-
tect and visual culture impresario. Like St. Peter’s and the Vatican Palace Stanze,
Villa Madama was a laboratory for creating a new system of design and a new
visual language – a rhetorical visuality – that would parallel humanist attempts
to proclaim the renovatio imperii using neo-Latin. As we have seen, the designs
for the Medici villa were produced not only on the architect’s drawing board,
but also in words: ideas were articulated and elaborated in verse by poets, and
in prose by the architect himself. Artists, humanists, and patrons collaborated
to produce not simply what art historians call a program or iconography, but
complex metastructures of word and image that were embodied in the villa
project and its realization. This study has shown how at Villa Madama, the ver-
bal and visual modes of ideation were not parallel, but inextricably connected.
The previous chapters have presented a rare portrait of collaboration, which
emerges as a dynamic working method in which concept and design evolved
dialectically. On the work table and in social convivia, humanists, artists, and
patrons rehearsed their ideas in verse, prose, and plans. This collective design
process was performative: a product of a culture of orality and, at times, of
improvisation (or at least, claims to such spontaneous creativity – a pretext
Castiglione lampooned in his Book of the Courtier).1 It was also competitive, as
170
CONCLUSION 171
artists and wordsmiths vied to promote their ideas. Their notion of the villa
evoked ancient prototypes, both literary and extant, from descriptions by Pliny,
Statius, and other authors to the ruins of Hadrian’s villa complex in Tivoli.
The wordsmiths and architects at Villa Madama sought to realize in verbal and
visual terms their vision of an all’antica Roman villa; they selected elements of
the classical past and brought them together in a new synthesis, thereby cre-
ating a new paradigm of the villa for the early modern Medici papacy. In so
doing, they enacted a fascinating chapter in the long struggle for primacy of
the arts of word and image.
In what turns out to be a proleptic poem describingVilla Madama, Francesco
Sperulo claimed to construct the villa with words. Poets since Pindar have
claimed to build with verse, but, as this study has demonstrated, Sperulo was
doing just that, and in an unusually literal way. He applied his literary skills to
a real-life project and did so with a remarkable degree of specificity, deploying
Virgilian hexameter as a practical tool for designing and decorating a building.
Sperulo’s claim to build the villa in verse was at once metaphor and coded pro-
posal, adhering to literary conventions of textual communication appropriate
to its elite audiences. This study has revealed its importance as a kind of white
paper in neo-Latin, the lingua franca of this circle of Medici patrons and Curial
humanists working with Raphael.
Considering literary and architectural plans for the Medici villa in the con-
text of Roman social and intellectual culture has allowed a new perspective on
the design process. This approach to the proleptic poetry and Raphael’s letter
describing the unbuilt villa has revealed their function and agency to propose
ideas, amplify plans, and frame the reception of the villa. I have suggested
that the writings by Sperulo, Tebaldeo, Vida, Equicola, and Raphael were all
composed around the same time and perhaps intended for performance in
convivia, even at the villa’s construction site. Thus, we may think of these
ekphrases being staged as a kind of performance art. This interpretation opens
a new reading of Raphael’s letter, suggesting it as the script for an embodied
presentation of the architect’s plans.
This line of inquiry has also led to a reassessment of the interaction between
architects and advisors. Sperulo turns out to have been an advisor for his
Medici patrons, and a contributor to the circle of villa planners, like the better-
known Medici humanist agent Mario Maffei. I have proposed that Sperulo’s
role in this collaborative milieu consisted of proposing conceptual structures
that encompassed architecture, decoration, and function at a formative stage
of the villa planning. It also emerges that he had been involved in the effort
to publicize Leo’s clemency toward the cardinals who had supposedly con-
spired against him in 1517, as shown by the poem in Appendix iii; so, Sperulo
was evidently well suited to distill Medicean ideology, literary metaphor, and
information about ancient spoils into proposals for the villa. Although he was
172 CONCLU S I O N
no Virgil, Sperulo was an accomplished poet and humanist who employed his
considerable knowledge and facility with Latin and Greek literature in his day
job as a papal chamberlain and diacono, and effectively, as a Curial image-maker.
Sperulo’s poem about the Medici villa turns out to be a masterpiece of a
little-known mode I have identified as “hortatory ekphrasis.” He praised the
unbuilt villa, exhorting both patron and artist to follow his ideas.This very par-
ticular Renaissance genre, seemingly without a direct ancient model, was an
assemblage of elements selected from ancient literature and rhetoric. Roman
humanists created poetry by selecting different elements from epic poetry, pro-
treptic panegyric, and notional ekphrasis, in an example of citazionismo. Thus,
Renaissance poetry, in this mode of hortatory ekphrasis, could be a utilitarian
instrument of architectural design.Words were tools, used not just for the pres-
entation and dissemination of plans, but also for proposing and working out
ideas.The agency of the wordsmiths is noteworthy in this context; the dialectic
of architecture and literature is not a theoretical concept, but a mode of think-
ing, a working discourse.
This narrative of collaborative design comes to a head at the time of a major
redesign of the villa project. Both Sperulo’s poem and Raphael’s letter, which I
have proposed were roughly coeval, were probably being written in early 1519,
when a major design change was under way that would distinguish the two
major surviving ground plans for the Medici villa. I have proposed that the
placement and recontextualization of significant antiquities was a generative
force during this reformulation of plans, and shown Sperulo’s involvement at
this juncture. The poet, in the authorial voice of Father Tiber, emphasizes that
his job includes choosing ancient sculpture and spoils, envisioning concep-
tual and physical environments for them, and directing their installation. Thus,
Sperulo shows that antiquities were not simply installed like trophies in the
modern fabric but – through the collaboration of humanists and architects –
could be used to generate the actual elevations in which they were to be
installed. Chapter 5 presented specific examples of this, including the ancient
relief from the Temple of Venus Genetrix that was the impetus for Sperulo’s
conception, Raphael’s elevation, and surrounding decorations. This scenario
overturns standard assumptions about the basic sequence of design, construc-
tion, and decoration. We normally think a building is built, then decorated,
then praised by writers; in the present narrative, poetry was prospective, and
important marble decorations were the impetus for architectural design.
Such a working process could engender tension and conflict, as artists and
wordsmiths jockeyed to promote their ideas and navigate their careers. Sperulo’s
abrasive tone and his sharp challenges to Raphael in a poem addressed to their
mutual patron, in a language Raphael did not read, show the poet trying to do
an end-run around the architect. It is striking that Raphael, despite his posi-
tion as the foremost architect in Renaissance Rome at this moment, had to
CONCLUSION 173
contend with adversarial critics like Sperulo at Villa Madama: even Raphael
had to engage in negotiation and persuasion to get his ideas built. Thus, we
may also read Sperulo’s poem and Raphael’s letter describing the villa as each
artist’s codification of his own ideas at a crucial juncture – as a bid to the
patron and also a memo to posterity.
Most significantly, Sperulo’s challenge to Raphael brings the sometimes
agonistic relation of word and image into the foreground. Formulating what
the Renaissance called invenzioni, or iconographic programs, was normally the
role of the wordsmith; thus, at the Medici villa, formulating what I describe
as metastructures involving sculptural set pieces was what Sperulo claimed as
his job. But Raphael had recently been made Prefect of Marbles, with such
power that no stone in Rome could be moved without his permission. At a
crucial juncture in the villa project, Sperulo saw an opportunity to expand his
creative authority. Creativity was understood in the Renaissance as a process
of selection; fragments of ancient literary and material culture were reused,
recontextualized, and recomposed into recombinant discourses, a parallel pro-
cess for wordsmiths and artists.2 Using ancient sculpture and spoils to gener-
ate new conceptual and spatial contexts went to the core of this creative act,
but it complicated traditional job descriptions of architect and advisor, and
the understanding of invention itself. So, Sperulo was challenging Raphael’s
authority to control the “act of art” in this process – that is, whether the
poet with his narrative description, or architect with visual and spatial plans
should control the process of invention. Of course, Raphael, with his astound-
ing workload of projects in many media and disciplines, had evolved a working
process in which the act of art lay in his own invention or Idea, the execution
of which could be delegated to a range of associates and assistants. Thanks to
Raphael’s creative processes (and literary pals such as Castiglione who cel-
ebrated them), he gave an important impetus to the emerging understanding
of the artist as idea-person, and to the artistic split between idea and facture.
Sperulo’s unsuccessful attempt to outflank Raphael is thus a revealing and
specific manifestation of the continually shifting relation of word and image in
sixteenth-century Italy, reflecting tensions over changing ideas about the roles
of artists and advisors, and the nature of invention itself.
This revisionist account of architectural design as a dynamic, collective pro-
cess engaging different epistemes has important implications for our under-
standing of the relation of architecture and language, meaning in architecture,
and the ways that idea could become form. Unlike earlier studies of ut lingua
architectura that have focused on issues of architectural style, the use of orna-
ment, and the language of the orders,3 this narrative has instead demonstrated
how notions of ut poesis architectura that would later be articulated in mid-
sixteenth-century treatise literature were incorporated in architectural practice
in Raphael’s circle. As we have seen, Raphael’s rhetorical visuality was not only
174 CONCLU S I O N
a linguistic analogy; and in the case of Sperulo’s poem, text is not only meta-
phorical architecture, but also a proposal for creating the real thing. Patterns of
invention arose most likely from the practical modality of artists and architects
working with humanists, engaged in the kind of collaborative practice I have
been describing.
Such visual–verbal collaboration opens new possibilities for thinking about
the design process, from ideation through representation and building. In the
collective modus operandi I have discussed, the tools to accomplish the job
included poetry and prose, as well as drawings and ground plans. That is not
to say that word and image were directly cognate intellectual processes; artists
and wordsmiths each had different tools, goals, and separate areas of expertise.
But we see them working in tandem – and sometimes in conflict – throughout
the long design process, as ideas and forms evolved in dialogue, competition,
and negotiation with each other. Nor am I suggesting that we can take the
design process at Villa Madama as a normative case study; patterns of idea-
tion varied by artist and patron, and even between projects of a given artist,
or elements thereof, as we have seen in the case of Raphael. But this scenario
demonstrates that architectural drawings and models alone are not sufficient to
express the idea of a building in this milieu; words, spoken and written, were
also instrumental in formulating architectural ideas. Notably, even Rome’s
foremost architect couched his ideas in words as well as drawings; Raphael
turned to prose to amplify the plans for the villa, his most ambitious project,
in the Plinian epistle that he perhaps recited aloud, or even performed onsite.
Thus, like his humanist colleagues and patrons, Raphael also worked out his
ideas and communicated them via literary forms. The logocentric mindset of
Curial culture reflected the linguistic forma mentis of all the participants in this
circle, even the artists. Moreover, poetry, in its role as a generative tool, could
further convey abstract modes of knowledge.
This study provides an important demonstration of how architecture could
embody discursive ideas, including philological and poetic modes of thought.
Alberto Pérez-Gómez has long called for more attention to the poetic and
metaphorical character of architectural thinking and design, especially at this
moment in the early cinquecento, which coincides with the void in surviving
written works on Italian architectural theory.4 At one level, the mutual depend-
ence of architecture and humanism was a legacy of Alberti, who had functioned
as a humanist counselor as much as an architect,5 (and as the Petrarch of archi-
tectural theory, as Trachtenberg has dubbed him.6) The collaborative design
process I have sketched specifically illustrates how rich, multivalent meanings
could be represented in architecture, as seen in the discussion of metastructures
for the garden loggia of the Medici villa, which included archeological, poetic,
and ideological notions. These case studies demonstrate that early sixteenth-
century architectural thinking encompassed a broader epistemological scope
CONCLUSION 175
than was later codified in mid-century treatises.7 Nor was this rich discourse
primarily based on architectural theory, but, rather, it was a function of differ-
ent patterns of knowledge harnessed in the service of praxis. These findings
illustrate that connections between language and architectural design practice
remain a fertile ground for exploration.8
The use of hortatory ekphrasis I have traced in Raphael’s ambient has pro-
vided a striking example. This verbal tool plugged into the larger collective
enterprise to revive the corpse of ancient Rome. This initiative was closely
associated with Raphael as the Christ-like healer of Rome reborn; in particu-
lar, Villa Madama was understood as his Lazarus, celebrated in visual imagery
depicting this miracle at the villa site (Figures 1, 2). Using a language of rebirth,
revivification, and healing, Raphael and other artists and letterati re-membered
sculpture, buildings, and the city of Rome itself. They used methods of com-
position in what may be seen as an early practice of creating a verbal–visual
exquisite corpse.9 Humanists addressed the burgeoning population of ancient
sculpture – mutilated bodies that were exhumed from the ground and made
whole by salvific acts of physical restoration by artists, and virtual restorations
by poets. Artists competed to create the missing arm of the Laocoön using wax
and marble, just as poets competed to complete the sculpture using words,
some in the form of ekphrasis. Significant sculptures were recontextualized, in
poetry and in actuality, and thereby given new meaning and new life, such as
the Laocoön and other famous figures in the Vatican Belvedere. Sperulo himself
engaged in this enterprise, from his poem about the Laocoön to his proposals
to recontextualize specific ancient sculptures in the Medici villa; as we saw
with the Venus Genetrix relief, he spun a metastructure about Medici rule
encompassing word and image, which Raphael would actually design into an
elevation of the building. The poet also suggests they were considering how
to display the then-broken bodies of nine sculptures of the Muses assembled
at the villa (Figures 50, 51), an ambitious ensemble that remained unrealized,
and a stimulus to later artists. The Raphael equipe also created the missing
head and torso to complete the colossal seated Jupiter Ciampolini, which would
be a focal point of the villa’s main representation space and an impetus for
architectural plan and decoration, perhaps in connection with Sperulo’s Jovian
conceits. These imaginative encounters with the fragmentary physical remains
of antiquity fostered a culture of re-membering, and of virtual completion.
Conditioned by the physical and conceptual parallel between old and new
ruins in Rome, poets could look at a half-built structure and bring before the
eyes a completed work in perfect form.Verbal restoration was a form of imagi-
native visualization. Thus, we may see ekphrastic completion as a literary mind-
set, further mobilized as a practical tool for scenario planning. It was deployed
by humanists accustomed to working with artists and architects, who were
engaged in physical restoration and the creation of new forms. At the Medici
176 CONCLU S I O N
villa, the power of ekphrastic agency was coupled with that of artistic techne to
bring the villa into being.
These proleptic villa descriptions are a fascinating example of the epis-
temology of the imaginary shaping the real, which has been analyzed from
Aristotle to Paul Ricoeur.10 The capacity of Renaissance thinkers to visual-
ize the non-extant was shaped by literary traditions: notional ekphrases from
Homer and Virgil to Ariosto, the imaginary sites described by Petrarch and
Boccaccio, or the dreamscapes of the Hypnerotomachia Polifili. Mnemonic prac-
tices also fostered the ability to build first in the mind’s eye; the trope of the
poet as master builder functioned as metaphor, and additionally reflected men-
tal techniques of composition using locational memory. Carruthers further
proposes that medieval monastic projects were understood to have been based
on proleptic visions, most famously Abbot Gunzo’s vision for Cluny, a practice
linked to divine revelations such as Ezekiel’s temple-city.11 We may see spe-
cific parallels between the way poets’ and artists’ prophetic fictions were given
visual form in the Roman Renaissance, an intellectual culture attuned to plays
on reality and illusion in many epistemes. Ariosto’s I suppositi (staged in the
Vatican in early 1519 with Raphael’s collaboration on the sets) played on the
ambiguity of reality and illusion; at the same time, the poet was revising and
holding readings of his Orlando furioso, in which he declares the supernatural
ability of the poet to see the outcome of contemporary events. Around the
same time, Raphael thematized fantasia by giving visual form to the invisible
in painted works, from his great visionary altarpieces to the Vatican fresco of
The Vision of Constantine, a process that Kleinbub has likened to Augustinian
notions of “imaginative vision.”12 Sperulo, in the authorial voices of the pro-
phetic Tiber and Hephaestus, uses enargeia to bring his textual villa vividly to
view in the mind’s eye, as Quintilian had advocated the orator should display
facts “in their living truth to the eyes of the mind.”13 The power to visualize
the non-existent – whether a future event, Constantine’s vision of the cross, or
a villa – was a badge of the ingenium of the artist. Humanists and artists engaged
in a metaconversation about the nature of vision, invention, and the relative
powers of word and image to express them; and at the same time, their creative
visualizations could be harnessed to inspire and shape reality.
I have proposed that Sperulo’s vivid ekphrasis was, at one level, a portrait
of the villa. Portraiture was traditionally the genre in which the paragonal
discourse pitting painting against poetry played out with special emphasis, as
painters and poets vied to demonstrate whose medium could more fully cap-
ture the internal and external image of a beloved.14 Castiglione characterized
his Book of the Courtier as a portrait of the Court of Urbino; he specifically
likened it to portraits by Raphael and Michelangelo, in comparison to whom
he humbly called himself a second-rate painter, thereby subverting the usual
play of painters who would be poets, and also illustrating the currency and
CONCLUSION 177
flexibility of this discourse.15 Sperulo’s textual portrait of a building connects

architecture to this conversation about portraiture – a variation on issues of
ut architectura poesis that would be articulated by later theorists. This notion of
Sperulo’s poem as a portrait of the villa is implicit in his text, and was further
given visual form in the illumination of the presentation manuscript (analyzed
in Appendix ii), which evokes the pairing of likeness and impresa on painted
and medallic portraits. The imagery also suggests the poem as a verbal equiva-
lent of a building medal, which could commemorate an architect’s proleptic
vision of the unbuilt edifice.16 With both these conceits of a verbal portrait and
a foundation medal in verse, Sperulo’s poem engages the paragone of visual art-
ists and poets, making a strong claim for the poet’s superior power to envision,
persuade, and inspire. In this case, the competition of word and image was not
just figurative, but also real: an actual, sharp-elbowed battle over the power of
invention, waged by the poet claiming to build his villa in verse.
Sperulo alludes to the paragone of poetry and architecture throughout the
poem, with special emphasis at the beginning and end. In his dedicatory let-
ter to Cardinal Giulio, Sperulo declares that the villa he builds with ink will
outlast that of the architects with their glue of lime and sand, evoking the
Horatian trope equating durability with immortality.17 I have suggested that
this seemingly peculiar conceit about glue is in fact a Vitruvian reference to
stucco, a lime-and-sand mixture that is essentially a fine-grained mortar.18
Sperulo thus particularizes the words-versus-monuments topos to the Medici
villa, where the newly chic material of stucco was to articulate every surface
inside and out, from architectural shell and ornament to decoration.19 So, the
poet pits his villa of ink and verse against that of his architect colleagues work-
ing with mortar and stucco. And he closes his poem by saying his work for
Cardinal Giulio is a pleasure, at once playing on a Medici impresa (his burden
is easy) and also citing a passage in Statius in which Pleasure records (scripsisse)
the plans for a villa. The ancient poet used the verb scribere, which can refer to
a visual or textual representation, one of his many plays on the visual and the
verbal to underscore their paragonal nature. Sperulo cites this passage in the
last line of his visionary ekphrasis, the poet’s parting shot for the power of text
in this battle of word and image.20
As it turns out, both the literary and the built versions of the Medici villa
have survived. Neither represents a perfect or completed product, and nei-
ther is well understood today. To Renaissance contemporaries, however, this
dialectic of literature and architecture constituted an essence of the Medici
villa. Thus, Sperulo’s villa built in hexameters functioned on several inter-
pretative levels: as coded proposal for the villa complex; as a metonym of the
poet himself, and of his patron; as a claim for the primacy of word; and as a
metaphorical equivalent of the villa, just as Statius’ choice of the Latin word
silva – with its associations with the raw material of literary composition or
178 CONCLU S I O N
building – reflected the ancient poet’s equation of poem and estate.21 The villa,
more than a building type, was a cultural ideal; and the villa as a cultural edifice
encompassed text as well as stone.
The texts by Sperulo, Tebaldeo, Vida, and Raphael himself celebrated the
bringing into existence of the villa as an important narrative in its own right, for
philosophical as well as practical reasons. Aristotle’s notion of poiesis common to
all the arts has been fundamental to artists’ conceptions of their endeavors from
antiquity forward. Homer’s account of the shield of Achilles, the great epic
set piece of ekphrasis, celebrates not the shield itself, but the process of making
it. Cicero had reified coming-into-existence as a worthwhile literary subject
in his letters to his brother Quintus narrating the progress of his unfinished
villa.22 Bertoja’s image of Vignola and his humanist advisors discussing plans
at the construction site records the designers’ roles in fashioning the Farnese
villa at Caprarola (Figures 84, 85). Working in a very different context, French
architect Marcel Lods made photographic documentation of every stage of
the construction and life of his buildings, considering all phases part of the
“constructed reality” of the work; and Sergei Eisenstein noted of the cinematic
montage, “The spectator not only sees the represented element of the finished
work, but also experiences the dynamic process of the emergence and assem-
bly of the image.”23 We may further see Sperulo’s hortatory ekphrasis as a poietic
narrative in this long tradition celebrating the process of ideation itself. So, the
dialectical practice of invention in this cultural matrix engaged architectural
design in larger, self-reflexive discourses about the relative powers of word and
image to envision new things, and the poietic processes of making them.
§
There is an irony in analyzing the coming-to-be of a villa that never did fully
come to be – at least not in the form envisioned by anyone associated with
its planning. Despite their acceptance of iterative, long-term planning and the
attendant necessity of living with partially finished modern ruins, and even
their celebration of continually evolving design processes, the villa’s planners
surely never imagined that setbacks would limit the villa complex to such a
kernel of its intended scope. But the tragedy of the villa (to borrow the conceit
that Ascanio Condivi famously applied to Michelangelo’s downscaling of the
Julius tomb) turns out to have had some remarkably interesting and produc-
tive consequences. The partially built state of the villa has ensured its status
as a sort of revenant, never finished, eternally coming to be, which has been a
stimulus to the imagination down to the present. In the Eternal City known
for its juxtaposition of ancient and modern ruins, various kinds of pilgrims to
the Monte Mario have found inspiration in Raphael’s ruin: from Serlio and
Palladio in the mid-sixteenth century, through Grand Tourists, to nineteenth-
and early twentieth-century photographers and Prix de Rome winners,
CONCLUSION 179
scholars, architects and urban planners, and finally modern conservators and
historians. Like Brunelleschi, who could see ancient Rome in his mind’s eye
as it was before the fall, they could visualize aspects of the villa as it was, or
might have been. The varied responses to the fragmentary villa have generated
a rich body of virtual restorations. Like a Roman Renaissance Pergamum or
Palestrina, Raphael’s grand project has thus continued to be an impetus for
virtual completion and re-imagination, enabling centuries of thinkers to par-
ticipate in the enterprise of reviving the corpse; like Raphael and Sperulo, we
continue to build the villa in drawings and prose, if not in mortar and verse.
APPENDIX I
Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata/

The Villa Giulia Medicea Constructed in Verse
(BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812)1
CRITICAL EDITION AND TRANSLATION BY
NICOLETTA MARCELLI AND GLOSS BY THE
AUTHOR
TRANSL ATOR ’ S N OT E ON T H E C RITICAL ED ITIO N

AND T R A N S L AT ION
Although the manuscript Vat. Lat. 5812 appears to be written in Sperulo’s hand,
for the sake of clarity, some changes in the orthography have been made as follows:
• I distinguish u and v, when it occurs as a consonant (e.g., dedicatory letter, §4:
tentauerim > tentaverim; line 13: renouare > renovare, etc.).
• For the diphthong ae, I do not distinguish between ae, æ, and ę, as Sperulo
does, because this alternation could generate confusion, so all three forms
are indicated as ae.
• Like many other humanists of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries (see
Ugolino Verino, Epigrammi, ed. Francesco Bausi [Messina, 1998], 177),
Sperulo uses the superscript o to indicate the vocative, which in this edition
has been signaled only by encapsulating the word(s) in commas.
The paleographical abbreviations (e.g. line 31: myrtiq3 > myrtique; line 94:
prioR̄ > priorum; line 230: int’ > inter) and suspensions (e.g. the horizontal
stroke interlined for m and n) have been silently expanded or written out in
full.
1
Editions of the poem have been published and translated by Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 414–38; and
Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage, vol. 2, 97–150.
180
S P E R U L O , V I L L A I UL I A M E DI C A TRAN S L ATI O N AN D G L O S S 181
As for punctuation, Sperulo uses many punctuation marks, sometimes in a

very modern way, such as exclamation marks (e.g. line 153), although in most
cases the original punctuation leads to confusion, if not a complete misunder-
standing of the text. Thus, for the sake of clarity and readability, I choose to
abide by modern punctuation criteria, also adding quotation marks to speeches.
A similar solution has been applied to capital letters, both for proper names
(whether real or mythological) and for adjectives (e.g. line 87: eois > Eois), while
titles, such as Dux, Cardinal, and Rex, are edited with lower case. Capital letters
at the beginning of each line are given in lower case for the sake of clarity.
Latin words with particular or unusual orthography are explained in the
footnotes.
Editing a text preserved in only one manuscript sometimes can be a chal-
lenging process, because we cannot possibly solve textual problems with the
help of other witnesses, and eventually they may be insoluble. Luckily, this has
not been the case, but, though this illuminated and lavish manuscript has been
copied very accurately in terms of text coherence, some misspellings or mis-
takes inevitably occurred. I have proceeded with corrections, explaining in the
footnotes my interventions.
Line numbers have been added to the poem, and paragraph numbers to the
dedicatory letter in prose.
In the translation, proper names are given in Italian, as most members of the
Medici family are known (e.g. Giulio de’ Medici).
182 APPEND I X I
Ad reverendissimum dominum Iulium Medicem Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae presby-

terum cardinalem et vice cancellarium humillimus servus Franciscus Sperulus villam
Iuliam Medicam versibus fabricatam mittit.
1. Nudiustertius observantia mea, quae erga te cum multis certat, superiorem esse
adhuc illi video neminem, fecit ut tempus deambulationi designatum converterem
ad visendam villam quae ad primum fere lapidem mira tibi impensa extruitur.
2. Vix primo lustrata obtuitu, ita me situs et amoenitas loci, magnitudo ac
varietas aedium antiquitatis non aemula modo, sed longe victrix, affecit ut alio
mox omni ex officina mea reiecto, hoc unum opus ipse quoque fabricandum
susceperim, sperans, si feliciter cederet – quod quidem summae est aleae –
dignosci demum facile posse, ut tenacius et sane perennius nigro suo Musae
aedificant, quam calcis et arenae glutino architecti.
3. Idque iam quantum per vires licuit meas perfectum celeritas ipsa, quae
praefuit ut ad te mittam, persuadet pollicita gratiam, quam forte ex ingenii
studiorumque industria sperare non liceat.
4. Quod si grate exceperis opus, mihi in corde quasi in incude quadam pietatis
malleo fabricatum, forsan efficies, ut maioribus ingeniis assequendi, quod minus
feliciter ego tentaverim, oestrum videar iniecisse; quo nihil aeque gratum contingat
mihi, cupido superari in praeconiis tuis, dum pro viribus certasse iudicari possim.
5. Vale spes et praesidium omnium bonorum.
6. Romae, calendis Martiis, a Servatoris nostri natalibus anno mdxviiii.
Quae nova tam celeri surgunt praetoria ductu?

Cui tantus circum sudat labor? Undique ferro
crebrae instant in saxa manus: descendit aperto
vasta solo2 moles, unde ingens scandit in astra
tectorum vertex. Operum certamine multo 5
per septena vagus mirantis culmina Romae
it fragor et curvis resonat de vallibus echo.
Ipse pater Thybris Thusco festinus in amne
vicinumque procurat opus, ratibusque ministrat
materiem, et varios laetus discurrit in usus 10
hortaturque viros, stimulisque ingentibus urget:
“Eia agite! extinctos ausi priscae artis honores
reddere et excelsis renovare penatibus urbem,
maturate, viri, praestans opus! Aethere ab ipso
cum superi terrena volent invisere nusquam 15
dignius esse queat sedes: hic bruma tepebit,
algebitque aestas varium nec sentiet annum,
utque domus volet, inversis dominabitur horis;
non quisquam madidi flatus hic horreat austri
pestiferos hospes, se Vaticanus Iaccho 20
obiicit, extantique iugo bibit ipse venenum.
Nempe Syracusia sic vos extollitis arte,
quem natura dedit non parvis usibus olim
2
descendit aperto … solo: descendo with dative case is of poetic usage only, see for example Ovid, Met., iii,14.
S P E R U L O , V I L L A I UL I A M E DI C A TR AN S L ATI O N AN D G L O S S 183
To the most reverend Lord Giulio de’ Medici, Cardinal Priest and Vice Chancellor
of the Holy Roman Church, his most humble servant Francesco Sperulo sends The
Villa Giulia Medicea Constructed in Verse.1
1. The day before yesterday my respect for you – which is greater than any-
one else’s, though it competes with many others – caused me to devote my
daily walk to visiting the villa you are constructing at extraordinary expense a
mile from the city.
2. As soon as I saw it, I was so struck by its pleasing situation2 and the size
and variety of its apartments (which not only rival but even far surpass antiq-
uity),3 that I immediately abandoned my other projects and undertook that I,
too, should also engage in building this same work. I hoped that, if it should
go forward happily – a risky business indeed! – that it could finally become
evident that the Muses build in ink with greater tenacity and more enduringly
than architects do with their glue of lime and sand.4
3. That task now being finished, as far as my powers permitted, Swiftness
herself, my commander, urged me to send it to you, promising a gratitude
which mental industry and laborious research may not perhaps hope for.5
4. If you shall receive my work favorably, forged in my heart as though on
a kind of anvil by the hammer of devotion,6 you will perhaps see to it that
anything unsuccessful in my efforts will turn me into an inspiration for greater
talents. Nothing would please me more; I want to be surpassed in praising you,
so long as I may be judged to have competed to the best of my ability.
5. Farewell, hope and defense of all good men.
6. Rome, 1 March 1519
[1–7] What extraordinary new mansion7 is this, rising so swiftly? To

what end is there so much labor and sweat all around? Everywhere
crowds of febrile workers, iron tools in hand, fall upon the stones.Vast
foundations are laid in the open ground, from which an enormous
mountain-peak of roofline climbs toward the stars.8 The clangor from
the arduous work wanders through the seven hills of marveling Rome,
the winding valleys echoing with the sound.9
[8–11] Father Tiber himself, hastening in his Tuscan stream,10 takes
charge of the nearby work. He supplies material on rafts and happily
runs to and fro on various tasks, exhorting men and spurring them on
mightily:
[12–21] “Come on, men!11 Dare to revive the splendor of ancient
art and renew the city with its own lofty household gods! Bring this
excellent work to fruition! When the gods above fly from their aethe-
rial home to visit earth,12 there can be no worthier abode for them.
Here winter is warm and summer cool; here changes of season are not
felt, and, as the house shall intend, it will be ruled by hours running
backwards.13 Here no one should shiver at the pestilential blowing of
the damp South Wind: the hospitable Vatican Hill will block its raging
storm,14 and swallow up its poison in the rise of its ridge.
184 APPEND I X I
tam blande complexa locum. Mirabar ut ante

nemo decus tantum, passim cum surgeret ingens 25
Roma, sibi ad famam legeret vitaeque levamen
debita nimirum sedes ingentibus illa
viribus, excelsisque animis, non divitis auri,
sed famae decorumque avidis te, maxime Iuli,
et vitrei circum fontes et amoena vireta,3 30
et placidi saltus, lauri myrtique manebant,
te collis Baccho sacer, innuptaeque Dianae.
At Nymphae, mea cura, vagis quae cursibus alveo
Apenninigenae tot se committere certant
hinc atque inde meo, mixtae ut socialibus undis 35
reginae mecum lambant sacra moenia Romae,
mirantes persaepe locum, qui primus ab urbe
sese offert cultu atque situ dignissimus artis
auxilio: fore de Thuscis primatibus illum
qui coleret Thuscisque ornatum hunc addere ripis 40
pergeret, edixere deae; nec me meus olim
hoc animus volvens praesago in corde fefellit.
Iamdudumque Lari tanto scrutatus honores,
eruta de priscis huc marmora densa ruinis
conveho. Adeste, viri! cognoscite singula certis 45
disponenda locis, meque hoc opus auspice surgat!
En Libycum in primo niteat quod limine marmor,
aeratosque ferat postes et grande figuret
vestibulum, ut multa subeuntis imagine ludat
detineatque oculos; iamque hinc miracula surgant: 50
id Capitolino defossum in colle repertum est,
et quondam ornavit limen sublime Tonantis.
Synnadicum hoc variam faciem et maculosus ophites
reddat ubique domus; his atria magna columnis,
quas modo Luculli detexit durus in hortis 55
agricola – hi quoque nam curvo exercentur aratro –
nitantur; caesae4 quae sunt e marmore eodem
quo scisso, mirum!, Sileni emersit imago.
Taenareis haec caesa iugis atque illa virebant
aede prius Paphia; longo post5 tempore Caesar 60
sceptra tenens rerum, clara Genitricis in aede
esse dedit Veneris, multo quam thure Quirites
Aeneadae authorem6 generis regnique colebant.
3
vireta: viretum less correctly than virectum. Poetic usage: see gloss note 16.
4
ms caese, erroneously; caesae is referred to quae and his columnis above line 54.
5
post: the same as postea.
6
authorem: author alternative form used instead of the more common auctor.The difference depends on ety-
mology: whereas the classical form auctor comes from the Latin verb augeo – thus auctor means also “the one
who makes something grow” or “the creator” – during the Middle Ages and Renaissance, some writers
preferred author, a form claimed to derive from the Greek noun αυʼ θέντης, which means “someone who
has the power to act,” “author” in the broadest sense.
[22–46] “Thus you are surely raising up with Syracusan art15 a place
that Nature, caressing it in her embrace, gave for no trivial purposes.
I am amazed that no one before, when great Rome was rising every-
where, chose such an ornament for himself to augment his fame and
provide solace for his existence. Doubtless that abode was destined for
great strength and lofty souls that were eager for fame and distinction,
not gold and riches. The glassy springs surrounding it, the pleasant
greenery16 and peaceful groves of laurel17 and myrtle18 waited for you,
greatest Giulio; for you waited the hill sacred to Bacchus and unwed
Diana. But the nymphs – my charges – who born in Apennine rivu-
lets strive so much on their wanderings from this source and that to
combine themselves with me, so that our mixed and combined waters
may wash the sacred walls of queenly Rome – [these nymphs] have
very often marveled at the spot, the first place out of the city that offers
itself as worthiest of art’s assistance for its fruitfulness and situation.
These goddesses decreed that the man who would cherish the spot
would be from among the foremost men of Tuscany, and that he would
proceed to add this embellishment to the Tuscan river-bank.19 Nor did
my spirit, which pondered this decree long ago in its prophetic heart,
deceive me. And having long sought marks of honor for so magnificent
a Lar,20 I carry hither numerous marbles pulled out of ancient ruins.
Come, men, learn how each of them should be disposed in its specified
place! Let this work rise under my auspices!21
[47–52] “Behold! Let the Libyan marble gleam upon the outer
threshold and bear the bronze door posts, giving shape to the great
vestibule,22 so that it may play many games with the image of someone
entering and catch his gaze. Now let miracles arise from hence! It [i.e.
the Libyan marble] was discovered buried on the Capitoline Hill, and
once adorned the lofty threshold of the Thunderer.23
[53–63] “Let this Synnadic marble24 and speckled serpentine give
variety to the appearance of the house;25 let its great courtyards26 gleam
with those columns which a hardy farmer recently uncovered in the
gardens of Lucullus27 (for these, too, are worked by the curved plough).
The columns were quarried from the same marble from which an
image of Silenus – how astonishing! – emerged when the marble was
split.28 Here [you can see] marbles cut from the crags of Taenaros,29 and
there those that were at the height of their beauty in the Paphian sanc-
tuary.30 Then, long afterwards, Caesar, when he ruled the world, offered
them to be part of the famous shrine of Venus Genetrix,31 whom
the Roman descendants of Aeneas32 used to worship with clouds of
incense as the author of their race and rule.
186 APPEND I X I
Hanc Numidam patriae inscriptam de patris honore,

Romulidae in pacisque et regni pignus Iulo 65
constituere fori in medio, tibi debita, Iuli,
ob patriae atque orbi pacis memorabile donum.
Nam, cum civili fremerent passim omnia Marte,
sanguinis et rivi fluerent, miserata Leonem
astra dedere patrem rerum, qui numine certo 70
parceret inflexis debellaretque protervos.
Ille tuum ingenium maturaque pectora curis
non ut frater amans, frater licet urbis habenas
te subeunte regit, rerum tibi pondera linquit,
subque tuis voluit pacatque laboribus orbem: 75
intentus nanque7 ipse sacris, tecum omnia nutu
digerit, inde tuo peraguntur singula ductu.
At vos huc aures animumque advertite: sedes
linquantur vacuae commensa per atria claris
maiorum statuis Medicum, quibus alma propago 80
se merito iactare queat. Quos ordine cunctos
si memorare velim, magnaeque exordia gentis
prodita Thuscorum priscis annalibus, aevum
Porsennae repetam doctasque evolvere Athenas
conveniat, quibus illa duces dedit inclyta proles, 85
Argivos lata dum sub ditione tenebant.
Quid mirum regnis, si nunc Leo summus Eois
tantum inhiat? Magnis proavi calcaribus urgent
et nativa animos succendit flamma nepotum.
Quare ego, qui Thuscos tot iam volventibus annis 90
Alluo, multa sciens, ne vos sermone fatigem
praetereo, et raros tam lata e stirpe reponi
hic iubeo, ut claris tendant in saecula gestis,
et domus authoris8 pretio magnisque priorum
surgat imaginibus vixque uni cedat Olympo. 95
Iani9 prima locum serie sibi poscit, ab annis
Daedala quem teneris exercens Curia, demum
consiliis foetum atque animis invita roganti
restituit patriae; ostendit tum denique nostras
posse aliquid tum Roma preces, germanus obortis 100
cum toties Arnus lachrymis instaret, ut illud,
me poscente, decus Thuscas pateretur in oras
vertere iter, magnoque viri haec langueret amore.
Nec prius evicta est sacra quam sorte nepotes
inde fore Augustos docui mundique parentem 105
te, Leo, quem lassis iam tum pia numina rebus
spondebant bellis finem scelerique nefando.
7
nanque: alternative form commonly used in neo-Latin instead of namque.
8
See note 4.
9
Iani: unless it is a mistake for the nominative case Ianus, this form seems a sort of allusive invention built up
from the Latin Ianus and the vernacular Janni/Gianni, diminutive for Giovanni still in use today in Tuscany.
[64–77] “This Numidian marble column, inscribed to the father-

land in honor of its father, the sons of Romulus set up in the middle
of the forum33 as a pledge of peace and empire devoted to Iulo.34 It is
you, Giulio, who deserve these marbles owing to the memorable gift
of peace you have given to your country and the world. For when
civil war roared everywhere and rivers flowed with blood, the merci-
ful stars granted that Leone should be the father of the world,35 who
with divine authority might spare those who bowed before him and
might subdue the impudent.36 He has an unfraternal love of your intel-
ligence and your heart, ripe for responsibilities, yet he fraternally takes
the reins of the city with you as deputy: to you he leaves the weight
of affairs. He exercises his will and pacifies the world through your
labors.37 Himself intent on sacred duties, he disposes and approves all
things through your agency, and each decision is brought to fulfillment
by your command.38
[78–95] “But you – turn your ears and your attention to this: let
empty places39 be left throughout the proportionate40 halls for illustri-
ous statues of your Medici ancestors,41 about whom their life-giving
progeny42 may justly boast. If I wished to commemorate all of these in
sequence, and the ancestry of the great family recorded in the ancient
annals of the Tuscans, I would recall the age of Porsenna,43 and it would
be proper to recount learned Athens, to which that famous line gave
leaders when they held the Argives under their wide dominion. What
wonder if supreme Leone now so greatly aspires to eastern king-
doms?44 The ancestors spur him on mightily, and a native fire inflames
the spirits of the [Medici] descendants. Therefore, I [Tiber], who for
so many cycles of years have already bathed the Tuscans, knowingly set
aside much lest I tire you with my words, and from such a wide line-
age I command only the most distinguished to be set out here, that
they may persist through the ages by their illustrious deeds. And let
the house rise worthy of its author,45 and with the great images of the
ancestors, ceding scarcely to Olympus alone.
[96–107] “Janus [Giovanni]46 requests for himself the first place in
order, whom the skillful Curia,47 employing him from tender years,
finally restored the son [i.e. Giovanni] unwillingly to a supplicating
homeland, filled with wisdom and courage.Then at last Rome showed
that our prayers could achieve something, for so many times brother
Arno insisted, with tears in his eyes, that upon my request Rome
should consent that such a glorious man turn his path into Tuscan
regions and this country should suffer for great love of the man; nor
was she won over until I determined that by sacred lot his descendants
would be Augusti, and you, Leone, the father of the world: then the
just gods pledged you to our exhausted affairs and sent you as an end
to wars and to accursed crime.
188 APPEND I X I
Multa licet scribi laudum praeconia possint,

huic circum tamen illud erit, quo sidera adisse
quippe reor magnum patriae quod gignere Cosmum 110
dii dederint, decus Ethruscum, virtutibus ingens;
qui partum post nomen opum, cum posset habenas
arbitrio solus moderari, magna senatus
reddere iura, domi privatam degere vitam
maluit, ac civis dici fautorque bonorum, 115
consiliis opibusque potens atque indole Cosmus.
Quae templa eximis erexit sedibus! auro
quam largo fulgere trabes! divumque in honorem
iussit ut unus opes fluere! ut torpentia lucro
pectora Thuscorum stimulis excivit in omnis10 120
mox decorum laudumque vias! Florentia coelo
sic caput erexit, nuncque est pulcherrima rerum.
Quam bene praesagi Cosmum dixere parentes!
Quam vox haec superum ornatus praenuncia tanti!
Huic sedem ex adamante date! huic deserviat aurum 125
eque Cytheriacis stent circum lilia conchis,
stetque aeternus honor gemma ex Erythreide veris.
Natorum statuis post hunc vacet aurea sedes
petrique atque iterum Iani: duo pignora nunquam
aemula sic genitoris erunt; hic fundere larga 130
dona manu ac patriis miseram studiosus ab oris
pauperiem procul exilio damnare, leporum
laetitiaeque sator, semperque in gaudia pendens
publica, praecipuos iuvenum inter fulgere coetus,
ignarus scelerum, virtutum percitus oestro 135
indolis, at tantae immaturo funere Parca
spem tulit ac populo questum lachrimasque reliquit.
Petro magna domus et vasti cura peculi
a puero cordi semper fuit addere partis
metiri impensam nec, dum res posceret, arcae 140
parcere mordacesque in se transferre parentis
longaevi curas et rerum pondera iniqua.
O pietas natique fides! o provida mentis
consilia et cauti vitae in discrimina gressus!
Non ideo tamen ad rerum consulta minorem 145
quis putet, heheu! sacra pedum importunaque pestis,
et magnis infesta viris, quae gesta morata es
publica in hoc? Dum Seditio clam serpere plebem
coepisset proceresque inter, multisque sibique
instructas fraudes in apertum educere divum 150
munere posse datum est, quanto cum pondere turbas
ipse domi obsessus morbo, stratusque cubili
10
omnis: ms omneis erroneously, then corrected. It is difficult to determine who was responsible for this
correction.
[108–27] “Although many proclamations of praises can be written

about this topic, still that by which he [Giovanni] attained the stars – I
believe – will be that the gods granted him to beget great Cosimo48 for
the fatherland, Etruscan glory, he who, great in virtues, having acquired
the fame of riches, when he could have controlled alone the reins by
his judgement, preferred to restore the great authority of the republi-
can institutions,49 lead a private life at home, and be held a citizen,50
supporter of the worthy, strong in counsel and wealth, and Cosmus by
nature.51 What temples did he erect in distinct places! With what lavish
gold did the beams gleam! How many riches did he, and he alone, order
to flow in honor of the gods! And [how much] did he stir up by exam-
ple the hearts of Tuscans, sluggish with money, and soon spur them
into the ways of distinction and fame! Thus Florence raised her head
to heaven, and is now the fairest of all; with what perfect foresight did
his parents call him Cosmus! What voice from above was this, prophecy
of such an ornament! Give him an adamantine throne, let gold be his
faithful servant, and let lilies from Cytherean conches stand around,52
and let stand eternal the grace of spring from the Erythraean jewel.53
[128–37] “In front of him,54 you [Giulio] prescribe that there should
be a splendid place55 free for the statues of his sons Piero and Giovanni
again:56 there shall never be two blessed children who so emulate their
begetter; the latter poured forth gifts with munificent hand,57 and far
from his native land,58 fervidly eager to banish poverty into exile, sower
of pleasures and joy, always outstanding during public festivities, he
glittered among the foremost companies of the young, knowing no
crime, animated by a virtuous passion; but Parca59 took away the hopes
for so great a talent with an untimely burial, and left to the people
grief and tears.
[138–58] “To Piero a great estate and the care of vast possessions
were of concern from childhood: to add accounts, measure expense,
but not to spare the treasure-chest when the matter required it, to
transfer to himself the consuming cares of his aged father and the
heavy burden of affairs. O dutiful respect and filial loyalty! O provident
advice of a wise mind and careful pacing of the decisive moments of
life!60 Nobody, to be sure, should think him inferior at making deci-
sions about affairs – alas, accursed and importunate disease of the feet,61
enemy of great men, what public deeds did you frustrate by behaving
this way? While Discord secretly began to insinuate itself between the
plebs and the aristocracy, and thanks to the gods the traps prepared
for him and many others were brought into plain sight,62 with what
gravity did he, himself, besieged by sickness in his house and prostrate
on his bed, settle the civil disorders and deflate blown-up hatred and
190 APPEND I X I
composuit tumidumque odium compressit et iras!

Libera quid medio egisset facundia tunc tunc
illa foro, blandique gravis presentia vultus? 155
ergo ambo expressere patrem, quaeque inclyta in uno,
sed virtus non una fuit, divisa in utroque
luxit et in dulci vidit se germine Cosmus.
Nunc orti ex Petro Laurens Iulusque sequuntur
ordine: verte aures, animumque huc verte Raphael! 160
Cuius Apelleos virtus aequare colores
ausa, Syracusii laudes livere magistri,
et priscos nostro cogit concurrere saeclo,
qua decus immortale domus, qua parte locabis?
En Laurens, olim cuius virtutibus orbis, 165
non Ethrusca modo res floruit, annus ut almo
veris ubique solet cultu, sacra tempora laurus
non simplex circum vatis meat: hic, velut isthmos
ne freta concurrant prohibet, sic undique Martem,
qui nos tam longa post clade afflixit, ahenis11 170
continuit vinctum nodis, vetuitque cruentum
effurere, ardentesque minas animosque repressit.
Huius enim docto Pax magna in pectore cudens
consilia, Eoïs Italos in foedere certo
esse dabat, nedum civili a labe retraxit. 175
At postquam immiti rapuit Mors funere, Thuscos
Seditio abripuit, rupto Mars foedere gentes
in ferrum cladesque vocat, tumuere cruore
flumina civili: Rhodanus concurrit Ibero
et cursum Eridani caedes utriusque morata est. 180
Nec dum finis erat, nisi tanto e semine cretum
conciliata orbi tribuissent astra Leonem,
imperio cuius discordia prelia paci
submisere caput, tantumque minantur Eois.
O felix Laurens, quae tu praestare nequisti 185
ulterius, nato demum concessa tueris
praestari ac tanto gaudes cessisse ministro.
Sed quota sit laudum pars nunc, nam dicere plura
instans cura domus tantae vetat. Huc age, sedem
ipse tibi et Musis, quas nullo in turbine rerum 190
e bello pacique instans procul esse ferebas,
delige, ut in Pario spirantem marmore cernam.
Sit tecum luctusque meus, luctusque tuorum
Iulius, infanda quem proditione dederunt
inter sacra neci, vix te evadente, nocentes. 195
11
ahenis: alternative form for aenis < aenus, more frequently used in poetry than aeneus/aheneus. For the

insert of h see Gellius, Attic Nights, ii, 3: “Qua ratione verbis quibusdam vocabulisque veteres immiserint
‘h’ litterae spiritum.”
anger! What would that fluent eloquence have achieved if exercised in

public, and the serious bearing of his persuasive countenance? So both
reflected their father [Cosimo], and any celebrated deed in the one –
but not one was the virtue – shone separately in each son, and Cosimo
could see himself in his sweet seed.63
[159–64] “Now, born from Piero, Lorenzo and Giuliano64 follow
in sequence. Raphael, turn your ears, turn hither your mind, whose
excellence, daring to equal the painting of Apelles, makes the fame
of the Syracusan master envious and the ancients compete with our
age;65 where, in what part, will you place the immortal glory of the
house?66
[165–84] “Behold! Lorenzo, by whose virtues the whole world, not
just the Etruscan state, once flourished; as the season spreads every-
where the life-giving ornament of spring,67 so not just a plain laurel
encircles the sacred temples of the poet; he, like an isthmus preventing
the seas clashing, everywhere restrained Mars (who afterwards afflicted
us with so long a disaster),68 bound him with bronze ties, forbade him
to wreak bloodshed, and extinguished blazing threats and passions. For
Peace, forging great counsels in this man’s breast, made possible a fixed
treaty between the Italians and the Easterners, and by all means put an
end to internal fighting [throughout Italy]. But after Death abducted
him with cruel burial, Sedition grasped the Tuscans, and Mars, the
truce broken, called the peoples to sword and massacres, the rivers
swelled with civil blood: the Rhône clashed with the Ebro, and the
collision of both prevented the Po from coursing freely.69 Nor would
there then have been an end if the stars had not agreed to give Leone
to the world,70 he who was born of so great a seed, by whose com-
mand discordant Strife has bowed its head to peace, and it [i.e. discord-
ant Strife] threatens only Easterners.71
[185–204] “O fortunate Lorenzo, what you yourself could no longer
provide, you ensure is supplied to your son at last, and you delight in
yielding to so great an agent. But, however plentiful may be the praises
now, the care of such a house urgently prevents us from saying more.72
Come here and let this be the abode for yourself and the Muses, whom
you, attentive to war and peace, could not bear to have far away in any
tumult of affairs, so that I may see you breathing in Parian marble.73
Let Giuliano74 be with you, my grief and your grief, whom assassins
consigned to death with infamous treachery at the holy mass, your-
self [Lorenzo] barely escaping; even Virtue herself, protesting at that
wound, burst forth: “There will come, will come, the time for a filial
avenger, criminal hand, you who have dared to shed so noble a blood;
the penalty that they will force you to pay now will seem mild to you:
192 APPEND I X I
Ipsa quidem virtus illo de vulnere clamans

Prosiliit: – Venient, venient sua tempora nato
ultori, scelerata manus, quae sanguine tanto es
ausa madere: levis quam nunc te pendere cogent
poena erit, in miseros surgent graviora nepotes –. 200
Dixit, et in cunis tibi sese, ut forte iacebas,
insinuans, magno implevit genitoris amore,
felicesque simul Iuli concrevit in annos,
et modo te rerum gaudet temone potiri.
Sed quid moesta cano? quid laetis tristia iungo? 205
Quo dolor incautum rapuit? Coenatio sedem
ergo det his statuis, quae a dextra spectat in ingens
vestibulum, a laeva vernantes semper in hortos,
Aeolias hinc inde minas, quibus aedita circum
defendit tecti moles; exurat hianti 210
ut libet ore canis segetes, huc sentiet aestus
praescriptum violentus iter, nec viribus ullis
efficiet, gelidas ne non fons evomat undas,
et circum virides lauros citrosque perennes
irriget ac totum sibi non domus instruat annum. 215
Hic, quando hybernis circum montana rigebunt
culmina frigoribus, tepido sol aureus ortu
occasuque aderit, vitreasque admissus utrinque
per speculas, magnum invitus retrahetur in orbem,
ad reditumque urgebit equos serusque recedet. 220
Tu, Iuli, hic magnos inter spatiatus amicos
in genitore oculos figens, patruique serenos
suspiciens vultus, praesens mirabere numen
amborum, et quamquam stimulis tua cognita virtus
non eget, his cupies et profecisse videri. 225
Parte alia, de turre udum quae spectat ad Austrum
consurgat specula, unde meum conversus in amnem
Iulius aeternum Thuscis ver numine ripis
praesenti sublimis alat, tunc tunc ego felix,
tunc venerandus ero, et cuncta inter flumina princeps. 230
Hac divina mihi Clementia parte Leonis
spiret Apelleae formata coloribus artis,
ut struxere necem mansueto ac tale verenti
nil penitus, divisque ideo servatus ab ipsis
supplicibusque ut prompta fuit non parcere tantum, 235
sed trepidos firmare animos, servare in honore,
divitiis augere, et amicum tollere nullum
de numero, nisi quem sceleris non passa voluntas
poenituisse fuit dira, et dignissima cunctis
suppliciis, hominumque omni de sorte moveri. 240
Ipsa hilaris curru aurato devecta per urbes,
corniger hinc taurus, Libycus Leo quem trahat inde,
worse things will rise against your wretched grandsons.” She spoke, and
slipping into your crib [Cardinal Giulio],75 as you chanced to lie, filled
you with a great love for your father and, oh Giulio, that love so grew
with the blessed years and now your father76 delights in your taking
the helm of affairs.
[205–25] “But why do I sing sad things? Why do I join the sad
to the joyful? Whither does grief draw me unawares? Therefore let
a place be given to these statues in the dining-hall,77 which on the
right looks onto the grand vestibule, on the left onto ever blooming
gardens:78 the mass of the roof built all round provides shelter from the
Aeolian threats.79 Let the dog-star with wide-open mouth scorch the
crops as it will,80 hither the fierce summer will realize that its effects
are restrained, nor by any force may it prevail: it will happen that the
fountain gushes forth cool waters and irrigates the green laurels and
the perennial citrons,81 and not only the house, but the season itself
shall be ruled. Here, when the mountainous heights all round are rigid
with frost, the golden sun will be warm at rising and setting, admitted
on all sides through glazed windows,82 [and] will withdraw unwillingly
to his great orbit; he will urge his horses to return, and will delay his
retreat.83 You, [Cardinal] Giulio, having strolled84 among your mighty
friends, fixing your eyes on your father and regarding the serene face
of your uncle, will admire the palpable majesty of each, and although
your evident virtue needs no spur, you will want to seem to them to
have done well.85
[226–44] “In another part, from the tower which looks out on the
damp south,86 let a belvedere87 arise, whence [Cardinal] Giulio,88 look-
ing toward my stream, may nourish from on high, with his noble pres-
ence, eternal spring on Tuscan banks:89 then, then will I rejoice, then be
worthy of worship, and first among rivers. From this place the divine
clemency of Leone, which is embodied by the pigments of Apellean
art, will breathe upon me:90 when they prepared to murder a man so
gentle, who did not at all fear such [death] – and for this reason he
was saved by the gods themselves – then [Clemency]91 was prompt
not only to spare suppliants,92 but also to strengthen wavering spir-
its, maintain [suppliants] in honor, raise through richness, and strike
no friends from the list except those whom fierce will did not allow
to repent, [thus they are] most worthy of all tortures and of being
194 APPEND I X I
post aquila et facies hominis Clementia divum

aemula quadriiugis quoque sacris digna triumphet.
Ad tua iam descendo, ducum nunc maxime, Laurens, 245
atria, perspicuis longum spectanda columnis,
quae Scauri domibus nunc exquiruntur in ipsis,
actutumque veham. Magni genitoris imago
hic sedeat, nymphae Lyris12 cui bella gerenti
barbariem adversus pro libertate Latina 250
instruxere dolos, tacitasque tulere sub undas,
sive rebelli odio, iuvenis seu lumine captae;
Ascanii haud clamatus Hylas in margine tantum,
Pïerus Euboico quantum est in littore,13 adusque
Caietam umbrosae per florida regna Maricae. 255
Hic tu illum tandem teque ille suosque nepotes,
quos sperare tibi magno de sanguine regum
contigit, ut Medicum proles in saecula tendat,
aspicies, hic laeta parens, hic maxima coniunx.
Sed mihi prae querulo demum precordia luctu 260
rumpantur, divo si sedem hic ponere Iulo
admonear, Iulo ingenti virtutis alumno,
quem viduo Philiberta toro castissima coniunx
plorat adhuc thalamoque illam assentire secundo
non regina soror precibus, non iussa nepotis 265
regia persuadent questu lachrymisque madentem.
Quare illum coelo, cuius praereptus obivit
invidia, penitus linquamus, ut ipsa dolori
conferat – heu miserum auxilium et lachrymabile! – Lethe.
At medio specula assurgens quae spectat ad Eurum 270
ac Boream, et quicquid circumque infraque supraque
pulchri Roma tenet, sublimi lumine lustrat,
haec tua sit sedes, Leo rex hominumque paterque.
Erigat hic sensus artem ingeniumque Raphael,
hic sit Apelleas studium superare figuras, 275
hic tolli sibi nomen amet, spes aemula ut omnes
destituat, solo admirandi ardore relicto.
Instructas acies hinc quas hortatur Iberus,
illinc quas Rhodanus paries ferat, utque tubarum
audito hortatu, infestis mox utraque signis 280
concurrit: non densa solet sic horrida grando
hybernique imbres ruere, ut per inane ruebat
telorum omne genus, plumbique a sulphure glandes
contortae et ferri moles ex aere frementi
et iam laeta dabat victoria gramen Ibero, 285
12
Lyris: less correct than Liris.
13
littore: stands for litore. This use of double consonants is very common in neo-Latin poetry for metrical
purposes.
removed from the whole condition of mankind. Herself [Clemency],

filled with joy, drawn through the cities on a golden chariot, here by
a horned bull and there a Libyan lion, next an eagle and the face of
a man, Clemency, rival of the gods, will triumph, worthy even of the
holy quadriga.93
[245–59] “Already I go down to your halls, Lorenzo [Duke of
Urbino],94 now the greatest of dukes, to be gazed upon long with
their translucent columns which are now sought in the very houses
of Scaurus,95 and forthwith I carry them here; let the image of the
great begetter [Piero]96 be placed97 here, for whom, making war for
the liberty of Latium against barbarism, the nymphs of the river Liri98
prepared snares and carried him under the silent waters either because
they hated him, the rebel, or were seized by the brilliance of his youth;
nor was Hylas lamented on the Ascanius river bank as much as Piero
was on the Euboean shore up to Gaeta, 99 through the flowery realm
of shady Marica.100 Here, at last!, you shall see him, and he shall see you
and his descendants, whom you may expect from the grand blood of
kings, so that the seed of the Medici may last for ever; here stands the
happy mother [Madeleine],101 here the greatest spouse.102
[260–9] “But finally my heart will break with plaintive grief, if I am
reminded to put here a place for superb Giuliano [Duke of Nemours],103
Giuliano the great student of virtue, for whom Philiberta104 most
chaste spouse weeps on her widowed couch; neither the Queen her
sister105 with her prayers nor the royal commands of her nephew106
can persuade her, still mourning with grief and tears, to a second mar-
riage.Therefore let us leave him in the deepest heavens, by whose envy
snatched off he died, so that Lethe herself, alas! miserable and tearful
aid, may contribute to grief.
[270–303] “And the belvedere rising in the center which looks out
to the east and north, and with elevated gaze covers whatever beauties
Rome encompasses all around, above and below, let this be your seat,
Leone, king and father of mankind.107 Here108 let Raphael elevate the
skill and ingenuity109 of visual experience, here let him be zealous to
surpass the forms of Apelles, here let him find pleasure in his exalted
fame so that everyone abandons any hope of emulating him, only the
fervor of admiration remaining.
196 APPEND I X I
cum mox, Hestensis sese dux vertit ad artem,

cui genitore olim revocante et turpe putante,
a puero incubuit. Nempe inter inertia semper
instrumenta necis, fauces versatus ahenas14
sulphuris et nitri cumulos, vix dignus haberi 290
sceptrum humili gestare manu, sed fata ferebant
artibus his olim rerum discrimina solvi.
Machina nanque15 illo ductante opponitur omnis
vincentum lateri, magno haec cum murmure densos
impetit, et larga solvit cum caede maniplos: 295
cernere erat galeas vulsa cervice rotari
brachia, thoracasque, et crura trementia leto;
It cruor undatim, surguntque cadavere montes,
infelix facies rerum et lachrymanda Latinis,
et Rhodano non laeta, aeque et funebris Ibero. 300
Tum quibus ardebant animoso in pectore laudes,
instaurare aciem, cornu revocare solutum,
tendereque ad pulchram caeco in discrimine mortem.
Infami at plures pugna nutante saluti
consuluere fuga, sed non fortissimus heros, 305
famaque belligerae Petrus iam summa Navarrae,
non virtus Cardona aevo mandata perenni,
non tu, summe Leo, qui tum vice fructus eadem
quam modo demandas aliis, praecepta facessens
pontificis, clamore viros hortaris in arma 310
magnanimo, praescripta tibi nanque arma, diuque
dum retines pugnam, demum interceptus ab hoste
captivus traheris, regi admirabile pignus.
Iamque per Eridanum te traiectura patentem
hostilis properat manus, indignatus ab alto 315
exerit amne caput, conchaque immane strepenti
– res mira! – intonuit fluviorum protinus ut rex,
omnia concurrunt ingenti rura tumultu,
ad sonitumque patris circum bacchantur agrestes.
14
ahenas: see note 10.
15
See above line 76.
“Behold! On this side, the wall bears armies arrayed,110 those the
Ebro exhorts, on the other side those the Rhône [exhorts],111 as if as
soon as the incitement of trumpets is heard, they immediately engage
each other in battle: not thus do swelling hail and winter rains fall, as
through the air every kind of weapon fell, bullets of lead propelled by
sulfur and a mass of iron from rumbling bronze; and joyful Victory was
already giving the palm to the Ebro, when suddenly the Este Duke112
turned to the craft he had known since childhood, his father long ago
dissuading him and considering it ignoble; in fact, always among lifeless
instruments of death, he was devoted to bronze mouths and to heaps of
sulfur and niter,113 when you would have considered him hardly able
to hold a stick with his little hand, but long ago the Fates had decreed
that by these arts struggles would be decided. For, with him directing,
the whole formation opposes the winning side, and with a great roar
it falls on crowded ranks, and clears them with great slaughter. One
could discern helmets spinning with neck torn away, arms, torsos, and
legs trembling with fear of death; blood flows in waves, and mountains
of corpses rise, a wretched vision of things, at once lamentable for the
Italian, miserable for the Rhône, and equally mournful for the Ebro.
Then those in whose courageous breast fame burned [began to] renew
the battle formation, recall the disordered wing, and seek a fair death
in the blind conflict.
[304–19] “Yet many cowards, the battle faltering, took thought for
safety by flight, but not the mightiest of heroes, Petrus,114 already the
greatest pride of warlike Navarre, not Cardona,115 virtue to be remem-
bered forever, not you, greatest Leo, who once did in your turn what
now you entrust others to do;116 you carrying out the precepts of the
Pope, exhort the men to battle with bold call, for arms are ordered
upon you, and while you continue the fight for so long, at last captured
by the enemy you are dragged as a captive, a splendid hostage for the
King. Already the enemy force hastens to take you across the open Po
[who], indignant, raises his head from the deep bed, and (remarkable
thing), a conch sounding fearsomely, as soon as the king of rivers thun-
ders, from all over the countryside people run up with mighty confu-
sion, and at the sound of their father the rustics rage round about.
198 APPEND I X I
Tum Mutinae decus et fidei, succensus amoris 320

excelsique animi stimulo atque ardore iuventae,
solus16 in armigeros te circum gaesa tenentes
irruit incautos et agrestum voce paventes,
distinuitque adeo, evadendi ut facta potestas
sit tibi, dein magno percussus vulnere ripis 325
concidit Eridani, Gallis fugientibus instant
indigenae ac demum tibi diis gratissime et illi
parta salus. Debes Mutinae, quae tempore duro
nec semel una fuit fidei tibi sedula custos,
nec deerit – non vana loquor: si proruat aether 330
omnis, erunt Mutinae fidissima pectora casus.
At quae cura tui superis fuit! ut tua virtus
premia tum demum, cum visa est obruta cuique
accepit! Patriae primum tibi redditae habenae,
quas dolus abstulerat fratri, nec mensibus annum 335
demensis, solio excelso Romana potestas
unde orbi dat iura sedes, rarumque senatum
luminibus merito ascitis lucere frequentem
iussisti et placida terras cum pace gubernans,
aurea restituis Saturni tempora Romae. 340
Ordine sed postquam cuncta haec color arte magistra
fecerit, ut credant oculi spirare figuras,
addi etiam maiora peto: persuasa moveri
bella Asiae te, summe Leo, duce et auspice, latos
restitui imperio fines, Solymasque receptas 345
exuere infandos mores, vitamque ferinam,
quem et nasci videre, colant de more Tonantem,
quem videre mori, et magnae post funera mortis
scandere sidereos cunctis mirantibus orbes;
atque ubi solennes ritus festosque sacrarit 350
more dies, clarosque illis praefecerit oris
rectores, magna Hesperia repetente parentem,
Auratis tandem vectus Leo regna quadrigis
Europae repetet plaudentis vincula Idaspem,
Euphratem, Tigrimque trahent cervice rebelli 355
iam dignante, iugumque et regis sceptra Latini.
Tu quoque gestorum consors revehere quadriga
consiliis animisque potens et robore, Iuli,
regnatorem Asiae devinctum colla catenis,
quas meret, et nexos genitori pone superbo, 360
turpiter ire iubens natos proceresque ducesque,
expectata dabis magnae spectacula demum
Ausoniae, et quamvis magnos spectare triumphos
contigerit nobis olim florente Quiritum
imperio, tamen his dicas, tu Roma, minores. 365
16
Mutinae decus … succensus … solus: about the syntax, see gloss note 117.
[320–40] “Then, oh glory of faithful Modena [Andrea Guidoni]!117

inflamed with love for a noble spirit [i.e. Leone], and with the ardor
of youth, alone hurls himself on the spear-bearing soldiers around you,
unwary and scared by the shouts of the peasants, and detains them until
you have the chance to escape, and then falls with a grave wound on
the banks of the Po; the locals pursue the fleeing French, and at last
you reach a safety most welcome to the gods as to him [i.e. Guidoni].
You are in debt to Modena, who in a difficult time, and not just once,
was the sole eager keeper of faith to you, nor shall he abandon you;
neither do I speak vainly: if the whole sky falls the most faithful hearts
will be found in Modena in every eventuality. But what care did the
gods have of you! For your virtue only then received its reward, when
to everyone it seemed overwhelmed. First the reins of the fatherland,
which trickery had wrested from your brother, were restored to you;118
not a whole year having passed, you sit on the exalted throne whence
Roman authority gives laws to the world, and you have ordered the
scanty Senate119 to become numerous and illustrious by creating emi-
nent members,120 and governing the earth with restful peace, you
restore to Rome the Golden Age of Saturn.121
[341–56] “But after paint has shaped all these deeds in sequence
with magisterial skill, so that the eyes believe the forms to be breath-
ing,122 I ask for still greater to be added: the wars of Asia, which you,
greatest Leo, as inspirer and leader, exhorted [the European princes] to
fight, the broad bounds of empire to be restored, and, once Jerusalem
was reconquered, to drive out shameful customs and beastly life; they
[the people of Jerusalem], who saw born the Thunderer123 shall wor-
ship rightly, they who saw him die, and, after the rites of his great death,
ascend the stellar spheres to universal wonder [i.e. the resurrection
of Christ]. And when he [Leone] shall have celebrated properly the
solemn rites and feast days, and shall have placed illustrious governors
in those regions, with Italy reclaiming her father, then Leone borne
on golden chariots shall return to the kingdoms of an applauding
Europe, [and] Hydaspes, Euphrates, and Tigris, their rebellious necks
now bowed, shall bear the chains, the yoke,124 and the scepter of the
Latin king.
[357–65] “You too, Giulio, sharer of these deeds, strong in coun-
sel, spirit, and might, shall be borne on a chariot: you shall chain the
defeated ruler of Asia, you shall tie with deserved bonds the arrogant
father [Selim I],125 forcing his children, the nobles and the generals
to walk in shame; you shall at last give to great Italy126 its longed-for
spectacle; and although it fell to us to watch great triumphs when the
Empire of Roman citizens127 flourished, yet you, Rome, will say that
they were inferior to these.
200 APPEND I X I
Ipse etiam Laurens, nitidis spectandus in armis,

Bistonio dux vectus equo, lauroque revinctus
laurigeros inter reges pubemque Latinam
ibit ovans: magno coelum clamore tonabit,
dum tota Europa Medicum tolletur in astra 370
nomen et ipsa, Leo, Leo! tecta urbesque boabunt.
Haec equidem video fatorum praescius utque
gesta volo iam nunc speculae a pictoribus addi,
ut quoties oculos huc vertet Iulius, ardor
tantae animum famae accendat; nam maior honorum 375
huic stimulo non ullus erit: per caeca pericla
gloria praecipitem impellat virtusque fidesque.
Cetera membra domus magnae subtusque supraque
praetereo tacitus, speculas, aulasque patentes,
cumque suo scenam non una fronte theatro, 380
munitumque caput geminatis turribus ad vim
eminus arcendam, ut genio pax tuta fruatur,
utque cubile frequens, ut porticus, ut vitreus fons
non unus tectis, nec balnea mutua aquarum
commemoro, aut xystum ramis frondentibus alte 385
contextum, et tonsa buxo, myrtoque virenti;
a latere indutum, vitreamque a margine xysti
piscinam, gradibus circum scandentibus imis,
hippodromumque et equis stabula alta a fronte, fluentes
ad quae sponte sua lymphae in praesaepia tendent: 390
omnia post melius. Diversum inquirere marmor
nunc opus, et plures ad tot dimensa columnas
atria, et in varias lusura asarota figuras
ingentesque trabes, largum quas imbuat aurum;
nanque peregrino pars marmore nulla vacabit 395
assumet nil vile domus: Caieta reponit
selectas citros, Campania tota requirit
insignes plantas, quid non Pomona revolvit?
Ipsa hortos colere ac maturo tempore ramos
Inserere, ut varios diversa ex arbore fructus 400
una ferat, totumque vireta graventur in annum
pollicita est, hic regna sibi, hic fore Thessala Tempe.
Non unus Thybrim versat labor, undique curae
impendent gratae ob dominum cui blanda Voluptas
frena gerit,Virtusque comes, Concordia custos, 405
Sidera amica, Leo frater, deus, arbiter et rex”.
Dixit arenosoque caput mox condidit alveo.
[366–77] “Also the general Lorenzo128 himself, admirable in his

gleaming weapons, the duke riding a Thracian horse, and wreathed
with laurel, shall go triumphant among the laurel-bearing kings and
the Latin youth; heaven shall thunder with the great clamor, while
Europe raises the Medici name up to the stars, and the buildings them-
selves and the cities shall roar: Leone, Leone! These deeds, truly, I see
with foreknowledge of the fates, as if already done and I want them
now added to the belvedere129 by the painters, so that whenever Giulio
casts his eyes hither, the desire for such fame might inflame his mind;
for there shall be no spur to honor greater than this: may glory, cour-
age, and faith impel him headlong through hidden dangers.
[378–91] “The other elements of the great house, above and below,
I pass over in silence,130 the many belvedere and open courtyards and
the stage of the theater with not just one backdrop131 and the head132
fortified by twin towers to prevent attack a long way off, so that in
safety and peace one might enjoy the amenity [of the place]; likewise
the many resting-places, the porticoes, the several fountains shining
indoors, not to mention the circulating baths of water, nor the xystus
woven above with leafy branches and clad on one side with clipped
box and green myrtle, nor the transparent fishpond next to the xys-
tus133 with steps all round ascending from the depths,134 nor the hip-
podrome and the lofty-fronted horse-stables, to which water will flow
of its own accord to the mangers. All this better anon.
[391–407] “Now,135 it is necessary to search out the different mar-
bles and the many columns to be placed around the planned court-
yards136 and the mosaic floors137 contriving varied figures, and the huge
roof-beams clad in plentiful gold; for no part shall be without exotic
marble, and the house shall incorporate nothing cheap: Gaeta contrib-
utes choice citron trees,138 all Campania provides the most noble seed-
lings, what does Pomona not revive?139 She, indeed, shall cultivate the
orchard and graft the branches at the right moment, so that one and
the same tree could bear various fruits140 and the greenery141 shall be
weighed down all year: here would be her realm, here her Thessalian
Tempe.142 Not one labor alone exercises the Tiber, from every side
impend pleasing cares, because of the master; his reins are plied by blan-
dishing Pleasure,143 and Virtue is the companion, Harmony the guard,
Constellations the friends, brother Leone, God, judge and king”.
Thus he spoke, and then buried his head in the sandy river-bed.144
202 APPEND I X I
gloss
1. In the address to Cardinal Giulio that titles the poem, Sperulo uses fabricatum to emphasize
that his role is practical as well as metaphorical; throughout the poem, he claims to be on
site and physically working with materials, devising placement of marbles, and bringing the
villa into being.
2. The topos of the locus amoenus, used by ancient poets to describe villas and natural beauty;
for which, Curtius, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages, 190–202; Newlands, “The
Transformation of the ‘Locus Amoenus’ in Roman Poetry.” See also lines 30 and 401–2; the
poet effectively opens and closes the poem with this imagery.
3. The first of several references to the ambition for the villa to surpass antiquity. See also lines
12, 163, and 275.
4. The Horatian topos of which will last longer, poetry or monuments (Horace, Odes, iii,
30), frequently evoked by Renaissance poets, discussed in Chapter 2, p. 55 and notes 55–6.
Sperulo’s odd conceit about a glue made of lime and sand (the ingredients of stucco) and his
use of glutinum, a relatively unusual word mostly used in technical literature, refers to Vitruvius’
description of lime-slaking for stucco facture: “cum vero pinguis fuerit et recte macerata,
circa id ferramentum uti glutinum haerens omni ratione probabit esse temperatam” (“when,
however, the lime is rich and duly slaked, it clings round the tool like glue, and shows that it is
properly mixed”):Vitruvius, De architectura, vii, 2.2. That the poet knew this technical passage
suggests exchange between artists and wordsmiths about their ancient sources, as discussed on
pp. 124–5 and 148–9.Thus, Sperulo transforms the words-versus-marbles topos into ink-ver-
sus-stucco, particularizing it for the Medici villa, where the newly revived material of stucco
would articulate every surface.
5. The poet hopes that Cardinal Giulio will reward the speed with which he completed the
poem – ostensibly in just two days, as he says at the outset. Speed of execution was a trope
of apology and also a badge of poetic furor and ingenium; see Chapter 2 p. 59 and notes 82–3.
6. An image of the poet as blacksmith, evoking Vulcan/Hephaestus, the god of all artificers, with
the power of prophecy. In Virgil, Aeneid, viii, 626–8,Vulcan forges the Shield of Aeneas that
foretells the story of Italy and the triumphs of Rome: “Illic res Italas Romanorumque tri-
umphos haud vatum ignarus venturique aevi fecerat ignipotens.” (“There the story of Italy and
the triumphs of Rome had the Lord of Fire fashioned, not unversed in prophecy or unknow-
ing of the age to come.”) For Vulcan as one of Sperulo’s authorial personae, see pp. 69–72.
7. In classical Latin, a praetorium signified a large mansion or palace, from the dwelling of a
praetor, or Roman magistrate (OLD, praetorium, def. 3). Sperulo’s choice of the word reflects
Statius’ usage of it for the twin mansions on either side of the river Anio that comprised the
villa of Manilius Vopiscus at Tibur (“alternas servant praetoria ripas,” Statius, Silvae, i, 3, 25).
See also the discussion in Newlands, Statius’ Silvae and the Poetics of Empire, 179.
8. The poetic conceit of a building so vast that the roofline approaches the stars or heaven itself
is perhaps drawn from Statius’ encomium of Domitian’s Palatine palace (Silvae, iv, 2, 30–1);
the impossibility in masonry construction of foundations being laid at the same time that
the roof was being built reflects the poetic rather than documentary nature of this passage.
9. Sperulo announces his debt to Statius with several references in the opening lines of the poem,
literally echoing the ancient poet’s description of construction noise. Lines 1–3 evoke Statius’
silva about Domitian’s construction of a road in Campania: “Quis duri silicis gravisque ferri /
immanis sonus aequori propinquum / saxosae latus Appiae replevit?” (“What monstrous
sound of hard flint and heavy iron has filled paved Appia on the side that borders the sea?”):
Statius, Silvae, iv, 3, 1–3. Lines 5–7 draw on two further passages from Statius: Silvae, i, 1, 63–5,
on the sound of Domitian’s equestrian monument being raised:“strepit ardua pulsa / machina;
continuus septem per culmina Martis / it fragor et magnae vincit vaga murmura Romae.”
(“The lofty scaffolding is loud with hammer strokes and an incessant din runs through Mars’
seven hills, drowning the vagrant noises of great Rome.”); and Silvae iv, 3, 61–4 on the build-
ing of Domitian’s road: “Fervent litora mobilesque silvae. / it longus medias fragor per urbes /
atque echo simul hinc et inde fractam / Gauro Massicus uvifer remittit.” (“The shore and
waving woods are astir. The lengthy din travels through the towns between and grapy [e.g.
vine-bearing] Massicus sends back to Gaurus the echo broken at either end.”) Of course, this
imagery subverts the more tranquil sounds normally associated with a locus amoenus; on sound
in poetic landscape, see Newlands, “The Transformation of the ‘Locus Amoenus’ in Roman
Poetry,” 94–5. Furthermore, Statius’ passage about Domitian’s statue evokes Virgil’s Cyclops
forging the shield of Aeneas, so, at another level, this is also an intertextual riff on the creative
power of the poet.
10. An echo of the phrase, “pater ipse suberbus aquarum Ausonidum Eridanus,” referring to
the Po, in Silius Italicus, Punica, ix, 187–8. The seventeen-book epic Punica was discovered
in 1417, and its importance for Renaissance humanists has been little studied. That Silius
Italicus was a collector of art and owned several villas, including one of Cicero’s, may have
made him an attractive model for Sperulo’s villa poem.
11. hortatur … Eia agite! (11–12): from the beginning of Father Tiber’s speech, Sperulo empha-
sizes its hortatory nature using vocabulary and the hortatory subjunctive. For Tiber as
Sperulo’s authorial persona, and the suggestion that the poet actually was engaged in many
of the tasks the Tiber claims to be doing, see pp. 67–9, 72–3 and passim; for the poem as an
example of a poetic genre I identify as hortatory ekphrasis, see p. 91.
12. The conceit of a villa so marvelous that the gods fly down to visit was familiar from other
Coryciana poems, including the Chigi villa panegyrics of Blosio and Gallo.
13. An evocation of Statius, Silvae i, 2, Epithalamium in Stellam et Violentillam, lines 156–7 on
Venus’ visit to the house of Stella: “hic Sirius alget, / bruma tepet, versumque domus sibi
tempeat annum.” (“Here Sirius is chill, midwinter warm. The house tempers the changing
year to its liking.”) Sperulo further presents a situation in which all ordinary rules and cat-
egories are subverted.
14. Iaccho: from Iacchus, an epithet for Bacchus (often used as a synonym for “wine”), but here
a synonym for strepitus or clamor, which derives from the Bacchantes and their wild shouts
during rituals: Iacchè, Iacchè, etc. Sperulo uses the word as a metaphor for the violence of the
South Wind. (NM)
15. Perhaps a reference to the extraordinary war booty of fine paintings and sculptures taken
back to Rome after Marcellus’ Siege of Syracuse, which initiated the Roman enthusiasm
for Greek works of art, according to Livy, History of Rome, xxv, 40, 1 –3; also described by
Polybius, The Histories, ix, 10. Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage, vol. 2, 124–5, offers the interest-
ing interpretation that it instead relates to the skill of Archimedes with his globe (sphaerae
mundi), suggesting that it likens the villa to the globe.This reading would be consonant with
Sperulo’s engagement with cosmological and astrological imagery that would later appear
in the villa, which was cast as a microcosm of Leo’s realm, and of the cosmos. This imagery
was also consistent with the poet’s repeated references to Cosmus and meanings attached
to the Medici palle; and perhaps also constituted a play on the poet’s own name, sometimes
spelled Sferolo. See p. 23, lines 70, 109–10, 116, 182, 211, 219, 370, 406, and gloss notes 35,
51, 80, 83 below. This imagery predated, and perhaps prefigured, Cardinal Giulio’s 1522
impresa Candor illaesus, which included an image of a crystal sphere, and which would be
prominently featured in the villa’s decorations.
16. A variation on the locus amoenus, for which see the dedicatory letter, §2. Sperulo’s amoena
vireta (see also line 401; for the form vireta see note 2 to the Latin) recalls some classical
sources: virecta is a Virgilian coinage (Aeneid, vi, 639–40: “locos beatos et amoena virecta /
fortunatorum nemorum sedisque beatas”, later borrowed by Prudentius, where it is Paradise
itself. Prudentius, Cathamerinon, hymn iii, 101–5:“Tunc per amoena virecta iubet / frondicomis
habitare locis, / ver ubi perpetuum redolet / prataque multicolora latex / quadrifluo celer
amne rigat,” in Aurelii Prudentii Clementis, Carmina, ed. Mauricii P. Cunningham, Corpus
Christianorum, Series Latina 126 (Turnhout, 1966), 14; see also Apuleius, Metamorphoses,
IV, 2: “laetissima virecta.” The English greenery allows for various forms of green places. See
“greeneries” in P. Vergili Maronis, Aeneidos Liber sextus, with a commentary by R. G.
Austin (Oxford, 1977), 203. (NM)
17. Laurel was sacred to Apollo, and of course was an emblem of Lorenzo de’ Medici. Petrarch
used laurel as a symbol of immortality, and Poliziano and other Laurentian panegyrists had
played on laurel/Lorenzo as a metaphor of Medici stability. It was further connected with
Venus; Poliziano mentioned laurel among the plants in the Garden of Love, and Lorenzo’s
own poetry places laurel among the perfumed trees of Venus: Levi D’Ancona, Botticelli’s
204 APPEND I X I
Primavera, 43, 83–4. Pliny recorded that the laurel was an emblem of victory and peace,
was the most beautiful tree on Mount Parnassus, and was pleasing to Apollo: Pliny, Natural
History, xv, 40. Laurel traditionally formed the crown for poets and for triumphs. Laurel
is intertwined with myrtle on the illuminated title page of Sperulo’s poem (Plate ix); the
illumination is analyzed in the following appendix.
18. Myrtle was sacred to Venus. In antiquity, crowns of myrtle were awarded to poets celebrat-
ing love (Ovid, The Art of Love, ii, 733–4) and to generals who conquered without blood-
shed (Pliny, Natural History, xv, 38, 125). In Poliziano’s Stanze, Galatea wears myrtle (as
well as roses) and Botticelli’s Venus in the Primavera is framed with myrtle: Levi D’Ancona,
Botticelli’s Primavera, 86–7. As noted above, myrtle and laurel are intertwined on the illumi-
nated title page of Sperulo’s poem (Plate ix).
19. For the left bank of the Tiber as Tuscan or Etruscan, see Chapter 3, p. 67 and note 20.
20. Sperulo casts Cardinal Giulio as one of the Lares, gods who take care of a home and the
people within it. (NM)
21. A play on Ovid’s Fasti, iv, 830, when the king says to Jupiter, “auspicibus vobis hoc mihi
surgat opus.” (“Under your auspices may this my fabric rise!”)
22. Perhaps he was here referring to the main entrance from the Vatican road, which as Raphael
described, would lead into a vestibule (Raphael/Dewez, 22, §3–4). Although Sperulo
loosely frames his poem as a walkabout, his description does not follow any logical itinerary,
jumping from one end of the complex to another and back.
23. Sperulo’s claim that highly polished Libyan marble from the Temple of Jupiter Tonans on
the Capitoline would adorn the threshold and walls of the villa’s vestibule evokes Pliny’s
reference to solid polished blocks of marble on the walls of this temple (Natural History,
xxxvi, 8, 50). No vestige has been found of this temple, as noted by P. Gros, “Iuppiter
Tonans, aedes” in LTUR, vol. 3, 159–60. Sperulo could have invented this provenance,
drawing on the Plinian account, in order to emphasize Leo/Jupiter ideology, which would
be prevalent in the villa, as it was at the Vatican and the Capitoline. However, this prov-
enance might actually have been true, because Pirro Ligorio recorded excavations at this
temple and its despoliation for use at St. Peter’s. (As pointed out by Shearman, who con-
sidered this a unique reference to real marbles among Sperulo’s otherwise literary descrip-
tions: Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 436.) Ligorio claims that Pentellic columns were taken from
Jupiter’s Temple to St. Peter’s; see Lanciani, Storia degli scavi e notizie intorno alle collezioni
romane di antichita (Rome, 1902), ii/2, 94. In any case, Sperulo intended these revetments
for one of the grand main entrances to the villa, in parts of the complex that were never
executed.
24. Synnadic marble came from the quarries of Docimium, a city in Phrygia, Asia Minor. The
quarries were under imperial control from the time of Tiberius and produced white and
pavonazetto marble used for large-scale imperial building projects, including the Forum of
Trajan in Rome: OCD, 489, 1463; Pliny, Natural History, xxxv, 1, 3.
25. In this passage, the poet enumerates the kinds of marble available to be installed in the villa,
and in some cases their provenance.
26. Sperulo consistently uses atria to refer to spaces with significant marbles or spoils (lines
54–6, 79–81, 245–7, 391–3) although he does not specify exact locations of these in the
villa.
27. There is sharp disagreement about whether the ruins of the gardens of Lucullus were
known, or identified as such, in 1519; see Moneti, “Forma e posizione della villa degli horti
Luculliani secondo i rilievi rinascimentale: la loro influenza sui progetti del Belvedere e delle
Ville Madama, Barbaro e Aldobrandini [part 1],” Palladio 12 (1993): 5–24, at 13–14 (citing
this passage of Sperulo as his only evidence that it was known to the Raphael school); and
the response by Henri Broise and Vincent Jolivet, “A proposito di Andrea Moneti e la villa
degli horti Luculliani, con una replica dell’autore,” Palladio 20 (1997): 119–25. Lucullus’ villa
was located on the Pincian hill, partly on the site of the later Villa Medici, although the
Medici did not yet own this site in 1519. I think Sperulo’s reference is more likely based
on a literary source, rather than an archeological one. Georgia Clarke notes that Lucullus
became almost a generic encomiastic term for a patron of architecture in this period: Roman
House – Renaissance Palaces, 33–4.
28. A reference to a Plinian topos (Natural History, xxxvi, 4, 14): “Sed in Pariorum mirabile
proditur, glaeba lapidis unius cuneis dividentium soluta, imaginem Sileni intus extitisse.”
(“As for the quarries of Paros, there is an extraordinary tradition that once, when the stone-
breakers split a single block with their wedges, a likeness of Silenus was found inside.”) A
similar tale is told by Cicero, but the figure of Pan instead emerges: Cicero, De divinatione,
i, 13, 23. Alberti repeats the Plinian tale, suggesting its familiarity to Renaissance audiences.
The story reflects the topos of art created by nature, which is discussed by H. W. Janson,
“The ‘Image Made by Chance’ in Renaissance Thought,” in Sixteen Studies (New York,
1973), 53–74, and was important for the villa and its garden decorations. This passage from
Sperulo has been misinterpreted to mean that there was a figural sculpture of Silenus at the
villa; rather, Sperulo describes that these columns are of the same Parian marble as described
by Pliny.
29. The Peloponnesian peninsula of Taenarum was home to quarries of rosso antico and black
“Taenarian” marble. OCD, 1471.
30. The sanctuary of Aphrodite at Paphos. Virebant (59) could be read literally as the color green,
although there is no textual or archeological evidence for green marble from Paphos or the
Temple of Venus Genetrix; rather, Sperulo probably meant it metaphorically as the height of
bloom or beauty, as translated here.
31. See Chapter 3, pp. 74–8 and notes 46–53 for the suggestion that Sperulo may have been
referring to an actual marble from the Temple of Venus Genetrix that was, in fact, installed
in the Medici villa.
32. Quirites was a name given to the collective citizens of Rome in their peacetime functions
(OLD, “quirites” def. 1), and thus appropriate to the worship of peace-bringing Venus.
33. Suetonius (Lives of the Caesars, “Divus Iulius,” 85) describes how, following the death of Julius
Caesar, a 20-foot column of solid Numidian marble, inscribed “To the Father of his Country,”
was set up in the Forum: “Postea solidam columnam prope viginti pedum lapidis Numidici
in Foro statuit inscripsitque “PARENTI PATRIAE.”Whether the Medici actually had this
or any other Numidian marble column is unknown (see the discussion in Chapter 3, pp. 75,
79 and notes 54–5). Numidian marble, a yellow African marble now known as giallo antico,
was quarried in ancient Chemtou in Numidia: Gabriele Borghini, Marmi antichi, (Rome,
2001), 214–15, with bibliography. Under Julius Caesar, the great Numidian quarries passed
from the patrimony of the Numidian kings to the Romans when the province of Africa
expanded eastward in 46 bce: J. B.Ward-Perkins, “Tripolitania and the Marble Trade,” Journal
of Roman Studies 41 (1951): 89–104, at 96; H. G. Horn, “Die antiken Steinbrüche von
Chemtou Simitthus,” in Die Numider: Reiter und Könige nördlich der Sahara (Bonn, 1979), 178–
80. About literary references to Numidian marble, Valérie Maugan-Chemin, “Les couleurs
du marbre chez Pline l’Ancien, Martial et Stace,” in Couleurs et matières dans l’Antiquité, ed.
Agnès Rouveret, Sandrine Dubel, and Valérie Naas (Paris, 2006), 103–26, at 111–12.
34. Iulo here carried the double meaning of Aeneas’ son, ancestor of the Romans, and also
Julius Caesar, to whom the column was dedicated (see previous note). This makes sense
because the gens Iulia had Venus and Aeneas among their ancestors and divine protectors.
35. Astrological themes characteristic of Leonine imagery, including Leo’s predestination to rule,
run throughout the poem; see also lines 182, 370, 406. Sperulo is probably referring here to
Leo’s capture and escape at the Battle of Ravenna, which had been construed as miraculous
and a harbinger of his papacy; the poet prescribes mural paintings of this battle for the villa
in lines 274–340.
36. Line 71 is an echo of the Virgilian ‘‘parcere subjectis et debellare superbos” (Virgil, Aeneid,
vi, 853), the mission of the Roman race, an observation I owe to James Hankins.This is also
a Christian reference to Leo as alter Christus, and to his clemency, especially in the aftermath
of the putative conspiracy against him; for which see lines 231–44 and notes 90–2 below.
37. A reference to the labors of Hercules, common in Medicean and Leonine imagery, drawing
on Hercules’ importance as a symbol of Florence. (For the representation of Hercules in the
206 APPEND I X I
sigillo used in the Chancery to sign official documents: Nicoletta Marcelli, Gentile Becchi: il
poeta, il vescovo, l’uomo (Florence, 2015), 235–6 and nn. 51–2.)
38. For Leo and Giulio’s joint patronage, see pp. 64–5. Sperulo’s text here also closely reflects
the ambiguous political situation in Florence: Leo was the governor of the city, but current
affairs were administrated by Giulio on his behalf.
39. Sperulo uses the noun sedes and the verb sedeo in different senses: here as sites for sculptures
of ancestors – which could mean thrones or simply places – and elsewhere to designate areas
of the villa as figurative seats for the living Medici, or as the villa as an abode (see also lines
16, 27, 125, 128, 189, 206, 249, 261, 273, 337). It is unclear whether he is proposing seated or
standing figures. Strikingly, the notion of thrones left empty took visual form in the marble
decorations of the Medici New Sacristy, begun for Pope Leo and Cardinal Giulio in the
same year as Sperulo’s poem (1519); see the discussion in Chapter 5, pp. 130–1 and note 98.
40. commensa, from commetior; an exhortation to the architects, while they are still refining the
plans, to leave room for sculpture in their measured halls, suggesting that the size of rooms
and the placement of statues were being planned together at this time; discussed on pp.
83–4 and Chapter 6, section on “Poetry as design tool.” See also his use of dimensa (392)
and note 136 below.
41. From lines 78 to 208, Sperulo uses the conceit of a proposed ancestor sculpture gallery
as a framework for the encomium of Medici forebears, which he concludes by specifying
that they should all be placed in a coenatio – the villa’s garden loggia. See Chapters 3–5 for
discussion of this proposal in the context of the villa’s planning and its literary antecedents.
See Figure 25 for a tree of Medici family members mentioned in the poem.
42. With the use of almus, normally reserved for divinities, the poet is crediting the Medici fam-
ily with divine, life-giving power. (NM)
43. Lars Porsenna, king of Clusium, one of the twelve cities of Etruria, who was important in
the history of Rome at the beginning of the Republic. Sperulo is thus linking the Medici
to Rome’s Etruscan founders, and making the Etruscan/Tuscan–Roman link.
44. A reference to the perceived Turkish peril at this time, as discussed in Chapter 3, pp. 80–1
and notes 62–9.
45. The conceit of the patron as author; see the Introduction, p. 5 and note 18.
46. Giovanni di Bicci (1368–1429). About the form Iani, see the note to the Latin, line 96. The
use of IANI is also surely a play on Janus, who controlled war and peace and the coming
of the new year, and who was prominently featured in the façade frieze at Poggio, devel-
oped by Poliziano and executed at the time of Lorenzo; Sperulo is here linking the family
founder to the god who controls the cycle of time.
47. Daedala Curia (97): an unusual, if not original, conceit likening the Papal Curia to the
Daedalian Senate. The skillful Curia is further a metaphor for the Roman papacy, and,
more generally, for Rome itself, where Giovanni de’ Medici resided from c. 1385 to 1402,
during which time he became the banker to the papacy and established the Medici Bank
as one of the wealthiest in Europe. Daedalus was renowned for his skills as the architect of
the labyrinth in Crete; in Latin the corresponding adjective daedalius/daedalus (lower case)
means “skillful, dexterous” in a broader sense, here especially referring to the outstanding
diplomatic and political skills of the Roman Curia. (NM)
48. Cosimo il Vecchio (1389–1464).
49. Florence, of course, did not have a Senate; this is another Romanization or a metaphor for
the main Florentine institutions: I Tre Maggiori, i.e. the Gonfaloniere di Giustizia, Priori,
and Collegi.
50. Machiavelli, in his history of Florence of c. 1520–25 written for Medici patrons, articu-
lated a similar view of Cosimo’s patrician propriety: “And although these dwellings and
all [Cosimo’s] other works and actions were kingly, and he alone in Florence was prince,
nonetheless, so tempered was he by his prudence that he never overstepped civil modesty.”
Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, 281. For the issue of how direct or ambiguous Cosimo’s
control and visual patronage were, see most recently Dale Kent, Cosimo de’ Medici and the
Florentine Renaissance, ch. xv, with extensive earlier bibliography. Nicoletta Marcelli notes
that the tropes of praise Sperulo uses throughout the poem, and especially in praise of
Cosimo, reveal his deep familiarity with earlier poetry about the Medici, especially from the
time of Lorenzo the Magnificent; for which, see the section on poetry dedicated to Cosimo
with earlier bibliography in Marcelli, Gentile Becchi, 219–52.
51. Cosmus is an allusive play on the Greek word kóσμoς, which could mean either world or
rule or, more rarely, glory. This was a popular topos among the poets close to Lorenzo the
Magnificent, especially Naldo Naldi, Cristoforo Landino, and Gentile Becchi. (NM)
52. The image of the lilies of Florence springing from the conches of Roman Venus is part of the
poet’s imagery that Romanizes the Tuscan Medici (see also p. 20). This phrase also alludes to
imagery of the generative Venus familiar from Laurentian Florence, especially in Poliziano’s
Stanze, i, 99–101 and Botticelli’s painted poesie, which would figure prominently in the deco-
rative imagery of Villa Madama (discussed on pp. 71–2, 74–8 and 116–18).
53. The eternal spring associated with the Medici, which Sperulo mentions many times (see
also gloss notes 78, 89).The conceit was particularly associated with Lorenzo, as in his motto
Le tems revient (for which see pp. 20, 50 and 116–17).The fantastical description of a jeweled
setting for the sculpture of Cosimo reflects the tradition of such ekphrases as allegories of the
Heavenly Jerusalem (for which see Chapter 4, pp. 92–3 and note 37), and is surely a marker
of the importance the poet is attaching to this sculpture, rather than a literal proposal.
54. In lines 128 and again in 156–8, he is being unusually specific about location, here using
post hunc to indicate the physical placement of these statues, rather than succession in a list.
(NM) This language is consonant with the function of the poem as a walkthrough, whether
literary or literal.
55. Here aureus is used metaphorically for places, as in many early Christian authors: aurea Roma
in Juvencus, Evangeliorum libri IV, praef. v. 2: “Inmortale nihil mundi conpage tenetur, /
Non orbis, non regna hominum, non aurea Roma, / Non mare, non tellus, non ignea
sidera caeli”; and especially for Paradise, see Paulinus Bishop of Aquileia, Regula fidei (poem),
“Hac Petrus in clavi caelorum limina pandit /Aurea ruricolas reserans ad regna phalanges,”
in L’œuvre poétique de Paulin d’Aquilée, edition critique avec introduction et commentaire de
Dag Norberg (Stockholm, 1979), 92. (NM)
56. Cosimo’s sons: Piero il Gottoso (1416–69) and Giovanni de’ Medici (1421–63). For empty
thrones, see lines 78–9 and note 39 above.
57. Larga … manus: a topos used by Medicean poets to indicate the family’s munificence, espe-
cially that of Cosimo. See Gentile Becchi’s poem praising Cosimo’s Larga manus, in Marcelli,
Gentile Becchi, 225 and 231 n. 10. This imagery was perhaps related to the manu fortis of
David and Hercules, but emphasizing a different type of power: a magnanimous/generous
hand, as Becchi and Sperulo use it, as opposed to a strong hand.
58. The poet alludes to Giovanni’s stay in Ferrara as the head of the Medici Bank branch, where
he acquired a refined and humanistic education. (NM)
59. One of the three goddesses of fate and human destiny.
60. This echoes what Machiavelli says about respettivo and impetuoso as different behaviors,
appropriate to varied situations: Il principe, ch. 25.
61. A reference to Piero’s gout.
62. The failed conspiracy organized by Dietisalvi Neroni, Agnolo Acciaiuoli, and Luca Pitti in
1466.
63. The poet is suggesting that the statue of Cosimo should face those of his two sons; see also
line 128. The imagery of propagating a branch from shoots evokes the Medici imprese of
laurel-Lorenzo, and the broncone symbolic of Medici restoration. For which, Cox-Rearick,
Dynasty and Destiny; and Francesco Bausi, “Il broncone e la fenice,” Archivio storico italiano
552 (1992): 437–54. For broncone in the illumination of Sperulo’s manuscript, see Appendix ii.
64. The brothers Lorenzo il Magnifico (1449–92) and Giuliano de’ Medici (1453–78). Sperulo
refers to Giuliano as Julus, following Poliziano’s practice in the Stanze of calling him Iulo,
after Aeneas’ son.
65. Raphael’s paintings will make Apelles, the Syracusan master, turn green with envy.
66. Sperulo is challenging Raphael about where to place the figure of Lorenzo the Magnificent
in the house. For the poet’s proposal, see, lines 189–92 and note 73 below.
67. Another reference to the eternal return of spring under the Medici.
208 APPEND I X I
68. A reference to the Medici exile and the Italian wars after 1494.
69. The Rhône represents France, the Ebro Spain, and the Po Italy in this description of the
Italian wars.
70. Pope Leo X, formerly Giovanni de’ Medici, son of Lorenzo il Magnifico. A reference to the
astrological topos that he was predestined for the papacy. See line 70 and note 35 above.
71. The topos of Leo as Rex pacificus, who tried to achieve a peace among the European powers
to unite them in a crusade against the Turks.
72. The poet is claiming that his actual responsibilities at the villa are more pressing than an
encomium.
73. The notion of a marble Lorenzo-as-Apollo surrounded by the Muses presents the villa as
Parnassus, evoking topoi of otium associated with villeggiatura, and also the trope of the living,
breathing statue. Further, the poet is probably making a literal proposal for using the ancient
sculptures of the Muses, some from Hadrian’s Villa, which were at Villa Madama, for which
see Chapter 5, section on “Parnassus”; for this proposal as a challenge to Raphael, see above
line 164 and pp. 83–4, 107, 110–11 and 156–7.
74. Giuliano de’ Medici (1453–78), who was murdered in the Florentine Duomo in the Pazzi
conspiracy.
75. The poet is addressing Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici, son of the murdered Giuliano.
76. Here the text is vague about who delights in Giulio’s accomplishments:Virtue or his father
Giuliano. The latter choice is consistent with other sections in which the poet has living
Medici family members interact with “living” statues of deceased ancestors (e.g. lines 256–9).
77. Lines 206–8 wrap up the encomium of ancestors, proposing that most of their sculptures
be placed in the coenatio, or dining hall; it is clear from Sperulo’s description of a grand
vestibule on the right, gardens on the left, that he is referring to the garden loggia, as if he
were standing in it, back to the hillside, facing the long façade of the building (see plans
in Figures 15, 26). For Sperulo’s choice of the word coenatio and literary models, including
Statius’ description of Domitian’s banquet hall, and his metaphorical construct for this space
as the coenatio Iovis, see pp. 124–6.
78. Another reference to the eternal spring of the Medici reign (see also gloss notes 53, 90), and
to the motto glovis, used at Poggio a Caiano and elsewhere.
79. Aeolus (in line 209), the ruler of the winds, who lived in the Aeolian (Lipari) Islands; Homer
makes him human (Odyssey, x, 1–79), whereas he appears as a minor deity in Virgil, Aeneid,
i, 52.
80. The conceit that a villa will withstand the scorching heat of the Dog Star, from Statius,
who notes that, “Sirius’ hot star did not bark” (illum nec calido latravit Sirius astro) at
one who experienced the chill (glaciale) villa of Manilius Vopiscus at Tibur (Silvae, i, 3, 5).
The Dog Star was also important in Pope Leo’s horoscope, related to the Sun and crea-
tion; thus it appears in the astrological iconography of the Sala dei Pontefice in the Vatican
and the imagery of the Poggio a Caiano frescoes, planned contemporaneously with Villa
Madama and Sperulo’s poem; see Cox-Rearick, Dynasty and Destiny, 195 and passim; and
Susan Regan McKillop, Franciabigio (Berkeley, 1974), 76. (Some depictions of dogs refer
to the Dog Star, or jokingly to early Medici stemme with dogs; a later fresco at Poggio by
Allori depicts a dog bearing a written message of warning for Medici opponents: si latrabitis,
latrabo [if you bark, I too will bark], surely reflecting the ongoing intertextuality of Medici
imagery: Cox-Rearick, Dynasty and Destiny, 107–8.)
81. Evergreen laurel and everlasting citrus suggest the immortality of the Medici. For laurel, see
line 31 and note 17 above. Citrus, especially oranges, were Medici emblems because of their
similarity to the Medici palle, and from a play on the Latin term for oranges, Citrus medica, or
the confusingly named mala medica. An orange grove with laurel was the background setting
for Botticelli’s Primavera.Valeriano recorded that, under Clement VII, the Medici interpreted
the health of a citrus grove as a harbinger of family fortune:Valeriano, Hieroglyphica, lib. iii,
ch. iii, under “Creta.” Citrus was also associated with the Garden of the Hesperides and
with Venus. Hesperidian Garden imagery was a Medici topos invoked from the gardens of
Lorenzo de’ Medici and the decorations of Poggio a Caiano to the Vatican Belvedere under
Leo X: Levi D’Ancona, Botticelli’s Primavera, 42–3, 87–9; and Cox-Rearick, Dynasty and
Destiny, 48 and passim. In Raphael’s letter describing the villa, his only reference to specific
plants is to sour orange trees (melangholi, or mala medica/arancio amaro) in an interior garden
court (Figure 15). For the suggestion that Pontano’s “De hortis Hesperidum” was conceived
as a Medici panegyric and later used by Giovio as the basis for painted iconography at
Poggio a Caiano, see Strunck, “Pontormo und Pontano,” discussed in Chapter 4, note 54.
82. Hic … Per speculas: Sperulo seemingly describes the tower ringed with glazed windows, a
feature described by Raphael as the winter diaeta and shown in plan in U 273a (Plate v,
Figures 15, 26); but that glazed room was planned in the east tower, and it would be odd
for the poet to interrupt a discussion of the garden loggia and inner garden to jump to the
other end of the villa, only to jump back to conclude the long section about Giulio’s ances-
tor gallery. Alternatively, perhaps the poet confused the towers; or he mistakenly thought the
north tower would also be ringed with windows (although none are shown in either mas-
terplan, and Raphael stipulates that the north tower will house a chapel: Raphael/Dewez,
28 §17). Possibly Sperulo is simply evoking the trope of the villa’s comfort in all seasons
with this vague reference to summer and winter quarters, rather than referring to a par-
ticular location; and the Hic would thus refer generally to the villa complex. (NB Gwynne
conflates Raphael’s description of the glazed diaeta in the east tower with that of the chapel
in the north tower, thereby compounding the confusion about Sperulo’s intended locations:
Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage, vol. 2, 136.) For more on the towers, see Chapter 3, pp. 81–2
and notes 72 and 74; and note 86 below.
83. The conceit that even the Sun will reconfigure his path to spend more time at the Medici
villa; he will urge his horses to return to it as early as possible each morning, and delay his
retreat from it each evening.
84. The vocabulary of a stroll or walk-about (spatiatus, 221) suggests the poem was conceived as
a walk-through with the patron, either metaphorical or literal. That the poem was possibly
intended to be recited, perhaps on-site at the villa, is suggested in Chapter 6 in the section
“Performing the plans.”
85. Subverts the traditional role of portrait/ancestor gallery; Giulio is so virtuous he does not
need inspiration from his ancestors, but rather he will wish for them to see his virtues. This
also reflects the conceit that the sculptures are alive.
86. The poet uses turre in lines 226 and 381 to designate the towers designed for the corners of
the villa, visible in the plans, and described by Raphael in his letter using the word torrione
(tower), and turrione (bastion) for a tower’s ground storey. Sperulo here specifies a tower
overlooking the damp south (technically impossible as the hillside blocks the view due
south) from which Giulio will face the Tiber; presumably the poet saw the plan, without
understanding its relation to the topography. Most likely, he meant the east tower (see Figure
26), which Raphael’s letter specifies would house a winter diaeta ringed with glass windows
(Raphael/Dewez, 23–4 §7–8). The murals may have been intended as a band above the
windows, or else between windows; there is sufficient wall space to allow for paintings,
although the visibility would not be ideal. However, as one of the largest and most novel
spaces planned for the villa, the diaeta would merit significant decoration. Alternatively, per-
haps Sperulo meant the south tower. For more on these murals and their setting, Chapter 3,
pp. 81–2, especially notes 72, 74. See also note 82 above and Chapter 4, p. 88 and note 15
for discussion of the poet’s lack of clarity about the site of these murals and other issues of
architectural interpretation. (NB Gwynne mistakenly sets these murals in the north tower,
which is impossible since Sperulo specifically describes a tower overlooking the south, and
because the north tower to contain a chapel was planned without windows, as seen in both
masterplans; Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage, vol. 2, 137. See note 82 above.)
87. Sperulo uses specula in the sense of a belvedere, whether in the corner towers as in this case,
or in the central loggia designated as Leo’s seat (line 270).
88. Cardinal Giulio continues his stroll, begun at line 221 (spatiatus).
89. Another reference to eternal spring under the Medici, and the Tuscan bank of the Tiber.
(See also notes 53 and 78 above.)
90. What follows is the poet’s proposal for a series of paintings in the villa, this one depicting
the Triumph of Clemency, specifically the clemency of Leo. For the subject of Medicean
and Leonine clemency, and Sperulo’s proposed murals, see pp. 81–2. Sperulo himself had
written an earlier poem celebrating Leo’s clemency: Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia
210 APPEND I X I
xviiii, for which see Appendix iii. Once again, the poet invokes the trope of art so vivid it
breathes.
91. Clemency, as embodied in Leo. A reference to the putative plot to murder Leo X, and his
clemency toward the conspirators who were allowed to live. For the conspiracy, see Chapter 3,
p. 82 and note 77.
92. Line 235 recalls the first line of Sperulo’s elegy on Leo’s clemency: “Parcere supplicibus
gaudet generosa leonum”; in Appendix iii.
93. The triumph of Clemency is to be depicted on a cart drawn by the four symbols of the
Evangelists, a reference to Ezekiel’s prophecy that the new throne of God shall be in the
form of a chariot drawn by the four living creatures, symbolizing the Gospels (Ezekiel
1:5–14). For the metaphor of the four Evangelists as a chariot team in Christian imagery
(the Quadriga Domini), Michael Jacoff, The Horses of San Marco and the Quadriga of the Lord
(Princeton, 1993), 12–20. As Nicoletta Marcelli observes, like many Medici panegyrists
before him, Sperulo combined the Old Testament tradition with that of ancient Rome
in this passage: Pliny (Natural History, xxxv, 157) records that the sculptor Vulca di Veio
shaped the terracotta quadriga that was placed on the pediment of the Temple of Jupiter
Capitolinus; during the ceremony of the triumphus, the victorious captain, like a hero worthy
of divine honors, rode on a wagon pulled by four white horses along the Via Sacra up to the
Capitoline Hill. Sperulo’s passage is also surely a reference to Raphael’s design for The Vision
of Ezekiel in which God the Father is shown as Jupiter borne aloft by the four creatures
(executed as a painting, probably by Giulio Romano, and a tapestry, possibly for Leo’s letto
de paramento): another instance of the paragone of poet and painter to envision the invisible,
discussed on pp. 82–4 and 176. For Raphael’s design, the attribution of the painting, and
history of the tapestry, Henry and Joannides, Late Raphael, 109–17.
94. Lorenzo, Duke of Urbino (1492 to 4 May 1519). As he does for other living Medici family
members, the poet assigns an area of the villa to Duke Lorenzo, here unspecified atria. For
Lorenzo, see also line 366 and note 128 below. For the chronology of Lorenzo’s illness and
death in relation to Sperulo’s composition of the poem, see Chapter 3, p. 66 and note 11,
Chapter 5, pp. 130–1 and note 98, and p. 155.
95. Pliny refers to the 360 columns set up by Marcus Scaurus in a temporary theater, the largest
of which was later placed in Scaurus’ house on the Palatine, which Pliny censures among the
early examples of the extravagant use of marble for private dwellings: Pliny, Natural History,
xxxvi, 2, 5–6. Sperulo’s evocation of such a splendid temporary theater might be a refer-
ence to the Medici Capitoline theater erected in 1513.
96. Piero de’ Medici (1472–1503).
97. See above note 39 for the ambiguity of whether Sperulo was specifying that the sculptures
be seated.
98. nimphae Lyris (nymphs of the river Liri). Liris flumen (also written Lyris), known from Pliny,
Natural History, ii, 227, stands for the whole basin of the Liri–Gari–Garigliano. From the
confluence of Liri and Gari, the river Garigliano begins, site of the battle during which
Piero died. (NM)
99. Reference to the death by drowning of Piero de’ Medici, who was fighting with the
French against Spain at the time. The mythological Hylas drowned when the nymphs
who fell in love with him pulled him under, and his Argonaut colleagues searched at
length for him in vain. Sperulo’s conceit echoes two passages, one from Statius, Silvae, i,
2, 199: “quantum non clamatus Hylas” (“never was Hylas so clamored”), which was itself
drawn from Virgil, Eclogues, vi, 44: “clamassent, ut litus ‘Hyla, Hyla’ omne sonaret” (“[the
seamen] called on him, ‘till the whole shore echoed ‘Hylas Hylas!’”); and the other from
Propertius, Elegies, i, 20, where the myth of Hylas is connected to the river Ascanius in
Bithynia, where the mournful episode took place (see Pliny, Natural History, v, 121 [32]:
“Aeolis proxuma est, quondam Moesia appellata, et quae Hellesponto adiacet Troas. Ibi
a Phocaea Ascanius portus.”). Euboico … in littore: Sperulo uses this epithet to refer to
Cuma, the ancient colony founded by the Greeks from the Euboean region in the eighth
century bce. The Euboean shore from Cuma to Gaeta is where the river Liri floods into
the Tyrrhenian Sea.
100. Marica is the nymph of the shore where the river Liri flows into the Tyrrhenian Sea; for
which, Horace, Odes, iii, 17, 7–8: “et innantem Maricae / litoribus tenuisse Lirim” (“and
Latium’s River Liris where it floods the shores of the nymph Marica”), but Sperulo prob-
ably had in mind Lucan, Civil War, ii, 424: “umbrosae Liris per regna Maricae.”
101. Duke Lorenzo’s wife, Madeleine de la Tour d’Auvergne (c. 1500 to 28 April 1519), was a
niece of Francis I, and was then about seven months pregnant with Catherine de’ Medici;
thus, the descendants expected by Lorenzo from the grand blood of kings would be
regarded by the statue of Piero.
102. An emphatic double exclamation referring to Madeleine, who is both pregnant (parens)
and the most honorable spouse (coniunx), and not a reference to the placement of sculp-
tures. (NM) Here, Sperulo once again suggests the interaction of the living with their
ancestors represented by “living” statues.
103. Giuliano, Duke of Nemours (1479–1516). Once again, it is ambiguous whether sedem
(261) stipulates a seat, throne, or simply place for this figure. For the conceit of the empty
throne in the New Sacristy, begun later this same year to house the tomb of Giuliano, see
lines 78–9 and note 39 above, and Chapter 5, p. 131 and note 98.
104. Filiberta of Savoy (1498–1524), daughter of Philip, Duke of Savoy. Her 1515 marriage to
Giuliano was arranged in conjunction with the alliance between Leo X and the French
king, Louis XII.
105. Louise of Savoy.
106. Louise of Savoy’s son, King Francis I, Duke of Angoulême.
107. For the importance of this central loggia designated as Leo’s seat, like a papal benediction
loggia, see the discussion in Chapter 5, section on “Topography of Christian triumph.”The
loggia is visible in the model and plan in Figures 14, 15.
108. From 274 to 276, Sperulo uses a series of adverbs (hic … hinc and illinc) to emphasize the
importance of the proposed decorations in Leo’s loggia, further stressing that these mural
paintings will stand as a milestone in the rebirth of the excellence of the arts, equaling and
surpassing those of the ancients – another instance of the paragone with antiquity that the
poet sets out in the dedicatory letter. (NM)
109. For the pairing of ars (skill, craft) and ingenium (innate talent, evoking notions of genius
and inspiration, and drawn from classical literary or rhetorical theory and applied by
Renaissance humanists to the visual arts), Baxandall, Giotto and the Orators, 15–17; and
Kemp, “From ‘Mimesis’ to ‘Fantasia’,” 392–3.
110. The following battle description proposes a depiction of the historic Battle of Ravenna
of 1512. The passage evokes ancient authors such as Livy, and also Leonardo’s description
of how to represent a battle (Kemp, Leonardo on Painting, 228–33), as well as his legendary
Battle of Anghiari. Leonardo also specifically discussed the paragone between the poet’s and
painter’s depiction of a battle (ibid. 28) – a comparison that Sperulo invites the reader to
make. This was a topical issue; at the time Sperulo was writing, Raphael was designing the
Battle at the Milvian Bridge mural painting for the Vatican Sala di Costantino, and Ariosto was
revising his Orlando furioso with its ekphrastic battle set pieces that thematized the visionary,
prophetic power of the poet; on these humanists and artists in a competition and a meta-
conversation about the nature of invention and the relative power of word and image, see
above note 93 and pp. 82–4 and 176–8.
111. In the prescriptions for battle paintings, Sperulo/Tiber describes rivers – e.g.Tiber’s broth-
ers – urging on the troops, an important early instance of personifications of these locative
deities prescribed for the visual arts. For his proposed mural about the Battle of Ravenna,
the Ebro and Rhône rivers represent Spain and France, respectively. It is also clear from
lines 315–16 below, describing the Po sounding his conch shell, that the poet intends the
river gods to be depicted as figures actively taking part in the battles, rather than as static
place markers in the recumbent pose of ancient statues as Raphael had depicted them in
the Sistine Chapel tapestries; for which see p. 80.
112. Duke Alfonso d’Este, one of the greatest experts in weapons and cannons of his time, who
had an extraordinary set of firearms; his role in this battle was crucial.
113. That is, cannons and gunpowder.
212 APPEND I X I
114. Pietro/Pedro Navarro, the leader of the allied Spanish and papal infantry in the Battle of
Ravenna.
115. The Spanish Viceroy Ramón de Cardona, commander of the allied Spanish and papal
armies in the Battle of Ravenna.
116. That is, Leo personally did the tasks he now asks others to do.
117. Gwynne (Patterns of Patronage, 144) unlocked this cryptic passage by identifying the Mutinae
decus (320) as a metaphor for Andrea Guidoni from Modena, a fellow papal chamberlain
with Sperulo. The fact that decus Mutinae (neutral) refers to a man explains the odd con-
cordance with the male succensus and solus.Thus, according to Sperulo, when Leo was being
transported as a prisoner of war after the Battle of Ravenna, Guidoni enabled Leo’s miracu-
lous escape at Pieve del Cairo, in Lomellina, near Valenza Po. (For the escape, see Marco
Pellegrini, Leone X, in Enciclopedia dei Papi, vol. 3, 42–64.) Even before the episode of the
escape, and when Leo was still cardinal and vice-legate in Romagna, Andrea Guidoni was
one of his associates: see Ottorino Montenovesi, “Documenti pergamenacei di Romagna
nell’Archivio di Stato di Roma,” in Atti e memorie della Regia Deputazione di storia patria per
le provincie di Romagna, ser. iv, xvi (1926), 71–106, and 99–100 about Bagnacavallo: “Budrio,
12 marzo [1511] 1512. Il cardinale Giovanni de’ Medici nomina Andrea Guidoni alla
parrocchia di S. Antonio di Maseria. Maseria, 23 marzo 1512. Nicola de Zingolis, c ontadino,
riconosce … di lavorare a tenimento di proprietà della parrocchia di S. Antonio di Maseria,
per conto di Andrea dei Guidoni, chierico modenese, rettore della parrocchia m edesima …
Maseria, 23 marzo 1512. Andrea dei Guidoni, di cui sopra, prende possesso della parrocchia
di S. Antonio.” Then, after assuming the papacy, Leo rewarded Guidoni for his loyalty by
giving him the title of chamberlain as well as other ecclesiastical privileges: see Mariano
Armellini, Le chiese di Roma dal secolo IV al XIX, seconda ed. accresciuta e migliorata (Rome,
1891), 349: “Ad Andrea Guidoni chierico di Modena, cameriere segreto di Leone X, con-
cessione di sito per fabbricare ab ecclesia s. Blasii novi prope ripas fluminis longitudinis XVI
cannarum usque ad portum aquariolorum. Datum in Camera apostolica, 22 Aug. 1514.” (NM)
118. A reference to Piero de’ Medici, brother of Leo, who was forced to leave Florence and fled
into exile in 1494.
119. The College of Cardinals.
120. A positive spin on the large number of new cardinals (43) named by Leo; for which, Conrad
Eubel, Hierarchia catholica medii et recentioris aevi (Regensberg, 1923), vol. 3, 13–18.
121. The topos that the Medici are restoring the Golden Age.
122. Another reference to painted forms so vivid they breathe.
123. Jupiter the Thunderer here represents God/Christ, as in Dante and earlier neo-Latin
poetry. (NM)
124. A reference to the Medici impresa consisting of a corpus of a yoke and ring and the anime of
Suave and N, which are explained by the text Anulus nectit iugum suave (The ring unites, the
yoke is easy). Paolo Giovio recorded the origin of the phrase in Matthew 11:30, “Iugum
meum suave est onus meum leve.” (“My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”): Giovio,
Dialogo dell’imprese militari et amorose (Rome, 1555). 39. The complete impresa was used by
Cosimo il Vecchio, by Lorenzo, and extensively by Pope Leo; he had received the yoke
while still in minoribus, probably in 1512. See Shearman, Raphael’s Cartoons, 85–9; Reiss,
“Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron of Art,” 133, 150 n. 18, 19; Cox-Rearick, Dynasty
and Destiny, 87–8, 36ff and pl. 70; and Rousseau, “The Yoke Impresa of Leo X,” 113–26. See
also lines 404–5 and note 143 below.
125. Selim I, Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, 1512–20. A reference to the topical issue of bro-
kering a peace among European rulers to facilitate a united crusade against the Ottoman
Turks, discussed in Chapter 3, pp. 80–1 and note 66. See also Chapter 3, note 83 for the
fast-changing political circumstances that rendered irrelevant Sperulo’s proposed frescoes
by the time the villa was actually decorated.
126. Ausonia (363) was a poetic designation for Italy, familiar from works of Virgil, Ovid, and
Statius, among other poets.
127. As noted for line 62, Quirites designated Roman citizens in their peacetime functions;
thus, Sperulo emphasizes that the Medici restoration of peace will surpass the ancient pax
romana.
128. Duke Lorenzo (1492 to 4 May 1519). Curiously, Sperulo foretells Lorenzo’s future glori-
ous military exploits, when in fact the Duke was already fatally ill with tuberculosis; for the
chronology of Lorenzo’s illness and Sperulo’s poem, see above note 94; Chapter 3, p. 66
and note 11; Chapter 5, pp. 130–1 and note 98; and p. 155.
129. specula, the same as in line 270, where the ekphrasis of battle paintings begins. As noted
above, this belvedere is the central loggia designated by the poet as Leo’s seat. For the
impossibility of executing murals in this open loggia as designed with little wall space, see
the discussion in Chapter 4, p. 88 and note 9.
130. With the phrase praetereo tacitus (I pass over in silence) Sperulo introduces a significant
praeteritio, an ironic rhetorical device by which the poet claims to ignore a subject while
bringing it to the reader’s attention. This highly significant passage of Sperulo’s poem
effectively sets aside the very subjects that Raphael treats in his epistolary description of
the villa, revealing the poet to be privy to Raphael’s ideas and thus engaged with the villa
planners. However, the variations in Sperulo’s list suggest that Sperulo did not actually see,
or spend much time with, Raphael’s letter.The relation of the two descriptions is discussed
in the first section of Chapter 4.
131. The notion of having multiple backdrops is drawn from Virgil (Georgics, iii, 21–5), who
mentions one of the faces of a set of reversible scenery: “Iam nunc sollemnis ducere
pompas / ad delubra iuvat caesosque videre iuuencos, / vel scaena ut versis discedat frontibus
utque / purpurea intexti tollant aulaea Britanni.” (“Even now I long to escort the stately pro-
cession to the shrine and witness the slaughter of the steers; and see how the scene on the stage
changes as the sets revolve and how Britons raise the crimson curtain they are woven into.”)
Raphael mentions painted screens as acoustical aids in the theater, but does not other-
wise mention scenery (Raphael/Dewez, 29 §20). As Sperulo was surely aware, the design
of Villa Madama’s theater was guided by intensive study of the ancient theater by Fra
Giocondo, Antonio da Sangallo, and others in this circle; for which, Christoph L. Frommel,
“Raffaello e il teatro alla corte di Leone X,” Bollettino del Centro internazionale di studi di
architettura Andrea Palladio 16 (1974): 173–87.
132. The use of caput (head) as well as membra (limbs; three lines above) reflects the body/build-
ing topos.
133. a margine xystus (387) suggests that the poet may have been looking at a plan for the villa
without completely understanding it, since the xystus (inner garden) and fishpond are
represented as contiguous in the masterplans that conflate elements from different sto-
reys, although these two areas are on different levels, as the stairways in the plans express.
Raphael, in his letter, clearly describes that the xystus overlooks the fishpond 4 canne
below that is reached by large staircases, so Sperulo is not following Raphael’s text here
(Raphael/Dewez, 27 §16). See plans in Plate v and Figures 15, 57.
134. The steps around the peschiera (a detail borrowed from the villa of Poggioreale in Naples)
are shown in the earlier masterplan (U 273a, Plate v and Figures 15, 57) and also described
in Raphael’s letter as a place to sit or stretch out (Raphael/Dewez, 27 §16), although they
were eliminated with the redesign of the fishpond and adjacent areas in the later masterplan
(U 314a, Plate vi and Figure 58). For the suggestion that this area was under discussion at
the time Sperulo and Raphael were writing, see Chapter 5, pp. 109–11 and note 57.
135. The poet concludes his praeteritio of elements he will not discuss – those which Raphael
does – by saying “All this better anon” (Omnia post melius), suggesting that the reader/lis-
tener can learn about those from Raphael later. In the following sentence, he switches the
focus to his own tasks, which he stresses are pressing.
136. dimensa, dimetior (392): the poet uses the rare dimensa to refer to the courtyards that have
been measured and designed by the architects, for which he is choosing marble columns.
Raphael’s letter includes specific measurements for each room, and since Vitruvius, meas-
urement had been a tool of the architect and a marker of his ingenium.The poet is improb-
ably suggesting that he could determine the placement of columns, bolstering his claim to
join the architects in “constructing” the villa; and once again claiming that the architects
should take into account his proposed selection of spoils as they finalize the plans; see
above line 79 and note 40 for gloss to commensa. For dimensa, see also Cicero, Epistles to
214 APPEND I X I
Atticus, i, 2 (i, 6): “Domum Rabirianam Neapoli, quam tu iam dimensam et exaedifi-
catam animo habebas, M. Fontius emit” (“The Rabirius house in Naples, which is already
laid out and architecturally complete in your mind, has been bought by M. Fonteius”);
Tacitus, Annals, xv, 43: “Ceterum urbis quae domui supererant non, ut post Gallica incen-
dia, nulla distinctione nec passim erecta, sed dimensis vicorum ordinibus et latis viarum
spatiis cohibitaque aedificiorum altitudine ac patefactis areis additisque porticibus, quae
frontem insularum protegerent” (“Of Rome, meanwhile, so much was left unoccupied by
his mansion, was not built up, as it had been after its burning by the Gauls, without any
regularity or in any fashion, but with rows of streets according to measurement, with broad
thorough-fares, with a restriction on the height of houses, with open spaces, and further
addition of colonnades, as a protection to the frontage of the blocks of tenements”) (trans.
A. J. Church and W. J. Brodribb, London, c. 1876).
137. asarota: a reference to Pliny’s and Statius’ descriptions of the famous “unswept floor” mosaic
in Pergamum. Pliny, Natural History, xxxvi, 184: “In this latter field [mosaic] the most
famous exponent was Sosus, who at Pergamum laid the floor of what is known in Greek
as ‘the Unswept Room’ because, by means of small cubes tinted in various shades, he
represented on the floor refuse from the dinner table and other sweepings, making them
appear as if they had been left there.” “celeberrimus fuit in hoc genere Sosus, qui Pergami
stravit quem vocant asaroton oecon, quoniam purgamenta cenae in pavimentis quaeque
everri solent velut relicta fecerat parvis e tessellis tinctisque in varios colores.” Statius
made reference to this floor in his description of the Tiburtine villa of Manilius Vopiscus:
“floor where the ground rejoiced in painting’s variety, with strange shapes surpassing the
Unswept Pavement” (“solum, varias ubi picta per artes gaudet humus superatque novis
asarota figuris”): Statius, Silvae, i, 3, 56. Alberti mentions the unswept floor in Pergamum as
an appropriate model for a dining room in a private building: Alberti, On the Art of Building
in Ten Books, trans. Joseph Rykwert, Neil Leach and Robert Tavernor (Cambridge,
MA, 1988), IX, 4. For Poliziano’s gloss on the term in Statius’ Silvae, Cesarini Martinelli,
Commento inedito alle Selve di Stazio di Poliziano, 284–5.The current floors in Villa Madama
are a product of twentieth-century restoration; I have not yet found any clear evidence for
the original floors.
138. Gaeta was the source of the best citrus trees. Pope Clement would indeed later order fruit
trees for the villa from there, as recorded in his correspondence of 1525 with Mario Maffei,
as noted by Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 438 and 604. Also, another allusion to the villa as the
Garden of the Hesperides (see note 81 above).
139. Pomona, goddess of fruit trees, orchards, and gardens, was fundamental to the imagery
being designed concurrently for Pontormo’s lunette fresco in the Salone of the Medici
villa of Poggio a Caiano. Here, the notion that she revives all plantings represents the eter-
nal renewal of the Medici.
140. A popular grafting technique that allows a tree to bear different fruits, which the poet lists
among the marvels at this extraordinary villa. Such products embody the contemporary
notion of a “third nature,” produced by the conjoined efforts of nature and art; for which,
Lazzaro, The Italian Renaissance Garden, 8–16 and passim.
141. vireta (401): see line 30, note 16 above, and the following note.
142. Thessala Tempe (402): another poetic topos for a pleasant green place (e.g. Virgil, Georgics,
iv, 317: Peneia Tempe, after the river Peneus in Thessaly). With this image, and that of the
vireta in the previous line, the poet closes the poem as he opened it, with classical imagery
of a pleasant green place (amoenitas loci in the dedicatory letter, §2; amoena vireta [30]).
143. The notion that Pleasure bears Cardinal Giulio’s reins is another reference to the Medici
impresa explained by the text Anulus nectit iugum suave (The ring unites, the yoke is easy),
and its source in Matthew 11:30: “Iugum meum suave est onus meum leve” (“My yoke is
easy and my burden is light”); for which see line 356 and note 124 above. Here it becomes
a conceit of Sperulo’s work: the poet, personified by Father Tiber, is saying that his work
for Cardinal Giulio is a pleasure. This is also a reference to Statius, Silvae i, 3, 9, where
Pleasure draws the plans for the Vopiscus villa, once again validating the poet’s proposal:
“Pleasure herself is said with tender hand to have traced with you” (“ipsa manu tenera
tecum scripsisse Voluptas”). The verb scribere can refer to text or visual representation, and
S P E R U L O , V I L L A I UL I A M E DI C A TRAN S L ATI O N AN D G L O S S 215
Statius pointedly played with these meanings throughout his ekphrastic silvae to underscore
the paragonal nature of the visual and verbal; see Adam R. Marshall, “Spectandi Voluptas:
Ecphrasis and Poetic Immortality in Statius’ Silvae 1.1,” Classical Journal 106.3 (2011): 321–
47 at 332–3. Although he declares the burden light, Sperulo perhaps reminds his patron of
his many labors in closing in hope of a payment.
144. Evokes the last line of Father Tiber’s prophecy of the founding of Rome in Virgil, Aeneid,
viii, 66–7: “Dixit, deinde lacu fluvius se condidit alto ima petens.”
A P P E N D I X II
Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata

(BAV,Vat. Lat. 5812)
ANALYSIS OF THE PRESENTATION
MANUSCRIPT
Francesco Sperulo’s Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata survives in a single copy:
an illuminated presentation manuscript that is the standalone work in an
elegant miniature leather-bound volume, housed in the Vatican Library. The
poem itself consists of 407 lines of hexameter, preceded by a dedicatory let-
ter to Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici dated 1 March 1519. A new critical edition,
translation, and gloss appear in Appendix i. If the content of Sperulo’s poem
has received scant scholarly attention, the manuscript itself has not yet been
studied at all.1
This pocket volume, measuring 6.8 × 4.7 inches, remains in its original
tooled-leather binding (Plate xii).2 Both front and back covers bear the same
pattern: a circle containing a six-pointed star with a four-leaf sprig at its center,
surrounded by four quarter-circles, each containing wavy, sun-like rays; and
all surrounded by a foliate border. The booklet contains seventeen parchment
folios measuring 6.7 × 4.5 inches, the edges of which are gilded.
The two-page opening of the manuscript is illuminated (Plates ix, x and
Figure 90). The title page on the left spread consists of a wreath framing
the address: “Ad r[everendissi]mum d[ominum] Iulium Medicem S[anctae]
R[omanae] E[cclesiae] presbyterum cardinalem et vice cancellarium humil-
limus servus Franciscus Sperulus villam Iuliam Medicam versibus fabricatam
mittit” (To the most reverend Lord Giulio de’ Medici, Cardinal Priest and Vice
Chancellor of the Holy Roman Church, his most humble servant Francesco
216
S P E R U L O , V I L L A I UL I A M ED I C A AN ALYS I S O F TH E MAN U S C R I P T 217
90. Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519, BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, fols. 1v–2r.
Sperulo sends The Villa Giulia Medicea Constructed in Verse).This text itself forms
part of the decoration: it is written in Latin square capitals in the style of an
ancient inscription, each line centered within the wreath; faint traces of ruling
for each line are visible. The mandorla-shaped wreath is formed by crossed
branches probably intended to represent myrtle and laurel, symbols of Venus
and the Medici,3 which are angle-cut at the bottom in the form of broncone, the
emblematic device of Medici renewal.4 These branches are tied together with
ribbons, which flutter like an all’antica banderole at the bottom of the page.
Opposite this sheet is the first page of the prose dedication, which is deco-
rated with a painted initial and white vine-stem decoration (bianchi girari) in
the margin and at the base of the page, where these foliate rinceaux flank a
fictive bronze medal with the arms of Cardinal Giulio: an escutcheon bearing
Medici palle, one blue with gold lilies, topped with a red cardinal’s hat and sus-
pended tassels. The initial is painted in gold to suggest a Roman square capital
in relief, surrounded by tiny gold foliage on a blue square ground. The fol-
lowing page also features a painted initial to mark the beginning of the poem
(Plate xi). The dedicatory letter and the poem itself are written in chancery
cursive (cancellaresca corsiva).5 All the pages are faintly ruled; occasional erasures
and the graceful hand minimize the impact of corrections.
218 APPEND I X I I
The elegant script and the delicate, gilded illumination are both of very
high quality, a judgement for which I am grateful to Jonathan J. G. Alexander.
This opulent treatment of the poem, together with the use of Cardinal Giulio’s
arms and the dedication to him, suggest that this manuscript was intended for
presentation to him and probably at his request, rather than an initiative of the
poet. It is possible that Sperulo recited the poem first, and Cardinal Giulio
subsequently requested that it be recorded.6 Giulio commissioned a handful of
other manuscripts around this time, notably Egidio da Viterbo’s book on the
Hebrew alphabet (BAV, Vat. Lat. 5808) of 1517;7 an edition of Lucian’s Dialoghi
maritimi (BAV, Vat. Lat. 5802) produced in 1519 (Plates xiii, xiv);8 and an opu-
lent Missal of 1520, now in Berlin.9
Despite the high quality of the illumination of Sperulo’s poem, it is dif-
ficult to make an attribution based on its relatively simple and non-figurative
imagery. The illumination is very close to the style of the Florentine Attavante
degli Attavanti,10 who worked in Rome at the end of his life, and who prob-
ably illuminated the manuscript of Lucian’s Dialoghi maritimi produced for
Cardinal Giulio. In particular, the white vine-stem decoration and circular
medals bearing the arms of Cardinal Giulio are strikingly similar in the manu-
scripts of Sperulo’s and Lucian’s poems, which may be seen in a comparison
of Plates x, xiii, and xiv.11 There is a remarkable variety of foliate forms in the
Lucian manuscript and no two pages are alike, but the palette and style of blue
and red flowers (vaguely like daisies and irises) and the golden, dandelion-like
orbs, as well as the scrolling foliate forms, are very close in the two manuscripts.
The Lucian boasts more extensive illumination and use of glossy gold leaf, but
the two manuscripts look to have been painted by the same hand, or a very
close associate in the same workshop.
The illumination is not extensive, but it engages the content of the poetry
in interesting ways. The wreath that frames the title page is unusual both for
its mandorla shape and for its composition of two branches (Figure 90). At
one level, it suggests mandorla-shaped cardinal’s seals, such as that of Cardinal
Giulio, which were used in the papal Chancery then headed by Giulio and
staffed by the scriptors who recorded such poetry.12 This imagery evoking a
cardinal’s seal rendered in Medici broncone is another striking link to Cardinal
Giulio.
Curiously, the unusual mandorla shape and two-branch composition of the
title page wreath are very close to the personal device of Bernardo Bembo:
an elongated wreath of laurel and palm sprigs framing the motto virtus et
honor (Figure 91).13 His device was surely familiar to Sperulo’s cohort, since
Bernardo Bembo had been a fixture in Laurentian Florence, and his son Pietro
was part of this circle in Curial Rome. The elder Bembo’s device appeared
on many objects, including manuscripts, notably his copy of Pliny’s villa
letters (Figure 92);14 possibly his son Pietro had this or other pieces of his
91. Personal device of Bernardo Bembo: an elongated wreath of laurel and palm sprigs
tied by ribbons, framing the motto virtus et honor; in Paolo Marsi, Bembicae peregrinae, fif-
teenth century, Eton College Collections, MS 156, fol. 111v.
92. Bernardo Bembo’s personal device on the first folio of his copy of Pliny the Younger,
Epistolarum libri IX, Treviso: Ioannes Vercellius, 1483.
220 APPEND I X I I
93 and 94. Leonardo, Portrait of Ginevra de’ Benci, recto and verso; the panel has been cut down
at the bottom, truncating the likeness and the wreath.
father’s library with him in Rome at this time. Perhaps Sperulo’s small volume
declared his connection to the Bembos. Or, Sperulo could have emulated
their device to formulate this very similar impresa for himself, although we
lack any other examples to support this possibility. Sperulo and his illumina-
tor may also have chosen this wreath for iconographical reasons. Strikingly,
the elder Bembo’s device appeared on the reverse of Leonardo’s double-sided
portrait of Ginevra de’ Benci (Figures 93, 94).15 As is well known, Leonardo’s
portrait reflects the tradition of double-sided medallic portraits, in which the
combination of a visual likeness with an emblem together constitute the por-
trait.16 Visually, the opening page spread of Sperulo’s manuscript loosely sug-
gests this double-sided imagery of Leonardo’s painting and portrait medals.
The title page for the villa built in verse functions as a verbal likeness; picked
out in red ink are the words humillimus servus Franciscus Sperulus and versibus
fabricatam, emphasizing the poet’s claim to be giving form to the villa in verse.
The opposing page functions as the verso; Giulio’s arms in the fictive bronze
medal makes the conceit explicit. (Although, admittedly, bronze medallions
decorated manuscripts for many other subjects.) But here the wreath encircles
the textual image of the villa, rather than a motto.17 This imagery pairing a
verbal “likeness” of the villa with the patron’s arms on a fictive bronze medal
is apt for this poem that is effectively a portrait of the building. Moreover,
this imagery evokes the tradition of producing medals to commemorate new
building initiatives, notably the medals commemorating the beginning of St.
Peter’s, traditionally attributed to Caradosso but recently given to Bramante
himself; one displays a portrait of the patron on the obverse with the proposed
new basilica on the reverse (Figure 95), while another features Bramante’s
own self-portrait all’antica, and on the reverse a personification of Architecture
222 APPEND I X I I
95. Donato Bramante or Cristoforo Foppa (Caradosso), Medal Commemorating the Building
of St. Peters, with a portrait of Julius II (obverse) and St. Peter’s (reverse), 1506, The British
Museum, g3,pmae3.5.
96. Donato Bramante, formerly attributed to Cristoforo Foppa (Caradosso), Medal

Commemorating the Building of St. Peters, with a portrait of Bramante (obverse) and personifica-
tion of the architect and St. Peter’s (reverse), 1506, The British Museum, 1923,0611.8.
holding her tools in front of the architect’s vision of the unbuilt basilica (Figure
96).18 Thus, Sperulo’s poem is at one level a foundation medal in verse, as well
as a prospective portrait of the unbuilt villa.
The prominent and inventive use of Medici devices on the manuscript sug-
gests a focus on this aspect of the illumination. The Medici emblems posted
on this textual villa echo the practice on brick and mortar buildings, such
as the Medici palle above the portal of Villa Poggio a Caiano. Moreover, this
visual identification of the family with the villa built in verse may have been a
significant issue because they were at pains to establish that this papal h ospitium
would remain a Medici possession beyond Leo’s pontificate – surely one
objective of Sperulo’s poem.19 Moreover, notably absent from the illumination
is a visual image of the planned villa, which would be characteristic of a foun-
dational medal; either it was too soon in the design process or, more likely, such
an image was the province of Raphael, not the poet. Instead, Sperulo’s verbal
likeness is ornamented with heraldic imagery and decorative words – apposite
for his villa built with verse and ink, which, he boasted, would outlive that of
the architects.20
Identifying the hand of the scriptor leads to an interesting conclusion. The
style and quality of the hand at first suggest a professional scriptor in the circle
of Ludovico degli Arrighi, known as Il Vicentino, who was active in the Vatican
Chancery, which was overseen by Cardinal Giulio.21 Arrighi was an occasional
collaborator with Raphael and copied several works for Giulio, including the
Lucian dialogues and the Berlin Missal. But while the hand of Sperulo’s manu-
script is close to that of Arrighi, it is more slanted; nor is it an exact match with
the hands of other known copyists in his circle, notably Genesius de la Barrera,
Fausto Capodiferro, or Giovanni Francesco Vitali.22 The signature (or closing
mark) on the last page of Sperulo’s villa poem (Figure 97) is in the same ink
as the rest of the poem; it consists of a stylized s or elongated volute crowned
with three x’s, which is similar to, but slightly different from, the signatures of
Genesius and Vitali.23 The same signature also appears at the end of Sperulo’s
elegy on Leo’s clemency (Figure 98), part of a compilation of Sperulo’s works
in BAV, Vat. Lat. 1673.24 Moreover, the hand of both manuscripts looks to be the
same, although that of the villa poem is considerably neater and more formal,
while that of the elegy is somewhat more natural. Other than a discrepancy in
the capital V’s, the letter forms are very similar, notably the unusual tails of the
minuscule g’s. Tamburini considers the entire manuscript of Vat. Lat. 1673 to
be autograph.25 Most likely, Sperulo wrote both manuscripts himself.26 If this
was the case, the elegance of the hand in the villa poem and its closeness to
Arrighi’s might suggest Sperulo had a close connection to Giulio’s Chancery.
More importantly, this would mean the author prepared the presentation man-
uscript himself for his patron Cardinal Giulio. There are other examples of
this practice of author as self-scriptor by prominent humanists, from Giovanni
Sabadino degli Arienti in Bologna to Machiavelli and Antonfrancesco Doni
in Florence; these works were often addressed to important patrons, includ-
ing a poem by Evangelista Maddaleni Capodiferro who wrote a presentation
manuscript of his own work for Pope Clement VII.27 This practice was spe-
cially valued for conveying a sense of the author’s presence.28 If we accept that
Sperulo was indeed the scriptor of his own manuscripts, then we may interpret
his presentation manuscript as another tool to curry favor in the competitive
arena of Roman humanists.
224 APPEND I X I I
97. Francesco Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 1519, BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812, fol. 16v;
detail of the final page of the manuscript with the signature or closing mark, probably in
Sperulo’s hand.
The inventiveness of the imagery and the prominent use of Medici devices,
along with the high quality of the script, illumination, and binding, suggest
that considerable attention was given to producing the manuscript, which
would be consistent with a Medici commission. One can imagine that this
imagery was devised in conversation between poet and illuminator, in a verbal
dialogue much like the collaborative pattern I have sketched for design of the
villa itself.29
98. Francesco Sperulo, Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia xviiii, BAV, Vat. Lat. 1673, fol. 103r,
detail.
A P P E N D I X III
Francesco Sperulo, Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia xviiii

(BAV,Vat. Lat. 1673, fols. 102v–103r)
Author’s transcription, preserving the capitalization and punctuation of the

manuscript, apparently autograph, but spelling out abbreviations.
102v Parcere supplicibus gaudet generosa Leonum
Ira: magisque nihil quam superasse iuvat:
Si tamen hostis amet contra temerarius ire,
Et nequeat cautus subdere frena timor,
Tum cauda ardescens surgentia terga flagellat, 5
Inque cruorem furens protinus ira natat:
Imperiumque olli natura dedisse ferarum
Censetur: tanti est nobilis ille furor:
Quod si nativo decus hoc fera sentit ab usu,
Quod nam hominum studio par decus esse queat! 10
Ergo tibi imperium superi quam iure dederunt
Summe Leo! rerum quam bene te esse caput!
Nomine in hoc omen: secum gerit imperii vim,
Interque astra Leo non satis unus erat:
Tu quoque fulgebis tanto sublimius: ipse 15
Quanto homini praestas, praestat et ille feris:
Iam tu materies de nobilitatem: Nepotes
Exemplo minuent maxima quaeque tuo:
Namque per insidias solum non nuper ademptus
Monstrasti mentis culmina quanta tuae: 20
Vicisti, arbitriumque tibi vitaeque necisque
226
S P E R U L O , AD L EO NEM X DE S U A CLE M E N T I A E LE GI A X VI I I I 227
Hostis erat: totum hoc denique in hostem fuit:

Ultoris iustas animi cognoscere vires
Commeritus, sero poenituisse gemit:
103r At lachrymis culpam fassus precibusque, superbae 25
Sensit inexhaustam nobilitatis opem:
Quem dudum impietas stimulis male torxit iniquis,
Iustitiae hunc pietas de manibus rapuit:
Perderem qui voluit modo te livore, salutem
Supplicibus lachrymis te tribuisse videt, 30
Miratur, votisque pavet felicibus: usque
Est adeo errati conscia culpa sui:
Servatas miratur opes, miratur honores:
Et quem crudelem fecerat, esse pium:
Admonitusque sui, nunc demum vivere coepit, 35
Profecit tecum crimine quippe suo:
Inter sacra, virum paci et tibi qui fuit hostis,
En circum pacis munera ferre iubes:
Et placidem amplexus lachrymis testaris obortis
Plus licuisse illi, quam libuisse tibi: 40
Quodque animi est insigne tui, sponte arma trementi
Restituis: rursus fiet an ille nocens!
Unguibus ex aquilae sic lapsa columba reverti
Audeat: an parvum pignus in hoste timor!
Vindicta o felix, in qua de pace triumphat 45
Victor: et in victo culpa triumphus erit.
Finis tertii libri, seguitur quartus in Laudem Virginis et matris dei Mariae
NOTES
PREFAC E 51.4–5 (1983): 259–82. The villa’s function as

papal hospitium to welcome foreign digni-
1. Christoph L. Frommel, Stefano Ray, and
taries was proposed by John Shearman, “A
Manfredo Tafuri, eds., Raffaello architetto, with
Functional Interpretation of Villa Madama,”
important contributions by Howard Burns
Römisches Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte 20 (1983):
and Arnold Nesselrath (Rome, 1984).
313–27. Shearman’s collection of Raphael
2. Caroline Elam, “The Raphael Conference in
sources added a few new documents to the
Rome,” Burlington Magazine 125 (1983): 437–9,
villa literature: Shearman, Raphael in Early
at 439.
Modern Sources. The reconstruction of archi-
3. John Shearman, Raphael in Early Modern
tectural plans for the complex are discussed
Sources, 2 vols. (New Haven, 2003), vol. 1,
below, pp. 7–8 and notes 28–31; and its patron-
414–38.
age at p. 5 and notes 19, 32. The multimedia
4. Yvonne Elet, “Papal Villeggiatura in Early
decorations of the villa complex – frescoes,
Modern Rome: Poetry, Stucco and Spoils at
stuccoes, sculpture, antiquities, and fountains –
Raphael’s Villa Madama,” Ph.D. diss., New
have received scant art-historical study and
York University, 2007.
remain imperfectly understood. Concise sum-
5. Paul Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage in
maries of the villa’s architecture and decora-
Renaissance Rome. Francesco Sperulo: Poet, Prelate,
tion can be found in David Coffin, The Villa in
Soldier, Spy, 2 vols. (Bern, 2015).
the Life of Renaissance Rome (Princeton, 1979),
245–57, and Roger Jones and Nicholas Penny,
IN TRO DU C TI ON Raphael (New Haven, 1983), 226–34, 247–8.
1. BAV, Vat. Lat. 5812. All references to this poem A recent work on the villa, with incomplete
are to Appendix i herein containing a critical bibliography, is Caterina Napoleone, ed., Villa
edition and English translation by Nicoletta Madama: Raphael’s Dream, trans. Simon Turner
Marcelli and gloss by the author. See below (Turin, 2007). The monographic literature on
p. 6 and passim, and note 22 for discussion Raphael and his associates, notably Giulio
of the poem, with bibliography and earlier Romano and Giovanni da Udine, provides
editions. further background on the villa’s decorations.
2. Along with the Transfiguration and the Sala di See also Elet, “Papal villeggiatura in early mod-
Costantino murals in the Vatican. ern Rome.” I am preparing a monograph on
3. The most comprehensive treatment of the the villa.
villa to date was undertaken by Renato 4.
Sperulo mentions the “situs et amoenitas
Lefevre, a cultural historian and politician: loci” (dedicatory letter, §5), subverting the
Renato Lefevre, Villa Madama (Rome, 1973), poetic topos of the locus amoenus, or pleasant
reprinted with expanded bibliography in place, to describe instead a noisy construction
1984; subsequent references are to the 1984 site. For the locus amoenus to describe ideal
edition. Among his numerous articles about landscape and villas in Roman antiquity, see
the villa is a useful 1983 historiography: Ernst Robert Curtius, European Literature and
Lefevre, “Interrogativi sulla ‘vigna del Papa’ a the Latin Middle Ages, trans. Willard R. Trask
Monte Mario,” Accademie e biblioteche d’Italia (New York, 1953), 190–202; Carole Elizabeth
228
N O TE S TO PAG E S 2– 4 229
Newlands, “The Transformation of the ‘Locus Pope’s Men. Raphael’s Stanza della Segnatura
Amoenus’ in Roman Poetry” (Ph.D. diss., and the Synthesis of Divine Wisdom,” in
University of California, Berkeley, 1984). History of Concepts: Comparative Perspectives,
5. The conceit of building with words was com- ed. Iain Hampsher-Monk, Karin Tilmans, and
mon among Greek and Roman poets, notably Frank van Vree (Amsterdam, 1998), 131–65
Ovid and Pindar, who wrote, “Let us set up and 264–9; John W. O’Malley, Praise and Blame
golden columns to support the strong-walled in Renaissance Rome: Rhetoric, Doctrine and
porch of our abode and construct, as it were, a Reform in the Sacred Orators of the Papal Court,
splendid palace; for when a work is begun, it c. 1450–1521 (Durham, NC, 1979); Stefano Ray,
is necessary to make its front shine from afar.” Raffaello architetto: linguaggio artistico e ideologia
Pindar, Olympian Odes, VI, 1. Ovid begins his nel Rinascimento romano (Rome, 1974); Ingrid
epilogue to the Metamorphoses 14.871, say- Rowland, “The Intellectual Background of
ing, “And now I have built a work” (Iamque the School of Athens,” in Raphael’s School of
opus exegi). And Propertius boasts he will Athens, ed. Marcia Hall (Cambridge, 1997),
lay out buildings and the walls of Rome in 131–70, among other sources by Rowland
verse (Elegies 4.1, 55–70). The device reflects cited herein; John Shearman, Raphael’s
the multiple meanings of the Latin monumen- Cartoons in the Collection of Her Majesty the
tum as a commemorative object, a written Queen and the Tapestries for the Sistine Chapel
memorial, or a literary work (OLD, monumen- (London, 1972); and Kathleen Weil-Garris, “La
tum, definitions 1, 4, 5); although, curiously, morte di Raffaello e la ‘Trasfigurazione’,” in
Sperulo never uses this word. This metaphor Raffaello e l’Europa: Atti del IV Corso internazio
of text as building and the related Horatian nale di alta cultura, ed. Marcello Fagiolo and
topos about which will be more durable and Maria Luisa Madonna (Rome, 1990), 177–90.
bring more everlasting fame, words or objects, 9.
In order to give the palm to his hero
are discussed in Chapter 2 notes 55, 56 and Michelangelo as the all-round painter-sculp-
Appendix i, gloss note 4. For Sperulo’s trans- tor-architect, Vasari suppressed Raphael’s
position of the words-vs.-marbles topos into wide-ranging activities, instead crowning
ink-vs.-stucco, see the Conclusion p. 177 and him “prince of painters.” On Vasari’s Life of
Appendix i, dedicatory letter §2 and gloss Raphael, David Cast, The Delight of Art: Giorgio
note 4. For the trope of the poet as master Vasari and the Traditions of Humanist Discourse
builder in medieval and Renaissance thought, (University Park, PA, 2009), 136–41; Patricia
see below pp. 54, 95, 96, 176, Chapter 2 note Lee Rubin, Giorgio Vasari: Art and History
50 and Chapter 4 note 58. (New Haven, 1995), 357–401.
6. A fuller discussion of Roman political and 10.
For which, Alina A. Payne, “Architectural
humanist culture with bibliography appears in History and the History of Art. A Suspended
Chapter 1. Dialogue,” Journal of the Society of Architectural
7. Linda Wolk-Simon discusses Raphael as the Historians 58 (1999): 292–9; on the tension
paradigm of the “universal artist-impresa- between the unity and disunity of the arts
rio” and the fact that no one stepped up to of painting, sculpture, and architecture in
assume that role in Rome after his death, Renaissance critical language and in practice,
instead tracing an increased specialization David Cast, “On the Unity/Disunity of the
among Roman artists in the following dec- Arts: Vasari (and Others) on Architecture,” in
ade: in “Competition, Collaboration, and Rethinking the High Renaissance: The Culture
Specialization in the Roman Art World, 1520– of the Visual Arts in Early Sixteenth-Century
27,” in The Pontificate of Clement VII: History, Rome, ed. Jill Burke (Farnham, 2012), 129–43;
Politics, Culture, ed. Kenneth Gouwens and on the divorce between architecture and the
Sheryl E. Reiss (Aldershot, 2005), 253–76. figurative arts in the seventeenth to twenty-
8. See especially Kim E. Butler, “‘Reddita first centuries, Joseph Rykwert, The Judicious
lux est’: Raphael and the Pursuit of Sacred Eye: Architecture against the Other Arts (Chicago,
Eloquence in Leonine Rome,” in Artists at 2008); for shifting boundaries between archi-
Court: Image-Making and Identity, 1300–1550, ed. tecture and the representational arts in modern
Stephen J. Campbell (Chicago, 2004), 138–48; and postmodern art, taking off from the work
Bram Kempers, “Words, Images and All the of Rosalind Krauss, see Spyros Papapetros
230 NOTES T O PA GE S 4–5
and Julian Rose, eds., Retracing the Expanded in Late Raphael, Exh. Cat., ed. Tom Henry
Field: Encounters between Art and Architecture and Paul Joannides (Madrid, 2012), 41–3 and
(Cambridge, MA, 2014). passim; Nicole Dacos, Le Logge di Raffaello
11. On the relation of media in Raphael’s oeuvre, (Rome, 1986); Wolk-Simon, “Competition,
Kathleen Weil-Garris Brandt, “Raffaello e Collaboration, and Specialization,” 254–6.
la scultura del cinquecento,” in Raffaello in 16. A point noted by Melissa Meriam Bullard,
Vaticano (Milan, 1984), 221–31. “Heroes and their Workshops: Medici
12. Howard Burns, “Painter-Architects in Italy Patronage and the Problem of Shared Agency,”
during the Quattrocento and Cinquecento,” Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 24
in The Notion of the Painter-Architect in Italy and (1994): 179–98. Among the rare studies dedi-
the Southern Low Countries, ed. Piet Lombaerde cated to the subject of collaboration in the
(Turnhout, 2014), 1–8. visual arts, see Wolk-Simon, “Competition,
13. Bette Talvacchia, “Raphael’s Workshop and Collaboration, and Specialization”; and the
the Development of a Managerial Style,” in essays in the classic collection by Wendy
The Cambridge Companion to Raphael, ed. Stedman Sheard and John Paoletti, eds.,
Marcia Hall (Cambridge, 2005), 167–85; and Collaboration in Italian Renaissance Art (New
Wolk-Simon, “Competition, Collaboration, Haven, 1978). See also Anthony Grafton’s
and Specialization,” 253–60, with a synop- discussion of individual versus collabora-
tic discussion of the subject with earlier tive modes of humanist endeavor compared
bibliography. to modern scientific laboratories, in Worlds
14. A phrase coined by Alexander Nagel in concert Made by Words: Scholarship and Community in
with recent studies in many disciplines focus- the Modern West (Cambridge, MA, 2009). Ann
ing on the non-heroic; Nagel, The Controversy Blair is currently working on a project about
of Renaissance Art (Chicago, 2011), 1–3 and pas- collaborative working processes of early mod-
sim. For the rejection of the triumphant model ern humanists.
of artist-heroes, see also Ernst Kris and Otto 17. The flourishing field of patronage stud-
Kurz, Legend, Myth, and Magic in the Image of ies has employed methodologies from social
the Artist: A Historical Experiment (New Haven, history and anthropology to bring to light
1979), originally published as Die Legende vom creative exchange between artists and highly
Künstler: ein historischer Versuch, 1934; Patricia engaged patrons, revealing the patrons’ con-
Emison, Creating the “Divine” Artist, from Dante tributions. For an excellent brief historiog-
to Michelangelo (Leiden, 2004). raphy of the study of Italian Renaissance
15. For Raphael’s workshop: Konrad Oberhuber, patrons and agents, focused on Raphael’s
“Raffaello,” in La bottega dell’artista tra Medioevo Rome, with earlier bibliography, see Sheryl
e Rinascimento, ed. Roberto Cassanelli (Milan, E. Reiss, “Raphael and his Patrons: From the
1998), 257–74; John Shearman, “Raffaello e la Court of Urbino to the Curia and Rome,” in
bottega,” in Raffaello in Vaticano (Milan, 1984), The Cambridge Companion to Raphael, 36–55,
258–63; Shearman, “The Organization of at 37 and nn. 9–15; and Reiss, “A Taxonomy
Raphael’s Workshop,” Art Institute of Chicago of Art Patronage in Renaissance Italy,” in A
Centennial Lectures, Museum Studies 10 (1983): Companion to Renaissance and Baroque Art, ed.
41–57; Shearman, “Raphael’s Unexecuted Babette Bohn and James M. Saslow (New
Projects for the Stanze,” in Walter Friedlaender York, 2013), 23–43; see also Guy Fitch Lytle
zum 90 Geburtstag: eine Festgabe seiner europäi and Stephen Orgel, eds., Patronage in the
schen Schüler, Freunde, und Verehrer (Berlin, 1965), Renaissance (Princeton, 1981).
158–80; Shearman, “Die Loggia der Psyche 18. On the patron as architectural author, Christof
in der Villa Farnesina und die Probleme der Thoenes, “‘Il carico imposto dall’economia’.
letzen Phase von Raffaels graphischem Stil,” Appunti su committenza ed economia dai
Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorichen Sammlungen in trattati di architettura del Rinascimento,” in
Wien 60 (1964): 59–100;Talvacchia, “Raphael’s Sostegno e adornamento: saggi sull’architettura del
Workshop”; Tom Henry and Paul Joannides, Rinascimento (Milan, 1998), 177–85. Giovanni
“Raphael and his Workshop between 1513 Pontano advocated that the patron should be
and 1525: ‘per la mano di maestro Rafaello the auctor of his buildings in the De magnifi-
e Joanne Francesco e Giulio sui discepoli’,” centia, and signed his own chapel (completed
c. 1490) pontanvs fecit; discussed in Bianca 192. The collaborative, hands-on character of
de Divitiis, “Giovanni Pontano and his Idea of Medici architectural patronage has also been
Patronage,” in Some Degree of Happiness: studi di emphasized by Lillie and Bullard among oth-
storia dell’architettura in onore di Howard Burns, ers: Amanda Lillie, “Giovanni di Cosimo and
ed. Maria Beltramini and Caroline Elam the Villa Medici at Fiesole,” in Piero de’ Medici
(Pisa, 2010), 107–31, at 109 and n. 4; and de “il Gottoso” 1416–1469, ed. A. Beyer and B.
Divitiis, “pontanvs fecit: Inscriptions and Boucher (Berlin, 1993), 189–205; and Bullard,
Artistic Authorship in the Pontano Chapel,” “Heroes and their Workshops.” See also D.
California Italian Studies 3 (2012): 1–36. De Kent, Cosimo de’ Medici; and further sources in
Divitiis notes that Pontano is at once patron, Chapter 3 note 5.
architect, and antiquarian for this project that 20. Maria Teresa Sambin de Norcen devised the
he claims to have made; and, significantly for term “cortigiano architetto” to characterize
the present study, I would add the role of the Ferrarese patrician Bartolomeo Pendaglia,
humanist “advisor.” I owe the last reference to who built a villa at Consandolo for himself
Charlotte Nichols. Raffaelle Riario’s inscrip- while serving as fattore generale for the Este,
tion on the Cancelleria façade is a prominent supervising aspects of the construction of the
Roman example of a patron’s declaration of Este villa at Belriguardo; Sambin de Norcen,
authorship; for which, Christoph Luitpold Il cortigiano architetto: edilizia, politica, umane-
Frommel, “Raffaele Riario committente della simo nel quattrocento ferrarese (Venice, 2012). For
Cancelleria,” in Arte, committenza ed economia a Maffei, Sheryl E. Reiss, “Giulio de’ Medici
Roma e nelle corti del Rinascimento, ed. Christoph and Mario Maffei: A Renaissance Friendship
Luitpold Frommel and Arnold Esch (Turin, and the Villa Madama,” in Coming About: A
1995), 197–211. On the patron as author of a Festschrift for John Shearman, ed. Lars Jones
body of work, Ernst H. Gombrich, “The Early and Louisa Matthew (Cambridge, MA, 2001),
Medici as Patrons of Art: A Survey of Primary 281–8, with earlier bibliography on Maffei
Sources,” in Italian Renaissance Studies, ed. E. F. and brief discussion of other Medici agents.
Jacob (London, 1960), 279–311; Dale Kent, Maffei’s role is discussed further below with
Cosimo de’ Medici and the Florentine Renaissance sources in Chapter 1, pp. 22–3 and notes 44, 47
(New Haven, 2000). and in Chapter 6, pp. 145–6 and notes 15–19.
19. As Sheryl E. Reiss has characterized Giulio 21.
The role of humanists in architecture has
de’ Medici, and demonstrated in her exten- prompted little attention beyond discussions
sive writings on his patronage; see especially of architect-theorists such as Alberti and
Reiss, “Raphael, Pope Leo X, and Cardinal Filarete. Discussion of the roles of advisors
Giulio de’ Medici,” in Late Raphael, ed. Miguel with bibliography follows in Chapters 5 and 6.
Falomir (Madrid, 2013), 14–25, with ear- 22.
Sperulo’s poem was cited by Ludwig von
lier bibliography in nn. 8–9; Reiss, “Cardinal Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste (Berlin, 1907), vol.
Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron of Art, 1513– 4, part 2, 548 n. 1; Mario Emilio Cosenza,
1523” (Ph.D. diss., Princeton, 1992), passim Biographical and Bibliographical Dictionary of the
and especially 622–4; Reiss, “Clemens VII,” in Italian Humanists and of the World of Classical
Hoch Renaissance im Vatikan: Kunst und Kultur Scholarship in Italy, 1300–1800 (Boston, 1962),
im Rom der Papste, 1503–1534 (Ostfildern, 1999), vol. 4, 3307; and P. O. Kristeller, Iter Italicum
55–69; Reiss, “Adrian VI, Clement VII, and (London and Leiden, 1963), vol. 2, 335.
Art,” in The Pontificate of Clement VII, 339–62; Christoph Frommel published and discussed
and her forthcoming book, Giulio de’ Medici: the lines that most explicitly describe the villa’s
A Renaissance Maecenas. For Giulio’s remark- planned decoration or state of construction;
able working relationship with Michelangelo, Christoph Luitpold Frommel, “Die architek-
Caroline Elam, “Michelangelo and the tonische Planung derVilla Madama,” Römisches
Clementine Architectural Style,” in The Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte 15 (1975): 62, 79–80;
Pontificate of Clement VII, 199–226; and William and Frommel, Raffaello architetto, 319–20. The
Wallace, who described Giulio as “both patron poem had been brought to Frommel’s atten-
and collaborator” to Michelangelo, in William tion by John Shearman (acknowledged by
E. Wallace, “Clement VII and Michelangelo: Frommel,“Die architektonische Planung,” 62).
An Anatomy of Patronage,” in ibid. 189–98, at Shearman published an additional two lines of
what he called this “unattractive poem,” in 28. Heinrich von Geymüller, Raffaello studiato come
Shearman, “A Functional Interpretation of architetto (Milan, 1884); Theobald Hofmann,
Villa Madama,” 315 and n. 3. Additional lines Raffael in seiner Bedeutung als Architekt, vol. 1,
were cited and discussed in Reiss, “Cardinal Villa Madama zu Rom (Zittau, 1900); John
Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron of Art,” 361 and Shearman, “Raphael … ‘fa il Bramante’,”
notes on 395–6. The manuscript was exhib- in Studies in Renaissance and Baroque Art
ited in 1985: Giovanni Morello, ed., Raffaello Presented to Anthony Blunt on his 60th Birthday
e la Roma dei Papi, Exh. Cat (Rome, 1986), (London, 1967), 12–17; Shearman, “Raphael as
cat. 89, 80. The poem was first published in Architect,” Journal of the Royal Society of Arts
its entirety (together with an English trans- 116 (1968), 388–409; Shearman, “The Born
lation) in 2003 by Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, Architect?,” Studies in the History of Art 17
414–38, although he dismissed it as a “shame- (1986) 203–10; Ray, Raffaello architetto: linguag-
lessly encomiastic” work. (This 407-line poem gio artistico e ideologia; Christoph L. Frommel,
has also been described pejoratively as a “Bramantes ‘Ninfeo’ in Genazzano,” Römisches
poemetto.) The analysis in this volume is based Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte 12 (1969): 137–60;
on a new critical edition and translation by Frommel, “Raffaello e il teatro alla corte di
Nicoletta Marcelli, with a gloss by the author Leone X,” Bollettino del Centro internazionale
(in Appendix i). di studi di architettura Andrea Palladio 16 (1974):
23. Paul Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage in 173–87; Frommel, “Die architektonische
Renaissance Rome. Francesco Sperulo: Poet, Prelate, Planung der Villa Madama”; Frommel et al.,
Soldier, Spy, 2 vols. (Bern, 2015), with a critical Raffaello architetto; Dewez, Villa Madama; David
edition and translation of Sperulo’s complete R. Coffin, “The Plans of the Villa Madama,”
oeuvre including his villa poem, analysis of his Art Bulletin 49 (1967): 111–22; Coffin, The Villa
style and sources, and biography. As noted in in the Life of Renaissance Rome, 245–57; Sabine
the Preface, Gwynne’s work appeared just as Eiche, “A New Look at Three Drawings for
the present book was going into production, Villa Madama and Some Related Images,”
making it impossible to respond to it thor- Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in
oughly herein. Florenz 36.3 (1992): 275–86; Guido Beltramini
24. First published in Philip E. Foster, “Raphael and Howard Burns, eds., Andrea Palladio e la
on the Villa Madama: The Text of a Lost villa veneta da Petrarca a Carlo Scarpa, Exh. Cat.
Letter,” Römisches Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte 11 (Venice, 2005), 242–5 (entry by Maddalena
(1967–8): 308–12; see most recently Shearman, Scimemi).
Sources, vol. 1, 405–13, with extensive earlier 29. The sole surviving drawing for the villa attrib-
bibliography, especially by Francesco Paolo di uted to Raphael’s hand is U 1356ar, a pre-
Teodoro and Christof Thoenes. An annotated cise drawing of three garden rooms showing
Italian/English language edition appears in their geometric forms, patterns of circulation
Guy Dewez, Villa Madama: A Memoir Relating down the sloping site, and the placement of
to Raphael’s Project (London, 1993), hereinafter sculpture and fountains. Frommel, Raffaello
Raphael/Dewez. architetto, 330.
25. Discussed by Ann C. Huppert, “Envisioning 30. Christoph Luitpold Frommel, “Introduction.
New St. Peter’s. Perspectival Drawings and Antonio da Sangallo the Younger and the
the Process of Design,” Journal of the Society Practice of Architecture in the Renaissance,”
of Architectural Historians 68 (2009): 158–77, at in The Architectural Drawings of Antonio da
159–60. Sangallo the Younger and his Circle, vol. 2,
26. For example, Caroline Elam, “The Raphael Churches,Villas, the Pantheon,Tombs, and Ancient
Conference in Rome.” Inscriptions, ed. Christoph Luitpold Frommel
27. That is, rapid rough sketches of initial ideas, and Nicholas Adams (New York, 1994), 1–21,
a practice of exploration and invention at 14.
given an important impetus by Leonardo; 31. On the respective contributions of Raphael
for which, Carmen C. Bambach, Leonardo da and Antonio da Sangallo the Younger, see
Vinci Master Draftsman, Exh. Cat. (New York, Frommel,“Villa Madama,” in Raffaello architetto,
2003), 21–2. 311–56; Frommel, “Raffael und Antonio da
N O TE S TO PAG E 8 233
Sangallo der Jungere,” in Raffaello a Roma: peut-on imaginer l’œuvre de Raphael?,” in

Atti del convegno, 1983 (Rome, 1986), 261–304; ibid. 304–23.
Frommel, “Raffaello e Antonio da Sangallo il 35. Stefano Ray, “Il volo di Icaro. Raffaello
Giovane,” in Architettura del Rinascimento alla architettura e cultura,” in Raffaello architetto, ed.
corte papale (Milan, 2003), 280–97; Frommel, Frommel et al., 47–58.
“Le opere romane di Giulio,” in Giulio 36. For the letters between Cardinal Giulio
Romano, Exh. Cat. (Milan, 1989), 98–103 and Mario Maffei, Shearman, Sources, vol.
and 290–1; Frommel, “Die architektonische 1, 599–601 and 602–5 with earlier bibli-
Planung der Villa Madama.” In his analysis ography, notably Reiss, “Giulio de’ Medici
of the most significant surviving drawing for and Mario Maffei”; Renato Lefevre, “Un
the villa, Fritz-Eugen Keller suggests that U prelato del ’500, Mario Maffei e la costru-
314a (Plate vi herein, discussed in Chapter 1) zione di Villa Madama,” L’Urbe 32.3 (1969):
reflects “intensive discussion” between 1–11; and Lefevre, “La ‘Vigna del Cardinale
Raphael and Antonio: F.-E. Keller, “Catalogue de’ Medici’ e il vescovo d’Aquino,” Strenna
Entry, U 314a recto,” in Architectural Drawings dei Romanisti 22 (1961): 171–7. For payment
of Antonio da Sangallo the Younger, vol. 2, 137–8. documents, Lefevre, Villa Madama, 119, 139,
Stefano Ray also interpreted various aspects 146–7, 153 nn. 83, 86, 87, 89–92; Shearman, “A
of the architecture of Raphael, Antonio da Functional Interpretation of Villa Madama,”
Sangallo, and other associates who worked at 316; Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 771–2 (but NB
Villa Madama: Stefano Ray, “Villa Madama a payments from the Entrata e uscita of Clement
Roma,” L’Architettura 14 (1969): 822–9; Ray, VII in the ASR listed as unpublished were in
Raffaello architetto: linguaggio artistico e ideo- fact published by Lefevre, Villa Madama; Elet,
logia; Ray, “Antonio da Sangallo il Giovane “Papal villeggiatura,” 43 n. 56; and Chapter 1
e Raffaello. I connotati di un confronto,” in note 107.
Antonio da Sangallo il Giovane: la vita e l’opera. 37. See especially Amanda Lillie, “The Humanist
Atti del XXII congresso di storia dell’architettura, Villa Revisited,” in Language and Images of
Rome, 1986, ed. Gianfranco Spagnesi (Rome, Renaissance Italy, ed. Alison Brown (Oxford,
1986), 43–62; Ray, “Palazzo e villa: Roma, 1995), 193–215; and Lillie, “Fiesole: Locus
1510–1550,” in Il Palazzo dal Rinascimento a amoenus or Penitential Landscape?,” I Tatti
oggi : Atti del convegno, 1988, ed. Simonetta Studies: Essays in the Renaissance 11 (2008):
Valtieri (Rome, 1988), 93–100; Ray, “Raffaello 11–55.
architetto, la costruzione dello spazio,” in 38. Nadja Aksamija, “Architecture and Poetry in
Raffaello e l’Europa, 131–52; Ray, Lo specchio the Making of a Christian Cicero: Giovanni
del Cosmo: da Brunelleschi a Palladio: itinerario Battista Campeggi’s Tuscolano and the
nell’architettura del Rinascimento (Rome, 1991). Literary Culture of the Villa in Counter-
See also Coffin, “Plans of the Villa Madama” Reformation Bologna,” I Tatti Studies: Essays
and Eiche, “A New Look at Three Drawings in the Renaissance 13 (2011): 127–91.
for Villa Madama.” 39. Among the works on Quattrocento Ferrara by
32. Reiss plausibly suggests that Cardinal Giulio must Maria Teresa Sambin de Norcen in the notes
have studied and discussed the plans for the villa, and bibliography, see especially “‘Ut apud
consistent with his practice in Michelangelo’s Plinium’: giardino e paesaggio a Belriguardo
Florentine projects: “Raphael, Pope Leo X, and nel Quattrocento,” in Delizie in villa: il giardino
Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici,” 22. rinascimentale e i suoi committenti, ed. Gianni
33. Christof Thoenes, “Neue Beobachtungen Venturi and Francesco Ceccarelli (Florence,
an Bramantes St.-Peter-Entwürfen,” in Opus 2008), 65–90; and Sambin de Norcen, Le ville
incertum: italienische Studien aus drei Jahrzehnten di Leonello d’Este: Ferrara e le sue campagne agli
(Munich, 2002), 381–417, at 386. arbori dell’età m
oderna (Venice, 2012). Paola
34. On the methodologies and limitations of Modesti analyzes a 1535–6 description of
architectural reconstruction, see Christoph Poggioreale, among other sources, to recon-
Luitpold Frommel, “La restitution des edifices struct the cinquecento appearance of this
de la Renaissance: problèmes de crédibilité,” in important villa in Naples, later destroyed,
Archives et histoire de l’architecture: Actes du col- in Modesti, Le delizie ritrovate: Poggioreale e
loque, Paris, 1988, ed. Pierre Joly (Paris, 1990), la villa del Rinascimento nella Napoli aragonese
285–304; and Guy Dewez, “La Villa Madama: (Florence, 2014).
234 NOTES T O PA GE S 9– 11
40. As noted by Kenneth Gouwens, “Perceiving From Giotto to Alberti and Modern Oblivion (New
the Past: Renaissance Humanism after the Haven, 2010); and Raffaella Fabiani Giannetto,
‘Cognitive Turn’,” American Historical Review Medici Gardens: From Making to Design
103 (1998): 55–82, at 79–82. (Philadelphia, 2008). See also the project of the
41. Among the vast bibliography on this subject, Biblioteca Hertziana in Rome and the Max-
see Caroline Elam, “Drawings as Documents: Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftgeschichte in
The Problem of the San Lorenzo Façade,” Berlin on Wissensgeschichte der Architektur/
Studies in the History of Art 33 (1992): 98–114; Epistemic History of Architecture (http://
Cammy Brothers, “Architecture, History, wissensgeschichte.biblhertz.it/WdA/WdA/
Archeology: Drawing Ancient Rome in the WdA_coll/description/#Deutsch).
Letter to Leo X and in Sixteenth-Century 47. Among the large literature on this subject,
Practice,” in Coming About, 135–40; Marco notably at St. Peter’s, see especially Nicoletta
Frascari, Jonathan Hale, and Bradley Starkey, Marconi, Edificando Roma Barocca: Macchine,
eds., From Models to Drawings: Imagination apparati, maestranze e cantieri tra XVI e XVIII
and Representation in Architecture (London, secolo (Città di Castello, 2004), 25–7 and passim.
2007); Hooman Koliji, In-Between: Architectural 48. For which, see discussion in Chapter 5 with
Drawing and Imaginative Knowledge in Islamic bibliography.
and Western Traditions (Farnham, 2015). 49. Among the rich bibliography on these subjects,
42. See the important work of Brian Richardson Martin Kemp, “From ‘Mimesis’ to ‘Fantasia’:
cited herein, especially Manuscript Culture The Quattrocento Vocabulary of Creation,
in Renaissance Italy (Cambridge, 2009). His Inspiration and Genius in the Visual Arts,”
research builds on the fundamental works of Viator 8 (1977): 347–98; Michael Baxandall,
Armando Petrucci; e.g. La descrizione del mano- Giotto and the Orators (Oxford, 1971), 15ff.
scritto: storia, problemi, modelli (Rome, 2001). 50. For the notion of efficacy in text, images,
43. Historians of Italian Renaissance literature, and the art of memory, see the essays in
following those of English literature, have Efficacité/Efficacy: How To Do Things with Words
recently begun to integrate literary analysis, and Images?, ed. Véronique Plesch, Catriona
the history of literary culture, and book history, MacLeod, and Jans Baetens (Amsterdam,
as noted by Brian Richardson, “The Diffusion 2011).
of Literature in Renaissance Italy. The Case 51. Caroline Van Eck, Classical Rhetoric and the
of Pietro Bembo,” in Literary Cultures and the Visual Arts in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge,
Material Book, ed. Simon Eliot, Andrew Nash, 2007), 37; Daniel Willis, The Emerald City and
and Ian Willison (London, 2007), 175–89. For Other Essays on the Architectural Imagination
a thoughtful historiography of socio-cultural (New York, 1999), 114.
approaches to Italian manuscript studies, see 52. Editorial theory opened up studies of textual
the Preface by Fillipo de Vivo and Brian process by considering different textual states
Richardson and review essay by Simone Testa of a work – including so-called ugly manu-
in a special issue of Italian Studies 66 (2011). scripts emended by the artist’s hand – along
44. Lauro Martines, Society and History in English with editorial performance and the processes
Renaissance Verse (Oxford, 1985), 20, 53, and of composition. For example, H.Wayne Storey,
passim. “Dirty Manuscripts and Textual Cultures.
45. Susanna de Beer, The Poetics of Patronage: Poetry Introduction to Textual Cultures 1.1,” Textual
as Self-Advancement in Giannantonio Campano Cultures: Texts, Contexts, Interpretation 1.1
(Turnhout, 2013); and David Rijser, Raphael’s (2006): 1–4.
Poetics: Art and Poetry in High Renaissance Rome 53. Mario Carpo, Alberti, Raffaello, Serlio e Camillo
(Amsterdam, 2012). (Geneva, 1993), 9–10, 52–5, and passim, high-
46. Among many possible examples, Dorothy lighting the importance of Pietro Bembo’s
Metzger Habel, When All of Rome Was under Prose della volgar lingua, Giulio Camillo
Construction: The Building Process in Baroque Delminio’s Trattato dell’imitazione (c. 1530), and
Rome (University Park, PA, 2013), who con- his Topica o vero dell’elocuzione (c. 1540). For
siders the voices of a variety of “stakeholders” Cicero’s comparison between ornament as
in what she terms the “incubation of architec- an assemblage of words or decorative build-
ture”; Marvin Trachtenberg, Building-in-Time: ing elements, see De oratore, xxxix, 134; and
N O TE S TO PAG E S 11 –12 235
the discussion in Alina Payne, The Architectural Art of Architectural Imitation,” in Raising the
Treatise in the Italian Renaissance: Architectural Eyebrow: John Onians and World Art Studies:
Invention, Ornament and Literary Culture An Album Amicorum in his Honour, ed. Lauren
(Cambridge, 1999), 63ff. Charles Dempsey Golden and Martin Kemp (Oxford, 2001);
characterizes Botticelli’s Primavera as a material and Elam, “Raphael’s New Architectural
manifestation of a poetic invention, “bringing Agenda,” in Imitation, Representation and
together material derived from and rational- Printing in the Italian Renaissance, ed. Roy
ized by a large number of ancient authors” to Eriksen and Magne Malmanger (Pisa and
create a new synthesis, providing an example Rome, 2009), 209–31. Cf. Guido Beltramini,
of this process in an earlier Medicean con- who invokes Tafuri’s caution of the risks
text: Charles Dempsey, The Portrayal of Love: of direct translation from one discipline to
Botticelli’s Primavera and Humanist Culture at another; in Beltramini, “Pietro Bembo e
the Time of Lorenzo the Magnificent (Princeton, l’architettura,” in Pietro Bembo e l’invenzione
1992), 19 and passim. del Rinascimento, ed. Guido Beltramini,
54. Among many recent works on the subject of Davide Gasparotto, and Adolfo Tura (Venice,
ut lingua architectura see especially Payne, The 2013), 12–31, at 25. The notion of selection in
Architectural Treatise; Payne, “Ut poesis archi- Raphael’s art and architecture is discussed in
tectura: Tectonics and Poetics in Architectural Chapter 1 pp. 45–6.
Criticism circa 1570,” in Antiquity and its 57. Although, as Caroline van Eck notes, the pur-
Interpreters, ed. Alina Payne, Ann Kuttner, and pose of this abstract analogy was to rationalize
Rebekah Smick (Cambridge, 2000), 145–58; architecture as an Aristotelian scienza: Classical
the essays in Georgia Clarke and Paul Crossley, Rhetoric and the Visual Arts, 37–46 and passim.
eds., Architecture and Language: Constructing 58. Ideas about style (maniera) and order (ordine)
Identity in European Architecture, c. 1000–1650 would be canonized into a theory of the
(Cambridge, 2000); Alberto Pérez-Gómez, orders by Sebastiano Serlio, who first codi-
Built upon Love: Architectural Longing after fied sixteenth-century architectural thought
Ethics and Aesthetics (Cambridge, 2006); and in the late 1530s, much of it drawing heav-
Roy Eriksen, The Building in the Text: Alberti ily on Peruzzi and the works of Raphael and
to Shakespeare and Milton (University Park, PA, Bramante. The period of Villa Madama’s plan-
2001), which presents a “topomorphic read- ning and construction in the second two dec-
ing” of spatial patterns in the composition ades of the sixteenth century coincides with
of poetry. For the parallel notion of ut pictura the lacuna in surviving theoretical writings on
poesis, Renssalaer W. Lee, Ut pictura poesis: The art and architecture, so in matters of architec-
Humanistic Theory of Painting (New York, 1967); ture and language we are left to triangulate
Martin Schwartz, “Ut pictura poesis,” Chicago among quattrocento treatises, those of the
School of Media Theory blog, https://lucian mid-cinquecento, and early cinquecento evi-
.uchicago.edu/blogs/mediatheory/keywords/ dence gleaned from other types of writing, as
ut-pictura-poesis/. well as the buildings themselves.
55. On Michelangelo and language see Caroline 59. W. J. T. Mitchell, Iconology: Image,Text, Ideology
Elam, “‘Tuscan Dispositions’: Michelangelo’s (Chicago, 1987); Mitchell, “Word and Image,”
Florentine Architectural Vocabulary and its in Critical Terms for Art History, ed. Robert S.
Reception,” Renaissance Studies 19.1 (2005), Nelson and Richard Shiff (Chicago, 1996),
46–82; and Elam, “Michelangelo and the 49. For an analysis of ekphrasis as a struggle
Clementine Architectural Style,” in The for mastery between the sister arts, James A.
Pontificate of Clement VII, 199–226. W. Heffernan, Museum of Words: The Poetics
56. Hans H.Aurenhammer,“Multa aedium exempla of Ekphrasis from Homer to Ashbery (Chicago,
variarum imaginum atque operum. Das Problem 1993).
der imitatio in der italienischen Architektur 60. For humanism as “an outlook on educa-
des frühen 16. Jahrhunderts,” in Intertextualität tion,” Ingrid Rowland, The Culture of the High
in der Frühen Neuzeit: Studien zu ihren theore- Renaissance: Ancients and Moderns in Sixteenth-
tischen und praktischen Perspektiven (Frankfurt, Century Rome (Cambridge, 1998), 10; for addi-
1994), 533–605; David Hemsoll, “A Question tional literature on humanism, see Chapter 1
of Language: Raphael, Michelangelo and the note 18 and passim.
236 NOTES T O PA GE S 14 – 17
61. A subject I treated in my dissertation (Elet, the autograph Castiglione manuscript in

“Papal villeggiatura”) and will address in a Mantua, Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 501–2. The
monograph encompassing the architecture, letter and issues about its authorship are dis-
decoration, landscape, and gardens of the cussed further below, p. 28 and note 86.
Medici villa complex. 7. For the poems at Raphael’s death, Shearman,
62. Mary Carruthers, “The Concept of ‘Ductus’. Sources, vol. 1, 639–62; Weil-Garris, “La morte
Or Journeying through a Work of Art,” in di Raffaello,” 177–90; and Giovanna Perini,
Carruthers, Rhetoric beyond Words (Cambridge, “Carmi inediti su Raffaello e sull’arte della
2010), 190–213. prima metà del cinquecento a Roma e Ferrara
63. Michel Jeanneret notes the surprising num- e il mondo dei Coryciana,” Römisches Jahrbuch
ber of Renaissance literary masterworks that der Biblioteca Hertziana 32 (1997/8), 369–407.
were presented as works in progress “in the 8. On the equation of ancient ruins and “new
image of a universe in perpetual gestation”; ruins,” see the discussion in Chapter 6 with
Jeanneret, Perpetual Motion: Transforming Shapes relevant sources.
in the Renaissance from da Vinci to Montaigne, 9. The classic studies on villeggiatura and villa ide-
trans. Nidra Poller (Baltimore, 2001), 197. ology are: James Ackerman, The Villa: Form and
Ideology of Country Houses (Princeton, 1990),
1 REVI VI NG T HE C OR P S E which focused on the relation of villa ideology
and architectural form; David R. Coffin, The
1.
“Tu quoque dum toto laniatam corpore Villa in the Life of Renaissance Rome (Princeton,
Romam / Componis miro Raphael inge- 1979); Coffin, Gardens and Gardening in
nio, / Atque Vrbis lacerum ferro, ignis, Papal Rome; Pierre de la Ruffinière Du Prey,
annisque cadaver, / Ad vitam … Te dudum The Villas of Pliny from Antiquity to Posterity
extinctis reddere posse animam”; text and (Chicago, 1994); William MacDonald and
translation in Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 650–3. John Pinto, Hadrian’s Villa and its Legacy (New
2.
Nancy Vickers, “The Body Re-Membered: Haven, 1995); Amanda Lillie, “The Humanist
Petrarchan Lyric and the Strategies of Villa Revisited”; and Beltramini and Burns,
Description,” in Mimesis: From Mirror to eds., Andrea Palladio e la villa veneta.
Method, Augustine to Descartes, ed. John D. 10. Sabine Eiche identified the architecture
Lyons and Stephen G. Nichols, Jr. (Hanover, in the background of these images as Villa
1982), 101–9. Madama in the catalogue entry in Renaissance
3.
As characterized by Leonard Barkan, Architecture from Brunelleschi to Michelangelo:
Unearthing the Past: Archeology and Aesthetics in The Representation of Architecture, ed. Henry
the Making of Renaissance Culture (New Haven, A. Millon and Vittorio Lampugnani (Milan,
1999), 119–207 and passim. 1994), 563. To my knowledge, no previous
4. For literary sources of the Rome-as-cadaver study has interpreted the confluence of subject
metaphor, Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 528–9 and setting in these works. Lombard’s draw-
with earlier bibliography. ing, dated 1544, was probably intended for a
5.
On the Hebrew etymology of his name- painting, but later reused for the engraving
sake, the Archangel Raphael, as Medicina Dei after 1548, as proposed by Cécile Oger, who
(“God heals”), and the imagery of Raphael notes the existence of two other Lombard
as Esculapius and divine healer: Weil-Garris, workshop drawings related to this one: Cécile
“La morte di Raffaello e la ‘Trasfigurazione’,” Oger, “Les pratiques de copies au sein de
185 and passim. For the representation of this l’atelier de Lombard,” in Lambert Lombard:
imagery in Raphael’s late paintings, and thus peintre de la Renaissance Liège 1505/06–1566,
during his lifetime, Butler,“‘Reddita lux est’.” Exh. Cat, ed. Godelieve Denhaene (Brussels,
See also Reiss, “Raphael, Pope Leo X, and 2006), 107–12. Lombard’s drawings further
Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici,” n. 57 with earlier detail his fascination with Muses; possibly he
bibliography on this imagery and the asso- studied the ancient sculptures of the Muses
ciation of the divine healer imagery (Christus at Villa Madama while he was there. See
medicus) with Medici patrons. for example the sketchbook sheet of twelve
6. “vedendo quasi un cadavero di quella nobil seated figures in his Arenberg Album, illus-
patria .… Onde quelle famose opere … per trated in Lambert Lombard, 374 cat. 34 and fig.
dir così, l’ossa del corpo senza carne.” From 325. (For the Muses at the Medici villa, see
N O TE S TO PAG E S 17– 2 0 237
Chapter 5 below.) For Lombard’s appropria- 306–9; Jeffrey Glodzik, “Vergilianism in Early
tion of Raphael as a model, his study of Muses, Cinquecento Rome: Egidio Gallo and the
and the Lazarus drawing and print, Godelieve Vision of Roman Destiny,” Sixteenth Century
Denhaene, Lambert Lombard: Renaissance et Journal 45 (2014): 73–98.
humanisme à Liège (Anvers, 1990), 77–100. On 17. James Hankins has traced the meanings of the
the context for Lombard’s Roman studies and term res publica in ancient and Renaissance
Cock’s prints of his work, Hieronymous Cock: sources, finding the origin of the modern
The Renaissance in Print, Exh. Cat., ed. Joris van notion of a republic as a non-monarchical
Grieken, Ger Luijten, and Jan van der Stock form of government in quattrocento Italy:
(New Haven, 2013). Hankins, “Exclusivist Republicanism and the
11. For Lombard’s depiction of the villa as ambig- Non-Monarchical Republic,” Political Theory
uously half-built or ruined in the context of 38 (2010), 452–82. I refer to the notion of
contemporary notions conflating ancient and the papacy as a res publica cristiana in the sense
modern ruins, see Chapter 6 p. 164. he traces to the late fifteenth century, which
12. About Leo’s pontificate: Roscoe, The Life and was engrained by the time of Machiavelli and
Pontificate of Leo the Tenth, trans. and revised by Castiglione.
Thomas Roscoe, 6th edn., 2 vols. (London, 1853); 18. Among the vast bibliography on Roman
Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste, vols. 7–8 (1898–1913); Renaissance humanism, see especially John
Maurizio Gattoni da Camogli, Leone X e la geo- D’Amico, Renaissance Humanism in Papal
politica dello Stato Pontificio, 1513–1521 (Città del Rome: Humanists and Churchmen on the Eve of
Vaticano, 2000); Marco Pellegrini, “Leone X,” Reformation (Baltimore, 1983), 134ff; the col-
in Enciclopedia dei Papi, vol. 2 (Rome, 2000); lected articles of James Hankins, Humanism
Nicoletta Baldini and Monica Bietti, eds. Nello and Platonism in the Italian Renaissance (Rome,
splendore mediceo: Papa Leone X e Firenze, Exh. 2003); Kenneth Gouwens, Remembering the
Cat. (Florence, 2013); Marcello Simonetta, Volpi e Renaissance: Humanist Narratives of the Sack
leoni: i Medici, Machiavelli e la rovina d’Italia (Milan, of Rome (Leiden, 1998), 8–30; Gouwens,
2014), 93–232. “Perceiving the Past: Renaissance Humanism
13. Discussed below with sources, Chapter 3 p. 82 after the ‘Cognitive Turn’”; and David
and nn. 77–80. Cast, “Humanism and Art,” in Renaissance
14. John M. McManamon, S.J., “Marketing a Humanism: Foundations, Forms, and Legacy, ed.
Medici Regime: The Funeral Oration of Albert Rabil, Jr. (Philadelphia, 1988): 412–49.
Marcello Virgilio Adriani for Giuliano de’ On the Leonine rhetoric of peace, Shearman,
Medici (1516),” Renaissance Quarterly 44 (1991): Raphael’s Cartoons; and Janet Cox-Rearick,
4ff with earlier bibliography. Dynasty and Destiny in Medici Art: Pontormo,
15. For which see Francesco P. di Teodoro, Ritratto Leo X, and the Two Cosimos (Princeton, 1984).
di Leone X di Raffaello Sanzio (Milan, 1998); 19. As characterized by P. Godman, From Poliziano
Nelson H. Minnich, “Raphael’s Portrait Leo to Machiavelli: Florentine Humanism in the High
X with Cardinals Giulio de’ Medici and Luigi de’ Renaissance (Princeton, 1998), 3. See also G. B.
Rossi: A Religious Interpretation,” Renaissance Picotti, La giovinezza di Leone X (Milan, 1927),
Quarterly 56 (2003): 1005–52; Joanna Woods- 265–7.
Marsden, “One Artist, Two Sitters, One Role: 20. See Sheryl E. Reiss, “‘Per havere tutte le
Raphael’s Papal Portraits,” in The Cambridge opere … Da Monsignor Reverendissimo’:
Companion to Raphael, 128–40; Jürg Meyer zur Artists Seeking the Favor of Cardinal Giulio
Capellen, Raphael: A Critical Catalogue of his de’ Medici,” in The Possessions of a Cardinal:
Paintings (Landshut, 2008), vol. 3: cat. 81, 162–7 Politics, Piety, and Art, 1450–1700, ed. Mary
with earlier sources. Hollingsworth and Carol Richardson
16. On the culture of Rome in the early sixteenth (University Park, PA, 2010), 113–31, at 115 and
century, see especially Charles L. Stinger, The n. 18 with earlier bibliography.
Renaissance in Rome (Bloomington, 1985); 21. Among the large and scattered literature on
Rowland, Culture of the High Renaissance. Medici imagery, see especially Cox-Rearick,
Among the large bibliography on Roman Dynasty and Destiny; Shearman, Raphael’s
Golden Age imagery, E. H. Gombrich, Cartoons; Dempsey, The Portrayal of Love;
“Renaissance and Golden Age,” Journal of Mirella Levi D’Ancona, Botticelli’s Primavera:
the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 24 (1961): A Botanical Interpretation Including Astrology,
Alchemy and the Medici (Florence, 1983); “Seeking Patronage under the Medici Popes:
Claudia Rousseau, “Cosimo I de’ Medici and A Tale of Two Humanists,” in The Pontificate
Astrology: The Symbolism of Prophecy” (Ph.D. of Clement VII, 293–309; and Gaisser, Pierio
diss., Columbia University, 1983); Anthony Valeriano on the Ill Fortune of Learned Men.
M. Cummings, The Politicized Muse: Music for 27. Josef Ijsewijn, ed., Coryciana: critice edidit,
Medici Festivals, 1512–1537 (Princeton, 1992); carminibus extravagantibus auxit, praefatione
and Cummings, The Lion’s Ear: Pope Leo X, et annotationibus instruxit (Rome, 1997);
the Renaissance Papacy, and Music (Ann Arbor, Ijsewijn, “Poetry in a Roman Garden: The
2012). Coryciana,” in Latin Poetry and the Classical
22. Gombrich, “Renaissance and Golden Age”; Tradition: Essays in Medieval and Renaissance
for the notion of Leo-Augustus succeeding Literature, ed. Peter Godman and Oswyn
Julius-Caesar on the throne of St. Peters in Murray (Oxford, 1990), 211–31; and Rosenna
contemporary imagery, Shearman, Raphael’s Alhaique Pettinelli, “Punti di vista sull’arte nei
Cartoons, 3. poeti dei Coryciana,” Rassegna della letteratura
23. Claudia Rousseau, “The Yoke Impresa of Leo italiana 90 (1986): 41–54; Phyllis Pray Bober,
X,” Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes “The ‘Coryciana’ and the Nymph Corycia,”
in Florenz 33 (1989): 113–26; Francesco Bausi, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes
“Il broncone e la fenice,” Archivio storico italiano 40 (1977): 223–39; Virginia Bonito, “The Saint
552 (1992): 437–54; Cox-Rearick, Dynasty and Anne Altar in Sant’Agostino, Rome” (Ph.D. diss.,
Destiny. New York University, 1983); and Bonito, “The
24. Cox-Rearick, Dynasty and Destiny, 48 and pas- Saint Anne Altar in Sant’Agostino in Rome:
sim; Levi-D’Ancona, Botticelli’s Primavera; and A New Discovery,” Burlington Magazine 122
Yvan Loskoutoff, “Le symbolisme des palle (1980): 805–12.
Médicéennes à la Villa Madama,” Journal des 28. The Academy first flourished under Pomponio
Savants (2001): 351–91. Leto, and it was subsequently headed by Paolo
25. For the social and intellectual life of these Cortesi, followed by Colocci, who probably
sodalities in early cinquecento Rome, see took over when Cortesi left Rome in 1503.
especially Domenico Gnoli, “Orti letterati For Colocci, see Rowland, Culture of the High
nella Roma di Leone X,” in Roma di Leon X Renaissance, 7ff and passim, with bibliography
(Milan, 1938), 136–63; Vincenzo De Caprio, at 255 n. 1. For his collaboration with Raphael,
“L’area umanistica romano (1513–1527),” Studi see below p. 26 and note 76.
romani 29 (1981): 321–35; D’Amico, Renaissance 29. Gaisser, “The Rise and Fall of Goritz’s Feasts”;
Humanism, 89–112; Julia Haig Gaisser, “The Rowland, Culture of the High Renaissance, chs.
Rise and Fall of Goritz’ Feasts,” Renaissance 6 and 7; Phyllis Pray Bober, “Appropriation
Quarterly 48 (1995): 41–57; Gaisser, Pierio Contexts: Decor, Furor Bacchicus, Convivium,”
Valeriano on the Ill Fortune of Learned Men: A in Antiquity and its Interpreters, 238ff; Bober,
Renaissance Humanist and his World (Ann Arbor, “The ‘Coryciana’ and the Nymph Corycia”;
1999), 23ff, 45–7, and passim; and Gaisser, “The Gnoli, “Orti letterari,” 136–63; T. C. Price
Mirror of Humanism: Self-Reflection in the Zimmermann, “Renaissance Symposia,”
Roman Academy,” in On Renaissance Academies: in Essays Presented to Myron P. Gilmore,
Proceedings of the International Conference “From vol. 1 (Florence, 1978): 363–74; T. C. Price
the Roman Academy to the Danish Academy in Zimmermann and Saul Levin, “Fabio
Rome,” ed. Marianne Pade (Rome, 2011), Vigile’s ‘Poem of the Pheasant’: Humanist
123–32. For shared intellectual habits in quat- Conviviality in Renaissance Rome,” in Rome
trocento and cinquecento sodalities, and in in the Renaissance: The City and the Myth, ed.
different cities, Vincenzo De Caprio, “I cena- P. A. Ramsey (Binghamton, 1982), 265–78;
coli umanistici,” in Letteratura italiana: il letterato D’Amico, Renaissance Humanism, 89–112; and
e le istituzioni, vol. 1, ed. Alberto Asor Rosa De Caprio, “I cenacoli umanistici.”
(Turin, 1982), 799–822; Rowland, Culture of 30. As Blosio Palladio described in his introduc-
the High Renaissance. tion to the Coryciana, noted by Bonito, “The
26. On the difficulties and uncertainties of earn- Saint Anne Altar” (1983), 177 n. 261. For the
ing a living via literary patronage in Leonine argument that early modern wall-writing of
and Clementine Rome, Julia Haig Gaisser, various sorts was more widespread than we
N O TE S TO PAG E S 21 –2 2 239
have known, Juliet Fleming, Graffiti and the Late Medieval French Poetry (Tempe, AZ, 2012);
Writing Arts of Early Modern England (London, Grafton, Worlds Made by Words; and Cast, The
2001). That this practice was especially asso- Delight of Art, 35–65. Ann Blair is working
ciated with villas is suggested by Varro; in his on humanist collaboration, as noted in the
discussion of the ideal villa in his dedication of Introduction, note 16.
the third book of his De re rustica to his friend 34. Gaisser, “Seeking Patronage under the
Pinnius, he says, “For just as you had a villa Medici Popes”; Gaisser, Pierio Valeriano on the
noteworthy for its frescoing, inlaid work, and Ill Fortune of Learned Men; Anne Reynolds,
handsome mosaic floors, but thought it was Renaissance Humanism at the Court of Clement
not fine enough until its walls were adorned VII: Francesco Berni’s Dialogue against Poets in
also by your writings, so I, that it might be far- Context (New York, 1997), 154–6, 158–9 and
ther adorned with fruit, so far as I could make passim; and Vincenzo De Caprio, “Intellettuali
it so, am sending this to you, recalling as I do e mercato del lavoro nella Roma Medicea,”
the conversations which we held on the sub- Studi romani 29 (1981): 29–46, at 34–6, on the
ject of the complete villa.” (“Cum enim villam system of Italian Renaissance literary patron-
haberes opere tectorio et intestino ac pavimen- age as an exchange of goods and services,
tis nobilibus lithostrotis spectandam et parum and the tensions inherent in the systems of
putasses esse, ni tuis quoque litteris exornati mecenatismo and clientelismo. See also Chapter 2
parietes essent, ego quoque, quo ornatior ea pp. 59–60 and notes 79–80.
esse posset fructu, quod facere possem, haec ad 35. This theme is explicit in Arsilli’s “De poetis
te misi, recordatus de ea re sermones, quos de urbanis” in the Coryciana. For discussion of
villa perfecta habuissemus.”) Varro, De re rustica this, Ijsewijn, “Poetry in a Roman Garden,”
iii, 1, 10; from Harrison Boyd Ash, ed., Marcus 216.
Porcius Cato: On Agriculture, trans. William 36. Gombrich, “Renaissance and Golden Age,”
Davis Hooper (Cambridge, MA, 1993). 307.
31. Brian Richardson, “‘Recitato e cantato’: The 37. D’Amico, Renaissance Humanism, 87, 238–40
Oral Diffusion of Lyric Poetry in Sixteenth- and passim; Gaisser, “Seeking Patronage under
Century Italy,” in Theatre, Opera, and Performance the Medici Popes,” 308–9 and passim; and
in Italy from the Fifteenth Century to the Present: Gaisser, Pierio Valeriano on the Ill Fortune of
Essays in Honour of Richard Andrews, ed. Brian Learned Men.
Richardson, Simon Gilson, and Catherine 38. Reynolds, Renaissance Humanism at the Court of
Keen (Leeds, 2004), 67–82. See also the web- Clement VII.
site “Italian Voices. Oral Culture, Manuscript 39. For which, Gouwens, Remembering the
and Print in Early Modern Italy, 1450–1700” Renaissance; Gaisser, Pierio Valeriano on the Ill
(http://arts.leeds.ac.uk/italianvoices/). Fortune of Learned Men.
32. “Nulla enim commercia maiorem concili- 40. Beltramini et al., Pietro Bembo e l’invenzione del
ant amiciciae coniunctionem quam convic- Rinascimento, entry by Carlo Vecce, “Il ‘cantiere
tus, quam simul ali, et enutriri, unde sodales romano’,” 276–83; and Claudio Vela, Cat. 4.1,
et sodalitium, pro amicorum eorum collegio 250–1. The work was published in 1525.
qui saepe simul cenitant. Cuiusmodi Romae 41. Pierio Valeriano, “Dialogo della volgar lingua,”
habetis Sadoletum, Gyberticum, Coritianum, in Discussioni linguistiche del cinquecento, ed.
Colotiacum, Melineum, Cursiacum, Mario Pozzi (Turin, 1988), 37–93; for which,
Blosianum, et alia.” From Valeriano’s lec- see Chapter 2 pp. 58–9 and notes 76, 77. I am
tures on Catullus of 1521–2, in a gloss on the grateful to Caroline Elam who first brought
term sodalis in Catullus 12. As pointed out by this work to my attention, and to Sheryl Reiss
Gaisser, with citation and translation in “The for this citation. For Valeriano, Gaisser, Pierio
Mirror of Humanism,” 123. Valeriano on the Ill Fortune of Learned Men;
33. The variously convivial, competitive, and col- Kenneth Gouwens, “L’umanesimo al tempo di
laborative aspects of humanist culture have Pierio Valeriano: la cultura locale, la fama, e la
been fruitfully traced in other contexts as well; Respublica litterarum nella prima metà del cin-
see Adrian Armstrong, The Virtuoso Circle: quecento,” in Bellunesi e Feltrini tra Umanesimo e
Competition, Collaboration, and Complexity in Rinascimento: filologia, erudizione e biblioteche, ed.
Paolo Pellegrini (Rome and Padua, 2006), 3– Biographical and Bibliographical Dictionary of
10; and Gouwens, Remembering the Renaissance, the Italian Humanists, vol. 4, 3307; and Davide
143–9. Canfora, “‘Carmine studioso, tamen veridico’:
42. As noted by Rowland, Culture of the High encomio, poesia e storiografia nell’epica di
Renaissance, 250–3. Francesco Sperulo,” in Il Principe e la storia:
43. Gaisser, “Mirror of Humanism,” 128–9. Atti del convegno Scandiano 18–20 settembre 2003,
44. Reiss, “Giulio de’ Medici and Mario Maffei,” ed. Tina Matarrese and Cristina Montagnani
with additional earlier sources; D’Amico, (Novara, 2005), 291–8. Sperulo also composed
Renaissance Humanism, 85–8; Lefevre, “Un a series of epigrams to Cesare Borgia, in BAV,
prelato del ’500, Mario Maffei e la costruzione Vat. Lat. 5205, fols. 31v–40, as noted by Filippo
di Villa Madama”; Lefevre, “La ‘Vigna del Tamburini, Santi e peccatori: confessioni e suppli-
Cardinale de’ Medici’ e il vescovo d’Aquino”; che dai Registri della Penitenzieria dell’Archivio
Luigi Pescetti, “Mario Maffei (1463–1537),” Segreto Vaticano 1451–1586 (Milan, 1995), 209.
Rassegna volterrana 6 (1932): 66–91. 52. The Rotulus of Leo’s papal court from 1514
45. In 1517, he entered the household of Cardinal to 1516 listed Sperulo among the cubicu-
Giulio, with whom he went to Florence in larii as Dominus Franciscus Sperulus (a lay
January 1519. T. C. Price Zimmermann, title), also naming the famuli in his personal
Paolo Giovio: The Historian and the Crisis of service: Matheus Ricus, Tertonensis dioc.,
Sixteenth-Century Italy (Princeton, 1995), chs. Ioannes Bartholomeus de Arofis, and Ioannes
2 and 3. On his role as artistic advisor in this de Furno, Gebenensis dioc. In Alessandro
period, Barbara Agosti, Paolo Giovio: uno storico Ferrajoli, Il ruolo della corte di Leone X (1514–16),
lombardo nella cultura artistica del cinquecento ed. Vincenzo De Caprio (Rome, 1984), 20.
(Florence, 2008), 10–34. On the role of the cubicularius, Christopher S.
46. Ijsewijn, Coryciana/critice edidit, 344–59. Celenza, Renaissance Humanism and the Papal
47. “Est Marius versu, pergrato et scommate Curia: Lapo da Castiglionchio the Younger’s De
notus, / Cui virides colles ruraque amaena curiae commodis (Ann Arbor, 1999), 167
placent. / Saepius inde novem vocat ad and n. 44; W. von Hoffman, Forschungen zur
vineta Sorores, / Munifica impendens citria Geschichte der kurialen Behörden vom Schisma
poma manu, / Promittitque rosas, violas, vac- bis zur Reformation, vol. 1 (Rome, 1914), 160–1
cinia et alba / Lilia, cum primo vere tepescet n. 4; and Peter Partner, The Pope’s Men: Papal
humus.” In Francesco Arsilli, De poetis urbanis, Civil Service in the Renaissance (Oxford, 1990),
lines 147–52, in Ijsewijn, Coryciana/critice edidit, 61, who notes that the choice to represent
344–59. For his villas, D’Amico, Renaissance Sigismondo de’ Conti in his robes of the papal
Humanism, 86 and 271 nn. 134–5. Maffei’s let- chamberlain in Raphael’s Madonna di Foligno
ters about his Volterra villa and his role as a reflects the dignity of this post.
Medici agent are discussed in Chapter 6, pp. 53. Although its annual pension of grain was given
145–6. to another papal familiare, Lorenzo Parmenio
48. For which, see the discussion in the context of da San Ginesio. Tamburini, Santi e peccatori,
Plinian villa literature in Chapter 2 pp. 47, 49 207–10 n. 5; and Rita Andreina, “Per la storia
and note 4. della Vaticana nel primo Rinascimento,” in
49. Inghirami’s villa was described by Albertini in Le origini della Biblioteca Vaticana tra umanesimo
1509; discussed by Christiane Joost- Gaug ier, e Rinascimento (1447–1534), vol. 1, ed. Antonio
Raphael’s Stanza della Segnatura: Meaning and Manfredi (Città del Vaticano, 2010), 237–308, at
Invention (Cambridge, 2002), 31 and 187 n. 50. 266.
50. See now Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage, for 54. “Mandamus quatenus Francisco Sperulo
a complete account of Sperulo’s career and diacono et Vincentio Pinpinello subdiacono,
works. dum per nos divina ministeria celebrantur
51. His Borgia panegyric is in the BAV, Vat. inter missarum solemnia in capella nostra in
Lat. 5205, fols. 1r–30v, published by W. W. lingua greca ad serviendum deputatis, duca-
Woodward, Cesare Borgia: A Biography tos quinque auri de cam. pro eorum quoli-
(London, 1913), 438–55, and discussed by R. bet singulo mense persolvi faciant. Datum
Garnett,“A Laureate of Caesar Borgia,” English Rome apud Sanctum Petrum mdxviii, die
Historical Review 17 (1902): 15–19; Cosenza, septima mensis aprilis.” G. Amati, “Notizia di
N O TE S TO PAG E S 23– 2 4 241
manoscritti dell’Archivio Segreto Vaticano,” “Ein Hofpoet Leo’s X über Künstler und
Archivio storico italiano ser. 3, iii, parte i (1866), Kunstwerke,” Repertorium für Kunstwissenschaft
227. 3 (1880): 52–60, at 55; the poem is included as
55. Vittorio Fanelli, “Il ginnasio greco di Leone X Sperulo’s in Salvatore Settis, Laocoonte: fama e
a Roma,” Studi romani 9 (1961): 379–93. stile (Rome, 1999), in the appendix by Sonia
56. Sperulo was involved in negotiations for a Maffei, 130–1.
marriage, revealed by two of Castiglione’s let- 62. For Sperulo’s poems in the Coryciana, Ijsewijn,
ters from July and August of 1519; Baldassare Coryciana/critice edidit, 42–3, 58, 88–9, 109.
Castiglione, Le Lettere, ed. Guido La Rocca, Franciscus Sperulus appears in Paolo Giovio’s
vol. 1 (Milan, 1978), 451, 482. I have not yet list of Coryciana members who had died by
consulted the unpublished letters between 1548: Corytianae Academiae Fato functi, qui sub
Sperulo and Duke Francesco Maria I della Leone floruerunt, ASF, Carte Strozziane, fol. 353,
Rovere of 1522–3, presumably also detail- 16, published in Federico Ubaldini, Vita di
ing his diplomatic responsibilities; Albano mons. Angelo Colocci: edizione del testo originale
Sorbelli and Giuseppe Mazzatinti, Inventari dei italiano (Barb. Lat. 4882), ed. Vittorio Fanelli
manoscritti delle biblioteche d’Italia/Pesaro, vol. (Città del Vaticano, 1969), 114–15.
33 (Florence, 1925), 177, 180, 181. I owe this 63. Reg. Lat. 2019, fol. 168, published in Lancellotti,
source to James Hankins. Ludovici Lazzarelli, 91–4.
57. G. F. Lancellotti, Ludovici Lazzarelli septem- 64. Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia xviiii, BAV,
pedani Poetæ Laureati Bombyx Accesserunt ipsius Vat. Lat. 1673, fols. 102v–103r, which appeared
aliorumque poetarum carmina (Aesii, 1765), 38, in Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” Appendix b, and is
without source. He was presumably ordained discussed further in Chapter 3, p. 82 and notes
after 1516, at which time he was still listed by 79–81.
a lay title in the papal Rotulus (as in note 52 65. For a listing of Sperulo’s known works,
above), and after serving as deacon, recorded 7 Kristeller, Iter Italicum, vol. 2, 54–5, 114, 335,
April 1518 (as in note 54 above). 352, 353, 371, 373–4, 412, 584 and vol. 4, 63;
58. Sperulo held the bishopric of San Leone in Lilio Gregorio Giraldi, “De poetis suorum
Calabria from 18 January 1525 to 1526, when temporum,” in Opera omnia (Leyden, 1696),
he gave up the post to his relative Anselmo vol. 2, 542; C.A.L.M.A. Compendium Auctorum
Sferolo; in Tamburini, Santi e peccatori, 209, Latinorum Medii Aevi, 500–1500 (Florence,
who also notes that Sperulo served as head 2011), vol. 3, 544; and Girolamo Tiraboschi,
priest of Bettona, without dates; Giuseppe Storia della letteratura italiana (Milan, 1822–6),
Cappelletti, Le chiese d’Italia: dalla loro origine vol. 13, 1979–80. Most notably, a collection
sino ai nostri giorni, vol. 21 (Venice, 1870), 256. of his writings in BAV, Vat. Lat. 1673, contains
59. Francesco Speroli, Oratio pro inita pace inter poems dedicated to Cesare Borgia, Corycius,
augustissimum Caesarem Carolum & Franciscum several cardinals, Duke Lorenzo de’ Medici,
regem Christianissimum, Romae in templo Divae and Leo X. For Sperulo’s hand, see Appendix
Mariae, quae de Populo dicitur, anno MDXXVI, ii.
VI Idus Martias habita per Reverendum Patrem 66. Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage.
Franciscum episcopum Sperulum (Rome, 1526); 67. Arsilli says, “Sperulo is celebrated for his ele-
and Speroli, Oratio R. in Christo P.D. Francisci gies while he sings of loves, he is burning
Speruli episcopi S. Leonis habita in pontificiis Sacris while he sings of the wars of heroes, nor is he
Clementis VII ob memorabilem cladem, quam impii the less when the lyre which is a rival to the
Tartari, auspiciis serenissimi Sigismundi regis, a Aolian poet, having been struck, sings its soft
Poloniis nuper acceperunt, ubi obiter de Polonorum measures.” (trans. Alan Fishbone.) “Sperulus
cum Tartaris nativo odio, & utriusque gentis mori- est elegis cultus, dum cantat amores, / Arduus,
bus, institutis, ac gestis agitur, cum brevi descriptione heroum dum fera bella canit. / Nec minor
Sarmatiae Poloniaeque (Rome, 1527?). in lyricis, cum barbitos aemula vati / Aeolio
60. BAV,Vat. Lat. 1673, fols. 2r–3r. molles concinit icta modos.” In Francesco
61. Francisci Speruli de Laocoonte in Titi impera- Arsilli, De poetis urbanis (lines 75–8), in Ijsewijn,
toris domo reperto, BAV, Vat. Lat. 3351, c. Coryciana/critice edidit, 344–59.
150v. Originally published as Evangelista 68. “But surely I cannot pass over Francesco
Maddaleni Capodiferro in Hubert Janitschek, Sperulo of Camerino. He composed books of
242 NOTES T O PA GE S 24–2 6
elegies on conjugal love, epigrams, and lyric dell’quattrocento, held in Milan, 28–9 October,
poems, as well as something that is incom- 2014; I am indebted to the author for kindly
plete and that he is still working on today, discussing this material and sharing a pre-
the achievements of Cesare Borgia, duke of publication copy. See also Carlo Bertelli,
Valentinois, and Alexander VI. He also wrote “Architecto doctissimo,” in Bramante e la sua
on the elements of human life, from infancy cerchia a Milano e in Lombardia 1480–1500, ed.
and, as Lucilius says, from a mother’s ‘purse’, Luciano Patetta (Milan, 2001), 67–75.
right to what happens after death; he gave 72. On his sonnets, variously dated from 1508
this work a Greek title, Anthropographia or to 1511, Ettore Camesasca and Giovanni M.
Andropaedia. But the style is harsh and the Piazza, Raffaello: gli scritti (Milan, 1993), 111–42;
content is very idiosyncratic.” “Sed numquid Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 130–43.
Franciscum Sphaerulum Camertem prae- 73. All the more so assuming Raphael did have
teream? Qui elegiarum libros de amore a hand in writing the certa Idea manifesto
coniugali, epigrammata et lyricos versus together with Castiglione, for which see
composuit et, quae imperfecta ad hanc diem below pp. 45–6 and notes 124–6.
habet in manu, Caesaris Borgiae Valentini 74. Among the vast bibliography on Raphael’s
gesta et Alexandri VI, item hominis institu- visual rhetoric and literary modes, see most
tiones ab infantia et matris, ut ait Lucilius, recently Butler, “‘Reddita lux est’”; Patricia
‘bulga’ ad ipsum usque post mortem statum, Reilly, “Raphael’s Fire in the Borgo and the
quod opus ille Graeca voce Anthropographia Italian Pictorial Vernacular,” Art Bulletin 92
vel Andropaedia inscribit. Sed durus hic et (2010): 308–25; and Rijser, Raphael’s Poetics, all
sui iudicii ubique.” In Lilio Gregorio Giraldi, with earlier sources.
Modern Poets, ed. and trans. John N. Grant 75. As proposed by Ray, “Il volo di Icaro.” For
(Cambridge, MA, 2011), 86–7. (Originally a recent overview of Raphael’s relationships
published 1551.) with humanists, Ingrid D. Rowland, “Raphael
69. The quality of his poetry is consonant with and the Roman Academy,” in On Renaissance
this assessment; it is accomplished and rich in Academies, 133–46.
its references, but he was no Poliziano. 76. Ingrid D. Rowland, “Angleo Colocci ed i suoi
70. Giovanni Santi’s literary output was unique rapporti con Raffaello,” Res publica litterarum
among quattrocento artists, as noted by Tom 14 (1991): 217–28; Rowland, “Raphael, Angelo
Henry and Carol Plazzota, “Raphael: From Colocci, and the Genesis of the Architectural
Urbino to Rome,” in Raphael from Urbino Orders,” Art Bulletin 76 (1994): 81–104;
to Rome, Exh. Cat., ed. Hugo Chapman, Roberto Weiss, “Andrea Fulvio antiquario
Tom Henry, and Carol Plazzotta (London, romano (c. 1470–1527),” Annali della Scuola
2004), 15–65, at 20. On Raphael’s early train- normale superiore di Pisa ser. 2, 28 (1959): 1–44.
ing, see also Kim E. Butler, “Giovanni Santi, 77. For the Quos Ego print of Marcantonio
Raphael, and Quattrocento Sculpture,” Raimondi as a frontispiece by or after Raphael
Artibus et historiae 30 (2009): 15–39; and for an illustrated Aeneid: Henri Delaborde,
Butler, “La Cronaca rimata di Giovanni Santi Marc-Antoine Raimondi: étude historique et cri-
e Raffaello,” in Raffaello e Urbino: la forma tique suivie d’un catalogue raisonné des œuvres
zione giovanile e i rapporti con la città natale, Exh. du maître (Paris, 1888), 146; and Carla Lord,
Cat., ed. Lorenza Mochi Onori (Milan, 2009), “Raphael, Marcantonio Raimondi, andVirgil,”
38–43; and Matteo Burioni, “Die Immunität Source 3 (1984): 23–33. Cf. Christian Kleinbub,
Raffaels. Lehre, Nachahmung und Wettstreit “Raphael’s Quos Ego: forgotten document of
in der Begegnung mit Pietro Perugino,” in the Renaissance Paragone,” Word and Image
Perugino Raffaels Meister, Exh. Cat., ed. Andreas 28 (2012): 287–301. On the play of media in
Schumacher (Ostfildern, 2011), 129–51. I owe this print, see Kleinbub and also Madeleine
the last source to Robert Williams. Viljoen, “Prints and False Antiquities in the
71.
Pierluigi Panza, “Quando l’architetto fa Age of Raphael,” Print Quarterly 21 (2004):
il poeta. Il Paradiso nelle liriche milan- 235–47.
esi del Bramante, tra Alberti, Bellincioni e 78. Margaret Daly Davis, “I geroglifici in marmo
Leonardo,” forthcoming in the Acts of the di Pierio Valeriano,” Labyrinthos 17/18 (1990):
conference Bramante e l’architettura lombarda 56ff.
N O TE S TO PAG E S 2 7 –2 8 243
79.
Jürg Meyer zur Capellen, “Baldassare of Julius II: Meyer zur Capellen, “Baldassare
Castiglione and Antonio Tebaldeo – Raphael Castiglione and Antonio Tebaldeo,” 26.
Portrays Two of his Friends,” in The Portrait 84. The comedy, a riff on the ambiguity of reality
of Baldassare Castiglione & the Madonna and illusion, was staged on 6 March 1519 by
dell’Impannata Northwick: Two Studies on Cardinal Cibo, and Leo X returned to Rome
Raphael (Frankfurt, 2011), 9–32; Meyer zur specifically to attend it; a letter of Benedetto
Capellen, Raphael: A Critical Catalogue, cat. 74, Buondelmonti reported that Raphael’s
120–6, cat. 76, 130–4; and Henry and Joannides, sets were highly praised. See the letters in
Late Raphael, 284–8, 292–6. Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 439–43 (documents
80.
Bembo declared, “Io gli ho una grande 1519/17, 1519/19, 1519/20, and 1519/21). For
invidia, chè penso di farmi ritrarre ancho io the proposed connection of the drawing
un giornò.” Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 240. in Figure 10 to the event, Frommel et al.,
81.
On Raphael and Bembo, Vittoria Romani, Raffaello architetto, cat. 2.11.1, 225–8 (entry by
“Raffaello e Pietro Bembo negli anni C. L. Frommel).
di Giulio II,” in Pietro Bembo e le arti, ed. 85. Notably, the certa Idea letter, the letter to Leo
Guido Beltramini, Howard Burns, and X, and the letter on Villa Madama, discussed
Davide Gasparotto (Venice, 2013), 339–56. below. On the reciprocal self-fashioning of this
Cf. Rowland, who doubts the friendship of pair, John Shearman, “Castiglione’s Portrait
Raphael and Bembo: Rowland, “Raphael and of Raphael,” Mitteilungen der Kunsthistorischen
the Roman Academy,” 141. Institut in Florenz 38 (1994): 69–97; and Ita
Meyer zur Capellen, Raphael: A Critical
82. MacCarthy, “Grace and the ‘Reach of Art’ in
Catalogue, cat. 69, 90–3; Joost-Gaugier, Castiglione and Raphael,” Word and Image 25
Raphael’s Stanza della Segnatura, 158–61; (2009): 33–45.
Giovanni Batistini, “Raphael’s Portrait of 86. The letter to Leo X, known in three manu-
Fedra Inghirami,” Burlington Magazine 138 script copies, raises complex issues of attribu-
(1996): 541–5, a source I owe to Sheryl Reiss. tion, but is generally accepted as a work of
For Raphael’s collaboration with Inghirami, Raphael and Castiglione, possibly with input
see also the discussion in Chapter 6, pp. 143–4, from Pietro Bembo, Colocci, or Fabio Calvo,
with notes and bibliography. who may have taken over the project after
83.
On the lost portrait, Meyer zur Capellen, Raphael’s death. See especially Francesco P.
Raphael: A Critical Catalogue, 19ff, cat. 75, Di Teodoro, Raffaello, Baldassar Castiglione e
127–9. For Pietro Bembo’s description of La Lettera a Leone X (Bologna, 2003); Christof
Raphael’s lost portrait and Tebaldeo’s sonnet Thoenes, “La ‘Lettera’ a Leone X,” in Raffaello
written in response to it: Shearman, Sources, a Roma, 373–81; and for the three manuscript
vol. 1, 240–1 and 277–8; and Basile and copies of the letter, commentary, attribution,
Marchand, Tebaldeo Rime, vol. 1, 150 n. 14 and and chronology, see Shearman, Sources, vol. 1,
vol. 3, 1, 438–9. About Vasari’s assertion that 500–45 with extensive earlier bibliography,
Tebaldeo is depicted in the Parnassus fresco including Rowland’s proposal for the involve-
and various interpretations about which fig- ment of Colocci. Bembo’s role is discussed by
ure represents him: Dominique Cordellier and Shearman, and further by Beltramini, “Pietro
Bernadette Py, Raphael: son atelier, ses copistes, Bembo e l’architettura,” 17. As to the letter’s
vol. 5, Inventaire général des dessins italiens (Paris, dating, I find persuasive Shearman’s conclu-
1992), 127–8; Deoclecio Redig de Campos, The sion that the three manuscripts were written
Stanze of Raphael (Rome, 1968), 31–2; Redig over a period of time, c. 1515–19.
de Campos, “Dei ritratti di Antonio Tebaldeo 87. Castiglione had a copy of Raphael’s villa letter
e di alcuni altri nel ‘Parnaso’ di Raffaello,” in his possession in Mantua, as he mentions in
Archivio della Società romana di storia patria 75 a letter of 1522; Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 724,
(1952): 51ff; and Jonathan Unglaub, “Bernardo doc. 1522/6. For the raw literary nature of the
Accolti, Raphael’s Parnassus and a New Portrait surviving drafts, see Chapter 4, p. 89 and notes
by Andrea del Sarto,” Burlington Magazine 12–14.
149 (2007): 14–22. Jürg Meyer zur Capellen 88. On antiquarian culture in this period, see
advises caution about the Vasarian account, especially Philip J. Jacks, The Antiquarian and
since Tebaldeo was not active in the Curia the Myth of Antiquity: The Origins of Rome in
Renaissance Thought (Cambridge, 1993); Silvia monumenta notam aliquam egregiam prae se
Danesi Squarzina, ed., Roma, centro ideale della ferunt, quaeque servari operae praetium esset
cultura dell’Antico nei secoli XV e XVI (Milan, ad cultum litterarum Romanique sermonis
1989); and Roberto Weiss, The Renaissance elegantiam excolendam, a fabris marmorariis
Discovery of Classical Antiquity (Oxford, 1988). eo pro materia utentibus temere secari, ita ut
89. As noted by Arnold Nesselrath, “Raphael’s inscriptiones aboleantur, mando omnibus qui
Archaeological Method,” in Raffaello a Roma, caedendi marmoris artem Romae exercent
357–71. ut sine tuo iussu aut permissu lapidem ullum
90. For the letter’s function as dedicatory epistola inscriptum caedere secareve ne audeant,
first noted by Anton Springer, see ibid. 363. eadem illi mulcta adhibita, qui secus atque
91. For a clarification of Raphael’s role as Prefect iubeo fecerit. Dat. sexto Kalendis septembris,
of Marbles, see the discussion in Shearman, anno tertio, Roma.” Text and translation in
Sources, vol. 1, 209ff; F. Castagnoli, “Raffaello Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 207–11, with earlier
e le antichità di Roma,” in Raffaello: l’opera, le bibliography. See also Chapter 5, pp. 140–1.
fonti, la fortuna, ed. Mario Salmi (Novara, 1968); 93. For a later documented tale of papal “spin
Simonetta Valtieri and Enzo Bentivoglio, doctoring” in which appropriated spoils
“Sanzio sovrintendente. Una lettera inedita putatively designated for St. Peter’s were in
di Raffaello,” L’architettura: cronache e storia 17 fact used elsewhere, we may consider Louise
(1971): 476–84; Ray, Raffaello architetto: lin- Rice’s discovery that the bronze appropri-
guaggio artistico e ideologia, 268 and passim; and ated from the Pantheon portico by Pope
Gabriele Morolli, “Le belle forme degli edifici Innocent VIII Barberini, which was justified
antichi”: Raffaello e il progetto del primo trattato for its reuse in Bernini’s Baldacchino for St.
rinascimentale sulle antichità di Roma (Florence, Peter’s, was in reality used entirely for mak-
1984), 35ff. ing cannons. Rice,“ Bernini and the Pantheon
92. “Raffaello Urbinati. Cum ad Principis Bronze,” in Sonderdruck aus Sankt Peter in Rom
Apostolorum phanum Romanum exaedi- 1506–2006, ed. Georg Satzinger and Sebastian
ficandum maxime intersit ut lapidum mar- Schütze (Munich, 2008), 337–52.
morisque materia, qua abundare nos oportet, 94. This paradox has been most fully analyzed
domi potius habeatur quam peregre adveha- by Thomas M. Greene, “The Double Task of
tur, exploratum autem mihi sit magnam eius the Humanist Imagination,” in Rome in the
rei copiam Urbis ruinas suppeditare, effodique Renaissance: The City and the Myth, ed. P. A.
passim omnis generis saxa fere ab omnibus, Ramsey (Binghamton, NY, 1982), 41–54; and
qui Romae quique etiam prope Romam David Karmon, The Ruin of the Eternal City:
aedificare aliquid, vel omnino terram ver- Antiquity and Preservation in Renaissance Rome
tere parumper moliuntur. Te, quo magistro (Oxford, 2011), 88–92.
eius aedificationis utor, cuiusque tum artis 95. Brothers, “Architecture, History, Archeology”;
peritiam tum probitatem et perspexi multis on Raphael “as a scholar and an archae-
in rebus, et probavi, marmorum et lapidum ologist in the modern sense of the word,”
omnium qui Romae, quique extra Romam Nesselrath, “Raphael’s Archaeological
denum milium passuum spatio, posthac Method.” See also Howard Burns and Arnold
eruentur, praefectum facio ea de causa ut
Nesselrath, “Raffaello e l’antico,” in Raffaello
quae ad eius phani aedifacationem idonea architetto, 379–450; and Hubertus Günther,
erunt, mihi emas. Quare mando o mnibus “Raffaels Romplan,” Sitzungsberichte der
hominibus, mediocribus, summis, infimis, Kunstgeschichtlichen Gesellschaft zu Berlin 31
quae posthac marmora quaeque saxa omnis (1982/3): 12–15.
generis intra eum, quem dixi, loci spatium 96. Raphael’s decoration of the Vatican Stanze
eruent, effodient, ut te earum rerum prae- and the construction of new St. Peter’s were
fectum de singulis erutis effossisve quam pri- seen by some contemporaries as reflecting the
mum certiorem faciant. Id qui triduo non reform of the Church. See O’Malley, Praise
fecerit, ei a centum usque ad mille num[m] and Blame in Renaissance Rome, 224–5, cit-
um aureorum, quae tibi videbitur mulcta ing Giles of Viterbo and Raffaele Brandolini.
esto. Praeterea, quoniam certior sum fac- For a discussion of how Raphael gives visual
tus multum antiqui marmoris et saxi litteris form to the humanist enterprise to synthe-
monumentisque incisi, quae quidem saepe size all wisdom – human and divine, ancient
N O TE S TO PAG E S 33 – 4 2 245
and modern – in the Stanza della Segnatura, 106. The design and construction timeline is dis-
Kempers, “Words, Images and All the Pope’s cussed below, with earlier bibliography, in
Men.” Chapter 4, section on “Poetry and Planning”.
97. Christoph Frommel, “La Villa Madama e 107. A series of payments to Bartolomeo
la tipologia della villa romana nel cinque- Gualfreducci da Pistoia, “soprastante della
cento,” Bollettino del Centro internazionale di vignia sotto la + a monti mari,” in 1528–9
studi di architettura Andrea Palladio 11 (1969): are in ASF, Corporazioni religiose soppresse
47–64; Inge Jackson Reist, “Raphael and the dal governo francese, 102, no. 329, fol. 6,
Humanist Villa,” Source: Notes in the History of mentioned in Shearman, “A Functional
Art 3 (1984): 13–28. Interpretation of Villa Madama,” 316 n. 8. It
98. Sources about the villa’s architectural plans has passed unnoticed that Felicie Lombardo is
appear in the Introduction, notes 28–32. listed as the “nuovo soprastante” in July 1529;
99. As proposed by Shearman, “A Functional ASF, Corporazioni religiose soppresse dal
Interpretation of Villa Madama,” 315 n. 2. governo francese, 102, no. 329, fol. 22. Clement
100. First proposed by Lefevre, with additional evi- was in somewhat dire straits in 1528 (as Sheryl
dence discussed by Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio de’ Reiss reminds me), making it unlikely that he
Medici as a Patron of Art” 364–5ff. was ordering new work at that date.
101. On the siting of the villa, Yvonne Elet, 108. For further detail, Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,”
“Raphael and the Roads to Rome. Designing 42–4.
for Diplomatic Encounters at Villa Madama,” 109. For the post-Medici history, see ibid. 44–6
I Tatti Studies in the Italian Renaissance 19.1 with earlier bibliography. I am presently pre-
(2016): 143–75, and Chapter 5 herein. For lit- paring an article on patronage at the villa by its
erary tropes about siting according to healthy owners in the 1920s and 1930s, Carlo, Count
winds in relation to Cortesi’s extended discus- Dentice di Frasso, and his wife, Dorothy
sion of the subject, Kathleen Weil-Garris and Cadwell Taylor, and will treat the restoration
John d’Amico, eds., The Renaissance Cardinal’s history of the villa in the monograph.
Ideal Palace: A Chapter from Cortesi’s De 110. Sheryl E. Reiss, “‘Villa Falcona’: The Name
Cardinalatu (Rome, 1980), 73–5 and 101 n. 20. Intended for the Villa Madama in Rome,”
For further discussion of Sperulo and Raphael Burlington Magazine 137 (1995): 740–2.
on this point, see p. 87. 111. On the Raphael school and stucco, see Elet,
102. Deborah Howard, “Seasonal Apartments in “Papal villeggiatura,” chs. 4 and 5. I am prepar-
Renaissance Italy,” Artibus et historiae 22 (2001): ing a book on stucco in the art and architec-
127–35. ture of early modern Italy.
103. The topographical symbolism of the villa’s sit- 112. Claudia Lazzaro, The Italian Renaissance Garden:
ing, roads, and sight lines will be considered in From the Conventions of Planting, Design, and
Chapter 5. Ornament to the Grand Gardens of Sixteenth-
104. On the inclusion of chapels in earlier Medici Century Central Italy (New Haven, 1990).
villas, as well as religious and sacred elements 113. For which, Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” ch. 3.
of villa life, Amanda Lillie, “Cappelle e chiese 114. See Nicole Hegener, DIVI IACOBI EQVES:
delle ville Medicee ai tempi di Michelozzo,” Selbstdarstellung im Werk des florentiner Bildhauers
in Michelozzo: scultore e architetto (1396–1472), Baccio Bandinelli (Munich and Berlin, 2008),
ed. Gabriele Morolli (Florence, 1998), 89– 128–33.
97; Lillie, “The Patronage of Villa Chapels 115. Cardinal Giulio wrote to Mario Maffei, 4 June
and Oratories near Florence: A Typology 1520: “Ché anche noi non siamo contenti di
of Private Religion,” in With or Without the quei duo pazzi, Vostra Paternità veda di accor
Medici: Studies in Tuscan Art and Patronage darli se si può che Giovanni da Uddine faccia
1434–1530, ed. Eckhart Marchand and Alison i stucchi e Julio dipinga le storie, o al manco
Wright (Aldershot, 1998), 23–4; and Lillie, faccia i dissegni et Uddine dipinga; però Vostra
“Fiesole: Locus Amoenus or Penitential Paternità veda di assetarla a suo modo pur che
Landscape?” For sacred villeggiatura, see also l’opra si faccia e perfettamente, e ci levi questa
Chapter 5, note 25. molestia.” And again on 17 June: “Ci piace che
105. For Medici imagery of bitter oranges, see quelli duo cervelli fantastichi dipintori siano
Appendix i, line 214 and gloss note 81. d’accordio e che lavorino.” Shearman, Sources,
vol. 1, 600, 603. The cardinal is recognizing Picture: Zeuxis, Myth, and Mimesis (Minneapolis,
Giulio Romano as the one to generate the 2007).
drawings, which is interesting in light of the 126. Eugenio Battisti, “Il concetto di imitazione
struggles over invenzione discussed in Chapter 6 nel cinquecento italiano,” in Rinascimento e
pp. 156–7. barocco (Turin, 1960), 175–215, at 182 and pas-
116. Amanda Lillie, “Villa Medici a Fiesole,” in sim. The Idea quaedam is discussed in Pico’s
Andrea Palladio e la villa veneta, 219–20, with famous dialogue with Bembo about imitation;
earlier bibliography. for which, see also Paola Barocchi, ed., Scritti
117. Philip E. Foster, A Study of Lorenzo de’ Medici’s d’arte del cinquecento, vol. 2 (Milan, 1973); and
Villa at Poggio a Caiano (New York, 1978); and Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 737. For the Pico–
F. W. Kent, Lorenzo de’ Medici and the Art of Bembo exchange, see most recently James
Magnificence (Baltimore, 2004), especially ch. Ackerman, “Imitation,” in Antiquity and its
V, “Lorenzo, ‘Fine Husbandman’ and Villa Interpreters, 11, 15 n. 20 with bibliography; and
Builder, 1483–1492.” Leonard Barkan, “The Heritage of Zeuxis.
118. As emphasized by Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio de’ Painting, Rhetoric, and History,” in Antiquity
Medici as a Patron of Art,” ix. and its Interpreters, 102. On the importance of
119. Ackerman, The Villa, ch. 3, “The Early Villas of the dialogue for Raphael, see Paul Davies and
the Medici”; and Du Prey, The Villas of Pliny David Hemsoll, “Sanmicheli’s Architecture
from Antiquity to Posterity. and Literary Theory,” in Architecture and
120. Lillie, “The Humanist Villa Revisited.” Language, 104ff.
121. Discussed further below in the context of 127. I leave aside now consideration of the related
literary exchange between Florence and Naples issue of how Raphael’s synthesis of many
on the subject of villeggiatura; see Chapter 2, media in the decorative complex at Villa
pp. 52–3 and notes 36–7. Madama engages issues of language and the
122. See now Modesti, Le delizie ritrovate, which composite, for which Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,”
treats Poggioreale, its appearance at various 311–23.
stages, its architectural debts to Laurentian 128. The architecture–body metaphor, significantly,
Florence and Giuliano da Maiano, the visits was also specifically related to the notion of
of Fra Giocondo and Peruzzi, and the villa as assemblage in writings from Leonardo to
a model for Villa Madama. She also analyzes Serlio. See Payne, The Architectural Treatise, 64–9,
a little-known encomiastic villa dialogue by for the assemblage metaphor that connected
Agostino Landulfo on the model of Bembo’s buildings, poems, and bodies. The notion of
Asolani describing Poggioreale in 1535–6, composition in Leonardo’s writings is interest-
ostensibly recording a dialogue held for the ing for this point. Kemp has called attention
visit of Charles V and Margarita of Austria, then to Leonardo’s use of the two-stage method
engaged to Alessandro de’ Medici, to whom the of resolutio and compositio in some of his late
work is dedicated; ibid. 3–4, 197–202 and passim. anatomical drawings of c. 1515, pointing out
This discourse honoring the bride to be – who how Leonardo applied traditional scientific
would later inherit Villa Madama – raises the methods to the painter’s comprehension and
possibility that some features of Poggioreale imaginative recreation of nature; Leonardo
may have been an inspiration not only for the drew on the writings of Peckham, Paul of
architectural design by Raphael and associates, Venice, Hugo of Siena, and Galen. For which,
but also for later upgrades and alterations by see Martin Kemp, “Dissection and Divinity
Madama Margarita. in Leonardo’s Late Anatomies,” Journal of the
123. Mary Carruthers, The Craft of Thought: Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 35 (1972):
Meditation, Rhetoric, and the Making of Images, 221–2; Kemp, “Leonardo’s Early Skull Studies,”
400–1200 (Cambridge, 1998), 10–12 and passim. Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes
124. Shearman proposed the letter was written by 34 (1971): 133 and passim; and Claire Farago,
Castiglione: Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 734–41, “The Classification of the Visual Arts in the
with extensive earlier bibliography, especially Renaissance,” in The Shapes of Knowledge from
Shearman, “Castiglione’s Portrait of Raphael,” the Renaissance to the Enlightenment, ed. Donald
69–97. R. Kelley and Richard H. Popkin (Dordrecht,
125. For which, Baxandall, Giotto and the Orators, 1991), 31. Further, Leonardo’s interest in sit-
35–8; Elizabeth C. Mansfield, Too Beautiful to ing the faculties of imagination, fantasy, and
N O TE S TO PAG E S 47 –5 0 247
intellect in the human body, as well as deter- at Stanford, discusses the writings of both
mining their relation to artistic invention, Bembos on their villa and villeggiatura, with
exemplifies his tendency to relate epistemo- earlier bibliography. On Pietro Bembo and
logical processes from different areas of the villeggiatura at the Villa Bembo at Santa Maria
arts, sciences, and natural philosophy: Kemp, Non and other villas acquired later, Pastore,
“Leonardo’s Early Skull Studies,” 119, 132. “Expanding Antiquity,” 285–336.
6. As pointed out by Sambin de Norcen, who
2 W RI TI NG A R C H IT E C T U R E discusses the rediscovery in 1419 of the
most complete manuscript of Pliny’s let-
1. Ackerman, The Villa, 35–42. ters by Guarino da Verona, part of the Este
2. On literary forms associated with villas, circle, and discusses Plinian villa epistles
Bernhard Rupprecht, Villa: Zur Geschichte written by Guarino, Angelo Decembrio,
eines Ideals (Berlin, 1966); Sonia Maffei, ed., Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti, and Pietro
Paolo Giovio scritti d’arte: lessico ed ecfrasi (Pisa, Donato Avogaro: Sambin de Norcen, “‘Ut
1999); A. R. Littlewood, “Ancient Literary apud Plinium’,” 72 and 84–8; and Sambin
Evidence for the Pleasure Gardens of Roman de Norcen, “I miti di Belriguardo,” in Nuovi
Country Villas,” in Ancient Roman Villa antichi: committenti, cantieri, architetti 1400–1600,
Gardens:The Tenth Dumbarton Oaks Colloquium ed. Richard Schofield (Milan, 2004), 17–65,
on the History of Landscape Architecture, 1987, at 21–7 and 43ff. See also the discussions in
ed. Elisabeth Blair Macdougall (Washington, Sambin de Norcen, Il cortigiano architetto; and
DC, 1987); Perrine Galand-Hallyn and Carlos Sambin de Norcen, Ville di Leonello d’Este.
Lévy, eds., La villa et l’univers familial dans For Sabadino’s villa descriptions, Werner L.
l’Antiquité et à la Renaissance (Paris, 2008); Gundersheimer, Art and Life at the Court of
Guy P. R. Métraux, “Some Other Literary Ercole I d’Este: the De triumphis religionis of
Villas of Roman Antiquity besides Pliny’s,” Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti (Geneva, 1972).
in Tributes to Pierre du Prey: Architecture and the 7. See note 2 above.
Classical Tradition, from Pliny to Posterity, ed. 8. O. B. Hardison, The Enduring Monument: A
Matthew M. Reeve (New York and Turnhout, Study of the Idea of Praise in Renaissance Literary
2014), 27–40; Aksamija, “Architecture and Theory and Practice (Chapel Hill, 1962), ch. ii:
Poetry”; and Christopher Pastore, “Expanding “Rhetoric, Poetics, and the Theory of Praise”
Antiquity: Andrea Navagero and Villa Culture and passim.
in the Cinquecento Veneto” (Ph.D. diss., 9. D’Amico, Renaissance Humanism; Domenico
University of Pennsylvania, 2003). Ancient Gnoli, La Roma di Leon X (Milan, 1938), 136ff;
writers who described villas in verse included Bonner Mitchell, Rome in the High Renaissance:
Horace, Statius, Martial, Ausonius, Fortunatus, The Age of Leo X (Norman, OK, 1973), chap-
Catullus, and Sidonius; and in prose, Horace, ter on “The Life of Letters,” 79ff; and Craig
Seneca, Cicero, Pliny the Elder, Pliny the Kallendorf, In Praise of Aeneas: Virgil and
Younger, Plutarch, Sidonius, and Gregory of Epideictic Rhetoric in the Early Italian Renaissance
Nyssa. (Hanover, 1989).
3. Du Prey, The Villas of Pliny from Antiquity to 10. Glodzik, “Vergilianism in Early Cinquecento
Posterity; Maffei, Paolo Giovio, 24–47. Rome”; Mario Di Cesare, Vida’s Christiad
4. For Giovio’s letter, S. Della Torre, “L’inedita and Vergilian Epic (New York, 1964); and Luba
opera prima di Paolo Giovio ed il museo: Freedman, The Classical Pastoral in the Visual
l’interesse di un umanista per il tema della Arts (New York, 1989).
villa,” in Atti del convegno Paolo Giovio: il 11. John W. Geyssen, Imperial Panegyric in Statius: A
Rinascimento e la memoria (Como, 1985); Maffei, Literary Commentary on Silvae 1.1 (New York,
Paolo Giovio, 2–16 and passim; Zimmermann, 1996), 9 and passim.
Paolo Giovio, 4–5. 12. Statius, Silvae, i, 3 and ii, 2 on the Tiburtine
5. William H. Sherman, “‘Nota Bembe’: How villa of Manilius Vopiscus and the Villa of
Bembo the Elder read his Pliny the Younger,” Pollius Felix near Sorrento, respectively.
in Pietro Bembo e le arti, 119–33. Sherman, who Additionally, Silvae, iii, 1 describes a temple to
identified the Elder Bembo’s copy of Pliny Hercules in the Sorrentine villa.
13. Newlands discusses the innovations of Statius 18. For Calderini and Perotti, see Lucia Cesarini
in poetry, as well as Pliny the Younger in Martinelli, “Poliziano e Stazio: un com-
prose, in Newlands, “The Transformation mento umanistico,” in Il Poliziano Latino, ed.
of the ‘Locus Amoenus’,” 123–4, 137; and Paolo Viti (Galatina, 1996), 65; John Dunston,
Newlands, Statius’ Silvae and the Poetics of “Studies in Domizio Calderini,” Italia medio-
Empire (Cambridge, 2002). On Statius’ villa evale e umanistica 11 (1968): 71–150; and Carlo
poems, see also Hubert Cancik, Untersuchungen Dionisotti, “Calderini, Poliziano e altri,” Italia
zur lyrischen Kunst des P. Papinius Statius medioevale e umanistica 11 (1968): 151–86. For
(Hildesheim, 1965); and Noelle K. Zeiner, Parrhasius, see Reeve, “Statius’ Silvae in the
Nothing Ordinary Here: Statius as Creator of Fifteenth Century,” 19. Susanna de Beer notes
Distinction in the Sylvae (New York, 2005), with the importance of Statius for Giannantonio
earlier bibliography. On Statius’ novel fusion of Campano’s panegyric of Pietro Riario; since
genres, Stephen Thomas Newmyer, The Silvae some of Campano’s poetry for Riario ended
of Statius: Structure and Theme (Leiden, 1979), up in the collection of Colocci, it was well
40 and passim. On visual representations of vil- known to Roman humanists into the six-
las as a precursor to Statius’ verbal descriptions, teenth century. De Beer, Poetics of Patronage,
Bettina Bergmann, “Painted Perspectives of a 187–94, 204–5, 208–11.
Villa Visit: Landscape as Status and Metaphor,” 19. That the putative figure of Statius has features
in Roman Art in the Private Sphere, ed. E. K. similar to Raphael’s own was first proposed by
Gazda (Ann Arbor, 1991), 49–70, a source I Bellori, and is considered a self-portrait sig-
owe to Eve D’Ambra. nature by Joost-Gaugier, Raphael’s Stanza della
14. OCD, “silva,” 1408; OLD, “silua,” 1762. On the Segnatura, 163 and pl. 12. See also Unglaub,
etymology of the word in Latin and Greek “Bernardo Accolti, Raphael’s Parnassus, and a
and its use in poetry and rhetoric, Newmyer, New Portrait,” 15 n. 10, with earlier bibliogra-
The Silvae of Statius, 3–9. For further discus- phy. I find it difficult to accept this figure as a
sion of the silva, see below pp. 51–2, 59 and self-portrait.
notes 20, 26, 28 and 83; Chapter 4, pp. 91, 95, 20. Poliziano and Battista Spagnoli Mantuanus
98 and notes 23, 52, 65; Chapter 6, pp. 155 and are credited with the flowering of the silva
159; and Conclusion pp. 177–8 and note 21. form; Juan F. Alcina, “Notas sobre la silva
15. For quattrocento editions of the Silvae, see neolatina,” in La silva: i encuentro internacional
A. Wasserstein, “The Manuscript Tradition of sobre poesia del siglo de oro, Sevilla–Córdoba,
Statius’ Silvae,” Classical Quarterly n.s. 3 (1953): 1990, ed. Begona Lopez Bueno (Seville
69–78; and M. D. Reeve, “Statius’ Silvae in and Cordoba, 1991), 131–2, 139. See also
the Fifteenth Century,” Classical Quarterly n.s. Hilaire Kallendorf and Craig Kallendorf,
27 (1977): 202–25. For Statius’s influence in “Introduction. ‘Conversations with the
sixteenth-century France, Perrine Galand- Dead’: Quevedo’s Annotation and Imitation
Hallyn, “Quelques coincidences (paradox- of Statius,” in Francisco de Quevedo, Silvas,
ales?) entre L’Épitre aux Pisons d’Horace et trans. Hilaire Kallendorf (Lima, 2011),
la poétique de la Silve (au début du xvie 23–85, especially 62–70; they note that the
siècle en France),” Bibliothèque d’Humanisme et silva became the premier genre of Spanish
Renaissance 60 (1998): 609–39. Baroque poetry (61) and discuss Quevedo’s
16. On Poliziano’s courses at the Studio silva (n. 30), a villa description of a casa de
Fiorentino, Isidoro Del Lungo, ed., Angelo campo built for Ferdinand and Isabella (70–80
Poliziano: le selve e la strega: prolusioni nello studio and 269–76). For the silva in England, David
fiorentino (1482–1492) (Florence, 1925), 231–41. Hill Radcliffe, “Sylvan States: Social and
For his commentary on Statius, Lucia Cesarini Literary Formations in Sylvae by Jonson and
Martinelli, ed., Commento inedito alle Selve di Cowley,” Journal of English Literary History 55
Stazio di Poliziano (Florence, 1978); Cesarini (1988): 797–809.
Martinelli, “Un ritrovamento Polizianesco: il 21. Lillie provides a nuanced discussion of the
fascicolo perduto del commento alle Selve di notion of the humanist villa, individuat-
Stazio,” Rinascimento 22 (1982): 183–212. ing different ways a villa might be consid-
17. As noted by Dempsey, The Portrayal of Love, ered humanist: Lillie, “The Humanist Villa
44ff, 47 n. 66, and passim. Revisited.”
N O TE S TO PAG E S 51 –5 2 249
22. For listings of early modern villa poetry: Oricellari circle (1502-1522),” forthcoming in
Carlo Caruso, “Poesia umanistica di villa,” in Interpres. Rivista di studi quattrocenteschi; I am
“Feconde venner le carte”: studi in onore di Ottavio grateful to her for sharing and discussing an
Besomi, ed. Tatiana Crivelli (Bellinzona, 1997), excerpt from her book in progress on the Orti
vol. 2, 272–94; Donatella Manzoli, “Ville e Oricellari. For Crinito’s text, Galand-Hallyn,
palazzi di Roma nelle descrizioni Latine tra “Aspects du discours,” 133–5 with French trans-
Rinascimento e Barocco,” Studi romani 16 lation. For the Orti Oricellari, Felix Gilbert,
(2008): 109–66; and Maffei, Paolo Giovio, part I. “Bernardo Rucellai and the Orti Oricellari:
23. Notably, the 1485 neo-Latin letter by Michele A Study on the Origin of Modern Political
Verino praising Poggio a Caiano before it is Thought,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld
built, when only the foundations are visible; in Institutes 12 (1949): 101–31.
Armando F.Verde, Lo studio fiorentino 1473–1503: 29. Amanda Lillie, “Francesco Sassetti and his
ricerche e documenti, vol. 3, 2 (Pistoia, 1977), 696–7. Villa at La Pietra,” in Oxford, China and Italy:
24. For which, Rab Hatfield, “Some Unknown Writings in Honour of Sir Harold Acton on his
Descriptions of the Medici Palace in 1459,” Eightieth Birthday, ed. Edward Chaney and
Art Bulletin 52 (1970): 232–49; and Christine Neil Ritchie (London, 1984), 84–5.
Smith, Architecture in the Culture of Early 30. For poetry by Pontano and also Francesco
Humanism: Ethics, Aesthetics, and Eloquence Patrizi, Bishop of Gaeta, about Poggioreale,
1400–1470 (New York, 1992), 195. see George Hersey, “Water-Works and
25. Alessandro Braccesi, “Ad eundem descriptio Water-Play in Renaissance Naples,” in Fons
horti Laurentii Medicis,” in Alexandri Braccii Sapientiae: Renaissance Garden Fountains, ed.
Carmina, ed.Alexander Perosa (Florence, 1943), Elisabeth Blair MacDougall (Washington,
75–7; E. H. Gombrich, “Alberto Avogadro’s DC, 1978), 61–83; Maffei, Paolo Giovio, 18 and
Descriptions of the Badia of Fiesole and of the 81–2; Pontano, Baiae, trans. Rodney Dennis
Villa of Careggi,” Italia medioevale e umanistica 5 (Cambridge MA, 2006); and on his descrip-
(1962): 217–29. tions of his own villas, Carol Kidwell, Pontano:
26. Poliziano’s silva “Rusticus” published in 1483 Poet & Prime Minister (London, 1991), 104ff
describes the Medici villa at Fiesole, especially and 114. For Pontano’s declaration in the De
in lines 11–16, 557–69. See Maffei, Paolo Giovio, magnificentia that the patron should be the auc-
15 n. 38; Del Lungo, ed. Angelo Poliziano: le selve tor of buildings he commissions, and the sug-
e la strega, 33–64. Poliziano’s silva “Nutricia” gestion that Pontano may himself have been
also treats the Fiesole villa; for which, Perrine involved in architectural projects, see the
Galand-Hallyn, “Aspects du discours human- Introduction, p. 5 and note 18. For Pontano’s
iste sur la villa au xvie siècle,” in La villa et villas in the Neapolitan Vomero district and
l’univers familial de l’Antiquité à la Renaissance, ed. on Ischia, De Divitiis, “Giovanni Pontano and
Perrine Galand-Hallyn and Carlos Lévy (Paris, His Idea of Patronage,” 111 n. 10 with further
2008), 119. Poliziano’s poems were published bibliography.
by Isidoro Del Lungo, ed., Prose volgari inedite 31. Published in Jacopo Sannazaro, Poemata ex
e poesie Latine e Greche edite e inedite di Angelo antiquis editionibus accuratissime descripta (Patavii,
Ambrogini Poliziano (Florence, 1867). See most 1731); and discussed in Jacopo Sannazaro,
recently Angelo Poliziano, Silvae, ed. and trans. Arcadia and Piscatorial Eclogues, ed. and trans.
Charles Fantazzi (Cambridge, MA, 2004). Ralph Nash (Detroit, 1966), 9. In addition,
27. Foster, A Study of Lorenzo de’ Medici’s Villa, Sannazaro may have been resident at villa
63–6, 71–2, 109–10, 221–2 for discussion of Poggioreale when he was finishing his Arcadia;
the poems by Angelo Poliziano, Ugolino Modesti, Le delizie ritrovate, 42.
Verino, and Naldo Naldi; and Julian M. 32. Anne Bouscharain, “L’éloge de la villa human-
Kliemann, “Politische und humanistiche Ideen iste dans une silve de Battista Spagnoli, le
der Medici in der Villa Poggio a Caiano” (Ph.D. Mantouan: la Villa Refrigerii (c. 1478),” in La
diss., Heidelberg University, 1976), 148–56. For villa et l’univers familial dans l’Antiquité et à la
Lorenzo’s toponymic poem Ambra: Lorenzo Renaissance, 93–116.
de’ Medici, Ambra (Descriptio Hiemis), ed. 33. Gallo’s and Blosio’s poems were published in
Rossella Bessi (Florence, 1986). 1511 and 1512, respectively. Ingrid D. Rowland,
28. As Nicoletta Marcelli has proposed in “Cultural “Some panegyrics to Agostino Chigi,” Journal
Gatherings in an ‘Open’ Space: the Orti of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 47 (1984):
194–9; Rowland, “Render unto Caesar the Mellini e i Casali Strozzi,” in Delizie in villa,
Things Which Are Caesar’s: Humanism and 229–68.
the Arts in the Patronage of Agostino Chigi,” 36. For Colocci’s admiration for Pontano and the
Renaissance Quarterly 39 (1986): 673–730, at close connection between the Roman and
688–9 and passim; Mary Quinlan-McGrath, Pontanian academies, S. Lattès, “Recherches
“The Villa of Agostino Chigi: The Poems and sur la bibliothèque d’Angelo Colocci,”
Paintings” (Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, Mélanges d’archéologie et d’histoire 48 (1931): 332.
1983); Quinlan-McGrath, “Aegidius Gallus, On Poliziano expressing his admiration to
De Viridario Augustini Chigii Vera Libellus. Pontano for his work, Kidwell, Pontano, 305–9.
Introduction, Latin Text and English 37. For diplomatic and architectural exchanges
Translation,” Humanistica Lovaniensia 38 (1989): between Lorenzo and Alfonso II of Aragon,
1–99; Quinlan-McGrath, “Blosius Palladius, Caroline Elam, “Art and diplomacy in
Suburbanum Augustini Chisii. Introduction, Renaissance Florence,” Journal of the Royal
Latin Text and English Translation,” Society of Arts 136 (1988): 813–26; Francesco
Humanistica Lovaniensia 39 (1990): 93–156; Quinterio, “Il rapporto con le corti italiane
and Michael Dewar, “Encomium of Agostino e europee,” in L’architettura di Lorenzo il
Chigi and Pope Julius II in the Suburbanum Magnifico, ed. Gabriele Morolli, Cristina
Augustini Chisii of Blosio Palladio,” Res publica Acidini Luchinat, and Luciano Marchetti
litterarum 14 (1991): 61–8. (Milan, 1992); Humfrey Butters, “Lorenzo and
34. Girolamo Borgia, Ecloga Felix, BAV, Vat. Lat. Naples,” in Lorenzo il Magnifico e il suo mondo,
5225, fols. 1013v–1015v, discussed by Rowland, ed. Gian Carlo Garfagnini (Florence, 1994),
“Raphael, Angelo Colocci, and the Genesis 143–51; and Bianca de Divitiis, “Giuliano
of the Architectural Orders,” 84 n. 22; and da Sangallo in the Kingdom of Naples:
Rowland, Culture of the High Renaissance, 182–3. Architecture and Cultural Exchange,” Journal
35. “In Petri Melini Villam, Ubi Ille Poetas de of the Society of Architectural Historians 74 (2015):
More Familia Coena exceperat,” in Benedictus 152–78. See also the discussion of Florence–
Lampridius, Carmina (Venice, 1550), fols. 27r– Naples architectural exchange in the previous
37v. Discussed by Stella P. Revard, “Lampridio chapter, p. 45 and n. 122. On Pontano’s role
and the Poetic Sodalities in Rome in the as first secretary, Kidwell, Pontano, ch. 10 and
1510s and 1520s,” in Acta Conventus Neo- passim. For the proposed connection between
Latini Bariensis: Proceedings of the Ninth Pontano’s “De hortis Hesperidum” and the
International Congress of Neo-Latin Studies, ed. Medici, see Chapter 4, note 54.
Rhoda Schnur (Tempe, AZ, 1998), 499–507. 38. An observation I owe to Nicoletta Marcelli.
Lampridio, professor in Leo’s Collegio dei 39. Ingrid D. Rowland, “Il giardino trans Tiberim
Greci, adapted Pindar’s proper triadic form di Agostino Chigi,” in C. Benocci, ed., I
in an attempt to create newly expressive neo- giardini Chigi tra Siena e Roma: dal cinquecento
Latin verse; Carol Maddison, Apollo and the agli inizi dell’ottocento (Siena, 2005), 57–72, at
Nine: A History of the Ode (Baltimore, MD, 62–3.
1960), 105–9. Lampridio’s ode laments the 40. For a discussion of how Italian and Islamic
loss of Mellini’s brother Celso, who died 20 garden aesthetics emerged in part from par-
November 1519, making his death a terminus allel poetic traditions, Cammy Brothers, “The
post quem for the poem, and thus it was written Renaissance reception of the Alhambra: The
at least six months after Sperulo’s villa poem. Letters of Andrea Navagero and the Palace of
Lampridio also wrote a melancholy post-Sack Charles V,” Muqarnas 11 (1994): 79–102, at 92
ode on the olive villa of Cardinal Lorenzo and passim.
Pucci: “Ad Olivetum Villam Laurentii Paccii 41. Intertextual and also metatextual aspects of
Card. Sanctorum Quatuor,” Carmina, 12v– villa literature are treated by Galand-Hallyn,
14r. For Tebaldeo on the Villa Mellini, BAV, “Aspects du discours”; and Galand-Hallyn,
Vat. Lat. 2835, fol. 186r (191r mechanical) and Le reflet des fleurs: description et métalangage poé-
220v (225v mechanical), both of which refer- tique d’Homère à la Renaissance (Geneva, 1994).
ence the ode of Lampridius. For Villa Mellini, Colocci’s manuscript collections interspersing
Sandro Santolini, “Due esempi di residenze excerpts from ancient and modern poets pro-
suburbane sul Monte Mario a Roma: la Villa vides a striking illustration of this intertextual
N O TE S TO PAG E S 53– 5 4 251
discourse; as noted by Lattès, “Recherches 45. For Cleopatra/Ariadne, Francis Haskell and
sur la bibliothèque d’Angelo Colocci,” 333. Nicholas Penny, Taste and the Antique:The Lure
My discussion of villa literature culminates of Classical Sculpture, 1500–1900 (New Haven,
with Roman humanist culture at the time of 1982), 186–7.
Raphael, leaving aside the tradition thereafter. 46. Bonito, “The Saint Anne Altar” (1983).
42. On Virgilian models for the particular or uni- 47. One of the poems by Caius Silvanus makes
versal, Alastair Fowler, “Georgic and Pastoral: a similar point: “Tres supero homines tres
Laws of Genre in the Seventeenth Century,” ornaverae, Corytus Sculptorque, et vates,
in Culture and Cultivation in Early Modern aerae, manu, fidibus.” (Three men have fur-
England: Writing and the Land, ed. Michael nished three gods: Corytius, the sculptor, and
Leslie and Timothy Raylor (Leicester, 1992), the poet, with money, hand and lyre.); text and
81–8; Kari Boyd McBride notes the impor- translation in Bonito, “The Saint Anne Altar”
tance of this model for English country house (1983), 294, poem 83.
discourse, which surely owed something to 48. Despite the vast bibliography devoted to
the earlier Italian models discussed herein. ancient and modern ekphrasis in rhetoric, lit-
McBride, Country House Discourse in Early erature, and history, there has been relatively
Modern England: A Cultural Study of Landscape scant attention paid to description of archi-
and Legitimacy (Farnham, 2001), 7. tecture. Christine Smith traces architectural
43. The attribution to the Roman Francesco ekphrasis in the Greek and Byzantine liter-
Colonna, Lord of Palestrina, was first pro- ary traditions, especially Second Sophistic
posed by Maurizio Calvesi, Il Sogno di Polifilo orators, and its introduction to Italy by
(Rome, 1983). There has been a recent accu- Chrysoloras: Smith, Architecture in the Culture
mulation of evidence in support of Calvesi’s of Early Humanism, chs. 7 and 9; Smith,
attribution, although to my mind the ques- “Christian Rhetoric in Eusebius’ Panegyric
tion remains unresolved. For a discussion of at Tyre,” Vigiliae Christianae 43 (1989): 226–47.
the issue, favoring the traditional attribution See also Eleanor Winsor Leach, The Rhetoric
to the Venetian Dominican Friar Francesco of Space: Literary and Artistic Representations
Colonna, with earlier bibliography, see Brian of Landscape in Republican and Augustan
Curran, The Egyptian Renaissance: The Afterlife Rome (Princeton, 1988), especially 73–8;
of Ancient Egypt in Early Modern Italy (Chicago, and Ann Kuttner, “Prospects of Patronage:
2007), ch. 7. Other attributions that have Realism and Romanitas in the Architectural
been proposed are to Alberti, writing under Vistas of the 2nd Style,” in The Roman Villa:
the pseudonym, which, like Curran, I find Villa Urbana. First Williams Symposium on
unlikely. In a forthcoming work, Tracey Eve Classical Architecture Held at the University of
Winton proposes that the Hypnerotomachia Pennsylvania, ed. Alfred Frazer (Philadelphia,
was a collaboration by multiple authors in 1998), 93–107. Christine Smith and Joseph
the circle of Ficino, tracing a parallel between O’Connor are preparing an annotated corpus
Polifilo’s journey and Ficino’s notion of of Greek and Latin architectural descriptions
the ascent of the soul to knowledge; verbal written between 300 and 1500. On ekphrasis
communication, Alberto Pérez-Gómez, 25 in general, see the recent study with bibli-
November 2013; and on his site www.po ography by Ruth Webb, Ekphrasis, Imagination
lyphilo.com/introduction.swf. and Persuasion in Ancient Rhetorical Theory and
44. Rowland notes that the book “struck a deep Practice (Farnham, 2009).
chord” for Colocci, in Culture of the High 49. Mary Carruthers, “Collective Memory and
Renaissance, 59–67. For the issue of how Memoria rerum. An Architecture for Thinking,”
Roman the archeological references really in Carruthers, The Craft of Thought, 7–21, with
were, see her interesting discussion in ibid. earlier bibliography, especially by Carruthers
272–3 n. 37. Among the arguments that the and Frances Yates.
Hypnerotomachia alludes to actual Roman 50. Demonstrated by Mary Carruthers, “The
topography, see especially Fabio Benzi, Poet as Master Builder: Composition and
“Percorso reale in sogno di Polifilo, dal tempio Locational Memory in the Middle Ages,”
della Fortuna di Palestrina a Palazzo Colonna New Literary History 24 (1993): 881–904. See
in Roma,” Storia dell’arte 93–4 (1998): 198–206. also E. N. Tigerstedt, “The Poet as Creator:
Origins of a Metaphor,” Comparative Literature quamvis tua Chisi, obnoxia seclis: / Quae
Studies 5 (1968): 455–88; and Koliji, In-Between. sata per Blosium sylva, peremnis erit.”) The
51. Timothy M. O’Sullivan, Walking in Roman topos is also discussed by John O’Malley, “The
Culture (Cambridge, 2011), ch. 4, “Cicero’s Vatican Library and the School of Athens: A
Legs,” 77–96. For Mario Maffei’s undated Text of Battista Casali, 1508,”Journal of Medieval
letter that mentions walking with Cardinal and Renaissance Studies 7 (1977): 272.
Giulio at the villa (at a pace that left Maffei 57. Sperulo, dedicatory letter, §2. (For the notion
limping), Reiss, “Villa Falcona,” 742 and n. 12. of a glue of lime and sand as particularizing
52. Ruurd R. Nauta, “Statius in the Silvae,” in The the topos to the use of stucco at the Medici
Poetry of Statius, ed. Johannes J. L. Smolenaars villa, see Appendix i, gloss note 4.)
et al. (Leiden, 2008), 161–4. 58. Poliziano himself alluded to the prejudice
53. For Sperulo’s villa poem as autograph, see against Silver Age authors, defending their
Appendix ii. writing style as neither corrupt nor depraved
54. About issues of poetic furor and the poem but simply different: Sarah Stever Gravelle,
written quickly, see below p. 59, and notes 82 “Humanist Attitudes to Convention and
and 83; and Appendix i, gloss note 5. Innovation in the Fifteenth Century,” Journal
55. Horace, Odes iii, 30. Another among many of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 11 (1981):
ancient models for this trope was known in 201. This prejudice continued even in modern
the Elegiae in Maecenatem, then thought to scholarship; among recent work rehabilitating
be by Ovid: “Marbles will be held in scorn; Statius’ importance in articulating Domitianic
victorious over monuments – the books of ideology, Newlands, Statius’ Silvae. The Silvae
men; through genius one lives, all else will have been recognized as important sources for
be subject to death” (marmora temnentur, villa poetry, for which Caruso, “Poesia umani
vincent monimenta libelli:/vivitur ingenio, stica di villa,” 52 and passim; and especially the
cetera mortis erunt). In Mary Miller, “The villa poems of Blosio and Gallo. Blosio himself
Elegiae in Maecenatem with Introduction, Text, declared his debt to Statius in the preface to his
Translation and Commentary” (Ph.D. diss., poem on the Chigi villa: Quinlan-McGrath,
University of Pennsylvania, 1942), 75. Biondo “The Villa of Agostino Chigi,” 186ff and
Flavio evoked this trope in his dedication 402–3; Quinlan-McGrath, “Blosius Palladius,”
of Roma instaurata to Eugenius IV, conclud- 99ff; Michael Dewar, “Blosio Palladio and
ing by musing whether the restoration in the Silvae of Statius,” Studi umanistici piceni
mortar, brick, stone, and bronze, or that in 10 (1990): 59–64; and Rijser, Raphael’s Poetics,
letters, would last better and longer: Cesare 319–24. Charles Dempsey emphasizes the
D’Onofrio, Visitiamo Roma nel quattrocento: la importance of Statius’ Epithalamium in Stellam
città degli umanisti (Rome, 1989), 100. et Violentillam (Silvae, i, 2) for Poliziano, and
56. The Exegi monumentum topos was clearly thus for Botticelli’s Primavera, in Dempsey, The
articulated by Battista Casalius, Marc Antonio Portrayal of Love, 47 and passim. On Statius as
Casanova, and Aegidius Gallus with regard to a model for Campano, de Beer, The Poetics of
the Villa Chigi, as pointed out by Quinlan- Patronage, 210–11.
McGrath, “The Villa of Agostino Chigi,” 4. 59. See Appendix i, gloss for Sperulo’s borrowings
Rowland publishes and translates the relevant from Statius, e.g. notes 7–9 for his citations to
poem of Casanova in “Some Panegyrics to several of the Silvae in the first lines of the poem.
Agostino Chigi,” 198–9 and n. 33. An exam- 60. I am indebted to Nicoletta Marcelli for the
ple is provided by Cursius Carpinetanus in observation about earlier Florentine poetic
a poem about Palladio’s panegyric, published sources. For Medici imprese and topoi, see the
and translated by Quinlan-McGrath, “Blosius gloss.
Palladius,” 110–11: “Chigi and Blosius, you 61. Published in the Coryciana: Hieronymi Vidae,
each erected an outstanding villa, but / each is Carmen. “Genius Falconis Villae,” in Coryciana
not of an equal fate. However golden be yours, (Rome, 1524), and included in M. H. Vidae,
Chigi, / it is subject to the ages; but the wood Opera omnia (Patavii, 1731), vol. 2, 158–60.
planted by Blosius, will be eternal.” (“Chisius The text is in Ijsewijn, Coryciana/critice edidit,
et Blossi villam erexistis, uterque / Egregiam: 328–30. An English translation is given in
sed non utraque sorte pari est. / Aurea sit Bonito, “The Saint Anne Altar” (1983), 315–19.
Ijsewijn assumes the poem is about Sinibaldo’s 65. Pastor (IV, part 1, 447) noted of Tebaldeo
villa, as does Quinlan-McGrath, “Aegidius that “auch die Villa des Kardinals Medici
Gallus,” 5–6 n. 20. Most recently, Shearman, auf dem Monte Mario hat er verherrlicht”
Sources, vol. 1, 774–8, includes a transcription without providing a citation, presumably

and English translation of the poem, and he based on Equicola’s reference. Lefevre
also recognizes its subject as Villa Madama. recorded looking for the poem in vain (Villa
For an early identifier of Villa Madama as Villa Madama, 131 n. 70) as did Shearman (Sources,
Falcona, Reiss, “‘Villa Falcona’.” vol. 1, 662), who additionally noted that the
62. Di Cesare, Vida’s Christiad and Vergilian Epic. poem is unknown to Marchand, an editor of
The appellation of the Christian Virgil is due Tebaldeo’s complete works: Tania Basile and
to Ariosto, Orlando furioso, xlvi, 13. Jean-Jacques Marchand, eds., Antonio Tebaldeo:
63. “Huc hospes veniens diversis partibus orbis / Rime (Ferrara, 1989). I have looked in the
Tam subitum miratur opus, congestaque saxa, / Vatican Library without finding this poem. It
Rupibus excisas attolli ad sidera could have been among the notes and books
moles, / Artificumque manus doctas, vari- that Tebaldeo lost during the Sack of Rome;
umque laborem. / Et merito quis enim c ernens André Chastel, The Sack of Rome (Princeton,
positusque locorum, / Silvarumque comas 1983). Colocci saved and annotated many of
virides, largasque perennis / Fontis opes, cae- Tebaldeo’s works, but the villa poem has not
lumque habili regione benignum, / Non credat emerged among them. The late Stefano Ray
his saepe Deos, Regemque Deorum/ Sidereas noted in passing that the poet Tebaldeo cel-
mutare domos, caeli aurea templa? / Fortunata ebrated Villa Madama in 1521, without cita-
loci sedes, tua gloria semper / Vivet, et aeter- tion, suggesting that Ray may have known the
num laudabunt saecula nomen. / Egregii poem – unless he, too, was citing Pastor: Ray,
proceres, te te undique saepe frequentem, / Raffaello architetto: linguaggio artistico e ideologia,
Et tua purpurei dignantur limina Reges. / 177.
Fortunata bonis multis, sedesque beata. / Non 66. Cavicchi, “Una vendetta dell’Equicola”;
tamen hoc unque mihi eris felicior uno, / Stephen Kolsky, Mario Equicola: The Real
Quod tua castalidum pater, hortatorque Courtier (Geneva, 1991), 137ff and 238 n. 27;
sororum, / Corycius, nuper dignatus visere Richardson, Manuscript Culture in Renaissance
tecta est, / Nam quis te, atque tuae egregios Italy, 123–4.
virtutis honores / Fortunate senex speret se 67. Valeriano, “Dialogo della volgar lingua.” On
aequare canendo? / Vos circumfusi mecum, the Medici appreciation of Tebaldeo, see also
vos carmina montes / Iungite, vos nymphae the following note.
tiberinides addite mentem.” Transcription and 68. I have searched payment records for the villa
translation by Bonito, “The Saint Anne Altar” in the ASR and ASF without finding any evi-
(1983), 315–19. dence of a payment to Sperulo. Vida’s poem
64. “Apage, sultis, vos inauspicatissimos /Vorsus makes clear that Corycius was the patron,
cito auferte hinc poetae pessimi, /Factos sinistre and thus perhaps his poem was Goritz’s gift
in laudem villae nobilis / Quam Medices ad to Giulio de’ Medici. The spese minuti of the
Tiberim incipissit [sic] struere / Regia prope Camera Apostolica include a 200-ducat pay-
Iulius magnificentia. /Vos, immortales dii, et ment to the poet Tebaldeo dated 9 July 1518
vestram imploro fidem, / Adeone perditae est (ASR Camerale I, 1489, 58r), the purpose of
nebulo iste audaciae, / Ut tam nobile opus which is not stated, but this payment was surely
tam cacatis versibus / Vobis viventibus inqui- too early for a villa panegyric. Presumably it
nari audeat? / Iste iste Tubaldeus, quem solae was also too high a sum; however, Leo could
probant / Prefectae anserculis pascundis vir- pay extravagant sums for poetry, notably 4,000
gines / Ad graveolentis paludes Ferrariens / ducats to Angelo Colocci for one forty-line
Insulsas eius dum cantitant nenias.” Biblioteca poem, discussed by Gaisser, Pierio Valeriano on
Universitaria di Bologna, cod. 400, c. 27B–28B, the Ill Fortune of Learned Men, 55.
published by Filippo Cavicchi, “Una vendetta 69. The poet’s request also reflects the tensions
dell’Equicola,” Giornale storico della letteratura inherent in the literary patronage process dis-
italiana 37 (1901): 94–8; trans. Alan Fishbone. cussed above. For poets’ boasts about speed of
composition, see Chapter 2, p. 59 and notes 82 that Colocci will be incapellato soon.Valeriano,
and 83; and Appendix i, gloss note 5. “Dialogo della volgar lingua,” 46–7.
70. For a late cinquecento example of coordi- 77. “so che il Cardinal de’ Medici non è di quei
nated literary production describing a villa signori che vogliono a tavola e da per tutto far
outside Bologna, Aksamija, “Architecture and adorar la maestà, ma vuol trar frutto dalla con-
Poetry in the Making of a Christian Cicero.” versazione, specialmente degli omini di lettere,
71. De Beer, The Poetics of Patronage, 204. che si trattengono dai grandi e s’accarezzano
72. The poems’ function as dinner entertainment per aver commodità di poter in ogni luogo, in
is discussed by Rowland, “Some Panegyrics ogni tempo imparar qualche cosa.” Valeriano,
to Agostino Chigi,” 198. On Renaissance “Dialogo della volgar lingua,” 48.
humanist convivia, see above. 78. Richardson notes that although dedications
73. “Dum tu circumagis nos bone Chissie / Per incorporated into the manuscript of a poem
coenacula Villae et viridaria / Perlustras [sic] (as Sperulo’s was) could be truly private docu-
abit hora: et / Intestina quatit fames: / Nec tu ments, more often they tacitly address a larger
crede meum pascere nobili / Pictura stoma- audience: Richardson, Manuscript Culture in
chum: Quod reliqui est age / Miremur bene Renaissance Italy, 202–3.
poti. / Nil non me saturum iuuat: / Tunc sane 79. Such competition became increasingly vit-
et Blosius carmina queis tuae / Villae crescit riolic as the 1520s progressed. See Gouwens,
honos continat: at tuum / Nomen posteritati “Perceiving the Past,” 74; Gouwens,
/ Villa clarius indicet.” Citation and translation Remembering the Renaissance; Reynolds,
from Rowland, “Some Panegyrics to Agostino Renaissance Humanism at the Court of Clement
Chigi,” 198. See also Quinlan-McGrath, VII, characterizing a climate of “dissen-
“Blosius Palladius,” 108. sion, debate and rivalry” among poets in
74. Quinlan-McGrath, “The Villa of Agostino Clementine Rome, 9 and passim; Gaisser, “The
Chigi,” 3, states that they were commissioned Rise and Fall of Goritz’s Feasts”; and Gaisser,
by Chigi, without citation. “Seeking Patronage under the Medici Popes.”
75. For which, see above, p. 52 and note 35. See also Chapter 1, p. 21 and note 34.
76. In the dialogue, the character of Colocci 80. Discussed in Revard, “Lampridio and the
excuses himself for having missed a planned Poetic Sodalities,” 503, citing Lampridio’s
dinner with his interlocutor Antonio Pindaric ode about Villa Mellini.
Matteazzi, saying that just as Colocci had 81. As noted by Bonito, “The Saint Anne Altar”
left his villa to go to Matteazzi’s, he ran into (1983), 179 n. 266.
Cardinal Giulio going to his own vigna in the 82. Poetic boasts about speed of composition, or
company of some letterati, and the cardinal celeritas, were a badge of poetic furor and inge-
invited Colocci to join them. Colocci says, nium, often linked to an improvisatory con-
“Io veniva dalla mia vigna, per trovarmi a text. Statius, in the preface to Book I of his
cena con voi secondo la promessa, e fuori Silvae, claims that all its contents were writ-
della porta m’incontrai nel Cardinal de’ ten in the heat of the moment, and that he
Medici, che andava alla sua vigna con una spent no longer than one or two days on any
compagnia d’uomini letterati; e avendogli
of these poems; he cites among his witnesses
io fatto riverenza e lasciatol passare, mi mesi to this fact Manilius Vopiscus, who attests that
per venir di lungo, ma Sua Signoria mandò the poem about his villa was done in one
un palafreniero a invitarmi, ch’io andassi a day: Statius, Silvae, i, 3–15. Statius’ disclaimer
cena con quegli uomini da bene. Così colto is discussed by Newlands, Statius’ Silvae, 33–4.
all’improvisa non seppi e non ardi’ ricusar Blosio Palladio uses the same image that
il favore, massime che sapete come io ho his poem poured forth in heat (Quinlan-
bisogno che Sua Signoria raccommandi la McGrath, “Blosius Palladius,” 113, preface line
cosa mia a Leone; onde mi pareva aver avuto 6). Sperulo similarly claims to have written
buon incontro di poterli così parlar a modo his 407-line poem in under two days; in his
mio.” The pragmatic note that Colocci really dedicatory letter (§1, 3), he specifies that he
needed the face time with Cardinal Giulio, conceived the idea on his visit to the villa site
who could intercede with the Pope on his the day before yesterday, and that the poem is
behalf, prompts his friend to reply teasingly now finished. The speed of writing was also a
N O TE S TO PAG E S 5 9 –65 255
key advantage of poets who built with words, Burlington Magazine 115 (1973): 640–9, at 649.
in competition with architects. For the painted window embrasure in the
83. In Roman rhetoric, the silva came to desig- Sala di Costantino representing Etruria as
nate an unpolished rough draft, often hastily the home of the Medici, Rolf Quednau, Die
composed; Newmyer, The Silvae of Statius, 6. Sala di Costantino im Vatikanischen Palast: zur
Quintilian associated the silva with off-the- Dekoration der beiden Medici-Päpste Leo X und
cuff writing in a pejorative sense: Quintilian, Clemens VII (Hildesheim, 1979), 500–4 and fig.
Institutio oratoria, X, 3, 17. For Statius’ reference 30. I am grateful to Sheryl Reiss for pointing
to performance and improvisational context, out the connection to this image, reproduced
Newlands, Statius’ Silvae, 31. For Renaissance as Figure 28 herein.
poets and artists, the silva form evoked the 2. Shearman, while acknowledging the ambigu-
ideal of creating ever greater things with- ity of evidence for the villa’s patronage, favored
out effort, thereby displaying one’s facility at Leo: Shearman, “A Functional Interpretation
accomplishing difficult tasks, and preserving of Villa Madama,” 315, 323; and Shearman, “A
the freshness of inspiration. For Statius and Note on the Chronology of Villa Madama,”
Renaissance humanists on the furor rhetoricus, Burlington Magazine 129 (1987): 181. (Shearman
Galand-Hallyn, Le reflet des fleurs, 498–500; and cited Sperulo out of context to suggest that
Cesarini Martinelli, “Poliziano e Stazio,” 68–9. the villa was the Sedes Leonis [Shearman, “A
For additional significance of the silva form, Functional Interpretation of Villa Madama,”
see above pp. 51–2 and notes 20, 26, and 28; 315, 323]; in fact, it is clear that Sperulo’s state-
Chapter 4, pp. 91, 95 and 98, and notes 23, 52, ment, “Let this be your seat, Leo,” refers to a
and 65; pp. 155 and 159; and Conclusion pp. particular room, not the entire villa, and the
177–8 and note 21. On improvisation, James poet similarly assigns a seat to Duke Lorenzo,
Haar, Essays on Italian Poetry and Music in the and to other living Medici family members.)
Renaissance, 1350–1600 (Berkeley, 1986), 76–99. Cf. Reiss, who sees Giulio as the patron (as in
84. See Chapter 1, p. 21 and note 34; and pp. 155–7, Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron
considering competition among visual artists, of Art,” 357ff), although in recent work she
and between artists and wordsmiths. has discussed the cooperative patronage of
85. For a note of caution on reading any sixteenth- Giulio and Leo, as in Reiss, “‘Per havere tutte
century poetry as spontaneous or as personal le opere’.”
expression without recognizing the rhetorical 3. As shown by Reiss, ibid., passim.
underpinning, A. Leigh De Neef, “Epideictic 4. For example, see the discussions below of
Rhetoric and the Renaissance Lyric,” Journal of Leonine imagery in the battle paintings, which
Medieval and Renaissance Studies 3 (1973): 207–8. would also include the figures of Giulio and
Duke Lorenzo, references to Leo’s clemency,
3 S P ERU LO ’ S V IS ION and marbles with a provenance from Julius
Caesar now owed to Giulio.
1. Sperulo is thus linking the Medici to Rome’s 5. Amanda Lillie rebuts the myth of the “lone
Etruscan founders, and further making the patron,” characterizing many early Medicean
Etruscan/Tuscan–Roman link. For the commissions as family endeavors: Lillie,
role of Porsenna in Medici imagery, espe- “Giovanni di Cosimo,” 189–205; and Melissa
cially the 1513 Capitoline theater version of Meriam Bullard discusses a history of partici-
Etruscan history, Fabrizio Cruciani, Il Teatro patory patronage under Cosimo and Lorenzo
del Campidoglio e le feste romane del 1513 (Milan, in Florence, in “Heroes and their Workshops,”
1969), 29; and Giovanni Cipriani, Il mito etrusco 179–98. Among the studies of Medici patron-
nel Rinascimento fiorentino (Florence, 1980). age by John T. Paoletti, see “Fraternal Piety
For a variation on historical myth of Rome’s and Family Power: The Artistic Patronage of
Etruscan prehistory, Rowland, “Render unto Cosimo and Lorenzo de’ Medici,” in Cosimo
Caesar,” 716–21. On the Medici and Etruscan “Il Vecchio” de’ Medici, 1389–1464, ed. F. Ames-
imagery in the New Sacristy of San Lorenzo Lewis (Oxford, 1992), 195–219. For shared
and Poggio a Caiano, Kathleen Weil-Garris projects of Pope Leo and Cardinal Giulio,
Posner, “Comments on the Medici Chapel Reiss, “‘Per havere tutte le opere’.”
and Pontormo’s Lunette at Poggio a Caiano,” 6. See p. 20.
256 NOTES T O PA GE S 65– 6 6
7. For which, Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” 53–65 I owe these sources to Sheryl Reiss. Lorenzo
and passim with earlier bibliography, e specially was quite ill in late February when visited by
Claudia Cieri Via, “Villa Madama: una Ariosto, who wrote a poem metaphorically
residenza ‘solare’ per i Medici a Roma,” in linking the Duke to the resurrection of laurel
Roma nella svolta tra quattro e cinquecento, ed. after the harsh winter (Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio
Stefano Colonna (Rome, 2004), 349–74. de’ Medici as a Patron of Art,” 286 and n. 250;
8. For example, Ovid, Fasti, iii, 135–75. On the 465–6; 484); so presumably Ariosto would
kalends of March, Mars says, “Now for the first have taken news of Lorenzo’s grave condition
time in the year am I, a god of war, invoked to back to Rome in late February, if Cardinal
promote the pursuits of peace” (Fasti, iii, 173). Giulio had not communicated it himself.
9. Cato, On Agriculture, 141. See also H. H. Thus, I think Sperulo must have composed his
Scullard, Festivals and Ceremonies of the Roman poem before this time, perhaps in January. For
Republic (London, 1981), 84–7. the implications of the poem’s dating, see also
10. As he does for all living family members, Chapter 5, note 98; pp. 154–5; and Appendix i,
Sperulo assigns Duke Lorenzo a section of the gloss notes 94 and 128.
villa (lines 245–6); and the poet also proposes 12. Cruciani, Teatro del Campidoglio.
that the Duke be portrayed as a glorious victor 13. Hans Henrik Brummer and Tore Jansen, “Art,
in battle murals predicting a triumphal Medici Literature, and Politics: An Episode in the
crusade against the Ottoman Turks (discussed Roman Renaissance,” Konsthistorisk Tidskrift 45
below): “Also the general Lorenzo himself, (1976): 79–93; F. Saxl, “The Capitol during the
admirable in his gleaming weapons, the duke Renaissance – A Symbol of the Imperial Idea,”
riding a Thracian horse, and wreathed with Lectures, vol. 1 (London, 1957), 200–14; Monika
laurel, shall go triumphant among the laurel- Butzek, Die kommunalen Repräsentationsstatuen
bearing kings and the Latin youth; heaven der Päpste des 16. Jahrhunderts in Bologna, Perugia
shall thunder with the great clamor, while und Rom (Bad Honnef, 1978), 204–5; Sybille
Europe raises the Medici name up to the stars” Ebert-Schifferer, “Ripandas Kapitolinischer
(366–71). Freskenzyklus und die Selbstdarstellung der
11. For Lorenzo’s illness and death, probably of Konservatoren um 1500,”Römisches Jahrbuch
pulmonary tuberculosis, Ann G. Carmichael, für Kunstgeschichte (Jahrbuch der Bibliotheca
“The Health Status of Florentines in the Hertziana) 23/24 (1988): 76–218; Jan de Jong,
Fifteenth Century,” in Life and Death in The Power and the Glorification: Papal Pretensions
Fifteenth-Century Florence, ed. Marcel Tetel, and the Art of Propaganda in the Fifteenth and
Ronald G. Witt, and Rona Goffen (Durham, Sixteenth Centuries (Philadelphia, 2013), ch. 3.
NC, 1989), 28–45, at 29–31. The Duke’s doc- 14. Paul Zanker, The Power of Images in the Age
tors and caretakers seemed to interpret opti- of Augustus, trans. Alan Shapiro (Ann Arbor,
mistically his series of remissions and relapses 1988), 193 and passim.
in January–April 1519. Lorenzo’s secretary 15. About forward/backward time in the Aeneid,
Goro Gheri kept a daily chronicle of the Page DuBois, History, Rhetorical Description and
Duke’s symptoms and traded letters about the Epic (Cambridge, 1982), 49.
his condition with Cardinal Giulio. Gheri 16. For example, he notes that several aspects of
recorded that the Duke was doing well in the villa “not only rival but even far surpass
January and was thought to be cured, despite antiquity” (dedicatory letter, §2); and Father
intermittent bouts of fever, pains, and digestive Tiber exhorts his workers saying, “Dare to
upsets. But the Duke’s decision to make the revive the splendor of ancient art” (12); he
15-km ride from Careggi to Poggio a Caiano notes that Raphael will make Apelles and the
on 19 February set him back; one observer ancients compete with him (160–3), and will
noted during this trek, “fu visto da ognuno surpass Apelles (275); and Tiber says to Giulio,
che pareva mezo morto.” For this and Gheri’s predicting a papal victory over the Ottomans
diary, Gaetano Pieraccini, La stirpe de’ Medici in the east, “you shall at last give to great Italy
di Cafaggiolo: saggio di ricerche sulla trasmissione its longed-for spectacle; and although it fell to
ereditaria dei caratteri biologici (Florence, 1924), us to watch great triumphs when the Empire of
vol. 1, 269–79, who additionally considered Roman citizens flourished, yet you, Rome, will
the Duke to have had intestinal tuberculosis. say that they were inferior to these” (362–5).
N O TE S TO PAG E S 6 6– 67 257
17. For Giulio-Julius Caesar: Reiss, “Cardinal Frühwerk (Berlin, 1961), 163–70. Rowland
Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron of Art,” 191, 215 discusses the conceit that the left bank of
n. 240. Of course, Pope Julius II had made use the Tiber is notionally in Tuscany, and other
of Julius Caesar imagery first. Etruscan/Tuscan themes in the patronage of
18. Sperulo’s source here was probably a similar Chigi and Leo X: Rowland, “Render unto
historical narrative that had been sketched in Caesar,” 716–22.
an oration written by Blosio Palladio in 1518 21. “O Arno, perché noi nascemo inseme di
to commemorate the new sculpture of Leo fraterne acque, le quali cadeno quasi de
to be placed on the Capitoline. For which, un medemo [sic] fonte, et ambo intramo in
D’Amico, Renaissance Humanism, 134–7. uno mare, intende gli fati de la tua gente, la
19. Virgil, Aeneid, viii, 36–65 in which the quale serà mo chiamata mia, et quello che dal
Tiber foretells Aeneas’ founding of Rome. X Leone sperare tu debbi. Costui darà a gli
For the varied uses of rivers as poetic voice Italiani pace eterna et acquietarà gl’instanti
throughout Virgil’s oeuvre, Prudence J. Jones, tumulti; gli Re mandaranno a ricercarli pace
Reading Rivers in Roman Literature and Culture et volere seguire gli suoi commandamenti.”
(Lanham, MD, 2005), with earlier bibliography. From the account of Paulo Palliolo Farnese,
On the personified Tiber and Roman identity cited in Cruciani, Teatro del Campidoglio, 57.
in ancient art and literature, see Gretchen E. The figures of the Tiber, the Arno, and Clarice
Meyers, “The Divine River: Ancient Roman Orsini rode on a carriage with Medici imprese
Identity and the Image of Tiberinus,” in The at its center (a laurel tree with golden palle,
Nature and Function of Water, Baths, Bathing, and gilded lilies, and diamond rings), symbols of
Hygiene from Antiquity through the Renaissance, Rome (the wolf with Romulus and Remus),
ed. Cynthia Kosso and Anne Scott (Leiden, and a pelican (symbol of Christ or Charity)
2009), 233–47. For the personification of the bearing the words Roma omnibus una est.
Tiber in one section of Blosio Palladio’s poem 22. “Roma desidera haverve raccolti nel suo beato
on the Chigi villa, Quinlan-McGrath,“Blosius grembo et haverve fatti suoi; de natura siete
Palladius,” 105. Statius uses the river Volturnus Thoscani, ma il privilegio vi facia Romani. Ad
as narrator in Silvae, iv, 3, 67–94, although the ogni modo l’una et l’altra gente è congiunta
subservient role of the river creates a much di sangue, imperoché anchora el Tibre se
different effect: Newlands, Statius’ Silvae, dice essere Thoscano.” Cruciani, Teatro del
301ff. Sperulo’s emphasis on the Tiber and his Campidoglio, 56. The word grembo means both
river nymphs was also surely meant to evoke lap and womb, and this passage figuratively
Poliziano’s and Lorenzo de’ Medici’s poems suggests the filiation of the Medici from Mater
about Poggio a Caiano, in which the villa is Roma. For an ethnographic interpretation of
personified as the nymph Ambra, daughter of river geography equating shared water sources
the river Ombrone, an Arno tributary. with shared culture, Jones, Reading Rivers, 37–47.
20. The Tiber’s source is near Arezzo (ancient 23. Cruciani, Teatro del Campidoglio, lxxiii, 55–6.
Arretium) in the Apennines. Virgil speaks of On music for this and other Medici celebra-
the Tuscan Tiber (Tuscum Tiberim) in Georgics, tions, Cummings, The Politicized Muse, ch. 4
i, 499; the Tyrrhenian Tiber in Aeneid, vii, 242; and passim.
and says,“On this side we are hemmed in by the 24. The celebration was directed by Tommaso
Tuscan [river]” (hinc Tusco claudimur amni) Inghirami and Camillo Porcari, his student.
in Aeneid, viii, 473. See also Pliny the Elder, 25. A. Fulvius, Antiquaria urbis (Rome, 1513). In
Natural History, ii, 5, 53; Strabo, Geography, v, this and in his 1527 prose edition of the work
2, 1; and Dionysius of Halicarnasus, Roman dedicated to Clement VII, Fulvio discusses
Antiquities, iii, 44, 1–2. Because the Tiber the Tiber at length, calling it the king of riv-
formed the east bank of ancient Etruria, the ers, identifying its Tuscan source, and provid-
left bank of the Tiber had long been referred ing citations from Virgil, Ovid, and others. A.
to as the Tuscan or Etruscan side. This west- Fulvius, Antiquitates urbis (Rome, 1527), fols.
ern bank of the Tiber was famously dotted 28–9.The first Italian edition is Andrea Fulvio,
with villas in Roman antiquity, as it was in Opera di Andrea Fulvio delle antichità della città
the Renaissance. For which, C. L. Frommel, di Roma, trans. Paulo dal Rosso (Venice, 1543),
Die Farnesina und Peruzzis architektonisches 90–2.
26. As pointed out by Ruth Rubinstein, “The owes something to earlier depictions of the
Renaissance Discovery of Antique River-God Apennine, as in Figure 28, or Giambologna’s
Personifications,” in Scritti di storia dell’arte in monumental Apennino. In addition to his
onore di Roberto Salvini (Florence, 1984). engraving illustrated here, Rosa also executed
27. Shearman, Raphael’s Cartoons, 84; Ilaria a painted variant of the composition, now in
Romeo, “Raffaello, l’antico e le bordure degli the Metropolitan Museum.)
arazzi vaticane,” Xenia 19 (1990): 41–86;Mark 31. When Aeneas visits his father in the under-
Evans, Clare Browne, and Arnold Nesselrath, world, Anchises shows him his descend-
eds., Raphael: Cartoons and Tapestries for the ants – future great Romans – down to Caesar
Sistine Chapel (London, 2010), 72–3. Augustus, whom Anchises predicts will restore
28. For river god figures in Sperulo’s proposed the Golden Age to Rome (Virgil, Aeneid,
murals for Villa Madama, which were never vi, 792ff). In Sperulo’s poem, Father Tiber
executed, see below, p. 80. Michelangelo pro- says that Leo has restored the Golden Age of
posed reclining figures of the Tiber and Arno Saturn to Rome (340), discussed below.
for Duke Lorenzo’s tomb in the Medici New 32. For the continuous one-way flow of a river
Sacristy, planned shortly after Sperulo’s poem as an analogy for oratorical composition in
(unexecuted but known from a surviving the works of Quintilian and Seneca, see Jones,
model and drawings); for other resonances Reading Rivers, 51–4; and for the metaphor of
between Sperulo’s poem and Michelangelo’s water and poetic inspiration, ibid., 56.
New Sacristy, Chapter 5, p. 131 and note 98. 33. See Appendix i, gloss note 9.
For the painted west window embrasure of 34. DuBois, History, Rhetorical Description and the
the Sala di Costantino (Figure 28), Quednau, Epic, 13–21.
Sala di Costantino, 499–504. For the restora- 35. Virgil, Aeneid, viii, 626–8. “Illic res Italas
tion and installation of the ancient sculpture Romanorumque triumphos haud vatum
of the Tigris/Arno in the Vatican, probably ignarus venturique aevi fecerat ignipotens.”
under Clement VII, Ruth Rubinstein, “The 36. Vitruvius, On Architecture, x, ii, 1. For Vulcan
Statue of the River God Tigris or Arno,” in and the imagery of the early history of civi-
Il cortile delle statue: der Statuenhof des Belvedere lization, Erwin Panofsky, “The Early History
im Vatikan, ed. M Winner, B. Andreae, and C. of Man in Two Cycles of Paintings by Piero
Pietrangeli (Mainz, 1998), 175–285; and Nicole di Cosimo,” in Studies in Iconology: Humanistic
Hegener, “Clemens curavit, Bandinellus Themes in the Art of the Renaissance (New York,
restauravit. Der Flußgott Arno im Statuenhof 1972 [originally 1939]), 33–68. On Vulcan
des vatikanischen Belvedere,” in Zentren imagery, see also Suzanne Butters, The Triumph
und Wirkungsräume der Antikerezeption: zur of Vulcan: Sculptor’s Tools, Porphyry and the Prince
Bedeutung von Raum und Kommunikation für die in Ducal Florence (Florence, 1996); and Dennis
neuzeitliche Transformation der griechisch-römischen V. Geronimus, Setting Sail for the Vulcan Isle:
Antike, ed. Kathrin Schade and Detlef Rößler Piero di Cosimo’s Jason and Queen Hypispyle
(Münster, 2007), 177–99. See also Claudia with the Women of Lemnos and its Companion
Lazzaro, “River Gods: Personifying Nature in Scenes (New York, 2005).
Sixteenth-Century Italy,” Renaissance Studies 37. “Mulciber, ut perhibent, his oscula coniu-
25 (2011): 70–94. gis emit moenibus et tales uxorius obtulit
29. The last clause is a play on Ovid’s Fasti, iv, arces. intus rura micant, manibus quae sub-
830, when the king says to Jupiter, “auspicibus dita nullis perpetuum florent, Zephyro con-
vobis hoc mihi surgat opus” (Under your tenta colono … Procul atria divae permutant
auspices may this my fabric rise!) As noted in radios silvaque obstante virescunt. Lemnius
Appendix i, gloss note 21. haec etiam gemmis extruxit et auro admiscens
30. As in the Aeneid and Rosa’s later depiction, artem.” Claudian, Epithalamium, 58–61, 85–8;
Sperulo’s Tiber and his brother river gods in Poliziano, The Stanze of Angelo Poliziano,
are active, embodied protagonists; by con- trans. David Quint (Amherst, 1979).
trast, Raphael and his associates depict river 38. Poliziano, Stanze, i, 93 and 95ff, in ibid.
gods in the reclining pose of ancient mar- 39. As noted below, imagery of Venus Genetrix
ble sculptures, instead using them primarily and her attributes of fecundity, bounty,
as locative signifiers. (Rosa’s Tiber perhaps and peace-giving victory would indeed be
N O TE S TO PAG E S 72 –75 259
realized in decorations throughout the villa; Antiquities Collections in Renaissance Rome, c.

see p. 75. 1350–1527 (New Haven, 2010).
40. This point is discussed further in Chapter 5, 46. Stefan Weinstock, Divus Julius (Oxford, 1971),
pp. 116–18. 80ff.
41. Cesarini Martinelli, ed., Commento inedito alle 47. Now in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale
Selve di Stazio di Poliziano, 247ff; discussed by di Napoli, inv. 6718, Ruesch 1018. For a discus-
Dempsey, The Portrayal of Love, 44–8. sion of this relief, its excavation history, place-
42. Along with Lucretius and, of course, Virgil; ment in the loggia, and subsequent history,
Dempsey, The Portrayal of Love, 47 n. 66. Statius, Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” ch. 3, 187–91.
Silvae, i, 2, 184–7: “alituum pecudumque mihi 48. F. W. Goethert, “Trajanische Friese,” Jahrbuch
durique ferarum/ non renuere greges; ipsum des Deutschen Archaeologischen Instituts 51 (1936):
in conubia terrae/ aethera, cum pluviis rares- 72–81; M. Floriani Squarciapino, “I pannelli
cunt nubila, solvo. sic rerum series mundique decorativi del tempio di Venere Genitrice,”
revertitur aetas.” (Neither birds nor cattle nor Ser. 8, vol. 2, fasc. 2, Atti dell’Accademia nazio
savage packs of wild beasts have said me nay. nale dei Lincei: memorie, classe di scienze morali,
I melt the very heaven into marriage with storiche e filologiche (Rome, 1948–50), 87; and
earth when rains thin the clouds. So one R. Bradley Ulrich, “The Temple of Venus
thing succeeds another and the world’s youth Genetrix in the Forum of Caesar in Rome:
returns.) The Topography, History, Architecture, and
43. A point that has been observed for Statius in Sculptural Program of the Monument” (Ph.D.
the Silvae, significantly for Sperulo. On Statius’ diss., Yale University, 1984), 227–8. On the
self-presentation, Nauta, “Statius in the Silvae,” popularity of the Basilica Ulpia motif, Bober
173; and Kathleen Coleman, “Mythological and Rubinstein, n. 171.
Figures as Spokespersons in Statius’ Silvae,” in 49. For which, Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” 187–91.
Im Spiegel des Mythos: Bilderwelt und Lebenswelt 50. Frommel, Raffaello architetto, 312. See also
(Wiesbaden, 1999), 67–80. I am indebted to Frommel, “Die architektonische Planung der
Bahadir Yildirim for that reference. For a Villa Madama,” 79–80.
similar notion a few decades after Sperulo, we 51. The generative power of ancient marbles, and
may look at Du Bellay’s Poemata in which the the poet’s role in devising their installations, is
Tyberis is both an authorial voice and also a discussed further in Chapter 5.
symbol for the poet himself, as proposed by 52. 26 September 46 bce; Dio Cassius, Roman
Perrine Galand-Hallyn, Les yeux de l’éloquence: History, 43, 22, 2.
poétiques humanistes de l’évidence (Orléans, 53. To my knowledge, neither this relief nor any
1995): ch. iv. other marble in the Temple of Venus Genetrix
44. For Sperulo on marble revetments and col- is known to have come from Paphos, nor is
umns at the villa for which I have not there a textual, mythical basis for this assertion.
found any trace, and the removal of marbles 54. Suetonius, The Lives of the Caesars (The Deified
from the villa, see Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” Julius), i, lxxxv. On Numidian marble, a yel-
160–3. low marble now known as giallo antico, see the
45. Remarkably, the rich Medici collection at gloss note 33 with bibliography. On the double
the villa passed unnoticed into the margins meaning of Iulo as Aeneas’ son, ancestor of the
of the legendary Farnese collection and Romans, and Julius Caesar, see gloss note 34.
remained virtually unknown until recently. 55. I have found no evidence that a Numidian
For the formation of this collection, its marble column was ever at Villa Madama,
passage from the Medici through Margarita although one could have been removed with-
of Austria into the Farnese family and then out documentation. No column with the
to the Bourbons, and its dispersal, as well as a inscription mentioned by Suetonius has ever
discussion tracing the works it contained, see come to light. Numidian marble columns
Elet,“Papal villeggiatura,” ch. 3; Federico Rausa, were plentiful, however; in fact, the Temple
“I marmi antichi di Villa Madama. Storia e of Venus Genetrix had Numidian marble col-
fortuna,” Xenia antiqua 10 (2001): 155–206; umns in the interior of its cella, and it is pos-
Kathleen Wren Christian, Empire without End: sible that one was recovered at the same time
260 NOTES T O PA GE S 75 – 81
as the relief. For the columns in the Temple of necessary troops, as discussed in Setton, “Leo
Venus Genetrix, Giuseppe Lugli, Roma antica: X and the Turkish Peril,” 399–405 and pas-
il centro monumentale (Rome, 1946), 252; and sim. After the Turkish threat near Loreto, Leo
LTUR, ii, 307 (P. Gros). issued a 1519 bull stating that funds earmarked
56. Alison M. Brown, “The Humanist Portrait for paving roads and making fountains should
of Cosimo de’ Medici, Pater Patriae,” Journal instead be used for the fortification of Loreto,
of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 24 as discussed by Eva Renzulli in a talk at the
(1961): 186–221; Anthony Molho, “Cosimo University of Warwick in May 2003. Leo actu-
de’ Medici: Pater Patriae or Padrino?,” Stanford ally called for a war against the Turks in 1519.
Italian Review 1 (1979): 5–33; D. Kent, Cosimo It was around this time that Mario Equicola
de’ Medici, 9. wrote a work addressed to Pope Leo urging
57. These are just two among many possible the crusade: Kolsky, Mario Equicola, 165–6.
examples of sculptures the poet describes, 64. Cesare Guasti, I Manoscritti Torrigiani donati al
which are treated further in the discussion of R. Archivio di Stato di Firenze (Florence, 1878),
program and metastructures in Chapter 5. 118 and passim.
58. Effectively equipping his camera like a council 65. “Romae terror est ingens … Quae res ita
hall. Like many aspects of the architecture and metu praesenti omnes occupat ut actum de
decoration of Palazzo Medici, this reflected Italia et urbe Roma esse videatur.” In a let-
the long-standing practice of deliberately ter of 26 January 1518, to the papal nuncio
appropriating civic elements to a private pal- to King Charles of Spain, BAV, Vat. Lat. 3146,
ace to designate the Palazzo Medici as the fol. 37v. Cited and trans. O’Malley, Praise and
locus of civic authority. Lorenzo appropriated Blame in Renaissance Rome, 233.
from an associate this cycle painted decades 66. The preamble to Leo’s bull of 31 December
earlier, the subject of which was associated 1518, ratifying the peace treaty of London,
with Florentine and Medici triumph and declared, “Be glad and rejoice, O Jerusalem,
peacemaking, and which linked the eras of since now your deliverance can be hoped for
Cosimo primo and Lorenzo il Magnifico. … The kings are assembling … to serve the
59. Sedes, line 273, for which see gloss note 39. Lord against the fierce madness of the Turks
60. As noted by Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 437. For and against the uncleanliness of Islam.” In
this battle, F. L. Taylor, The Art of War in Italy Setton, “Leo X and the Turkish Peril,” 413. On
1494–1529 (Cambridge, 1921), 180–215; and exhortations to war against the Turks to ensure
Roscoe, The Life and Pontificate of Leo the Tenth, a Christian peace in sermons, O’Malley, Praise
vol. 1, 259ff. and Blame in Renaissance Rome, 232–6. For
61. Shearman, Raphael’s Cartoons, 17–18, 84–5; east–west clashes and strife within Christian
Romeo, “Raffaello”; Evans et al., Raphael, Europe as a theme of Giovio’s Histories,
86–7. Zimmermann, Paolo Giovio, 25–26 and passim.
62. James Hankins, “Humanist Crusade Literature The notion that local peace was compatible
in the Age of Mehmed II,” Dumbarton Oaks with foreign war was familiar from ancient
Papers 49 (1995): 111–207; Kenneth M. Setton, panegyrics.
“Leo X and the Turkish Peril,” Proceedings of 67. I owe this observation to Rachel Kousser.
the American Philosophical Society 113 (1969), 68. Rolf Quednau, “Aspects of Raphael’s ‘Ultima
367–424;Setton, The Papacy and the Levant, Maniera’ in the Light of the Sala di Costantino,”
1204–1571, vol. 3 (Philadelphia, 1984), 172– in Raffaello a Roma, 247–8; and Quednau, Sala
97; Nancy Bisaha, Creating East and West: di Costantino, 384–98. Related imagery figured
Renaissance Humanists and the Ottoman Turks in the Vatican Stanza dell’Incendio painted by
(University Park, PA, 2004), 174–87. Raphael, depicting Leo IV’s victory over the
63. In 1517, Leo granted indulgences for crusad- Saracens at Ostia as a prefiguration of Leo X’s
ers, and the pontiff appointed a commission close brush with Turkish pirates at Ostia in
of cardinals to study a possible campaign 1516.
against the Turks. Throughout 1518, discus- 69. Rudolf Preimesberger, “Tragische Motive
sions among the Vatican and European princes in Raffaels ‘Transfiguration’,” Zeitschrift für
were consumed with the plan for a crusade Kunstgeschichte 50 (1987): 97ff with earlier
and the logistics of amassing and financing the sources; and Kathleen Weil-Garris Posner,
N O TE S TO PAG E S 81– 8 2 261
Leonardo and Central Italian Art, 1515–1550 paintings for the south tower. Most confus-
(New York, 1974), 43–8. ingly, he mentions at lines 216–19 an area of
70. Raphael, in his letter on the villa, describes the villa where “here … the golden sun will
this “bellissima lhoggia” with a view overlook- be warm at rising and setting, admitted on all
ing the hippodrome, the beautiful countryside, sides through glazed windows” (Hic … tepido
the Tiber, and Rome. He also points out that sol aureus ortu/ occasuque aderit, vitreasque
the portone under this loggia, one of the main admissus utrinque/ per speculas); this passage,
entrances of the villa, opens to the newly built which would seem to describe the windowed
road leading straight to the Milvian bridge, tower, occurs in the middle of his description
making it look as if the bridge had been built of the garden loggia and inner garden (i.e. the
for the villa. Raphael/Dewez, 22 §2, 24–5 opposite end of the villa from Raphael’s pro-
§10–11. On the symbolic significance of the posed glazed diaeta), and it precedes Sperulo’s
villa’s siting and views, see Chapter 5, pp. 101– introduction of the south-facing tower with
5, and also Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” 30–42, and the phrase “In another part” (“Parte alia,” 226).
Elet, “Raphael and the Roads to Rome.” Perhaps the poet was confused about where
71. Ioana Jimborean,“La Loggia delle Benedizioni the glazed diaeta was to be, or he mistakenly
at St. Peter’s in the Quattrocento and the thought the north tower would also be ringed
Visualization of Power,” in Perspectives on Public with windows and ignored its function to
Space in Rome, from Antiquity to the Present Day, house the chapel (although a look at U 273a
ed. Gregory Smith and Jan Gadeyne (Farnham, or Raphael’s letter would clarify these points).
2013), 109–30. More likely, Sperulo was simply juxtaposing
72. Sperulo specifies a tower overlooking the highlights of the summer and winter quarters
damp south, from which Cardinal Giulio will in this passage at lines 216–19 to address the
look toward the Tiber (“Parte alia, de turre comfort-in-all-seasons trope, without mind
udum quae spectat ad Austrum / consurgat to specific physical location or proposed
specula, unde meum conversus in amnem / decoration.
Iulius aeternum Thuscis ver numine ripis / 73. For which, see gloss note 93. For Raphael’s
praesenti sublimis alat” [226–9]). The hillside design for The Vision of Ezekiel in which God
of Monte Mario actually blocks the view the Father is shown as Jupiter borne aloft by
looking due south from any of the towers; the four symbols of the Evangelists (executed
presumably the poet had seen the plan but did as a painting probably by Giulio Romano, and
not understand its relation to the topography a tapestry, possibly for Leo’s letto de paramento),
of the site. Most likely, by describing a tower see Henry and Joannides, eds., Late Raphael,
overlooking the south and the Tiber, he means 109–17. For the tradition of the Quadriga
the east tower (see Figure 26). Raphael’s letter Domini, or the metaphor of the Evangelists
specifies that this tower would contain a diaeta as a chariot team, see Michael Jacoff, The
ringed with glass windows for pleasant con- Horses of San Marco and the Quadriga of the Lord
versation – presumably Cardinal Giulio’s van- (Princeton, 1993), 12–20.
tage point mentioned by the poet. (Raphael 74. The glazed windows were a novel luxury. As
does not specify a function for the south tower, for the scale of the diaeta, Raphael stipulates it
other than noting that both the east and south would be 6 canne in diameter; Dewez notes
towers could be used for defense; Raphael/ that assuming a wall thickness of 6 palmi, the
Dewez, 23–4 §4, 7–8. And since Raphael notes interior dimension of the room would be 48
the diaeta will be above the bastion [turrione], palmi (35.2 feet), although both plans show it
I assume he intended only one level of liv- as 30 palmi (22 feet). Raphael/Dewez, 23 §7
ing space in each tower; Raphael/Dewez, 22 and n. 7.2.
n. 4.1 and §7.) This cycle of Clemency paint- 75. I am indebted to James Hankins for a dis-
ings could have been intended as a mural cussion of this point. A later example of this
band above the windows or else as a series of topos in Medici visual imagery is Bandinelli’s
paintings set between the windows, for which Hercules and Cacus, for which Pope Clement
there is enough wall space, although the light chose the more restrained subject of Cacus
would not create ideal viewing conditions. as prisoner rather than Cacus about to be
Alternatively, Sperulo could have intended the killed: Kathleen Weil-Garris, “On Pedestals:
Michelangelo’s David, Bandinelli’s Hercules and Francis I began to focus on squaring off against
Cacus and the Sculpture of the Piazza della each other rather than the Turks. The death of
Signoria,” Römisches Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte Sultan Selim in September 1520 and the acces-
20 (1983): 397–8. sion of Suleiman shifted the focus of Ottoman
76. Pellegrini, “Leone X.” aggression away from the Italian peninsula,
77. Paolo Giovio recorded contemporary specu- and the issue of an anti-Turkish crusade lost
lation about Leo’s motives: Giovio, De vita its urgency. Moreover, the Lutherans replaced
Leonis Decimi Pont. Max (Florence, 1551), 85. the Turks as the prime threat to the church.
Winspeare and Ferrajoli, following Pastor, For which, Setton, Leo X and the Turkish Peril,
believed it was a real conspiracy. Cf. G. B. 419–20. So Sperulo’s emphasis on Leo’s estab-
Picotti, who first proposed instead that the lishing peace in Europe to wage war against
Medici capitalized on Petrucci’s actions and the Turks was outdated by the time the walls
invented the conspiracy with the goal of were actually built, and decorations were
squashing Riario and other enemies, then reconsidered in 1520. Additionally, Leo’s death
stacking the College of Cardinals with pro- in 1521 would have relegated the subjects of
Medicean allies – a view recently solidified by his clemency and the Battle of Ravenna to
Kate Lowe and Marcello Simonetta.Alessandro Medici family history, rather than timely sub-
Ferrajoli, La congiura dei cardinali contro Leone X, jects. Thus, the very topical program the poet
Miscellanea della R. Società romana di sto- had created was quickly rendered obsolete.
ria di patria, vol. 7 (Rome, 1919–20), 140–9; 84. On the vision of history in the Virgilian set
G. B. Picotti, “La congiura dei cardinali contro piece, DuBois, History, Rhetorical Description
Leone X,” Rivista storica italiana, n.s. 1 (1923): and the Epic, 41ff.
249–67; Fabrizio Winspeare, La congiura dei car- 85. As noted above, Ariosto was working in the
dinali contro Leone X (Florence, 1957), 159–66 Vatican to stage his I suppositi with Raphael
and passim; K. Lowe, “An Alternative Account on 6 March 1519, when he was revising the
of the Alleged Cardinals’ Conspiracy of 1517 princeps edition of the Orlando furioso.
against Pope Leo X,” Roma moderna e con- 86. Christian Kleinbub, Vision and the Visionary in
temporanea 11 (2003): 53–78; Simonetta, Volpi Raphael (University Park, PA, 2011), 113.
e leoni, 161–201. For a positive spin on Leo’s 87. See above, pp. 81–2 and note 73; and Appendix
stacking the College of Cardinals, see Sperulo, i lines 241–4 and gloss note 93.
Appendix i, lines 337–40 and gloss notes 88. About this topos, see Chapter 2, p. 55 and
119–20. notes 55–6.
78. Ferrajoli, La congiura dei cardinali contro Leone X,
213–15.
4 ENC O M IA O F TH E U NBU ILT
79. The terms of Leo’s clemency were that Riario
was allowed to live, but was stripped of his 1. Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 434.
honors and the Palazzo della Cancelleria, 2. Shearman believed that the poem is based
which he had built. on the letter: Shearman, “A Functional
80. The date of this elegy is not clear.The poem is Interpretation of Villa Madama,” 315; and
part of four books with a miscellanea of mate- Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 410 and 434.
rial presented to Cardinal Rangone. The final Frommel (“Die architektonische Planung
book is dated 19 May 1520, and the dedica- der Villa Madama”) first dated the letter as
tion is given as 1 December 1520. Presumably 1518–19, noting it as the source for Sperulo,
the poem was written on the occasion of the although he later suggested that the letter
pardon (in December 1518), as suggested by could postdate the poem: Frommel, Raffaello
Ferrajoli, La congiura dei cardinali contro Leone X, architetto, 325. For the latter interpretation,
213. see also Philip J. Jacks, “The Simulachrum of
81. Imagery that he revisits in the villa poem, Fabio Calvo: A View of Roman Architecture
especially in lines 71 and 235; see gloss notes all’antica in 1527,” Art Bulletin 72 (1990):
36 and 92. 453–81, at 471ff; and Camesasca and Piazza,
82. As discussed in the following chapter, p. 94. Raffaello: gli scritti, 340ff.
83. Charles V was elected as Holy Roman 3. Heinrich Lausberg, Handbook of Literary
Emperor in June 1519, and he and his rival Rhetoric, trans. Matthew T. Bliss, Annemiek
N O TE S TO PAG E S 8 7 –9 0 263
Janse, and David E. Orton (Leiden, 1998), 15. Sperulo’s use of architectural vocabulary is
§882–6 (pp. 393–4). I am grateful to Jean inconsistent and at times confusing. He con-
Sorabella, who first pointed out to me the sistently uses atria to refer to spaces with sig-
name of this poetic device, which is also nificant marbles or spoils (54–6, 79–81, 245–7,
known as paralipsis. 391–3), although he does not specify exact
4. The other possibility – that Raphael, hav- locations. He uses specula interchangeably
ing seen Sperulo’s poem, decided to focus on for a loggia (270, 373) and towers (219, 227)
these items – is implausible. designed to have views, so that in a sense, it
5. Bembo sometimes showed others a poem designates a kind of belvedere. He also uses
without giving them a copy or allowing them turre for the towers (226, 381), perhaps to indi-
to copy it: Richardson, Manuscript Culture in cate the base of the tower, just as Raphael’s
Renaissance Italy, 24–6. letter distinguishes between torrione (tower)
6. Raphael used hypodromo (Raphael/Dewez, 25 and turrione (bastion, or ground storey of the
§12), and Sperulo hippodromus (389). tower). The word sede appears eleven times,
7. Shearman mistakenly says that Sperulo cop- sometimes to designate figurative seats for
ies the order of items mentioned in Raphael’s the living Medici, or as seats for sculptures of
letter (Sources, vol. 1, 434); in fact, the order is ancestors, which could mean thrones or sim-
very different. ply places (16, 27, 78, 125, 128, 189, 206, 249,
8. For coenatio/cenatione, Sperulo, 206 and 261, 273, 337). His only use of the terms aula,
Raphael/Dewez, 27 §16. Shearman incor- theatro, porticus, balnea, xystus, piscina, hippodrome,
rectly notes the word specula among Sperulo’s and stabula is in the praeteritio of subjects he
borrowings from Raphael’s letter: Sources, vol. will not discuss, a clear reference to Raphael’s
1, 434; in fact, neither Raphael nor Pliny uses letter.
it, but Sperulo does many times, in the sense 16. De Beer, The Poetics of Patronage, 333.
of a belvedere or loggia. 17. See further discussion of this hypothesis in
9. Raphael/Dewez, 24–5 §10–12. Both surviving Chapter 6, which additionally considers the
ground plans detail these architectural features travel schedules of the planners around the
that leave almost no continuous wall space for time of Sperulo’s poem.
a mural cycle; see plans in Plates v, vi and the 18. Valeriano’s Dialogo is discussed on p. 22 and in
model in Figure 14. Chapter 2, pp. 58–9 and notes 76–7.
10. See the discussion in Chapter 3, p. 81 and note 19. As reported in a letter of Alfonso Paolucci in
72 about the contradictions in Sperulo’s pro- Rome to Alfonso d’Este in Ferrara, 13 March
posed placement of the Clemency murals in the 1519: in Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 443 (doc.
villa. For his description of the fishpond abut- 1519/22).
ting the inner garden or xystus (a margine xystus), 20. Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 455 (Castiglione),
see the poem line 387 and gloss note 133. 483–4 (Alfonso Paolucci, the Duke of Ferrara’s
11. I use loosely the word commissioned; on the agent), and 774ff (Vida). (In Chapter 6, the
uncertainty associated with the patronage practice of frequenting unfinished buildings is
process for scholar-courtiers of the papal linked to the perception of them as modern
Curia, from lining up work to getting paid for ruins.)
it, see Gaisser, “Seeking Patronage under the 21. As for the Villa Madama poems, Vida and
Medici Popes,” 293–309. Sperulo specify that the construction is in
12. Frommel observed that parts of the letter are progress; Sperulo’s date of 1 March 1519
copied word-for-word from Calvo’s transla- supports his assertion, and Equicola tells us
tion of Vitruvius, as discussed most recently in that Tebaldeo’s lost panegyric was written
Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 410. during this period. Both of the major poems
13. I think it is likely that Raphael sent a draft about the Chigi villa, dated 1511 and 1512,
to Castiglione to transform the artist’s ideas were written in the middle of its construc-
into a more polished and literary product, tion. Of the two Poliziano poems about
as proposed by Shearman, “A Functional Poggio a Caiano, one states that Lorenzo
Interpretation of Villa Madama,” 315 n. 2. is about to begin a villa, and the other
14. Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 142. admires the foundations of the new ris-
ing villa. Michele Verino’s 1485 short letter
describing Poggio a Caiano also mentions as though they were finished … I did not
visible foundations. hesitate to weave into my songs, as though
22. D’Amico, Renaissance Humanism, 8ff and pas- already existing, those future things which
sim. Rowland dubbed this “an erudite pub- you had planned in your mind.” (“quod in
lic relations campaign” in Rowland, “Some hortis pleraque … iam inchoata et affecta, ceu
Panegyrics to Agostino Chigi,” 194. See also effecta cecinerim … non dubitavi c arminibus
Quinlan-McGrath, “Blosius Palladius,” 102. intexere, ut iam extantia: quae tu animo
23. Galand-Hallyn, “Quelques coincidences (par- destinasses futura.”) Citation and translation in
adoxales?) entre L’Épitre aux Pisons d’Horace Quinlan-McGrath, “Blosius Palladius,” 114–15.
et la poétique de la Silve),” 612, for the etymol- 26. I owe this observation to James Hankins.
ogy of silva as materia or raw material in Greco- 27. I am indebted to Ann Kuttner for bringing
Roman philosophy, from the Greek hyle, and these letters to my attention (verbal commu-
the typology of the humanist silva. This aspect nication); she also treated them in a 2006 RSA
of the silva form in Statius is discussed by conference talk “Villas in the Mind’s Terrain:
David Wray, “Wood: Statius’s Silvae and the Realism and Imagination in the Poetry of
Poetics of Genius,” Arethusa 40 (2007): 127–43; Horace and Ovid.” Cicero, Letters to Quintus,
and by Newlands, “The Transformation of especially 3.1.
the ‘Locus Amoenus’,” 151–2, who proposes 28. Another villa description of potential interest
that, “[Statius’] choice of the term silvae to for this point may be found in the work of
describe these poems suggests that he views Sidonius, the late fifth-century ce author of
them as metaphorical equivalents of the work villa panegyrics in verse and prose, which owed
of reshaping nature to an exciting work of much to the letters of Pliny and the Silvae of
art.” She further discusses the multiple asso- Statius (the latter debt was acknowledged by
ciations of the silva form in Roman poetry, Sidonius himself in the postscript to his Carm.
including “material to be reworked, revised, 22). In this poem describing the Gallic bur-
and contested” in Newlands, Statius’ Silvae, gus (castle-villa) of Pontius Leontius near
36–7. Quintilian, Cicero, and Aulus Gellius Bordeaux, Sidonius prophesies, “Methinks
also equate the silva form with raw material: I see the future that is in store for thee, O
Quintilian, Institutio oratoria, V, 10, 33; Cicero, Castle!” (“cernere iam videor quae sint tibi,
De oratore, xii; and Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights, Burge, futura”): Sidonius, Poems and Letters, 22,
Preface 5–6. James Hankins points out that 126. The poet seems to be predicting the fame
silva is a well-established synonym for mate- of the castle, not the fact of its existence, as
ria in the medieval and Renaissance exege- contemporary scholarship has interpreted the
ses of Plato’s Timaeus. Poliziano’s silva Manto, poem, to my knowledge. But this apostrophe
39–43, playfully compares the poet shaping his to the villa was in one sense proleptic and may
song to the woodcutter choosing which trees have been of interest to later villa writers.
to fell in the forest (sylvae): Poliziano, Silvae, 29. For a discussion of “rhetorische Ekphrasis” in
8–9. Italian writers played on silva/selva, and poetry, Paul Friedländer, Johannes von Gaza,
the Italian word selva has been used to con- Paulus Silentiarius und Prokopios von Gaza:
vey something produced with the rapidity Kunstbeschreibungen justinianischer Zeit (Leipzig
and immediacy of a sketch. An interesting and Berlin, 1912, repr. Hildesheim and New
later example is Giuseppe Verdi’s use of selva to York, 1969), 83ff. On the relation of ekphra-
designate his first-draft score: Daniela Goldin sis and descriptio, and its role in Latin poetry
Folena, “Lessico melodrammatico verdiano,” as formulated in Horace, Ars poetica, 14–19,
in Le parole della musica, ed. Maria Teresa see Andrew Laird, “Vt figura poesis: Writing
Muraro (Florence, 1995), vol. 2, 232ff, a source Art and the Art of Writing,” in Art and Text
I owe to Philip Gossett. in Roman Culture, ed. Jaś Elsner (Cambridge,
24. On poetry written quickly, see Chapter 2, pp. 1996), 75–102.
58 and 59 and notes 82–3; and Appendix i, 30. Smith, Architecture in the Culture of Early
dedicatory letter §3 and gloss note 5. Humanism, ch. 7; Smith, “Christian Rhetoric
25. In his dedication to Chigi, Blosio says, “I in Eusebius’ Panegyric,” 228, in which
have sung of the majority of things in the she further traces sources of architectural
garden … now just begun and planned, ekphrasis in the traditions of laus urbis and the
N O TE S TO PAG E S 9 2– 93 265
periegesis; Baxandall, Giotto and the Orators, and iii, 17, 30; and Quintilian, Institutio oratoria,
85ff; Friedländer, Johannes von Gaza, Paulus XI, 2, 17–22. This tradition is discussed
Silentiarius und Prokopios von Gaza; John in Kuttner, “Prospects of Patronage,” 98;
Monfasani, “The Byzantine Rhetorical Leach, Rhetoric of Space, 73–8; and Ann Vasaly,
Tradition and the Renaissance,” in Renaissance Representations: Images of the World in Ciceronian
Eloquence, ed. J. J. Murphy (Berkeley, 1983), Oratory (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1993). On
174–87. imagined and real architectural models for
31. Noted by Christine Smith, Architecture in the the Hypnerotomachia, see Benzi, “Percorso
Culture of Early Humanism, 184. reale in sogno di Polifilo”; and Marco Ariani,
32. The importance of Statius as a model was “Descriptio in somniis: racconto e ekphrasis
discussed by Friedländer in his fundamen- nella Hypnerotomachia Poliphili,” in Storia della
tal 1912 study of ekphrasis, and by Cancik in lingua e storia dell’arte in Italia: dissimmetrie
his study of the Silvae; but subsequent litera- e intersezioni, ed. Vittorio Casale and Paolo
ture has virtually ignored Statius’ contribu- d’Achille (Florence, 2004), 153–60.
tion; cf. Friedländer, Johannes von Gaza, Paulus 36. Filarete, Filarete’s Treatise on Architecture, Being
Silentiarius und Prokopios von Gaza, 60–9 and the Treatise by Antonio di Piero Averlino, Known
passim; Cancik, Untersuchungen, 34–8 and passim; as Filarete, ed. and trans. John R. Spencer (New
Adam R. Marshall,“Spectandi Voluptas: Ecphrasis Haven, 1968).
and Poetic Immortality in Statius’ Silvae 1.1,” 37. On poetic sources for these descriptions,
Classical Journal 106.3 (2011): 321–47. Smith, Architecture in the Culture of Early
33. For topothesia, Lausberg, Handbook of Literary Humanism, 194–5; Christine Smith and Joseph
Rhetoric, §819, pp. 365–6. The term “notional O’Connor, Building the Kingdom: Giannozzo
ekphrasis” was devised by John Hollander, Manetti on the Material and Spiritual Edifice
“The Poetics of Ekphrasis,” Word and (Tempe, AZ, 2006), 66–8.
Image 4 (1988): 209ff. Hollander also treats 38. “Descriptio villae salubrie,” in Marsilio
notional ekphrasis that is imperative or opta- Ficino, Opera omnia (Turin, 1962), vol. 1, 893–
tive, as in advice-to-an-artist poems from the 4. Ficino specifies that the actual villa they
Hellenistic Anacreontea to eighteenth-cen- come upon is that of Pier Filippo Pandolfini,
tury England. These poems, which instruct a originally built by Leonardo d’Arezzo and
painter or sculptor to make a work of art, are located near Bocaccio’s villa that was the
conceptual riffs on the ut pictura poesis tradi- Decameron setting. The fullest treatment
tion rather than a literal exhortation, and thus of this letter is in André Chastel, Art et
are a difference genre from the Renaissance humanisme à Florence au temps de Laurent le
villa poems discussed, although they may Magnifique (Paris, 1959), 148–9, who rejects a
have been the inspiration for Sperulo’s apos- hypothesis that the villa described by Ficino
trophes to Raphael. See John Hollander, The was actually built by Leonardo Bruni. On
Gazer’s Spirit: Poems Speaking to Silent Works of the letter, see also Ackerman, The Villa, 77;
Art (Chicago, 1995), 4, 23–4 and passim; Elegy Hartmut Biermann, “Lo sviluppo della villa
and Iambus with the Anacreontea, trans. J. M. toscana sotto l’influenza umanistica della
Edmonds (Cambridge, MA, 1954), vol. 2, corte di Lorenzo il Magnifico,” Bollettino del
Anacreontea, 3–5, 16, 17. Centro internazionale di studi Andrea Palladio
34. Virgil, Aeneid, i, 446ff. This passage was espe- 11 (1969): 36–46, at 40; Foster, “A Study
cially resonant for Medicean readers, for the of Lorenzo de’ Medici’s Villa at Poggio a
famous Riccardiana Virgil – the manuscript Caiano,” vol. 1, 21; Fabiani Giannetto, Medici
of the Aeneid illustrated by Apollonio di Gardens, 144.
Giovanni – depicts the palaces in Carthage 39. Richard Krautheimer, “The Panels in Urbino,
and Troy modeled after the Medici Palace Baltimore, and Berlin Reconsidered,” in The
in Florence. Discussed by Annabel Patterson, Renaissance from Brunelleschi to Michelangelo:The
Pastoral and Ideology: From Virgil to Valéry Representation of Architecture, ed. Henry Millon
(Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1987), 69–72. and Vittorio Lampugnani (Milan, 1994),
35. The Classical texts on such rhetorical 233–57.
exercises are: Cicero, De inventione rhetorica,
40. On Hellenistic sources of encomiastic
I, 39; Cicero, Auctor ad Herennium, iii, 16, 29 ekphrasis, Alex Hardie, Statius and the Silvae:
Poets, Patrons and Epideixis in the Graeco-Roman Hybrid History: The Antique Basilica with a
World (Liverpool, 1983), 128ff. Modern Dome,” in Old Saint Peter’s, Rome, ed.
41. It was Statius who first applied epideictic Rosamond McKitterick, John Osborne, Carol
formulas to poetry, as observed by Hardison, M. Richardson, and Joanna Story (Cambridge,
The Enduring Monument, 95. Hardie further 2013), 386–403, at 390–4.
calls Statius “the most important exponent 47. Susanna Morton Braund, “Praise and
of epideixis in poetry,” emphasizing Statius’ Protreptic in Early Imperial Panegyric: Cicero,
Neapolitan origins and thus his familiarity Seneca, Pliny,” in The Propaganda of Power: The
with Greek display poetry and rhetoric, which Role of Panegyric in Late Antiquity, ed. Mary
he infused into Latin literary models; in Hardie, Whitby (Leiden, 1998), 71 and passim.
Statius and the Silvae, 74ff, 91–102, and passim. 48. I am grateful to Curtis Dozier for this obser-
On rhetorical formulas in Statius’ poems, or vation. For the hortatory function of delib-
rhetorical poetry, Cancik, Untersuchungen, erative oratory, Quintilian, Institutio oratoria, iii,
34–7; and Friedländer, Johannes von Gaza, 8, 6.
Paulus Silentiarius und Prokopios von Gaza, 60–1 49. Braund, “Praise and Protreptic,” 68–74. On
and passim. For Statius’ inventive blurring of Statius’ Silvae, iv, 1, in which Janus as spokes-
genres, see below notes 44 and 52. person exhorts Domitian to join him in
42. As shown by O’Malley, Praise and Blame in founding a new age of peace, K. M. Coleman,
Renaissance Rome. On the importance of epi- Statius. Silvae iv (Oxford, 1988), 62–5.
deictic rhetoric for Renaissance lyric poetry, 50. Egidio of Viterbo composed an exhorta-
Hardison, The Enduring Monument, 95 and passim. tion urging Pope Leo to finish rebuilding
43. The inclusion of architecture was common by St. Peter’s, but in metaphorical rather than
the second century ce, as in Pliny’s panegyric specific terms (it will be like the Tower of
of Trajan, and the practice was revived in the David), so once again we are not dealing
quattrocento by writers including Leonardo with a direct model for Sperulo’s poem. In
Bruni and Giannozo Manetti, as noted by Historia viginti saecolorum, Bib. Angelica ms.
Smith, “Christian Rhetoric in Eusebius’ Lat. 502, fol. 112, partially cited in Marcello
Panegyric,” 229–31. Fagiolo dell’Arco, “La Basilica Vaticana come
44. For the way Statius draws attention to his tempio-mausoleo ‘Inter duas metas’. Le idee
creative adaptation of Homeric ekphrasis in his e i progetti di Alberti, Filarete, Bramante,
villa poems, Adam R. Marshall, “Statius and Peruzzi, Sangallo e Michelangelo,” in Antonio
the Veteres: Silvae 1.3 and the Homeric House da Sangallo il Giovane, 208 n. 19, and discussed
of Alcinous,” Scholia: Natal Studies in Classical by Smith, Architecture in the Culture of Early
Antiquity 18 (2009): 78–88. Humanism, 52. For another example, chroni-
45. As noted by Smith and O’Connor, Building clers of Leo’s 1515 Florentine entry recorded
the Kingdom, 66–8. They interpret Manetti’s that a wooden relief sculpture of San Lorenzo
laudatio of Nicholas’ architectural patronage decorating the unexecuted façade of the
as a posthumous effort to salvage the pontiff ’s eponymous family church was accompanied
reputation by refuting criticisms of his build- by an inscribed plaque exhorting the pontiff
ing project as an incomplete, vainglorious to complete the façade. This conceit put the
effort and instead describing it as a unified, exhortation in the mouth of San Lorenzo,
grand vision. For this and varied interpreta- although the brevity of an inscription did
tions about the reality of the projects Manetti not allow for a specific or detailed prescrip-
describes, Smith and O’Connor, Building the tion: Ilaria Ciseri, L’ingresso trionfale di Leone
Kingdom, 191–2 and 203–4. X in Firenze nel 1515 (Florence, 1990), 137–8
46. Francesco Albertini, “Opusculum de mira- with earlier sources; Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio
bilibus novae & veteris urbis Romae (Rome, de’ Medici as a Patron of Art,” 238; and Reiss,
1510),” in Five Early Guides to Rome and “The Patronage of the Medici Popes at San
Florence, ed. Peter Murray (Farnborough, Lorenzo in the Historiographic Tradition,” in
1972), especially book 3, “De aedificiis ab Iulio San Lorenzo: A Florentine Church, ed. Robert
Secundo constructis” and passim; see also the Gaston and Louis A. Waldman (Florence,
discussion in Bram Kempers, “Epilogue. A forthcoming).
N O TE S TO PAG E S 9 4 –97 267
51. For the poem as a metonym of the patron in 56. The work was written in late 1525 and first
French villa poetry, Galand-Hallyn, “Aspects published in 1526, although perhaps known,
du discours,” 143. circulated, or performed earlier; for which,
52. As noted, Statius’ villa poems were a model Reynolds, Renaissance Humanism at the Court
for the assemblage of elements from many of Clement VII. On the “professional” exercise
genres to form a new one – specifically the of poetry, ibid. 119, 339–40 n. 396 and passim.
combination of encomium and extended 57. On Berni’s role as secretary sorting Giberti’s
description; see above, p. 93 and notes 41 unwanted mail, ibid. 198–9 and 299 n. 261,
and 44. For the silva from Statius forward as and for his description of the lavish volumes,
a “cocktail” of literary and rhetorical styles 190–3. For Sperulo’s booklet, see Appendix ii.
that resists generic classifications, Galand- 58. For the poet as builder/manual worker, ibid.
Hallyn, Les yeux de l’éloquence, 24–7, 30 n. 35, 186–9, 249–54 nn. 88–106, 204–5, and 313 n.
and passim. On Statius’ blurring of genres, 315; in particular, Berni declares that “ll primo
see also Newmyer, The Silvae of Statius, 17ff, exercizio de’ poeti fusse il murare” (186) and
40, and passim. For Statius’ engagement with “tutti i poeti alla fin sono o muratori o mano-
epic poetry to develop new types of ekphrasis vali” (188).
and panegyric, Marshall, “Spectandi Voluptas.” 59. Frommel, Raffaello architetto, 311–14; Frommel,
Although Sperulo does not identify it as such, “La Villa Madama e la tipologia della
his poem is a quintessential silva in the sense villa romana nel cinquecento”; Frommel,
of its being a collection of varied material, dis- “Raffaello e Antonio da Sangallo il Giovane,”
cussed below pp. 97–8 and notes 64–6. 289–97, 308; Frommel, “Die architektonische
53. It remains unclear whether Blosio’s and Gallo’s Planung der Villa Madama”; Frommel and
poems were specifically intended as proposals; Adams, The Architectural Drawings of Antonio
Quinlan-McGrath, in her dissertation, sug- da Sangallo the Younger, 131ff, cat. entries by
gested the possibility that the poets played a Fritz-Eugen Keller; Coffin, “Plans of the Villa
formative role in the Farnesina decorations, Madama”; and Beltramini and Burns, Andrea
although she did not return to this idea in Palladio e la villa veneta, 239–46, with cat.
her subsequent articles on the two poems: entries by Burns and Scimemi.
Quinlan-McGrath, “The Villa of Agostino 60. Although most scholars converge on 1519 as a
Chigi,” 319, 321, 399, 407, 520. likely date for the Letter to Leo, Shearman con-
54. As noted above, Poliziano’s poems, though vincingly reviews the evidence that the man-
written during the construction of Poggio a uscripts were revised over a period of years,
Caiano, were not specific or prescriptive in perhaps from 1514/15 to 1519: Shearman,
the same way as Sperulo’s. Christina Strunck Sources, vol. 1, 538–43. On the dating of the
has proposed the intriguing hypothesis that Villa Madama letter to winter 1518–19, ibid.
Pontano’s 1493 poem “De hortis Hesperidum” 410 and 434, with earlier bibliography.
was written as a Medici panegyric, which was 61. As noted by Frommel, “Die architektoni
later picked up by Giovio as the source for sche Planung der Villa Madama,” 85. A letter
iconography at Poggio a Caiano: Strunck, of 5 August 1518 documents plans for ship-
“Pontormo und Pontano. Zu Paolo Giovios ping building materials to the site by Giuliano
Programm für die beiden Lünettenfresken Leno, the foremost project manager in early
in Poggio a Caiano,” Marburger Jahrbuch für cinquecento Rome, who also managed aspects
Kunstwissenschaft 26 (1999): 117–37, at 127; one of the Fabbrica of St. Peter’s; see Shearman,
can speculate whether Pontano might origi- Sources, vol. 1, 360 (doc. 1518/56); and Ivana
nally have intended the poem as a contribution Ait and Manuel Vaquero Piñeiro, Dai casali alla
of imagery for Poggio, a building project with fabbrica di San Pietro. I Leni: uomini d’affari del
which he was surely familiar given his close Rinascimento (Rome, 2000,) 167, 194 n. 220,
contacts with Piero de’ Medici and Poliziano. 200 n. 253.
The ongoing research of Christine Smith on 62. Frommel, Raffaello architetto, 311–12, 337.
late quattrocento architectural ekphrasis may 63. For this set piece and the relation of the pro-
provide further examples of this genre. posed iconography to the setting in Leo’s
55. For this trope, see Chapter 2, p. 54 and note 50; loggia, and its antecedent in the Lateran bene
note 58 below; and p. 176. diction loggia, see Chapter 5, pp. 101–5.
268 NOTES T O PA GE S 98– 10 0
64. Most significantly, in Bonaventure’s famous for- xviii–xxvii; Giovanna Sapori,“Dal programma
mulation of the four ways to write a book, the al dipinto: Annibal Caro, Taddeo Zuccari,
roles of scriptor, compilator, commentator, and auc- Giorgio Vasari,” in Storia della lingua e sto-
tor each depend on others’ writings to varying ria dell’arte in Italia: dissimmetrie e intersezioni.
degrees: Alastair J. Minnis, The Medieval Theory Atti del III convegno Associazione per la storia
of Authorship: Scholastic and Literary Attitudes in della lingua italiana, ed. Vittorio Casale and
the Later Middle Ages (Philadelphia, 2012), 94–5. Paolo d’Achille (Florence, 2004), 199–220;
65. Newmyer, The Silvae of Statius, 3–7. The word Hochmann, et al., Programme et invention;
silva was used to refer to a compendium of and Jérémie Koering, “‘Intrecciamento’ –
genres or ideas by Suetonius, De grammaticis et Benedetto Lampridio, Giulio Romano et la
rhetoribus, 10, 5; I am grateful to Curtis Dozier poétique de la salle de Troie,” Zeitschrift für
for this observation. See also Poliziano’s silva Kunstgeschichte 75 (2012): 335–50. On programs
Manto, 40, comparing the abundance of varied for ephemeral festival decorations, R. A.
material in poems/woods, in Poliziano, Silvae, Scorza, “Vincenzo Borghini and Invenzione:
8–9; and for a discussion of docta varietas in The Florentine Apparato of 1565,” Journal of
Poliziano’s Sylvae, Clare E. L. Guest, “Varietas, the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 44 (1981):
poikilia and the silva in Poliziano,” Hermathena 47–75. For the important quattrocento exam-
183 (2007): 9–48. ple of Leonardo Bruni’s rejected program for
66. As noted by Guest, ibid. 30–1, with respect to Ghiberti’s Florence Baptistery doors, Richard
Poliziano and Statius. Krautheimer and Trude Krautheimer-Hess,
67. D’Amico, Renaissance Humanism, 115–43 and Lorenzo Ghiberti (Princeton, 1982), vol. 1, 169–
passim. 72, and vol. 2, 372–3. See also the discussion in
68. Martines, Society and History in English Chapter 6 of the roles of artists and advisors,
Renaissance Verse, 14; Rijser, Raphael’s Poetics. with additional related bibliography.
3. See Hope, “Artists, Patrons, and Advisers”; and
5 M ETAS TRU C T UR E S OF WOR D especially Clare Robertson, “Annibal Caro as
AN D I M AG E Iconographer. Sources and Method,” Journal of
the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 45 (1982):
1. As noted by Julian Kliemann,“Dall’invenzione 160–81.
al programma,” in Programme et invention dans 4. An early example is Guarino da Verona’s writ-
l’art de la Renaissance, ed. Michel Hochmann, ten program for the studiolo at Belfiore, of
Julian Kliemann, Philippe Morel, and Jérémie 1447: Anna K. Eörsi, “Lo studiolo di Leonello
Koering (Rome and Paris, 2008), 17–26. On d’Este e il programma di Guarino da Verona,”
the use of the terms invenzione and fantasia, see Acta historiae artium Academaie scientiarum hun-
also Salvatore Settis, “Artisti e committente fra garicae 21 (1976): 15–52, a source I owe to
quattro e cinquecento,” Storia d’Italia: Annali Nicoletta Marcelli.
4. Intellettuali e potere, ed. Corrado Vivanti 5. Weil-Garris and d’Amico, The Renaissance
(Turin, 1981), 701–61, at 735 and passim. Cardinal’s Ideal Palace, 90–7.
Michel Hochmann draws a parallel between 6. Cardinal Giulio expressed these wishes in a let-
the reverse ekphrasis – that is, paintings based ter to his agent Mario Maffei about the villa
on ekphrastic descriptions of paintings by then of 17 June 1520: “Quanto alle storie o fabule:
lost – and the work of the iconographic advi- piacemi siano cose varie, né mi curo siano
sor devising programs: Hochmann, “L’ekphrasis distese e continuate, e sopratutto desidero siano
efficace. L’influence des programmes cose note, acciò non bisogni che ‘l pintore vi
iconographiques sur les peintures et les décors aggiunga, come fece quello che scrisse: Questo
italiens au xvie siècle,” in Peinture et rhétorique: è un cavallo … Cose oscure come ho detto non
Actes du colloque de l’Académie de France à Rome, voglio.” In Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 603. For
ed. Olivier Bonfait (Paris, 1994), 43–76. Giulio reading Cortesi, Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio
2. On program and invention, Charles Hope, de’ Medici as a Patron of Art.”
“Artists, Patrons, and Advisers in the Italian 7. I am discussing notions of program or mean-
Renaissance,” in Patronage in the Renaissance, ing in architecture other than the mean-
293–343; Creighton Gilbert, Italian Art 1400– ings of the orders, or notions of decorum or
1500: Sources and Documents (Evanston, 1980), magnificence.
N O TE S TO PAG E S 10 0– 103 269
8. See Anthony Grafton, Leon Battista Alberti: an ein bisher unbekanntes Sarkophagfragment
Master Builder of the Italian Renaissance (New (Opladen, 1970), 67.
York, 2000), chs. viii, ix and passim, with ear- 18. “Da questo luoco si può vedere per retta linea
lier bibliography; and below p. 150 for the colla strada que va dalla villa al Ponte Molle, el bel
laboration of architects and humanists at the paese, el Tivere et Roma.” Raphael/Dewez, 25
Cancelleria. §11.
9. “an almost precise correspondence can 19. Such axial alignments of loggia–road–view
be established between the aesthetic ideas can be traced from Augustan Rome to
expressed in The Courtier and the artistic Fascist propaganda newsreels; examples con-
achievement of the circle in direct contact temporaneous with Villa Madama include
with the persons who appear in the dialogue. Raphael’s papal loggia envisioned in The Fire
Obviously one should not force the analogy. It in the Borgo fresco, Antonio da Sangallo’s U
would be naïve to propose an influence exerted 72ar and U 73ar for the St. Peter’s benedic-
by the ideas of Bembo or Castiglione on tion loggia, and the Castel Sant’Angelo log-
painters and architects; nor can the respective gia overlooking the eponymous bridge. For
aesthetic theories elaborated by these intellec- notions of framed vision and dominion sym-
tuals be discerned by observing works of art bolized in such ensembles, Tafuri, Interpreting
[which presumably express them]. Rather, we the Renaissance, 79 (about Castel Sant’Angelo);
can best explore this terrain by using the con- Denis Ribouillault, Rome en ses jardins: paysage
cept of diffuse mentalities as our guide; meta- et pouvoir au XVIe siècle (Paris, 2013), 257–315
languages that obliquely traverse the spaces (on Urbino and Pienza); D. Fairchild Ruggles,
of architectural language, conditioning their Gardens, Landscape, and Vision in the Palaces of
organization and liberating their potentials.” Islamic Spain (University Park, PA, 2000), 94,
Manfredo Tafuri, Interpreting the Renaissance: 106ff, 203–8 (on the parallel tradition of the
Princes, Cities, Architects, trans. Daniel Sherer mirador in Hispano-Islamic palaces).
(New Haven, 2006), 7. 20. Discussed by Quednau, Sala di Costantino, 352,
10. James S. Ackerman, “The Geopolitics of 392. It remains unclear when the Raphael
Venetan Architecture in the time of Titian,” in school decided to include the villa in this
Distance Points: Essays in Theory and Renaissance composition, since it does not appear in the
Art and Architecture (Cambridge, MA, 1991), Louvre modello.
453–94, at 453–4. 21. Marc Dykmans, S.J., “Du Monte Mario à
11. Smith and O’Connor, Building the Kingdom, ix l’escalier de Saint-Pierre de Rome,” Mélanges
and passim. d’archéologie et d’histoire 80 (1968): 547–94;
12. Marie Tanner, Jerusalem on the Hill: Rome Thomas Ashby, ed., La campagna romana al
and the Vision of St. Peter’s in the Renaissance tempo di Paolo III: mappa della campagna romana
(London and Turnhout, 2010), and Nicholas del 1547 di Eufrosino della Volpaia (Rome, 1914),
Temple, Renovatio urbis: Architecture, Urbanism 64; Giuseppe Tomassetti, La campagna romana:
and Ceremony in the Rome of Julius II (London, antica, medioevale e moderna, vol. 3 (Rome,
2011) 1976), 27; Giuseppe Aldo Rossi, Monte Mario:
13. To borrow the title of Cox-Rearick’s Dynasty profilo storico, artistico e ambientale del colle più alto
and Destiny in Medici Art. di Roma (Rome, 1996), 76–7; Sandro Santolini,
14. As shown by Shearman, “A Functional “Due esempi di residenze suburbane sul
Interpretation of Villa Madama.” Monte Mario a Roma.” See Elet, “Raphael
15. For the Renovatio imperii, Stinger, The and the Roads to Rome” for further discus-
Renaissance in Rome, 235–54; for earlier Medici- sion of this toponym.
imperial imagery, Cox-Rearick, Dynasty and 22. Castiglione in Rome to Isabella d’Este in
Destiny; for Leonine Constantinian ideology, Mantua: “[Raphael] fassi una vigna anchor
Quednau, Sala di Costantino. del Rev.mo Medici, che serà cosa excellentis-
16. A fuller exposition of this complex multime- sima; nostro S.re vi va spesso, e questa è sotto la
dia construct with additional bibliography is Croce de Monte Mario,” in Shearman, Sources,
presented in Elet, “Raphael and the Roads to vol. 1, 459.
Rome.” 23. As noted by Shearman, “A Functional
17. Erich Dinkler, Der Einzug in Jerusalem: Interpretation of Villa Madama,” 316, without
Ikonographische Untersuchungen im Anschluss further discussion of the symbolism.
24. This liturgy developed from the pagan pro- Castiglione, and Isabella d’Este) arrived via
cession of the Robigalia. For which, Joseph a road that ascended so gradually one barely
Dyer, “Roman Processions of the Major noticed: as Raphael specified, “salisce tanto
Litany (litaniae maiores) from the Sixth to the dolcemente che non pare de salire, ma essendo
Twelfth Century,” in Roma Felix – Formation giunto alla villa non se accorgie de essere in
and Reflections of Medieval Rome, ed. Éamonn alto e de dominare tutto il paese” (Raphael/
Ó Carragáin and Carol Neuman de Vegvar Dewez, 22 §3). Once at the villa, these privi-
(Aldershot, 2007), 112–37. I am grateful to leged guests could share the views that sym-
Joseph Dyer for discussing this material with bolized papal dominion. Formal embassies
me and generously sharing further unpub- entering Rome from the north, by contrast,
lished research, and to Meredith Fluke for had to ascend the steep road from the Milvian
bringing his work to my attention. Bridge to the papal hospitium far above, per-
25. For sacred villeggiatura, Amanda Lillie, “The forming their trek of obeisance. Once there,
Patronage of Villa Chapels and Oratories near had the planned amphitheater been built, they
Florence,” 23–4; Lillie, “Cappelle e chiese could have looked down the vista on axis to
delle ville Medicee ai tempi di Michelozzo”; the bridge, reinforcing the route of their jour-
Lillie, “Fiesole: Locus Amoenus or Penitential ney and its meaning.
Landscape?”; Nadja Aksamija, “Landscape and 31. For the Sala di Costantino as Leo’s throne
Sacredness in Late Renaissance ‘Villeggiatura’,” room, Philipp P. Fehl, “Raphael as Historian.
in Delizie in Villa (Florence, 2008), 33–63; Poetry and Historical Accuracy in the Sala di
Ribouillault, Rome en ses jardins, 133–212. On Costantino,” Artibus et historiae 14 (1993): 9–76,
the interest in ancient triumphal processional at 15, 49; for other functions for religious and
routes and topographical symbolism for urban court rituals, banquets, and consistories, Guido
planning, architecture, and papal ceremonial, Cornini, ed., Raphael in the Apartments of Julius
Temple, Renovatio urbis. II and Leo X (Milan, 1993), 167; and Quednau,
26. The Coronation of Charlemagne fresco evoked Sala di Costantino, 44–70.
legends associating Charlemagne with the 32. As noted by Quednau, Sala di Costantino, 352.
Monte Mario; for which, Elet, “Raphael and 33. The villa itself has never been visible from the
the Roads to Rome.” Vatican, as it is behind a bend in the hillside;
27. Loren Partridge, “The Farnese Circular but the Monte Mario dominates the distant
Courtyard at Caprarola. God, Geopolitics, view due north-northwest from the Vatican, as
Geneaology and Gender,” Art Bulletin 83 depicted in the background of the Vision of
(2001): 259–93, at 262, 268–9; Hartmut Constantine fresco in the Sala di Costantino.
Biermann, “Der runde Hof Betrachtungen 34. Frances Yates, The Art of Memory (London,
zur Villa Madama,” Mitteilungen des 1966), ch. 2; Carruthers, The Craft of Thought,
Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz 30 (1986): 10–21, 40–4; Mary Carruthers, The Book of
493–536. Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture
28. A suggestion I owe to Sheryl Reiss; for the (Cambridge, 2008), 89–98; Diane Favro, “The
umbilicus mundi in relation to Michelangelo’s Roman Forum and Roman Memory,” Places
designs for the Capitoline, see Stinger, 5 (1988): 17–24; Favro, The Urban Image of
Renaissance in Rome, 264. Augustan Rome (Cambridge, 1996), 5–7; Denis
29. Either route led to the Porta Viridaria; the Ribouillault, “Landscape ‘All’antica’ and topo
portals were reconfigured and renamed graphical Anachronism in Roman Fresco
later in the cinquecento, so the Catasto Painting of the Sixteenth Century,” Journal of
Alessandrino map shows these roads leading the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 71 (2008):
to Porta Angelica Castello, and the Prati road 211–37, at 230–1; Amanda Lillie, “Memory of
came to be called Via Angelica. Place: Luogo and Lineage in the Countryside,”
30. Of course, the villa would accommodate in Art, Memory, and Family in Renaissance
different audiences who arrived by differ- Florence, ed. Giovanni Ciappelli and Patricia
ent routes – and even the grading of roads Rubin (Cambridge, 2000), 195–214; Karl
reflected these distinctions.The pope, Cardinal Galinsky’s Memoria Romana project, www
Giulio, and their personal guests arriving from .utexas.edu/research/memoria/, which I owe
the Vatican (who would include Cardinals, to Rachel Kousser; see Vasaly, Representations,
N O TE S TO PAG E S 105–10 6 271
41 and passim on the importance of “meta- (Hildesheim, 1977); and Schröter, “Der
physical topography.” Vatikan als Hügel Apollons und der Musen.
35. This construct was actually part of a larger Kunst und Panegyrik von Nikolaus V. bis
urban plan for Rome; on the relation Julius II,” Römische Quartalschrift für christliche
to Raphael’s other Leonine urban pro- Altertumskunde und Kirchengeschichte 75 (1980):
jects, Manfredo Tafuri, “‘Roma instaurata’. 208–40.
Strategie urbane e politiche pontificie nella 40. “Le statoe che sono state tolte da questo
Roma del primo ’500,” in Raffaello architetto, magnifico et ornatissimo luogo primieramente
59–106, at 85, 94–8; Hubertus Günther, “Die sono quelle delle nove Muse che siedono, di
Straßenplanung unter den Medici-Päpsten in marmo pario, che sono state trasportate nella
Rom (1513–1534),” Jahrbuch des Zentralinstituts vigna di papa Clemente VII presso Roma sul
für Kunstgeschichte (1985): 237–93. colle detto Monte Mare del Vaticano.” Cited
36. Cox-Rearick, Dynasty and Destiny, 77 and n. in Lefevre, Villa Madama, 175.
58. Poliziano, in his silva Ambra about Homer, 41. Bober and Rubinstein, 80, §40; Rausa,“Marmi
Lorenzo, and Poggio a Caiano, says “Gloria antichi,” 159–61, 184, and cat. 1, 4, 10–14; Rausa,
musarum Laurens” (line 600): del Lungo, Prose “Un gruppo statuario dimenticato: il ciclo
volgari, 333–68. The importance of Apollo–sun delle Muse c.d. Thespiades da Villa Adriana,” in
imagery throughout Villa Madama’s deco- Villa Adriana: paesaggio antico e ambiente moderno:
rations also reflects these associations with elementi di novità e ricerche in corso. Atti del con-
Lorenzo. vegno, Rome, 2000, ed. Anna Maria Reggiani
37. Giulio Simone, Oratio de poetica et musarum tri- (Milan, 2002), 43–51; J. Raeder, Die statuari-
umpho, 1517, fol. eii; cited in Louis Cellauro, sche Ausstattung der Villa Hadriana bei Tivoli
“Iconographical Aspects of the Renaissance (Frankfurt-am-Main and Bern, 1983), 48–55;
Villa and Garden: Mount Parnassus, Pegasus Anne-Marie Leander Touati, Ancient Sculptures
and the Muses,” Studies in the History of in the Royal Museum (Stockholm, 1998), 111ff;
Gardens & Designed Landscapes 23 (2003): 43. Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron
Leo’s association with Apollo also evokes his of Art,” 387, 408 n. 179; Coffin, The Villa in the
role as healer. Life of Renaissance Rome, 255; Hans Henrik
38. In antiquity, the Monte Mario was known Brummer, The Muse Gallery of Gustavus III
as the Clivus Cinnae, one of three hills com- (Stockholm, 1972); and Antonio Blanco and
prising the Montes Vaticani. The name Monte Manuel Lorente, Catalogo de la Escultura Museo
Mari is documented as early as the twelfth del Prado, second edition (Madrid, 1969). The
century, but generally the medieval names Muses were dispersed in two groups: Queen
for it were Monte Malo, as in Dante, or Mons Christina of Sweden requested in 1681 to
Gaudii (Mount of Joy or Montjoie). On the purchase the four seated Muses, which she
history of Monte Mario, Rossi, Monte Mario, installed in her Palazzo Riario alla Lungara,
12–13; Tomassetti, La campagna romana, 80ff; along with four other ancient Muses and two
Dykmans, “Du Monte Mario à l’escalier de modern ones, presenting herself as the tenth
Saint-Pierre de Rome,” 549, 552; “Cinnae cli- Muse (as Isabella d’Este had been celebrated).
vus,” in LTUR Suburbium, vol. 2, 102–3 (M. Her Villa Madama Muses subsequently passed
Macciocca); Luciana Frapiselli, Monte Mario: through the Azzolini and Odescalchi collec-
finestra su Roma (Rome, 1998); Frapiselli, La tions to Philip V of Spain, and thus are now
via francigena nel Medioevo da Monte Mario a in the Prado. In the following century, the
San Pietro (Rome, 2003); Frapiselli, Presenze di remaining Tivoli Muses at Villa Madama, after
grandi a Monte Mario: all’ombra di un antico pino some peregrinations, were sold by Giovanni
(Rome, 1979); and Luigi Pallottino, ed., Monte Volpato in 1784 to King Gustavus III for
Mario tra cronica e storia: mostra di dipinti, disegni, his Pavilion of the Muses. For the confusion
stampe e fotographie (Rome, 1991). about the later provenance of the Muse with
39. For earlier treatments of Parnassus, Elisabeth nebris (either in Stockholm or location cur-
Schröter, Die Ikonographie des Themas Parnass rently unknown, ex-collection Abamalech)
vor Raffael: die Schrift- und Bildtraditionen see Leander Touati, Ancient Sculptures in the
von der Spätantike bis zum 15. Jahrhundert Royal Museum, 126–31.
42. Rausa, “Marmi antichi,” cat. 18 (Melpomene makes this a logical assumption, although
Farnese), cat. 15 (Niobide). Raphael tended to transpose his ancient finds
43. “Nessuno, né nel cinquecento né nel seicento, into radically different ensembles.
sospettava che le due quaterne di statue (o 48. Although these sculpture niches were not
quantomeno una di queste) appartenessero indicated in plan in U 314a, they were origi-
tipologicamente a un celebre ciclo che nal to the villa, because they are shown in
sarebbe riemerso solo dopo il fortunato scavo Palladio’s drawing of the fishpond in the
del 1774 nella tiburtina villa detta di Cassio, a 1540s (RIBA, Palladio x/18, reproduced in
non molta distanza da Villa Adriana.” Rausa, Frommel, Raffaello architetto, 339). That they
“Un gruppo statuario dimenticato,” 44. are shallow indentations, rather than full-
44. It is interesting that later the same year Baccio depth niches might explain why they were
Bandinelli executed his marble figure of not shown in U 314a; in any case, this style
Orpheus/Apollo to be installed in the courtyard of vestigial niche would be well suited to the
of the Palazzo Medici in Florence, although sculptures of the Muses, which are too deep
there is disagreement over whether this com- and three-dimensional for traditional sculp-
mission was initiated in 1518 (Francesco ture niches. Thus, the figures of the Muses
Caglioti, Donatello e i Medici: storia del David would exist in the space of the ambulatory,
e della Giuditta [Florence, 2000], 353) or after and at ground level, enhancing the effect of
the death of Lorenzo di Piero in May 1519 modern poets and patrons mingling with the
when Cardinal Giulio began to take the Muses.
reins of Florentine government (J. Rogers 49. The seated Muses range from 50 to 64 inches
Mariotti, “Selections from a ledger of Cardinal tall and the standing ones from 70 to 75 inches
Giovanni de’ Medici, 1512–1513,” Nuovi studi tall (leaving aside the standing headless Farnese
6–7 [2001–2]: 103–46). Melpomene at 52 inches). The niches range
45. None of Heemskerck’s drawings of the Muses from 90 to 94 inches tall (inside dimensions).
provides any context, and the sculptures Although there has been significant restora-
were dispersed before the 1783/6 inventory tion of this grotto, the basic configuration and
compiled by Domenico Venuti and Philipp shape of the exedrae and niches is original, as
Hackert, the only inventory of the villa’s sculp- documented in Palladio’s drawing of the 1540s
tures that specified locations; for which, see showing the same configuration visible today:
Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” 155–158 with earlier three exedrae, each containing three niches in
sources. Pier Leone Ghezzi left an annotated alternating square and rounded shapes. (Palladio
drawing of the Muse with nebris dated 1726, shows the central exedra itself as rectangular
noting that the figure “stà nell’entrare nel rather than semicircular, although it is unclear
primo casino in Villa Madama,” but the loca- whether this is documentary, or another of his
tion of a single figure two centuries after the creative corrections, e.g. adding an exedra to
Medici period is scarcely helpful: BAV, Cod. the garden loggia to render it symmetrical):
Ottob. Lat. 3109, fol. 106, pub. Lucia Guerrini, Palladio, RIBA X/18, reproduced in Frommel
Marmi antichi nei disegni di Pier Leone Ghezzi et al., Raffaello architetto, 339. The height of the
(Città del Vaticano, 1971), pl. xvi. niches must be very close to the original as
46. For the taste for completed sculpture, and res- they are delimited by the string course that
toration of sculpture at the Medici villa, Elet, runs above them, visible in Palladio’s drawing
“Papal villeggiatura,” 178–80. as it is today; see Figures 53–5.
47. Unless perhaps they were intended for a nym- 50. On ancient musaea, Birgitta Tamm, Auditorium
phaeum beneath the theater. The theater set- and Palatium: A Study on Assembly-rooms in
ting was suggested by Rausa, “Marmi antichi,” Roman Palaces during the 1st Century B.C. and
172, on the basis that the Muses were found the 1st Century A.D. (Stockholm, 1963), 168–
in the so-called Odeion, actually a theater, at 79; and G. Lugli, “Nymphaea sive musaea,” in
Hadrian’s villa. Ligorio recorded the find spot, Atti del IV congresso nazionale dei studi romani
which was confirmed by later excavations, (Rome, 1938), 155–68. For changing notions
although we do not know that Raphael and his of the term in the Renaissance, Paula Findlen,
circle knew this fact. Kathleen Christian also “The Museum: Its Classical Etymology and
hypothesizes a theater setting: Empire without Renaissance Geneaology,” Journal of the History
End, 341. The suitability of Muses for a theater of Collections 1 (1989): 59–78.
N O TE S TO PAG E S 10 9–115 273
51. Pliny, Natural History, xxxvi, 42, 154: “We for water theater. Also, drawings by Sangallo for
must not forget to discuss also the character- a rustic nymphaeum at the northwestern, out-
istics of pumice. This name, of course, is given ermost edge of the Medici villa gardens suggest
to the hollowed rocks in the buildings called that they were thinking of yet another water
by the Greeks ‘Homes of the Muses’, where theater at the villa, although perhaps slightly
such rocks hang from the ceilings so as to later in the planning process than the fishpond.
create an artificial imitation of a cave.” (Non 60. For these ensembles and the descriptions of
praetermittenda est et pumicum natura. appel- them known in the Renaissance, Katherine M.
lantur quidem ita erosa saxa in aedificiis, quae D. Dunbabin, “Convivial Spaces: Dining and
musaea vocant, dependentia ad imaginem Entertainment in the Roman Villa,” Journal of
specus arte redendam.) Roman Archaeology 9 (1996): 66–80; A. F. Stewart,
52. Charles Percier and P. F. L. Fontaine recorded “To Entertain an Emperor: Sperlonga, Laokoon
that those niches had decoration en rocaille; and Tiberius at the Dinner Table,” Journal of
Percier and Fontaine, Choix des plus célèbres mai- Roman Studies 67 (1977): 76–90; Ann Kuttner,
sons de plaisance de Rome et de ses environs, mesu- “Delight and Danger in the Roman Water
rées et dessinées (Paris, 1809), 30, planche XI. Garden: Sperlonga and Tivoli,” in Landscape
53. Propertius, Elegies, iii, 3. Design and the Experience of Motion, ed. Michel
54. D. Roux, “Le val des Muses et les Musées chez Conan (Washington, DC, 2003), 103–156.
les auteurs anciens,” Bulletin de Correspondence For the similarity to the water pond-theater
Hellénique 78 (1954): 38ff. in the ancient villa near the Arcinelli, first
55. Raphael/Dewez §16. noted by Neuerburg, see Burns, “Raffaello
56. For a recent roundup of cinquecento exam- e ‘quell’antiqua architectura’,” in Raffaello
ples and sources on Musea, with earlier bib- architetto, ed. Frommel et al., 393 with earlier
liography, see Cellauro, “Iconographical bibliography. Although it is unclear exactly
Aspects of the Renaissance Villa and Garden,” what Raphael could have seen of the Villa
and Cellauro, “The Casino of Pius IV in the Vopiscus, later excavations revealed a tripar-
Vatican,” Papers of the British School at Rome 63 tite, concrete barrel-vaulted loggia housing
(1995): 183–214. fishponds, tucked underneath a terrace in the
57. As discussed, Sperulo’s poem, Raphael’s letter, hillside – a configuration with striking simi-
and the design changes from U 273a to U larities to the final design for Villa Madama’s
314a seem to have been taking place in early fishpond and adjacent grottoes; for Vopiscus’
1519.That Sperulo was planning for the instal- villa, James Higginbotham, Piscinae: Artificial
lation of the Muses and Raphael’s descrip- Fishponds in Roman Italy (Chapel Hill, 1997),
tion of the fishpond using elements from 125–8 with additional sources. For further dis-
both plans shows that both issues were under cussion of Sperlonga, Baia, and the Serapeum/
consideration at this time. This is consistent Canopus of Hadrian’s Villa as possible models
with the traditional construction chronology, for dining at Villa Madama, see the discussion
which puts the execution of the fishpond at of the Coenatio Iovis in this chapter.
summer/fall of 1519. 61. As noted by Kathleen Wren Christian, “The
58. Notable among them Paolo Giovio’s Museo, Multiplicity of the Muses: The Reception of
for which, see Della Torre, “L’inedita opera Antique Images of the Muses in Italy, 1400–
prima di Paolo Giovio ed il museo”; and 1600,” in The Muses and their Afterlife in post-Clas-
the mid-sixteenth-century Casino deco- sical Europe, ed. Claudia Wedepohl, Kathleen W.
rated under the Medici Pope Pius IV, which Christian, and Clare E. L. Guest (London and
Cellauro proposes was an antiquarian recon- Turin, 2014), 103–53, at 119. On the connection
struction of a classical musaeum: “The Casino among Lymphae, Musae, and Nymphae, Cellauro,
of Pius IV,” 183–214. “The Casino of Pius IV,” 202–5.
59. The ponds at Poggioreale in Naples were 62.
Anna Cavallaro, “‘… quella casa è del
certainly another early example of this ele- papa …’: la villa della Magliana e la contesa
ment, and a model for Villa Madama. The per il suo possesso alla morte di Leone X,” in
Vatican Cortile del Belvedere and the Colonna Congiure e conflitti: l’affermazione della signoria
Nymphaeum in Genazzano, while different pontificia su Roma nel Rinascimento: politica, econo-
conceptions, were at times flooded for nauma- mia e cultura, ed. M. Chiabò et al. (Rome, 2013),
chie, perhaps contributing to the evolving taste 417–32, at 421; and Cummings, The Lion’s
274 NOTES T O PA GE S 115 – 121
Ear, 113–22. The attribution and dating of the poésie, humanisme, ed. R. Schilling (Paris,
frescoes are problematic; they were probably 1988), 152–257; Ulrich, “The Temple of Venus
executed by Gerino da Pistoia, commissioned Genetrix in the Forum of Caesar in Rome,”
by Cardinal Francesco Alidosi during the pon- 32–3, 236–7, 259–60. See also Dempsey,
tificate of Julius II, and finished after Alidosi’s The Portrayal of Love, 50ff and passim. I am
death during Leo’s pontificate; they are now indebted to Rachel Kousser for invaluable
in the Museo di Roma: Anna Cavallaro, La discussion and bibliography on this subject.
villa dei papi alla Magliana (Rome, 2005), 64–7; 67. Panofsky was the first to propose that the
and Coffin, The Villa in the Life of Renaissance central figure in Botticelli’s Primavera rep-
Rome, 120–2 (with earlier attribution to Lo resented Venus Genetrix: Erwin Panofsky,
Spagna). On La Magliana, see also Marco Dezzi Renaissance and Renascences in Western Art (New
Bardeschi, “L’opera di Giuliano da Sangallo e York, 1969), 195, 199, and passim. The notion
di Donato Bramante nella fabbrica della villa was upheld by Dempsey, who further sees
papale della Magliana,” L’arte 4 (1971): 111–73. Botticelli’s Birth of Venus as a “seaborne Venus
63.
On the culture of music at Leo’s convivia, Genetrix”: Dempsey, The Portrayal of Love, 41ff,
Cummings, The Lion’s Ear, chs. 4 and 5, and 44, and n. 63. At Poggio a Caiano, a figure of
passim. Venus Genetrix stands by a Medicean orange
64. Antonio da Sangallo the Younger’s U 1267a grove on the portico frieze, which represented
has drawings for the villa’s amphitheater on Lorenzo’s rule: Cox-Rearick, Dynasty and
the recto, and for a garden theater with foun- Destiny, 83 and passim.
tains for the rustic, northwestern area of the 68. As noted by Dempsey, The Portrayal of Love, 47
villa on the verso, suggesting the possibil- n. 66.
ity that the architects were thinking organi- 69. The fundamental ancient text about this deity
cally about various notions of theater, aquatic is Lucretius, De rerum natura, I, which famously
or otherwise; however, it remains unclear if begins, “Aeneadum genetrix, hominum
recto/verso were drawn at the same time. For divomque voluptas, alma Venus.” Discussed in
this drawing, Frommel, Raffaello architetto, 336; Cesarini Martinelli, Commento inedito alle Selve
Frommel and Adams, Architectural Drawings of di Stazio di Poliziano, 247ff; and Dempsey, The
Antonio da Sangallo, vol. 2, 225–6 (entry by F. E. Portrayal of Love, 44–8.
Keller). For an interesting analysis of Raphael’s 70. Frommel, “Bramantes ‘Ninfeo’ in Genazzano,”
and Sangallo’s diverse ideas for the villa’s main 137–60. Although the dating of Bramante’s
amphitheater (not yet being built in this phase) nymphaeum and its relative chronology with
and their reinterpretation of the theater all’antica, Raphael’s Villa Madama have been debated, I
Annarosa Cerutti Fusco,“Teatro all’antica e tea- follow the general consensus that the nym-
tro Vitruviano nell’interpretazione di Antonio phaeum was earlier.
da Sangallo il Giovane,” in Antonio da Sangallo il 71. Serlio notes in his description of Villa
Giovane, 455–69. Madama’s garden loggia that the semi-circle
65. Themes of the Muses and Parnassus would at the northeast end was left out, but his plan
later be enacted in Medici garden theaters corrects the asymmetry by adding it nonethe-
in the villa of Pratolino and in Catherine less: Serlio, book iii, ch, 4, fol. 70. Palladio’s
de’ Medici’s Tuileries, as well as in the Villa measured drawing of the villa’s plan also adds
Aldobrandini at Frascati; John Dixon Hunt, an exedra to correct the asymmetry (RIBA,
“Garden and Theatre,” in Garden and Grove: Palladio x/18, illustrated in Frommel et al.,
The Italian Renaissance Garden in the English Raffaello architetto, 339).
Imagination (Philadelphia, 1986), 59–72. 72. Pliny, Natural History, xxxvi, 24.
66.
The Venus Genetrix type was popular in 73. The myth appears in Jacobus de Voragine, The
antiquity for combining the generative Golden Legend, trans. William Granger Ryan
fecundity of Venus Felix with the peace- (Princeton, 1995), 38–9: “[Mary] was a virgin
giving victory of Venus Victrix. For which, both before and after giving birth, and the fact
Robert Schilling, La religion romaine de Vénus that she remained a virgin is assured by five
(Paris, 1982), 315–16 and passim; Schilling, proofs … The fifth proof is a miraculous event.
“L’évolution du culte de Vénus sous l’Empire As Pope Innocent III testifies, during the
romain,” in Dans le sillage de rome: religion, twelve years when Rome enjoyed peace, the
N O TE S TO PAG E S 121– 125 275
Romans built a Temple of Peace and placed 76. Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” ch. 3, 181–7 and pas-
a statue of Romulus in it. Apollo was asked sim; Rausa, “Marmi antichi,” 159 and cat. 27;
how long the temple would stand, and the Christian, Empire without End, 305, 340, 342.
answer was that it would be until a virgin bore 77. First suggested by Frommel, Raffaello architetto,
a child. Hearing this, the people said that the 312.
temple was eternal, for they thought it impos- 78. Fusco and Corti assume that the Jupiter was
sible that such a thing could happen; and an in the possession of the Medici by 1519, based
inscription, templum pacis aeternum, was on earlier erroneous translations of a few lines
carved over the doors. But in the very night of Sperulo’s March 1519 poem: Laurie Fusco
when Mary bore Christ, the temple crumbled and Gino Corti, “Giovanni Ciampolini (d.
to the ground.” Giovanni Rucellai echoes 1505), a Renaissance Dealer in Rome and his
this popular tale in his record of his trip to Collection of Antiquities,” Xenia 21 (1991): 18,
Rome, reflecting its long-standing popularity; 30; in fact, Sperulo does not mention a figural
in Alessandro Perosa, ed., Giovanni Rucellai ed Jupiter (see note 103 below).
il suo zibaldone, vol. 1, “Il zibaldone quaresi- 79. The contract of sale, negotiated by Giulio
male” (London, 1960), 67–78. On the iden- Romano, does not list specific works. It is
tification of the Basilica of Constantine and published in Rodolfo Lanciani, “La raccolta
Maxentius in the Middle Ages, see Louis antiquaria di Giovanni Ciampolini,” Bullettino
Duchesne, “Notes sur la topographie de della Commissione archeologica comunale di Roma
Rome au moyen-âge, I: Templum Romae, 27 (1899): 109–10.
Templum Romuli,” in Scripta minora: études de 80. John Shearman hypothesizes that Raphael
topographies romaine et de géographie ecclésiastique had studied the figure while it was in the
[Collection de l’École française de Rome XIII] Ciampolini collection, and proposes that
(Rome, 1973), 3–15. On the Temple of Peace a drawing of it in the Codex Escurialensis
and the art of memory, see Maria Fabricius is a copy after a lost Raphael drawing:
Hansen, “Out of Time: Ruins as Places of Shearman, “Raphael, Rome, and the Codex
Remembering in Italian Painting ca. 1500,” in Escurialensis,” Master Drawings 15.2 (1977): 128.
Memory & Oblivion: Proceedings of the XXIXth 81. For example, there is an Aspertini drawing
International Congress of the History of Art held in reconstructing this figure as a woman. For
Amsterdam, 1996 (Dordrecht, 1999), 797ff. the restoration of this figure, Elet, “Papal
74. Tanner, Jerusalem on the Hill, 69 and passim. villeggiatura,” 177–83, with earlier bibliography.
75. The colossal figure in the so-called Temple of 82. Sigismondo dei Conti, secretary to Julius
Peace was found during the reign of Innocent II, recorded that this had been Bramante’s
VIII (1484–92), who took its head to the intention.
Capitoline in 1486 or 1489; this w ell-known fig- 83. For literary sources on dining, Dunbabin,
ure of Constantine was variously misidentified in “Convivial Spaces.”
the Renaissance as Commodus, Domitian, Nero, 84. Pliny the Younger, Letters, v, 5, 19, 21.
or Apollo. See Bober and Rubinstein, 100, 216–17; 85. The annotation, “Columela / la villa sia
Tilmann Buddensieg, “Die Konstantinsbasilika partita in tre parte / urbana / la rustica /et
in einer Zeichnung Francescos di Giorgio und frutuaria”(Columella, De re rustica, i, 6) is jot-
der Marmorkoloss Konstantins des Grossen,” ted on U 1054av in Antonio da Sangallo’s
Münchner Jahrbuch der bildenden Kunst 13 (1962): hand, for which see Frommel and Adams,
37–48, especially n. 37. The Constantinian colos- Architectural Drawings of Antonio da Sangallo,
sus even had a pose similar to that of the Jupiter vol. 2, 197–8 with earlier bibliography (entry
Ciampolini – a seated figure with the right foot by Fritz-Eugen Keller). Opinions vary as to
forward and the left drawn back – although I am whether the drawing was a pensiero for an ideal
not sure this fact was known to the Renaissance, villa in the mode of Giuliano da Sangallo (De
and the pose is not uncommon; see H. Stuart Angelis d’Ossat, Biermann) or preparatory for
Jones, A Catalogue of the Ancient Sculptures Villa Madama (Frommel); whatever the draw-
Preserved in the Municipal Collections of Rome, vol. ing’s origin, the presence of many unusual fea-
2, The Sculptures of the Palazzo dei Conservatori tures that would characterize the actual plan of
(Oxford, 1926), 5–6, no. 2, and pl. I. I am indebted Villa Madama – e.g. the circular courtyard and
to Rachel Kousser for pointing out the parallel towers with dieate – show that this drawing,
to the Constantine colossus. and presumably Columella’s ideas, factored
into discussions of the Medici villa’s design at (Oxford, 2003), 114–16; Nicoletta Cassieri, La
some point. For this, see below p. 148. Grotta di Tiberio e il Museo archeologico nazionale,
86. Statius, Silvae, iv, 2. Rather than naming the Sperlonga (Rome, 2000); Dunbabin, “Convivial
dining hall specifically, Statius describes a ban- Spaces,” 72; Kuttner, “Delight and Danger
quet (cenae) in Domitian’s august edifice (tec- in the Roman Water Garden,” 128; Maria
tum augustum). For the importance of Statius Mangiafesta, “Fortuna del mito di Polifemo
to Sperulo and his circle, see Chapter 2. See nelle collezioni di antichità tra xv e xvii
also Juvenal, Satire, vii, 182, in Juvenal and secolo,” Bollettino d’arte 82 (1997): 44ff; Michael
Persius. Squire,“Dining with Polyphemus at Sperlonga
87. On the apsidal dining room in antiquity, see and Baiae,” Apollo 158, July (2003): 29–37; and
Simon P. Ellis,“Power,Architecture, and Decor: Stewart, “To Entertain an Emperor,” 76–90.
How the Late Roman Aristocrat Appeared to The dining grotto at Baia, in addition to the
his Guests,” in Roman Art in the Private Sphere: Polyphemus at one end, had imperial portraits
New Perspectives on the Architecture and Decor of down the side of the space, which would fur-
the Domus,Villa, and Insula, ed. Elaine K. Gazda ther make it an apt model for Sperulo’s con-
(Ann Arbor, 1991), 117–34, at 119ff. For a dis- ception of the garden loggia as ancestor gallery.
cussion of the commanding position of the For Baia, see Kuttner, “Delight and Danger in
emperor at the head of apsidal imperial ban- the Roman Water Garden,” 128 n. 103. For the
quet halls in relation to Statius’ ekphrasis, see Polyphemus group in the Serapeum/Canopus at
Newlands, Statius’ Silvae, 266–7. Hadrian’s Villa, Bernard Andreae, “I gruppi di
88. The Chigi frescoes were in part based on the Polifemo e di Scilla a Villa Adriana,” in Ulisse,
banquet scene from Apuleius and works of 342–4.
the Renaissance poet Niccolò da Correggio; 91. A later example of this practice was the portrait
for their ancient literary sources, Quinlan- head of Alessandro Farnese that was attached
McGrath, “The Villa of Agostino Chigi,” to an ancient figural sculpture of Julius Caesar
456–7 and passim; and John Shearman, “Die and placed on the Capitoline for his funeral
Loggia der Psyche in der Villa Farnesina und commemoration in 1593. Although this was a
die Probleme der Letzen Phase von Raffaels temporary installation, it nonetheless suggests
graphischem Stil,” Jahrbuch der Kunsthistorischen the acceptability of a modern likeness grafted
Sammlungen in Wien 60 (1964): 73–4. Martial on to the body of an ancient hero: Orietta
had praised the dining room of Germanicus as Rossi Pinelli, “Chirurgia della memoria:
fit for Jupiter to visit: Epigrams, 8, 29, 1–4. scultura antica e restauri storici,” in Memoria
89. For contemporary imagery of Leo as Jupiter dell’antico nell’arte italiana, ed. Salvatore Settis
in this sculpture, decorations at Villa Madama, (Turin, 1986), 192–3.
and other textual and visual sources, notably 92. For ancestor portraits in atria, Pliny, Natural
Domenico Aimo’s sculpture of Leo, see Elet, History, xxxv, 2, 6;Vitruvius, De architectura, vi,
“Papal villeggiatura,”184–7 with earlier bibliog- 3, 6; Seneca, De beneficiis, iii, 28, 2; and Seneca,
raphy; Agosti, Paolo Giovio, 18–26; and de Jong, Ad Lucilium, 44.5. Pliny also mentions portraits
The Power and the Glorification, ch. 3. on shields in houses (Natural History, xxxv, 4,
90. On Giulio’s Polyphemus as a reverse-ekphrasis 13), ancestor portraits on portals (xxxv, 2, 7),
of a Plinian anecdote and a claim of the art- displaying ancestor sculptures that were not
ist’s ingenium, see Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” one’s own (xxxv, 2, 8), and the demise of
61–3. For Polyphemus in the dining areas sculpted and painted depictions of ancestors in
at Sperlonga and Baia, Bernard Andreae, favor of images of strangers in order to display
Praetorium speluncae: l’antro di Tiberio a Sperlonga more valuable materials (xxxv, 2). A handful of
ed Ovidio, trans. Katrin Schlaefke and Felice ancient villas have been discovered to have had
Constabile (Soveria Mannelli [Catanzaro], ancestor portrait galleries, but these were not
1995); Alessandro Viscogliosi, “Antra cyclopis: known in the early sixteenth century: Richard
osservazioni su una tipologia di coenatio,” in Neudecker, Die Skulpturen-Ausstattung römischer
Ulisse: il mito e la memoria, ed. Bernard Andreae Villen in Italien (Mainz am Rhein, 1988), 76;
and Claudio Parisi Presicce (Rome, 1996), John Bodel, “Monumental Villas and Villa
252–69; Sorcha Carey, Pliny’s Catalogue of Monuments,” Journal of Roman Archeology 10
Culture: Art and Empire in the Natural History (1997): 5–35, at 18, 27–30.
N O TE S TO PAG E S 130 – 131 277
93. The Forum of Augustus was familiar to Sperulo was writing in early 1519 before
Renaissance readers in Virgil, Aeneid, vi, 792ff; the death of Duke Lorenzo on 4 May and
and Ovid, Fasti, V, 551ff; discussed by Zanker, Giulio’s subsequent proposal for the New
The Power of Images in the Age of Augustus, 210– Sacristy, but the framework of Sperulo’s
13; and Kuttner, “Prospects of Patronage,” 100. poem, with its threnody for lost Medici
For the bucolic precinct of Augustus, Virgil, family members and their seats in marble
Georgics, iii, 2, which I owe to Ann Kuttner. halls, is so startlingly close to the conception
94. For uomini famosi cycles, Jean Alazard, “Sur for the New Sacristy that it suggests a con-
les hommes illustres,” in Il mondo antico nel nection between plans for Villa Madama and
Rinascimento: Atti del V convegno internazionale the Florentine project. (Although Lorenzo
di studi sul Rinascimento, Firenze-Palazzo was already critically ill, Sperulo’s poem
Strozzi, 2–6 settembre 1956 (Florence, 1958), treats him as a vital dynastic hope for the
275–7; Christiane Joost-Gaugier, “Earliest family, suggesting that the poet was una-
Beginnings of the Notion of Uomini Famosi ware of the gravity of the illness when he
and the De viris illustribus in Greco-Roman wrote, as discussed in Chapter 3, p. 66 and
Literary Tradition,” Artibus et historiae 3 (1982): note 11; p. 155; and Appendix i, gloss notes
97–115; L. Klinger Aleci, “Images of Identity. 94 and 128.) In his description of Pope Leo’s
Italian Portrait Collections of the Fifteenth architectural patronage written in 1524,
and Sixteenth Centuries,” in The Image of Stephanus Ioanninensis noted that Leo had
the Individual: Portraits in the Renaissance, ed. ordered polished marble ancestor sculptures
Nicholas Mann and Luke Syson (London, for San Lorenzo: in Reiss, “Patronage of the
1998), 67–79; and Georgia Clarke, Roman Medici Popes at San Lorenzo,” with further
House – Renaissance Palaces, 232ff. Paolo discussion of both Medici popes’ commem-
Giovio’s Museo built at his Como villa in oration of ancestors at San Lorenzo.
the 1530s is an interesting post-Villa Madama 99. A project of the young Cosimo I de’ Medici
elaboration of this idea; see Della Torre, beginning c. 1541 in conjunction with his
“L’inedita opera prima di Paolo Giovio ed il transformation of the civic palace into the
museo”; and Maffei, Paolo Giovio. ducal residence. This Udienza was designed to
95. Bramante’s project for a chapel at the Villa welcome citizens as well as foreign dignitar-
La Magliana with eight niches for sculptures, ies, with an architectural setting by Giuliano di
which remained unexecuted, may have served Baccio d’Agnolo and sculptures by Bandinelli,
as another model. For which, Dezzi Bardeschi, who had been involved at Villa Madama
“L’opera di Giuliano da Sangallo e di Donato and in other Leonine Roman projects. This
Bramante nella fabbrica della villa papale della ambitious Florentine ancestor gallery took
Magliana,” 129. decades to complete, finally finished c. 1592
96. M. Donato, “Gli eroi romani tra storia ed by Giovanni Caccini. See Carlo Francini,
‘exemplum’. I primi cicli umanistici di “L’Udienza della Sala Grande di Palazzo
Uomini Famosi,” in Memoria dell’antico nell’arte Vecchio,” in Baccio Bandinelli: scultore e maestro
italiana, ed. Salvatore Settis (Turin, 1985), vol. 2, (1493–1560), Exh. Cat., ed. Detlef Heikamp
97–152. and Beatrice Paolozzi Strozzi (Florence, 2014),
97. Various motives, dates, and attributions have 202–11; Johannes Myssok, “L’Udienza di
been proposed for this drawing, summarized in Palazzo Vecchio nel contesto internazionale,”
Beltramini and Burns, Andrea Palladio e la villa in ibid. 212–29, who notes that Bandinelli has
veneta, 245–6 (Howard Burns). Additionally, been credited with creating the cinquecento
for the proposal that it is a fair copy by an tradition of the secular honorary statue in the
assistant of Raphael’s and represents his ideas Udienza (214) – a conception that was actu-
for the elevation of this cortile, Elam, “The ally in play decades earlier, if not realized; and
Raphael Conference,” 438–9. Hegener, DIVI IACOBI EQVES, 492–3 and
98. It is further striking that Michelangelo’s passim, with earlier sources.
New Sacristy designs would also include 100. As Nicole Hegener and I have both surmised:
empty thrones and figures of river gods, email communication, August – September
both of which were featured prominently in 2006. For Bandinelli’s close relation with
Sperulo’s proposed decorations for the villa. the Medici family and Cardinal Giulio and
his presence in Rome, see Hegener, DIVI novae & veteris urbis Romae, book 3, “De domi-
IACOBI EQVES, 85–103 and passim. bus Cardinalium.” Alfonsina Orsini died
101. Kathleen Wren Christian, “From Ancestral on 7 February 1520, leaving Pope Leo as
Cults to Art: The Santacroce Collection her heir: Sheryl E. Reiss, “Widow, Mother,
of Antiquities,” Annali della Scuola normale Patron of Art: Alfonsina Orsini de’ Medici,”
superiore di Pisa. Classe di lettere e filosofia Series in Beyond Isabella: Secular Women Patrons of
iv, 14 (2002): 255–72. Art in Renaissance Italy, ed. Sheryl E. Reiss
102. For the collection of sculpture and antiquities and David G. Wilkins (Kirksville, MO, 2001),
at the villa, see Chapter 3, pp. 73–4 and note 45. 125–58. However, I have found no documen-
103. Sperulo has previously been mistranslated or tary or visual evidence that sculptures actu-
misinterpreted to suggest that there were fig- ally were transferred from the Medici Palace
ures of Silenus and Jupiter in the villa – as in to the villa. Alternatively, Rausa interprets the
Frommel et al., Raffaello architetto, 320; Reiss, phrase to mean that antiquities may have been
“Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron of taken from Lorenzo’s collection in Florence
Art,” 361, 395 n. 37; Fusco and Corti,“Giovanni to Rome, which is an interesting possibility,
Ciampolini,” 30; and Rausa, “Marmi antichi,” although no evidence has emerged for this
169 and cat. 9 (Silenus). The tale of the Silenus hypothesis either: Rausa, “Marmi antichi,” 157
in the stone is a Plinian topos, which Sperulo (mis-citing Giulio’s letter to read “statue di
evokes to describe columns that are of the case,” that is, houses in the plural).
same kind of Parian marble in which the 106. From the letter of 17 June 1520 from Cardinal
Silenus was found (line 58 and gloss note Giulio in Florence to Bishop Mario Maffei in
28). Sperulo’s passage about marbles from the Rome: Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 603. On the
Temple of Jupiter Tonans has been mistrans- subject of statues in stucco, see Elet, “Papal vil-
lated to refer to a figural sculpture of Jupiter; leggiatura,” 177ff.
rather, Sperulo says that marbles came from 107. On the surrounding decorations, Elet, “Papal
Jupiter’s temple (lines 47-52 and gloss note 23). villeggiatura,” 186–7.
104. Raphael makes no mention of any use of 108. I am grateful to the late Richard Tuttle for
figural sculptures or architectural ornament, bringing this project to my attention. The let-
whereas Pliny does mention columns and ter was published in Tilman Falk, “Studien zür
marble revetments. Topographie und Geschichte der Villa Giulia
105. Where Leo’s own collection had recently in Röm,” Römisches Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte
been augmented by works he inherited from 13 (1971): 171–3, and is discussed in Richard
Alfonsina Orsini.The Palazzo Medici in Rome Tuttle, “Vignola e Villa Giulio: il disegno
is the present-day Palazzo Madama, seat of the White,” Casabella 61 (1997): 50–69.
Senate, near Piazza Navona. Before his pon- 109. Cited and discussed in Chapter 1, pp. 28–30
tificate, Giovanni de’ Medici had lived in the and note 92.
Palazzo Ottieri, which was famous for its col- 110. On the Medici and time, Cox-Rearick,
lection of antiquities as well as its library. For Dynasty and Destiny, 16–17 and passim; Maia
that palace, see Christoph Luitpold Frommel, Wellington Ghatan, “Michelangelo and the
Der römische Palastbau der Hochrenaissance Tomb of Time: The Intellectual Context of
(Berlin, 1973), vol. 2, 227. For Leo’s collec- the Medici Chapel,” in Studi di storia dell’arte
tion there, Weil-Garris and d’Amico, The (Todi, 2002), 59–124. I owe the latter source to
Renaissance Cardinal’s Ideal Palace, 116–17 and Sheryl Reiss.
n. 117; M. Müntz, “Les collections d’antiques 111. “Atque ex omnibus, quae rettuli, clarissima
formées par les Médicis au xvie siècle,” quaeque in urbe iam sunt dicata a Vespasiano
Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles principe in templo Pacis aliisque eius operi-
Lettres 35.2 (1896): 88–97; Claude Bellièvre, bus, violentia Neronis in urbem convecta et in
Noctes romanae in Eugène Müntz, “Le Musée sellariis domus aureae disposita.” Pliny, Natural
du Capitole et les autres collections romaines History, xxxiv, 19, 84. My thanks to Katherine
à la fin du xve siècle et au commencement Welch for pointing out this passage.
du xvie siècle avec un choix de documents 112. The dual function of the complex as a Medici
inédits,” Revue archéologique 43 (1882): 24–37, villa suburbana and also as papal hospitium
at 35; and Albertini, Opusculum de mirabilibus surely engendered some tension about its
N O TE S TO PAG E S 141–145 279
private/papal function and funding; Sperulo’s in the Stanza della Segnatura to the topogra-
claim that the villa was built at Giulio’s phy of Rome beyond, see also Tafuri, “Roma
extraordinary expense probably reflected the instaurata,” 63; Temple, Renovatio urbis, ch.
strategy to keep the villa in the family beyond 6; and Christiane Joost-Gaugier, “Some
a Medici pontificate (see above p. 64 and Considerations on the Geography of the
Sperulo, dedicatory letter §1); but that empha- Stanza della Segnatura,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts
sis on a family-owned villa could make the 124 (1994):223–32.
Medici a target of criticism for appropriating 5. Rowland, “The Intellectual Background of
antiquities. the School of Athens,” 139, 159; Joost-Gaugier,
113. Henning Wrede,“Römische Antikenprogramme Raphael’s Stanza della Segnatura, 17–21, 158–63;
des 16. Jahrhunderts,” in Il cortile delle statue, 83–115; and Paul Taylor, “Julius II and the Stanza della
Wrede,“Antikenstudium und Antikenaufstellung Segnatura,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld
in der Renaissance,” Kölner Jahrbuch 26 (1993): Institutes 72 (2009): 103–41.
11–25; and Christian, “From Ancestral Cults 6. As discussed in Chapter 1, p. 27 and note 82.
to Art,” 262–3; Christian, Empire without End, Shearman surmised that Raphael’s Ashmolean
163–7. drawing was a preliminary idea for a smaller-
114. Hans Brummer, The Statue Court in the Vatican scale project to remodel a vigna Leo had
Belvedere (Stockholm, 1970), 216–49; Arnold acquired by 7 June 1516; thus, the first ideas
Nesselrath, “The Imagery of the Belvedere for that project might have been in the
Statue Court under Julius II and Leo X,” works before Inghirami died in September
in High Renaissance in the Vatican: The Age of of that year. See Shearman, “A Functional
Julius II and Leo X, Exh. Cat., ed. Michiaki Interpretation of Villa Madama,” 322; and
Koshikawa and Martha McClintock (Tokyo, Shearman, “A Note on the Chronology of
1993); Matthias Winner, Bernard Andreae, and Villa Madama,” 179–81.
Carlo Pietrangeli, eds., Il cortile delle statue: der 7. By then, Inghirami also served as librarian for
Statuenhof des Belvedere im Vatikan: Akten des Leo X. On Raphael and Inghirami: Rowland,
internationalen Kongresses zu Ehren von Richard “The Intellectual Background of the School of
Krautheimer (Mainz, 1998). Athens”; Joost-Gaugier, Raphael’s Stanza della
115. Again, I speak of meaning other than the Segnatura; and P. Künzle, “Raffaels Denkmal
communicative function of the orders, or such für Fedro Inghirami auf dem letzten Arazzo,”
general issues as decorum and magnificence. in Mélanges Eugène Tisserant (Rome, 1964), vol.
6, 499–548.
6 DY NAM IC D E S IG N 8. A point Arnold Nesselrath has emphasized in
his nuanced studies of the Stanze. For sources
1. For what is known about Raphael’s collabora- on Raphael’s workshop, see the Introduction,
tions, see the Introduction, p. 4, with bibliog- note 15.
raphy in notes 13, 15, and 16; and pp. 26–8. 9. For Giuliano Leno as “curatore” of the
2. On the convincing identification of the figure Fabbrica, Ait and Piñeiro, Dai casali alla fab-
as Giulio Romano, with a history of earlier brica di San Pietro, 157–72. For Raphael and
interpretations, Henry and Joannides, Late the Fabbrica of St. Peters, see Christoph
Raphael, 296–300. L. Frommel, “Die Peterskirche unter Papst
3. “Quare tantum abest ut cristas erigat, ut multo Julius II. im Licht neuer Dokumente,”
magis se omnibus obvium et familiarem ultro Römische Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte 16 (1976):
reddat, nullius admonitionem aut colloquium 57–136; Frommel, “S. Pietro. Storia della sua
refugiens, utpote quo nullus libentius sua com- costruzione,” in Raffaello architetto, 241–309;
menta in dubium ac disceptationem vocari Frommel, “Il cantiere di S. Pietro prima di
gaudeat, docerique ac docere vitae praemium Michelangelo,” in Les chantiers de la Renaissance,
putet.” Text and translation in Shearman, ed. Jean Guillaume (Tours, 1991), 175–90;
Sources, vol. 1, 546–50. Frommel, “St. Peter’s: The Early History,”
4. Summarized in Stinger, The Renaissance in in Renaissance Architecture from Brunelleschi
Rome, 196–9; and see James Ackerman, The to Michelangelo, 399–423; Frommel, “The
Cortile del Belvedere (Città del Vaticano, 1954), Endless Construction of St. Peter’s: Bramante
125. For the relation of the painted iconography and Raphael,” in ibid. 598–631; and Arnaldo
Bruschi and Cristiano Tessari, San Pietro fascinating chronicle of the life of a Curial
che non c’è: da Bramante a Sangallo il Giovane humanist in contemporary political and social
(Milan, 1996). context, from c. 1511 to post-Sack.) Alda Spotti
10. For the fundamental analyses of the plans by has interpreted a 1527 letter written to Maffei
Frommel, Adams, Ray, and others acknowl- with a one-sentence description of the villa
edging the problematic nature of determin- to suggest that he was still involved at that
ing each architect’s contributions to their date, although the statement that “everything
ideation, see the Introduction, pp. 7–8 and is fine and almost as you left it” (“ogni cosa
notes 28–31, 34. sta bene et quasi in quel medeximo modo che
11. Unfortunately for Sperulo’s proposed mural V.S. li lasciò”) does not clarify when Maffei
program, the political world order changed was last there: Alda Spotti, “Mario Maffei e
dramatically shortly after he finished his poem, Martino Virgoletta: note a un carteggio della
as detailed in Chapter 3, p. 82 and note 83. Biblioteca Nazionale di Roma,” in Roma
12. The iconography of paintings was frequently nella svolta tra quattro e cinquecento, ed. Stefano
worked out in the later stages of planning for Colonna (Rome, 2004), 151–8, at 157. In a 1987
practical reasons, as demonstrated by Kathleen talk, John D’Amico proposed that Maffei left
Weil-Garris Brandt, “Michelangelo’s Early Rome a few years before the Sack to tend to
Projects for the Sistine Ceiling:Their Practical his own villa in Volterra because of shrinking
and Artistic Consequences,” in Michelangelo opportunities for work in Rome; for which,
Drawings, ed. Craig Hugh Smyth (Washington, Gouwens, “L’umanesimo al tempo di Pierio
DC, 1992), 56–87. Bibbiena’s stufetta offers Valeriano,” 9 and n. 12. Maffei was also disap-
another example among Raphael’s projects, pointed at not having been made a cardinal.
analyzed by Arnold Nesselrath in “L’antico 18. Maffei seems to have been in Rome most of
vissuto. La stufetta del cardinal Bibbiena,” in the time from the inception of the Medici
Pietro Bembo e l’invenzione del Rinascimento, villa through early 1527, judging from his fre-
284–91, at 287–8. quent letters from Rome now in the BNCR.
13. Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 599–601, 602–5. Gwynne documents that Sperulo was dis-
14. For Maffei see the Introduction, pp. 5, 8 and notes patched to Camerino around May 1519 to
20, 36; and Chapter 1, pp. 22–3 and notes 44, 47. assist in some cloak-and-dagger marriage
15. On their friendship and epistolary exchanges, negotiations (which would later lead to his
Reiss, “A Renaissance Friendship.” On the involvement with anti-Medicean interests):
rhetoric of amicitia between letterato and Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage, vol. 1, 31ff. This
patron, de Beer, The Poetics of Patronage, ch. 2, would explain why his attention was diverted
especially 111–19. from the villa project shortly after his poem.
16. “Li pavoni per adesso non sono da presentare, 19. Lefevre hypothesized, based on the letters,
per che sono spennachiati et le femine non that Maffei was hired after Raphael’s death to
sono da vedere.” Mario Maffei in Rome to oversee the project: Lefevre, “Un prelato del
his nephew Paolo in Volterra, 5 January 1524 ’500, Mario Maffei e la costruzione di Villa
(BNCR a95.16/1 ). Madama;” Lefevre, “La ‘Vigna del Cardinale
17. Reiss calls attention to Maffei’s practical expe- de’ Medici’ e il vescovo d’Aquino.” Reiss,
rience with building projects for himself and pointing out Giulio’s practice of hiring over-
patrons in “A Renaissance Friendship.” Two seers at Poggio and San Lorenzo, sensibly
letters by Maffei mention his work at the notes that there is no reason why Maffei could
Medici villa: in March 1523 he says pruning not have been an agent at Villa Madama before
has been done, and on 25 October 1524 he Raphael’s death: “Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici
says he has planted trees there: Reiss,“Cardinal as a Patron of Art,” 373–6.
Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron of Art,” 388 and 20. Elet,“Papal villeggiatura,” 31ff for links between
411 nn. 220, 221, citing letters in the Biblioteca Villa Madama and the Sala di Costantino,
Comunale Guarnacci, Volterra, Archivio 272–4 for shared ideas about stucco at the
Maffei, filza I. I have been through Maffei’s villa and the New Sacristy, and 314–17 for
letters in the BNCR and the BAV during Medici patronage of materials in Florence
the period of Villa Madama’s construction and Rome.
without finding new material about his work 21. For which, Julian Kliemann, “Il pensiero di
on the Medici villa (although they provide a Paolo Giovio nelle pitture eseguite sulle sue
N O TE S TO PAG E S 14 6– 14 9 281
‘invenzioni’,” in Paolo Giovio, 197–223. A strik- Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron
ing example of the cross-fertilization of ideas of Art,” chs. viii and xi, especially 622–4 and
among humanists is Strunck’s proposal that passim. Earlier Medici patrons also exhibited
Giovio based his program for the north lunette this range of involvement in building projects,
of the Poggio Salone on Pontano’s 1493 from descriptive poetry to practical, hands-on
“De hortis Hesperidum,” and her intriguing issues, as shown by F. W. Kent’s revisionist por-
hypothesis that this poem may originally have trait of Lorenzo’s patronage, which points out
been written as a Medici panegyric, for which his role as husbandman pruning his own mul-
see Chapter 4, note 54. berry trees at Poggio a Caiano, and Amanda
22. Giovio went to Florence with Giulio in Lillie’s account of how Giovanni di Cosimo
January 1519. On Giovio as advisor and his oversaw the construction of the Fiesole villa,
interest in villeggiatura, see Chapter 1, p. 22–3 from structural issues down to the winter
and note 45 and Chapter 2, pp 47, 49 and protection of the pomegranate plants. Kent,
note 4. Lorenzo de’ Medici and the Art of Magnificence,
23. Summarized in Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio de’ ch. v; and Lillie, “Giovanni di Cosimo.”
Medici as a Patron of Art,” 484 with earlier 29. Sperulo, dedicatory letter §2 and gloss note
bibliography, especially by Matthias Winner 4; for Cardinal Giulio’s letter of 4 June
and Julian Kliemann who first connected 1520, Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 599–601. For
Ariosto’s poem to the Poggio decorations. Cardinal Giulio’s visits to the construction site,
24. As noted by Beltramini, “Pietro Bembo e Reiss, “‘Per havere tutte le opere’,” 127 n. 15.
l’architettura,” 12, 17–18. Bembo was in Rome 30. On earlier humanists’ practice of the collec-
during the design phases of the Medici villa tive emendation of their drafts, Grafton, Leon
discussed herein, although he was away in Battista Alberti Master Builder, 53–7.
Venice from May 1519 to April 1520. His 31. Discussed in Chapter 5, p. 124–5 and note 85.
inheritance of the family villa in May 1519 32. Bembo’s letters are in Shearman, Sources,
surely whetted his interest in villa culture at vol. 1, 240–6 (documents 1516/8; 1516/10;
this time. For Bembo’s annotated edition of 1516/11). Discussed by Vittoria Romani, Cat.
Pliny’s villa letters and his own villa writings, 4.13 in Beltramini et al., eds., Pietro Bembo e
see Chapter 2, p. 48–9 and note 5. l’invenzione del Rinascimento, 259; and Arnold
25. Discussed in Chapter 1, pp. 27–8, 33–4, 45–6 Nesselrath, “L’antico vissuto.”
and notes 85–7, 99–100, and 124; and Chapter 33. “Per ancora non ho stantie in Palazo, ma
4, p. 89 and note 13. buone promesse … domattina comincieremo
26. Castiglione returned to Rome on 26 May havere el pane di Palazo come familiari.”
1519, dined with the pope at the villa on 4 June, Mario Maffei in Rome to his nephew Paolo
and wrote to Isabella d’Este about it on 16 in Volterra, 12 December 1523 (ASCR
June. For this dinner and his letter, Shearman, A95.15/2). His increasing frustration at not
Sources, vol. 1, 455, 459–60 with earlier bibli- being given rooms is chronicled in his let-
ography. As discussed in Chapter 1, the trio of ters; to my knowledge, he never did receive
Raphael, Castiglione, and Bembo fraternized them. (Nor did he receive a hoped-for
closely and exchanged ideas, as we know cardinalate.)
from their 1516 field trip to Tivoli, described 34. On the differences between patronage at close
by Bembo, and from Bembo’s involvement in range and long distance, see Reiss, “Per havere
the letter to Leo X. Castiglione also included tutte le opere,” with earlier sources; and her
Bembo as an interlocutor in the Cortegiano. article in preparation, “Mandare sempre disegni
27. Reiss, “Raphael, Pope Leo X, and Cardinal di quello si fac[i]a, per chontentare el Papa: The
Giulio de’ Medici,” 22. Place of Drawings in the Art Patronage of
28. Reiss has highlighted the hands-on nature of Giulio de’ Medici (Pope Clement VII).”
Giulio’s patronage, citing the Giulio–Maffei 35. Although these plans may have reflected some
letters about Villa Madama on issues rang- verbal back-and-forth communication, they
ing from iconography to hydraulics, and suggest primarily a one-way flow of ideas
Fattucci’s letters that record Giulio’s desire to assigning primary agency to the advisor, as in
see Michelangelo’s drawings for many details the well-known example of Annibale Caro
of the San Lorenzo and New Sacristy projects: and Onofrio Panvinio for Taddeo Zuccaro at
282 NOTES T O PA GE S 14 9–155
the Farnese villa of Caprarola; see Robertson, grateful to Julian Kliemann for discussing
“Annibal Caro as iconographer;” and Sapori, the iconography with me. See also the cata-
“Dal programma al dipinto.” Caro’s plan for logue entry by Massimo Scolari in Renaissance
the Stanza della Solitudine dictates to the Architecture from Brunelleschi to Michelangelo, 589.
painter the subjects and figures to be painted 42. For these boasts, see pp. 83–4 and gloss notes
in each ceiling compartment, down to minute 40, 136.
details – as indeed they were executed. 43. See Chapter 2, pp. 58–9 and notes 76–8; and
36. Settis, “Artisti e committente fra quattro e cin- Chapter 4 pp. 90, 97, and passim on this point.
quecento,” 725–9; Alberti, Della pittura, vol. 3, 44. Discussed Chapter 2, p. 59 and note 77.
53. 45. As noted by Brian Richardson, “From Scribal
37. Antonio Pinelli, “Intenzione, invenzione, arti- Publication to Print Publication: Pietro
fizio. Spunti per una teoria della ricezione Bembo’s ‘Rime’ 1529–1535,” Modern Language
dei cicli figurativi di età rinascimentale,” in Review 95 (2000): 684–95, at 689.
Programme et invention, 27–79. 46. Brian Richardson, “‘Recitato et cantato’: the
38. Reiss, “A Taxonomy of Art Patronage in oral diffusion of lyric poetry in sixteenth-
Renaissance Italy,” 26. century Italy,” in Theatre, Opera and Performance
39. Margaret Daly Davis, “‘Opus Isodomum’ in Italy from the Fifteenth Century to the Present:
at the Palazzo della Cancelleria. Vitruvian Essays in Honour of Richard Andrews, ed. Brian
Studies and Archaeological and Antiquarian Richardson, Simon Gilson, and Catherine
Interests at the Court of Raffaele Riario,” Keen (Leeds, 2004), 67–82, at 70.
in Roma centro ideale della cultura dell’antico nei 47. As noted, Sperulo’s poem was dedicated to
secoli XV e XVI, 442–57, especially at 447. Giulio. I think it most likely that Giulio was also
40. Clare Robertson, “Paolo Giovio and the the addressee of Raphael’s letter, as proposed by
‘invenzioni’ for the Sala dei Cento Giorni,” Lefevre and Reiss; see Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio
in Paolo Giovio, 225–53, especially at 230–1, de’ Medici as a Patron of Art,” 364–5.
tracing the exchange of ideas between Giovio 48. Richardson has analyzed such practices of
and Vasari for working out details of painted “mixed orality” in early cinquecento Italy,
imagery, notably the identity and place- noting that, “Print, in other words, was a
ment of the personifications between the means of extending into the domain of read-
narrative scenes in this room; and Koering, ing what had pleased a listening audience in
“‘Intrecciamento’,” treating interaction public performance. There could thus be a
between Benedetto Lampridio and Giulio cycle of sung and written transmission, with
Romano at Palazzo Tè. Baptista Fiera’s 1515 each type of diffusion leading in turn to the
dialogue between Mantegna and Momus, in other.” Richardson, “‘Recitato et cantato’,”
which Mantegna asks his philosopher friends 73–4, 77; see also Richardson,“Oral Culture in
about how to represent the figure of Justice, Early Modern Italy: Performance, Language,
may in part reflect Mantegna’s practice of Religion,” The Italianist 34 (2014): 313–17.
developing iconography in dialogue with 49. Richardson, “From Scribal Publication to
humanists: Baptista Fiera, De iusticia pingenda: Print Publication,” 688.
A Dialogue between Mantegna and Momus, ed. 50. For example, after Egidio di Viterbo delivered
James Wardop (London, 1957); I owe this a sermon praising Julius II for his proposed
source to Patricia Emison. project at St. Peter’s, the pontiff then requested
41. This drawing was preparatory for a painting it in writing, keeping one copy in his library
of the same subject, now in the Bibliotheca and sending another to a diplomatic contact:
Hertziana, Rome. The painting diverges sig- Kempers, “Epilogue,” 393.
nificantly from the drawing in composition 51. Riccardo Pacciani, “New Information on
and details; I illustrate and discuss the drawing Raphael and Giuliano Leno in the Diplomatic
because it is more detailed and lively. Among Correspondence of Alfonso I d’Este,” Art
the differences is the treatment of the female Bulletin 67 (1985): 137–45, at 141; Shearman,
figure, who, in the painting, certainly repre- Sources, vol. 1, 443.
sents a real person, perhaps Francesca Zuccaro, 52. A letter of Benedetto Buondelmonti refers to
in contrast to the sketchy female of the draw- both patrons, then ambiguously says that one
ing, more likely personifying invention. I am or both went “alla sua vignia dove fa murare”;
N O TE S TO PAG E S 155 – 158 283
Shearman noted that the villa is variously Michelangelo’s Work (Montreal, 1992), 21–43.
referred to as Leo’s or Giulio’s and favored For Renaissance notions of disegno and idea,
Leo in this reading, but the mention of “dove Magne Malmanger, “Rise and Fall of the
fa murare” suggests Giulio, since he was in Designer,” in Imitation, Representation and
charge of the construction. Shearman, Sources, Printing in the Italian Renaissance, ed. Roy
vol. 1, 387–8. Eriksen and Magne Malmanger (Pisa and
53. Although we lack a complete diary of Giulio’s Rome, 2009), 233–46, with earlier bibliography.
travels, we know that he was in Florence with 63. For the notion of patron as author, see the
his ailing nephew Lorenzo by 22 January 1519; Introduction, p. 5 and note 18.
he returned to Rome for a consistory on 13 64. Trachtenberg, Building-in-Time, 61 and 85–95;
April; he left again for Florence on 3 May; and and Trachtenberg, “Ayn Rand, Alberti and the
he returned to Rome in October of that year; Authorial Figure of the Architect,” California
for which, Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici Italian Studies 2 (2011).
as a Patron of Art,” 286–7, 466, 394 n. 23; 65. On literary collaboration, Jack Stillinger,
Adriano Prosperi, “Clemente VII,” Enciclopedia Multiple Authorship and the Myth of the Author
dei Papi (Treccani, 2000). in Criticism and Textual Theory (New York,
54. For the dating of the poem, see Chapter 1991). For the notion of collaboration as one
3, pp. 65–6 and notes 10–11; pp. 96–7; and of architecture’s family secrets, now exposed,
Appendix i dedicatory letter §6. Colomina, “Collaborations,” 462–71. On
55. As Charles Hope observed, there was no collaborative paradigms versus notions of
ancient precedent for the role of the human- authorship, Hélène Lipstadt, “‘Exoticising the
ist advisor – at least none that was known to Domestic’: On New Collaborative Paradigms
the Renaissance; Hope, “Artists, Patrons, and and Advanced Design Practices,” in Architecture
Advisors,” 328. and Authorship, ed. Tim Anstey, Katja Grillner,
56. This competitive arena is discussed in Chapter and Rolf Hughes (London, 2007), 164–73 and
1, p. 21 and note 34; and Chapter 2, pp. 59-60 190–1. For an analysis of different collaborative
and notes 79–81. modes introduced in nineteenth- and twen-
57. On poetic contests, which Lampridio likened tieth-century architectural practice, includ-
to Olympic competition, see Chapter 2, p. 59 ing Walter Gropius’ experimental Architects
and note 80. Collaborative, Gilbert Herbert and Mark
58. Reiss presents an excellent discussion of artists Donchin, eds., The Collaborators: Interactions in
maneuvering as they vie for patronage, includ- the Architectural Design Process (Farnham, 2013).
ing the Raphael/Sebastiano competition, in 66. For example, Castiglione’s letter to Isabella
“‘Per havere tutte le opere’,” 123–4 and passim, d’Este in which he describes the Vatican
with bibliography in n. 72. Logge as “opra di Raphaello” and goes on
59. Kempers, “Epilogue,” 388. Beatriz Colomina to say that Raphael is also creating the villa:
stresses the role of critic as collaborator in “Fassi una vigna anchor.” In Shearman, Sources,
modern architecture, noting that, “What vol. 1, 459.
appears to be criticism or publicity is actually 67. See Henry and Joannides, “Raphael and his
design,” in Colomina, “Collaborations: The Workshop,” 18ff on related issues of the ten-
Private Life of Modern Architecture,” Journal sion between invention and execution, and
of the Society of Architectural Historians 58 (1999): what constituted the hand of Raphael, espe-
462–71, at 464. cially in movable paintings.
60. Agosti, Paolo Giovio, 27. 68. For example, G. Thomas Tanselle, “The
61. Notably, in Homer’s account of the facture of Editorial Problem of Final Authorial
the shield. For the rivalry of Hephaestus and Intention,” Studies in Bibliography 29 (1976):
Daedalus, Heffernan, Museum of Words, 14–16. 167–211.
62. Discussed by Kathleen Weil-Garris Brandt, 69. For an interesting analogue to these ideas,
“The Relation of Sculpture and Architecture Federica Goffi uses a phenomenological
in the Renaissance,” in The Renaissance approach to the building, rebuilding, and
from Brunelleschi to Michelangelo, 74–99 at renovation of St. Peter’s to argue for a new
85; and Weil-Garris Brandt, “‘The Nurse paradigm uniting architecture and conser-
of Settignano’: Michelangelo’s Beginnings vation in a diachronic understanding of a
as a Sculptor,” in Genius of the Sculptor in building. She defines mnemic architecture
284 NOTES T O PA GE S 158 – 164
as “built conservation always in-the-mak- the façade and cortile: Christoph L. Frommel,
ing” (8) and rejects the notion of “still shot” “Raffaello e gli ordini architettonici,” in
frozen moments, instead arguing for a L’emploi des ordres à la Renaissance: Actes du col-
phenomenological approach to these pal- loque de Tours, 1986, ed. Jean Guillaume (Paris,
impsestic transformations: Federica Goffi, 1992), 124.
Time Matter(s): Invention and Re-imagination 79. In the letter describing Villa Madama, in refer-
in Built Conservation: The Unfinished Drawing ence to fountain design: Raphael/Dewez, 28
and Building of St. Peter’s,The Vatican (Farnham, §18.
2013). 80. On the attribution of the drawing and fresco
70. James S. Ackerman, “Transactions in to Bertoja, the topographical iconography,
Architectural Design,” in Distance Points, and the identification of the figures in the
23–36. (Originally published in Critical Inquiry, fresco itself, see Loren W. Partridge, “The Sala
1974.) d’Ercole in the Villa Farnese at Caprarola,
71. As noted by Howard Burns, “Building against Part i,” Art Bulletin 53 (1971): 467–86, at 474
Time: Renaissance Strategies to Secure Large and figs. 5, 18, 19, 20; and Partridge, “The Sala
Churches against Changes to their Design,” in d’Ercole in the Villa Farnese at Caprarola, Part
L’église dans l’architecture de la Renaissance: Actes ii,” Art Bulletin 54 (1972): 50–62, especially
du colloque de Tours, 1990, ed. Jean Guillaume 53–4. See also Diane De Grazia, Bertoia, Mirola,
(Paris, 1995). and the Farnese Court (Bologna, 1991), 71, 132
72. Among which, Nicola Camerlenghi, “The cat. D75.
Longue Durée and the Life of Buildings,” 81. The gesture does not conform specifically
in New Approaches to Medieval Architecture, to any of the oratorical repertoire set forth
ed. Robert Bork, William Clark, and Abby in Quintilian, Institutio oratoria, xi, 3, 88–136,
McGehee (Farnam, 2011), especially 12–13 unless perhaps that of a question (xi, 3, 101); I
with a useful recent analysis of historiographi- am indebted to Anthony Corbeill for looking
cal approaches to building in time, including at this drawing and suggesting this possibility,
four-dimensionalism. and further noting the traditional restrained
73. James Ackerman, “Architectural Practice in left hand of the orator.
the Italian Renaissance,” Journal of the Society of 82. Reflecting the etymology of perfetto (Ciò che
Architectural Historians 13 (1954): 3–11, at 9. non abbisogna, che gli s’aggiunga niente, intero,
74. Burns, “Building against Time.” compiuto. Crusca) and of the Latin perfectus
75. Marvin Trachtenberg, “Building outside Time (Realized to its full extent, complete, perfect;
in Alberti’s De re aedificatoria,” Res 48 (2005): developed or completed so as to have all the
123–34; and Trachtenberg, Building-in-Time. desired qualities, perfect, finished. OLD, 1337).
76. See also the discussion by Catherine 83. Discussed in Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” ch. 3,
Wilkinson, “The New Professionalism in the 177–83.
Renaissance,” in The Architect: Chapters in the 84. As reported in a letter of Alfonso Paolucci in
History of the Profession, ed. Spiro Kostof (New Rome to Alfonso d’Este in Ferrara, 13 March
York, 1977), 124–60, at 157. 1519; in Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 443 (doc.
77. For issues of Renaissance temporalities, 1519/22).
Alexander Nagel and Christopher S. Wood, 85. Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 455 (Castiglione),
Anachronic Renaissance (New York, 2010), 16– 483–4 (Alfonso Paolucci, the Duke of Ferrara’s
17 and passim. agent), and 774ff (Vida).
78. Frommel notes that in Raphael’s descrip- 86. For musical performances at the villa,
tion of the villa, he does not mention the Cummings, The Lion’s Ear, 112–13.
two principal Orders to be used, concluding 87. “quantunche sia imperfecta, tamen Joanne
that Raphael left the Orders of the façade Antonio non mi recordo havere visto un’altra
and cortile to be determined during con- che si li assomigli, o vi agionghi da uno gran
struction. Raphael does specify the Doric for pezo.” Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 769ff.
the entrance portals and the columns of the 88. “Ma quello che excedeti ogni altro nostro
Tevere loggia, and Ionic columns for a vesti- piacere fo la stantia la quale, anchor che imper-
bule, but without discussing the Orders for fecta sii, ne parvi bellissima, in sito amenissimo,
N O TE S TO PAG E 164 285
copiosa di molte e maravigliose antiquitati.” In 92. Luciano Patetta, ed., Bramante e la sua cerchia
ibid. 793. The letter does not specify which a Milano e in Lombardia 1480–1500 (Milan,
room she means, but her description of it as 2001), 98–9 (catalogue entry on the Prevedari
full of antiquities suggests the garden loggia. engraving by Stefano Borsi, with earlier
89.
For example, Albertini’s guide to Rome sources).
contained encomiastic reports on Julius II’s 93. Marina Döring interprets the conflicting evi-
unfinished projects: “Opusculum de mira- dence that the Genazzano nymphaeum was
bilibus novae & veteris urbis Romae (Rome, unfinished by proposing that it was conceived
1510),” book 3, “De aedificiis ab Iulio Secundo as an artificial ruin – an early folly – and a built
constructis.” version of Bramante’s Prevedari engraving:
90.
Vasari praises Michelangelo’s unfinished Döring, “La nascita della rovina artificiale nel
Medici Madonna in both the 1550 and the Rinascimento italiano, ovvero il ‘Tempio in
1568 editions, saying that “ancora che non rovina’ di Bramante a Genazzano,” in Donato
siano finite le parti sue, si conosce, nell’essere Bramante, 347ff.
rimasta abozzata e gradinata, nella imper- 94. The background of Andrea Mantegna’s fic-
fezione della bozza la perfezzione dell’opera.” tive view of the Mantuan countryside in
Vasari, Le vite de’ più eccellenti pittori scultori the Camera Picta frescoes famously includes
e architettori, ed. Bettarini and Barrochi, vi, Roman-style ruins, but also a scaffolded cas-
57. Although the patron’s ambition was still tle-villa under construction. Also, the back-
surely completion; Cardinal Giulio, in his let- ground of his 1474 fresco of the ducal family
ter about the squabbling artists at the villa depicts an imaginary castle-style villa under
after Raphael’s death, encourages Maffei construction in the Mantuan countryside;
to do whatever is necessary to get them to the villa is completely built, but its tower is
complete the work: “Vostra Paternità veda di still in scaffolding, with workmen on it. The
assettarla a suo modo pur che l’opra si faccia e detail is illustrated in Ackerman, The Villa, 77
perfettamente”; Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 600. fig. 3.17. Leonardo da Vinci provided a promi-
91.
Christof Thoenes, “St. Peter als Ruine. Zu nent example of the notion of the modern
einigen Veduten Heemskercks,” Zeitschrift ruin in the background of his Adoration of the
für Kunstgeschichte 49 (1986): 481–501. For Magi and its preparatory drawings, replac-
the notion of the Belvedere and St. Peter’s ing the traditional motif of crumbling ruins
as modern ruins, see also Fausto Testa, “‘ut symbolizing the vanquished pagan order
ad veterum illa admiranda aedificia accedere with a construction scene of workmen
videatur.’ Il Cortile del Belvedere e la retorica building a structure very similar to Poggio
politica del potere pontificio sotto Giulio II,” a Caiano. For the suggestion that this back-
in Donato Bramante: ricerche, proposte, riletture, ed. ground depicts the rising portico and origi-
Francesco Paolo Di Teodoro (Urbino, 2001), nal stairs of Poggio, see Giuseppe Marchini,
229–66. A contemporary reference to St. “Leonardo e le scale,” Antichità viva 24 (1985):
Peter’s as the ruins of Bramante surely reflects 180–5, 214; supporting this suggestion see
this perception, as well as the tongue-in-cheek Gabriele Morolli, “Lorenzo, Leonardo e
moniker of the architect as Maestro Ruinante; Giuliano: da San Lorenzo al Duomo a Poggio
Curial humanist Filippo Beroaldo, in a 1516 a Caiano. Paralipomeni architettonici minimi
humorous piece in the voice of the recently in vista del semimellenario della morte del
deceased elephant Hanno, has the elephant say Magnifico,” Quaderni di storia dell’architettura
that he wishes, “che ‘l mio corpo sia sepulto e restauro 3 (1990): 5–14. However, Caroline
nel Vaticano tra le ruine de Bramante.” In V. Elam doubts this identification based on
Rossi, Dal Rinascimento al Risorgimento (Scritti the relative chronology of the painting and
di Critica Letteraria iii) (Florence, 1930), 233. villa, further noting that the combination of
On old and new ruins, see also Suzanne B. portico arches and stairs was not unique to
Butters, “Figments and Fragments: Julius II’s Poggio: verbal communication.
Rome,” in Rethinking the High Renaissance: 95. As noted by Thoenes, “St. Peter als Ruine.”
The Culture of the Visual Arts in Early Sixteenth- 96. On the unfinished as a stimulus to contem-
Century Rome, ed. Jill Burke (Farnham, 2012), porary architectural imagination, Nicholas
57–93. Temple and Soumyen Bandyopadhyay,
“Contemplating the Unfinished,” in From 104. Robert Williams comments: “In a still more
Models to Drawings, 109–19. all-encompassing, absolute sense, art could be
97. Greene, “The Double Task of the Humanist understood as a dynamic principle, a principle
Imagination.” of becoming. Aristotle had discussed techne in
98. “Fu tale questo studio, che rimase il suo these terms, likening the way a work of art
ingegno capacissimo di poter vedere nella comes into existence to natural processes of
immaginazione Roma, come ella stava quando formation and transformation … Sixteenth-
non era rovinata.”Vasari, Le vite de’ più eccellenti century writers frequently invoke the defi-
pittori scultori e architettori, ed. Milanesi, ii, 338, nition of art provided in the Nicomachean
cited in this context in Greene, “The Double Ethics: ‘a rational habit of making (metá logou
Task of the Humanist Imagination,” 43. poetike) that reasons truly’.” Robert Williams,
99. Cf. the visual representations of Renaissance Art, Theory, and Culture in Sixteenth-Century
gardens and landscapes that became popular Italy (Cambridge, 1997), 11. For the relevance
subjects for villa decoration and prints in the of this section of the Nicomachean Ethics to
mid-sixteenth century, which often depicted Alberti’s definition of architecture as an art or
partially built estates as finished. These vedute science, Branko Mitrović, Serene Greed of the
could serve as a kind of prescriptive visualiza- Eye: Leon Battista Alberti and the Philosophical
tion, and are a later example of the synchro- Foundations of Renaissance Architectural Theory
nism between design and execution on the (Berlin, 2005), 66–7.
one hand, and visual or textual representa- 105. Jeanneret, Perpetual Motion.
tions. Proleptic garden views are discussed by 106. Pietro Floriani, Bembo e Castiglione: studi sul
Denis Ribouillault, “Toward an Archaeology classicismo del cinquecento (Rome, 1976), 75–8.
of the Gaze: The Perception and Function of 107. Shearman, Sources, vol. 1, 539.
Garden Views in Italian Renaissance Villas,” in 108. As noted by Richardson, “From Scribal
Clio in the Italian Garden: Twenty-First-Century Publication to Print Publication,” 694–5 and
Studies in Historical Methods and Theoretical n. 38; he analyzes this as a function of poetic
Perspectives, ed. Mirka Beneš and Michael G. practice during the transition from scribal to
Lee (Washington, DC, 2011), 203–32, espe- print publication.
cially 205ff.Another such example may be seen
in the well-known prints of Michelangelo’s CO NC LU SIO N
Campidoglio, shown as complete long before
the fact. 1. Castiglione wryly suggests that a sonnet
100. On the ruin as a form of discourse that ostensibly improvised by L’Unico Aretino (the
stimulates reflection and engages narrative poet Bernardo Accolti, famous for this tal-
forms, Ahuvia Kahane, “Image, Word and ent) had actually been prepared in advance; in
the Antiquity of Ruins,” European Review of Baldassare Castiglione, Il Libro del Cortegiano,
History – Revue européenne d’histoire 18 (2011): I, 9. On varying degrees of improvisation in
829–50, as well as his introduction to this poetic recitation, Richardson, “‘Recitato e
volume on the subject of “Antiquity and the Cantato’,” 71–2.
Ruin,” 631–44. 2. I owe the term recombinant discourses to Katja
101. Thoenes sees the disparity between the gran- Brandt, from her Slade lectures delivered in
diose and the feasible as a defining characteris- 1997–8.
tic of Roman Renaissance building: Thoenes, 3. See the discussion in the Introduction, pp.
“St. Peter als Ruine,” 137. 10–11 and notes 54–8.
102. On the historiography of attitudes to the 4. Pérez-Gómez has further stressed that
unbuilt, Daniel M. Abramson, “Stakes of the Renaissance architectural drawings themselves
Unbuilt,” The Aggregate website (transpar- were “value-laden” tools that distilled the
ent peer reviewed), http://we-aggregate visionary power of the architect and poetic
.org/piece/stakes-of-the-unbuilt, accessed 6 nature of architecture, rather than serving sim-
February 2014. ply as “neutral artefacts” of building: Alberto
103. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. H. Pérez-Gómez, “Questions of Representation:
Rackham (London and New York, 1926), VI, The Poetic Origin of Architecture,” in From
iv, 2–4. Models to Drawings, 11–22, at 14; Pérez-Gómez,
N O TE S TO PAG E S 174– 177 287
Built upon Love: Architectural Longing after power of the “imaginal” for worldmaking,
Ethics and Aesthetics (Cambridge, MA, 2006); Koliji, In-Between, 33 and passim.
and Pérez-Gómez, Architecture and the Crisis 11. Carruthers, “The Poet as Master Builder.”
of Modern Science (Cambridge, MA, 1983), 12. Kleinbub, Vision and the Visionary in Raphael,
Introduction. His call has resonated with 111–15 and passim.
thinkers interested in the relation of history, 13. Quintilian, Institutio oratoria, viii, 4, 62–3. On
theory, and practice of architecture, seeking to enargeia in Cicero as well as Quintilian, Vasaly,
understand metaphorical and symbolic aspects Representations, 88–104.
of architectural design in historic context and 14. Among the vast bibliography on the subject,
their applications for contemporary practice; see especially John Shearman, “Portraits and
e.g. the essays in The Humanities in Architectural Poets,” in Only Connect: Art and the Spectator in
Design:A Contemporary and Historical Perspective, the Italian Renaissance (Princeton, 1992), 108–
ed. Soumyen Bandyopadhyay, Jane Lomholt, 48; Lina Bolzoni, Il cuore di cristallo: ragionamenti
Nicholas Temple, and Renée Tobe (London, d’amore, poesia e ritratto nel Rinascimento (Turin,
2010); and Frascari et al., From Models to 2010), part ii; and Elizabeth Cropper, “On
Drawings. Beautiful Women. Parmigianino, Petrarchism,
5. For the dialectic of humanistic inquiry and and the Vernacular Style,” Art Bulletin 58
design ideas in Alberti’s thinking, Nikolaos- (1976): 374–94.
Ion Terzoglu, “The Human Mind and 15. “And since, while they lived, you did not
Design Creativity. Leon Battista Alberti and know the Duchess or the others who are
lineamenta,” in The Humanities in Architectural dead … in order to make you acquainted
Design, 136–59. with them, in so far as I can, after their death,
6. Trachtenberg, Building-in-Time, 61. I send you this book as a portrait of the Court
7. A point that has been made by Pérez-Gómez, of Urbino, not by the hand of Raphael or
Built upon Love, 155–7. Michelangelo, but by that of a lowly painter
8. On the use of literary writing as a practical and one who only knows how to draw the
tool for contemporary architectural design and main lines, without adorning the truth with
planning, Klaske Havik, Urban Literacy: Reading pretty colors or making, by perspective art,
and Writing Architecture (Rotterdam, 2014). that which is not seem to be.” Baldassare
9. This early modern exquisite corpse was Castiglione, The Book of the Courtier, trans.
very different from the random aspect of the Charles S. Singleton (New York, 1959), 3.
eponymous Surrealist game, but shared with This metaphor actually appeared in a dedica-
it the practice of a collective enterprise to tory epistle that postdated the treatise itself
bring together disparate elements to com- and is known from the 1528 edition; on this
pose a whole, drawing on the anthropologi- point, and on the Courtier as portrait, Robert
cal metaphor. In her study of architectural W. Hanning, “Castiglione’s Verbal Portrait:
conservation as a creative spur to invention, Structures and Strategies,” in Castiglione: The
Federica Goffi traces the exquisite corpse Ideal and the Real in Renaissance Culture, ed.
metaphor from the assemblage of physi- Robert W. Hanning and David Rosand (New
cal spoils in Renaissance building, especially Haven, 1983), 131–41.
at St. Peter’s, to contemporary architecture: 16. Conversely, building medals could function as
Goffi, Time Matter(s), 97–122. a visual panegyric of the patron via a build-
10. For the phenomenology of fiction as “producing project, or serve to link a patron to his
tive” or “reality shaping,” Paul Ricoeur, “The seat of rule, as in Matteo de’ Pasti’s medal
Function of Fiction in Shaping Reality,” Man of Sigismondo Malatesta with the castle of
and World: An International Philosophical Review Rimini on the reverse.
12 (1979): 123–41. For recent approaches to the 17. For the Horatian Exegi monumentum topos, see
imaginary made manifest via visual and verbal Chapter 2, p. 55 and notes 55–6.
means, Claus Clüver, Matthijs Engelberts, and 18. See Appendix i, dedicatory letter, §2 and gloss
Véronique Plesch, eds., The Imaginary: Word note 4 for the Vitruvian source and the sug-
and Image/L’imaginaire: text et image (Leiden, gestion that this conceit refers to stucco, par-
2015). On the ontology of imagined worlds ticularizing the words-versus-marbles topos to
in medieval thought, east and west, and the the Medici villa.
19. Elet, “Papal villeggiatura,” chs. 4 and 5, which I Aspects of Humanistic Script 1460–1560 (Oxford,
will treat further in a book on early modern 1963).
stucco. 6. As noted in Chapter 6, p. 154 and notes
20. In Father Tiber’s final sentence, he declares 48–50.
that his tasks are pleasing because of his patron, 7. Morello, Raffaello e la Roma dei Papi, cat. 84.
and Pleasure holds his reins (403–5); for the 8. Ibid. cat. 85; and Alfred Fairbank, “Another
relation of this conceit to the Medici device Arrighi Manuscript Discovered,” Book
iugum suave (the yoke is easy), and to Statius’ Collector 20 (1971): 332–4.
Silvae, i, 3 in which Pleasure draws the plans 9. Sheryl E. Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici’s
for Vopiscus’ villa, see Appendix i, gloss note 1520 Berlin Missal and Other Works by Matteo
143. On Statius’ plays on the visual/verbal, da Milano,” Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen 33
Marshall, “Spectandi Voluptas,” 332–3. (1991): 107–28; and Jonathan J. G. Alexander,
21. On this metaphor of text as building, Quinlan- ed., The Painted Page: Italian Renaissance Book
McGrath, “The Villa of Agostino Chigi,” 4–5; Illumination 1450–1550, Exh. Cat. (Munich,
and Lina Bolzoni, The Gallery of Memory: 1994), cat. 128.
Literary and Iconographic Models in the Age of the 10. As suggested by Jonathan J. G. Alexander
Printing Press, trans. Jeremy Parzen (Toronto, (email correspondence).
2001), 191–6. See Aksamija, “Architecture and 11. Another close comparison may be made to
Poetry in the Making of a Christian Cicero” the illuminated dedication page of an edition
on the textual villa as simulacrum; and of Plotinus (BNCF 86) painted by Attavante
Galand-Hallyn, “Aspects du discours,” 143, on and dedicated to Leo in minoribus, although
villa poetry as metonym of poet or dedicatee. the shape of the shield is slightly different;
22. As noted by Ann Kuttner. For Cicero’s letters, illustrated in Nicoletta Baldini and Monica
see Chapter 4, p. 92 and note 27. Bietti, Nello splendore mediceo: Papa Leone X e
23. Sergei Eisenstein, Film Sense (New York, Firenze (Florence, 2013), cat. 15, 378–9.
1942), 4; and for Marcel Lods, see David 12. On Giulio’s cardinalate seals in this period,
Leatherbarrow and Mohsen Mostafavi, Reiss, “Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici as a Patron
Surface Architecture (Cambridge, MA, 2002), of Art,” 414–19; and Hegener, DIVI IACOBI
157–60. EQVES, 89–90 and fig. 35.
13. I am grateful to Katja Brandt for this
AP PENDI X I I observation.
14. Sherman, “‘Nota Bembe’: How Bembo the
1. The manuscript was exhibited in the 1985 Elder Read his Pliny the Younger.”
Vatican exhibition without attribution of the 15. Ginevra was the Platonic love interest of the
scriptor or illuminator: Giovanni Morello, elder Bembo, who evidently commissioned
ed., Raffaello e la Roma dei Papi, Exh. Cat. the portrait with his device on the verso, which
(Rome, 1986), cat. 89. I am very grateful to was later overpainted with hers. Bernardo
Jonathan J. G. Alexander for generously shar- Bembo, humanist and Venetian ambassador,
ing his observations on the style, quality, and was well connected in Laurentian Florence,
attribution of the script and illumination of where he took part in the chivalric tradition
this manuscript, and to Paolo Vian, Director of celebrating a Platonic lover with Petrarchan
of the Department of Manuscripts, Biblioteca imagery, and the culture of villa life. For lit-
Apostolica Vaticana, for examining the manu- erature on his device, Leonardo’s painting, and
script with me. the conservation treatment that revealed the
2. I am indebted to Paolo Vian for the observa- change to the inscription, see Caroline Elam,
tion that the binding is consistent with the “Bernardo Bembo and Leonardo’s Ginevra de’
date of the poem, and that the BAV would Benci: A Further Suggestion,” in Pietro Bembo e
have had no reason to rebind it. le arti (Venice, 2013), 407–20; Lina Bolzoni, “I
3. For the symbolism of myrtle and laurel, see ritratti e la comunità degli amici fra Venezia,
Appendix i, line 31, and gloss notes 17 and 18. Firenze e Roma,” in Pietro Bembo e l’invenzione
4. Cox-Rearick, Dynasty and Destiny, 17–23. del Rinascimento, 210–18; Bolzoni, Cuore di
5. On the development of chancery cursive, cristallo, 345–50; and David Alan Brown, ed.,
James Wardrop, The Script of Humanism: Some Virtue and Beauty: Leonardo’s Ginevra de’ Benci
N O TE S TO PAG E S 2 2 0 –223 289
and Renaissance Portraits of Women (Princeton, surely a reflection of Medici strategy to keep
2001), 142–6, with earlier bibliography, nota- it in the family beyond Leo’s pontificate.
bly Jennifer Fletcher, “Bernardo Bembo and 20. See Conclusion, p. 177. For the topos about
Leonardo’s Portrait of Ginevra de’ Benci,” the relative longevity of words and monu-
Burlington Magazine 131 (1989): 811–16. ments, see Chapter 2, p. 55 and notes 55–6.
Although Leonardo himself was in France by 21. For Arrighi in Rome and his ties to the circle
the time of Sperulo’s poem, the artist’s resi- of Cardinal Giulio and Raphael: A. S. Osley,
dence in the Vatican until a few years before Scribes and Sources: Handbook of the Chancery
may have made this conceit well known. (The Hand in the Sixteenth Century (Boston, 1980), ch.
whereabouts of the Ginevra portrait in 1519 5; Cecil H. Clough, “Ludovico degli Arrighi’s
remain unknown, although presumably it was Contact with Raphael and with Machiavelli,”
in Florence.) Bibliofilia 75 (1973): 294–306; Clough,
16. This combination was also familiar from “Ludovico degli Arrighi and Raphael,” Journal
deschi da parto and Netherlandish paintings, as of the Society for Italic Handwriting 79 (1974): 13–
noted by Brown, Virtue and Beauty, 146 n. 8. 16; Clough, “A Manuscript of Paolo Giovio’s
Specifically, a mid-quattrocento pair of Medici Historiae sui Temporis Liber VII. More Light
portraits (perhaps Piero and Giovanni?) vari- on Ludovico degli Arrighi,” Book Collector 38
ously attributed to Andrea del Castagno or (1989): 27–59, especially at 44–7; A. Pratesi,
Domenico Veneziano, also paired likenesses “Ludovico Arrighi, detto il Vicentino,” in
on the rectos with wreaths containing palle on Dizionario biografico degli Italiani (1962), vol.
the versos. But the style is totally different; in 4, 310–13; Stefano Pagliaroli, “Ludovico degli
the verso of these paired portraits, the wreaths Arrighi,” in Studi medievali umanistici (Messina
are round and a very different foliate design and Rome, 2005), vol. 3, 47–79.
from the paired sprigs of Bembo’s device, 22. The hand is a close, but not exact, match with
Leonardo’s Ginevra verso, or Sperulo’s manu- that of Genesius de la Barrera, a Spaniard who
script – and the palle are flattened circles. The worked as a copyist in the Chancery with
paired portraits are now in the Gottfried Keller Arrighi between 1519 and 1523; for which,
Stiftung, Zurich. Illustrated and discussed in José Ruysschaert, “Le copiste Genesius de la
Baldini and Biette, Nello splendore mediceo, 358– Barrera et le manuscrit Barberini d’Il Principe
61 (catalogue entry by Miklós Boskovits), with de Machiavelli,” in Studies on Machiavelli, ed.
earlier bibliography, to which should be added Myron P. Gilmore (Florence, 1972), 348–59.
Brown, Virtue and Beauty, 146 n. 8. Neither is it an exact match with the hand
17. We may see the same pairing of sprigs fram- of Evangelista Maddaleni, known as Fausto
ing Leo’s papal arms, in this case palm with Capodiferro (see Wardrop, The Script of
laurel or myrtle, but differently shaped and Humanism, 43–4 and pl. 46); or with the poet
not forming a wreath, in Egidio da Viterbo’s and scriptor Giovanni Francesco Vitali, one
Libellus de litteris hebraicis of 1517; BAV,Vat. Lat. of the Coryciana scribes. Vitali did a manu-
5808, Morello cat. 84, illuminated by Matteo script of the Coryciana poetry with Caius
da Milano. Silvanus. His hand had the same sloping qual-
18. Luke Syson, catalogue entry 33 and 33a, ity as the Sperulo manuscript, although the
in The Currency of Fame: Portrait Medals of tails of the p’s are very different. For Vitali, José
the Renaissance, ed. Stephen K. Scher (New Ruysschaert, “Les péripéties inconnues de
York, 1994), 114–15. Among other medals l’édition des ‘Coryciana’ de 1524,” in Atti del
commemorating recent building initiatives convegno di studi su Angelo Colocci (Jesi, 1972),
were one depicting Bramante’s Vatican logge 50–1 and passim.
overlooking the Cortile di San Damaso, and 23. For the signature of Genesius, see
another with a bird’s-eye view of the Cortile Ruysschaert, “Le copiste Genesius de la
del Belvedere; illustrated in Millon and Barrera,” fig. 9; for that of Vitali, Ruysschaert,
Lampugnani, The Renaissance from Brunelleschi “Les péripéties inconnues de l’édition des
to Michelangelo, cats. 127 and 128. ‘Coryciana’,” fig. 4.
19. As noted in Chapter 3, p. 64. See also Appendix 24. Although various signatures, or closing marks,
i dedicatory letter §1 for Sperulo’s emphasis appear in this volume; sometimes an S is
on Giulio’s great expense in building the villa, crowned with dots instead of x’s (as in his
290 NOTES T O PA GE S 2 23–224
poem about the Laocoön, fol. 150v); or else a 27. Richardson, Manuscript Culture in Renaissance
stylized S and two dots appear at the end of Italy, 79–81.
a line. Sperulo’s elegy on Leo’s clemency (fol. 28. Ibid. 81, and passim.
102v–103r) is the only work that closes with 29. For an instance of close collaboration
the S and three x’s at the center bottom like between painter and scribe in the mak-
his villa poem, perhaps because it marks the ing of maps in luxurious late quattrocento
end of his third book of elegies in this volume. manuscripts, F. W. Kent† and Caroline Elam,
25. Tamburini, Santi e peccatori, 209. “Piero del Massaio: Painter, Mapmaker
26. See now Gwynne, Patterns of Patronage, vol. 2, and Military Surveyor,” Mitteilungen des
xxiii, noting that Sperulo’s Vatican manuscripts Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz 67
appear to be autograph. (2015): 65–89.
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INDEX
Acciaiuoli, Agnolo, 207n62 Julius II as, 143

Accolti, Bernardo (L’Unico Aretino), 286n1 Lorenzo the Magnificent and Leo X associated with,
Ackerman, James, 100, 158, 159 20, 105, 109
Adrian VI (pope), 23 Apollo Belvedere (sculpture), 141
Aelst, Peter van, 68 apple of the Hesperides (mala aula), as Medici family
Aeneas. See Virgil, Aeneid device, 20
Aeolus, 208n79 Apuleius, 276n88
agonistic/competitive culture architectural design/planning process. See design process
design process and, 155–7, 172–3 architecture–body metaphor, 46, 246n128
villa poems and, 58–60, 90, 153–7 Arcinelli, villa near (Tivoli), 115, 273n60
word and image as agonistic, 2–3, 11, 173, 177 Ariadne (Sleeping Cleopatra; sculpture), 53, 141
Agosti, Barbara, 156 Ariosto, Carlo, 163
Aimo, Domenico, Leo X, 66, 125, 126 Ariosto, Ludovico, 3, 24, 79, 92, 146, 176, 256n11
Aksamija, Nadja, 8 Cristoforo dell’Altissimo, Portrait of Ludovico Ariosto,
Alberti, Leon Battista, 100, 149, 157, 159, 160, 174, 30
251n43 I suppositi, staging of, 27, 31, 146, 176, 262n85
Albertini, Francesco, 94, 285n89 Orlando furioso, 27, 83, 169, 176, 211n110, 253n62,
Aldrovandi, Ulisse, 107 262n85
Alexander VI (pope), 241n68 Aristotle, 14, 54, 176, 178
Alexander, Jonathan J. G., 218 Nicomachaean Ethics, 168, 286n104
Alidosi, Francesco (cardinal), 273n62 Arrighi, Ludovico degli (Il Vicentino), 223, 289n22
altarpieces Arruntius Stella, wedding of (described by Statius), 72,
Raphael’s visionary altarpieces, 83, 176 203n13, 252n58
St. Anne altar commission, Sant’Agostino, Rome, 53 ars memoriae tradition, 92
Altissimo, Cristofano dell’, Portrait of Ludovico Ariosto, 30 Arsilli, Francesco, 23, 24, 241n67
ambulatio (leisurely walk), 54, 64, 204n22, 209n84 De poetis urbanis, 23
Ammannati, Bartolomeo, 139 assemblage metaphor connecting buildings, poems, and
antiquities and spoils. See also under metastructures of bodies, 246n128
word and image for Villa Madama; Villa astrological and cosmological imagery, 20, 65, 203n15,
Madama 205n35, 207n51, 208n80
generative for metastructures/programs, 101, 133–41, Attavante degli Attavanti, 218, 288n11
172 Augustinian imaginative vision, 176
papal appropriation of, 29–33, 79, 137, 244n93 Augustus (Roman emperor), 66, 75, 81, 130
poetry describing, completing, and recontextualizing, Aulus Gellius, 264n23
53, 175–6 Aurenhammer, Hans, 11
Raphael as Prefect of Marbles and, 4, 28–33, 73, 137, Ausonia, as term for Italy, 212n126
140, 157 Ausonius, 247n2
Raphael’s letter about Roman antiquities to Leo X, authorial voice, 72, 98, 176
15, 24, 28, 96, 147, 169, 243n86, 267n60 as Father Tiber, 55, 61, 67–9, 72, 74, 83, 91, 155, 156,
re-membering, 7, 15, 175 172, 176, 203n11, 214n143, 215n144, 257n19
Sperulo’s Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata on, 30, 62, as Hephaestus/Vulcan, 69–72, 155, 156, 202n6
73–9, 101 authorship, concepts of, 142, 157–63
as symbol of pax romana, 118 autograph manuscript, presentation manuscript of
Apelles, Raphael compared to, 83, 207n65, 256n16 Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem as, 55, 180, 223
Apollo Avogadro, Alberto, 52
320
INDEX 321
Baia, 112, 125, 276n90 Braccesi, Alessandro, 52

Bandinelli, Baccio, 42, 131, 133, 272n44, 277n99 Bracciolini, Poggio, 15, 50, 92
Barbaro, Daniele, 11 Bramante, Donato, 130, 277n95
Barrera, Genesius de la, 223, 289n22 as collaborator and model for Raphael, 4, 143
Basilica of Constantine and Maxentius, Rome, identified Genazzano, Colonna nymphaeum, and, 43, 120, 121,
as Temple of Peace, 120, 118–24 164, 273n59, 274n70, 285n93
Baxandall, Michael, 149 medals commemorating building of St. Peter’s in
Beazzano, Agostino, 26, 27 Rome, 221, 222, 289n18
Becchi, Gentile, 207n51, 207n57 “new ruins” and, 164, 285n91
Belriguardo (Este villa), 49 as poet and “architecto doctissimo,” 24
Belvedere Courtyard (Cortile del Belvedere),Vatican Prevedari engraving, 164, 165
Palace, 105, 143, 164, 167, 273n59, 289n18 bringing into being/into existence, arts as process of
Belvedere Statue Court, 141, 143, 175 (poiesis), 14, 163–9, 178
Bembo, Bernardo broncone, as Medici family device, 20, 207n63, 217, 218
copy of Pliny’s letters owned by, 49, 49 Brunelleschi, Filippo, 164
Ginevra de’ Benci and, 288n15 Bruni, Leonardo, 265n38, 266n43
personal device of, 218, 219 building in the mind’s eye, 54, 176, 179
Bembo, Pietro building with words, 59, 229n5. See also Exegi
De Aetna, 49 monumentum topos
Gli Asolani, 246n122 Buondelmonti, Benedetto, 243n84, 282n52
Ciceronianism of, 22 Burns, Howard, 159
epitaph for Raphael, 4
friendship and projects with Raphael, 26, 28, 147, 148,
243n86, 281n26 Caius Silvanus, 251n47, 289n22
as humanist at Roman court of Leo X, 3, 22 Calcagnini, Celio, 143
letters, restricted access to, 87 Calderini, Domizio, 50
literary methodologies adapted to architecture by Campano, Giannantonio, 58, 248n18
Raphael, 11 Candor illaesus (device of Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici),
Prose della volgar lingua, 22 203n15
Raphael’s portrait of Navagero and Beazzano owned Capitoline, Rome
by, 26, 27 festivities (1513) celebrating Roman citizenship of
revision of poems by, 169 Giuliano and Lorenzo de’ Medici, 66, 67, 144,
Sperulo acquainted with, 218 210n95, 257n21
Sperulo compared, 24 Palazzo dei Conservatori, 66, 79, 125, 155
villeggiatura, interest in, 23, 49, 147, 247n5, 281n24 Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, 210n93
Zucchi, Francesco, Pietro Bembo in Villa Bozza, 49 Temple of Jupiter Tonans, 204n23, 278n103
Bénard, Henri Jean Émile, 167, 168 as umbilicus mundi, 104
Berlin Missal, 218, 223 Capodiferro, Fausto (Evangelista Maddaleni), 223,
Berni, Francesco, Dialogo contra i poeti, 22, 95 289n22
Beroaldo, Filippo, the Younger, 58, 285n91 Caprarola, Farnese villa in, 160–3, 161, 162, 178, 281n35
Bertoja, Jacopo, Construction of a Round Temple, 160–3, Caradosso (Cristoforo Foppa), 221, 222
161, 162, 178 Careggi,Villa Medici, 52
Bibbiena, Cardinal (Bernardo Dovizi), 27, 147, 148 Carnevale, Fra, The Ideal City, 93
bitter/sour orange (mala medica), as Medici family device, Caro, Annibale, 161, 162, 281n35
20, 35, 208n81 Carpinetanus, Cursius, 252n56
Blosio. See Palladio, Blosio Carruthers, Mary, 176
Boccaccio, Giovanni, Decameron, 176, 265n38 Casa Panigarola, Milan, 130
Boccati, Giovanni, 130 Casalius, Battista, 252n56
body–architecture metaphor, 46, 246n128 Casanova, Marc Antonio, 252n56
Bologna, plague of 1478–79 in, 52 Castagno, Andrea del, 289n16
St. Bonaventure, 268n64 Famous Men and Women, 130
Boniface VIII (pope), 81 Castel Sant’Angelo, Rome, 269n19
Borghini,Vincenzo, 151, 152 Castiglione, Baldassare
Borgia, Cesare, 23, 241n68 Ariadne sculpture and, 53
Borgia, Girolamo, 52 Carmen on the death of Raphael, 15
Botticelli, Sandro, 20 certa Idea (attrib. Raphael) and, 46
La Primavera, 50, 203n17, 204n18, 208n81, 234n53, Il cortegiano (The Book of the Courtier), 22, 24, 170, 176,
274n67 269n9, 287n15
322 I NDEX
Castiglione, Baldassare (cont.) between artists on Medici projects, 146

describing Villa Madama as Raphael’s work, 158, authorship and, 142, 157–63
283n66 design process, as collaborative/dialogic, 4–5, 6, 142,
dining at Villa Madama site, 90, 147, 163 143–51, 160, 161, 162
friendship and projects with Raphael, 26, 27, 34, 89, humanists, collaborative practices of, 4–5
147, 169, 243n86, 281n26 Raphael, collaborative aptitude of, 4, 143–51
as humanist at Roman court of Leo X, 3, 23 villa poems, coordination/competition of
Raphael’s portrait of, 26, 26 compositions about same building, 58–60, 90,
Sperulo compared, 24 153–7
Superbi colli e voi, sacre ruine, 53 Colocci, Angelo, 21, 23, 26, 50, 52–3, 82, 238n28,
Villa Madama described in relation to cross of Monte 250n41, 251n44, 254n76
Mario by, 103 Colomina, Beatriz, 283n59
Catasto Alessandrino map, 103, 103, 270n29 Colonna, Francesco, 53, 251n43
Cati, Ludovico, 163 Colonna Nymphaeum, Genazzano, 43, 120, 121, 273n59,
Cato the Elder, 65 274n70, 285n93
Catullus, 239n32, 247n2 Columella, 72, 124
certa Idea (attrib. Raphael), 46 De re rustica, 148
chancery cursive, 55, 217 coming into being/coming to be, 14, 163–9, 178
Charlemagne, 104, 270n26 commemorative medals, 221, 222, 289n18
Charles V (Holy Roman Emperor), 18, 38, 104, Como,Villa Lissago (of Paolo Giovo), 23, 47
246n122, 262n83 competition. See agonistic/competitive culture
Chigi, Agostino, and Chigi villa (now Villa Farnesina), 91 Condivi, Ascanio, 178
convivium for reciting villa poems, 58, 90, 153 conspiracy
cultural exchange with Neapolitan humanists, 52–3 to assassinate Leo X (1517), 18, 82, 171, 210n91,
Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem and, 59, 155, 203n12 262n77
villa poems about, 13, 52–3, 58, 59, 91, 95, 153, 155, against Medici family (1466), 207n62
252n56, 252n58, 257n19 Constantine I (Roman emperor), 79, 81, 97, 101–2, 148,
villa poems as proleptic and, 90, 91, 95, 96, 263n21, 148, 275n75. See also Sala di Costantino
264n25, 267n53 Conti, Sigismondo de’, 240n52
visual–verbal imagery of gods coming down to visit, Contini, Francesco, Strada per la Croce di Monte Mario,
116, 125, 203n12, 276n88 103, 103, 270n29
Chimenti da Empoli, Jacopo, Michelangelo Presenting Leo continual revision, 160, 168, 283n69
X and Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici his Models…, convivia, 3, 58–9, 90, 97, 115, 153
150, 150 corpse of Rome, reviving. See “reviving the corpse of
Christian triumph, topography as narrative of, 101–5 ancient Rome”
Christina of Sweden, 110, 271n41 Correggio, Niccolò da, 276n88
Chrysolorus, Manuel, 92 Cortesi, Paolo, 99, 238n28
Cicero, 3, 22, 54, 94, 95, 234n53, 247n2, 264n23 Cortile del Belvedere (Belvedere Courtyard),Vatican
De divinatione, 205n28 Palace, 105, 143, 164, 167, 273n59, 289n18
letters to Quintus, 92, 178 Corycius (Johannes Goritz), circle of, and Coryciana
For Marcellus, 82 anthology, 21, 23, 24, 53, 56, 59, 90, 125, 153, 163
Claudian, Epithalamium, 71 cosmological and astrological imagery, 20, 65, 203n15,
clemency 205n35, 207n51, 208n80
of Leo X towards conspirators, 18, 82, 171, 210n91, Cresti da Passignano, Domenico, Michelangelo Presenting
262n77 his Model to Pope Paul IV, 148, 151
Triumph of Clemency (proposed Villa Madama Crinito, Pietro, 52
mural), 63, 63, 81–2, 209n90, 210n93, 261n72 cross of Monte Mario (croce di Monte Mario), 38, 103, 101–5
Clement I (pope), Leo X depicted as, 125, 127 Crotona, Zeuxis and the maidens of, 46
Clement VII (pope). See Medici, Giulio de’ crusades
Cleopatra (Ariadne; sculpture), 53, 141 Holy Land, papal desire to recapture, 121
Clerisseau, Charles-Louis, 132, 136 Ottoman Turks, threat of, 3, 18, 63, 80, 102, 212n125,
Cluny, Abbot Gunzo’s vision for, 176 260n63, 260n66, 262n83
Curia, 18, 27, 82, 125, 174, 206n47
Cock, Hieronymous, after Lambert Lombard, The
Curial humanists, 3, 12, 18, 20–2, 23, 33, 61, 80, 83, 91,
Raising of Lazarus with Villa Madama in the
98, 145, 147, 171, 280n17
Background, 17, 17, 164
Coenatio Iovis, metastructure/program for Villa Madama
as, 124–6, 135, 136 Daedala Curia and Daedalian Senate, 206n47
Coffin, David, 33 Daedalus, 156, 206n47
collaboration D’Amico, John, 21, 98
INDEX 323
Dante, 50 editorial theory, 10, 158, 234n52

David (biblical king), 207n57 Egidio of Viterbo, 80, 82, 218, 266n50, 282n50, 289n17
Davis, Margaret Daly, 150 Eisenstein, Sergei, 178
della Rovere, Felice (daughter of Julius II), 52 ekphrasis, 13, 49, 54, 60, 68, 71, 83, 92, 94
Dempsey, Charles, 72, 234n53 ekphrastic agency, 176
design process (architectural), 9–12, 14, 142–69, 174 ekphrastic completion, as literary mindset or tool,
as agonistic/competitive, 155–7, 172–3 175–6
authorship, concepts of, 142, 157–63 hortatory, 13, 90–3, 95, 98, 133, 172, 175, 178, 203n11
as collaborative/dialogic, 4–5, 6, 142, 143–51 notional, 92, 95, 172, 176, 265n33
continual revision, 160, 168, 283n69 reverse, 268n1
cultural discourse, as part of, 14, 167, 178 Elam, Caroline, xix
defined, 10, 12 Elegiae in Maecenatem, 252n55
as dynamic/iterative, 10, 158–63 Elephant Fountain,Villa Madama, 42, 119, 164
epistemological scope of architectural design, 10, encomia, 49, 93
152–3, 173–4 English country house discourse and Italian villa poetry,
gigantism of projects and, 167 251n42
modern ruins and the non-finito, 163–9, 178 epideictic rhetoric, 93, 154, 266n41
as performative, 153–5 epistemology of the imaginary shaping the real, 176
plans and documents, use of, 7 Equicola, Mario, 57, 64, 90, 153, 171, 260n63
poetry as design tool, 152–3, 171, 172, 174, 175 Este, Duke Alfonso d’, 211n112
Raphael’s letter as proposal for, 85, 89 Este, Isabella d’, 110, 147, 164, 270n30, 283n66
selection and composition as method of, 3, 11, 45, 173 eternal return of spring, as Medici imagery, 43, 65, 71,
as self-reflexive discourse, 14, 178 117, 207n53, 208n78, 209n89
sources for, 43–6 ethopoeia, 72
Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem as proposal for, 6, 11, Etruscan origins attributed to Medici family, 20, 62, 67,
83, 89, 91, 96–8, 145, 152–3, 171, 202n1, 69, 206n43, 255n1, 257n20
213n136 Eugenius IV (pope), 252n55
transformative planning model, 9 Exegi monumentum topos, 55, 177, 202n4, 252n56
transforming power of time and, 158–60, 163 “exquisite corpse,” 175, 287n9
virtual completion, 175, 179
words as design tools, 2–3, 152–3, 171, 172, 174, 175 falcon, as Medici family device, 20, 38, 69
devices and imprese Farnese, Alessandro, 276n91
of Bernardo Bembo, 218, 219 Farnese, Ottavio, 38
of Medici family. See Medici family devices and Farnese, Paulo Palliolo, 257n21
imprese Farnese Melpomene, 106, 112, 272n49
Dewez, Guy, 8, 33 Farnese villa in Caprarola, 161, 162, 160–3, 178, 281n35
diaeta,Villa Madama. See under Villa Madama Father Tiber, 55, 61, 63, 68, 69, 67–9, 70, 72, 74, 83, 91,
dialectical invention, 14, 142–69, 170, 172, 178 155, 156, 172, 176, 183, 203n11, 214n143,
diamond ring, as Medici family device, 20 215n144, 257n19
dining and dining areas Ficino, Marsilio, 93, 265n38
Coenatio Iovis, metastructure/program for Villa Fiera, Baptista, De iusticia pingenda (A Dialogue between
Madama as, 124–6, 135, 136 Mantegna and Momus), 282n40
convivia, 3, 58, 153 Fiesole,Villa Medici, 43, 52, 121, 249n26
of Domitian, in Statius’ Silvae, 125 Filarete, 92
grotto of Tiberius, Sperlonga, 112, 125, 129 Filiberta of Savoy, 62, 211n104
Hadrian’s Villa, Serapeum/Canopus, 115, 125 fishpond (peschiera),Villa Madama. See under Villa
Villa Madama fishpond (peschiera), dining area at, 38, Madama
109, 118, 119, 126 Flavio, Biondo, Roma instaurata, 252n55
Dog Star, 208n80 Florence. See also Poggio a Caiano; San Lorenzo
Domitian (Roman emperor), 48, 56, 58, 94, 125, 154, Cathedral, 100, 151, 152
202n8, 202n9 Hercules as symbol of, 205n37
Domus Aurea, Rome, 90, 140, 167 Medici alliance with symbols of, 20
Doni, Antonfrancesco, 223 Medici restoration to power in, 18
Dovizi, Bernardo (Cardinal Bibbiena), 27, 147, 148 Orti Oricellari, 52, 249n28
Du Bellay, Poemata, 259n43 Palazzo Medici, 79, 92, 130, 260n58, 265n34, 272n44
Dupérac, Étienne, The Basilica of Constantine and Palazzo Vecchio, Sala del Cinquecento, 131, 133,
Maxentius, 118, 120 277n99
324 I NDEX
Florence (cont.) grafting, of fruit trees, 214n140

patronage culture of, 19 Grapaldo, De partibus aedium, 49
Pratolino (villa), 274n65 Gregory of Nyssa, 247n2
Villa di Montughi (of Francesco Sassetti, currently Guarino da Verona, 268n4
Villa La Pietra), 52 Guidoni, Andrea, 212n117
Fontaine, Pierre François Léonard, 109, 167 Gunzo, Abbot, vision for Cluny, 176
Fonzio, Bartolomeo, 52 Gwynne, Paul, xx, 6
Foppa, Cristoforo (Caradosso), 221, 222
Fortunatus, 92, 247n2
Forum, Rome, 75, 104, 205n33 Hackert, Philipp, and 1783/6 inventory of Villa Madama,
Forum of Augustus, Rome, 130, 277n93 272n45
Forum of Julius Caesar, Rome, 74, 75 Hadrian’s Villa (Tivoli)
Forum of Trajan, Rome, 204n24 model for disposition of sculpture at Villa Madama,
Francis I (king of France), 211n101, 211n106, 262n83 43, 208n73
Frascati,Villa Aldobrandini, 112, 274n65 Odeion/theater, 272n47
Frommel, Christoph L., 7, 33, 87, 89, 96, 97, 231n22 Raphael and friends visiting, 26, 90, 147, 167
Fulvio, Andrea, 26, 67, 75, 257n25 Serapeum/Canopus, 115, 126
furor, poetic, 55, 59, 98, 202n5, 254n82, 255n83 Hanno (elephant), 285n91. See also Elephant Fountain,
Villa Madama
healing metaphors, associated with Raphael and Medici,
Gaeta, fruit trees from, 214n138
15, 17, 81, 175, 236n5, 271n37
Gaisser, Julia Haig, 21, 22
Heavenly Jerusalem, allegories of, 207n53
Gallo, Egidio (Aegidius Gallus), 52, 95, 252n56, 267n53
Heemskerck, Marten van
garden loggia,Villa Madama. See under Villa Madama
Genius Augusti, 131, 134
Garden of the Hesperides
Jupiter Ciampolini, 122
citrus associated with, 208n81
Seated Muses at Villa Madama, 107, 113, 272n45
golden apple of the Hesperides (mala aula), as Medici
Hemsoll, David, 11
family device, 20
Hephaestus/Vulcan, 69–72, 155, 156, 202n6
Pontano, De hortis hesperidum, 208n81, 267n54,
Hercules, Labors of, 160–3, 161, 162, 205n37, 207n57
280n21
hexameter, 6, 54, 61, 89, 95, 98, 154, 171, 177, 216
Genazzano, Colonna Nymphaeum, 43, 120, 121, 164,
Homer, 13, 56, 71, 92, 176, 178, 283n61
273n59, 274n70, 285n93
Horace, 55, 92, 211n100, 247n2
Genius Augusti, 131, 134, 135
hortatory ekphrasis, 13, 90–3, 95, 98, 133, 172, 175, 178,
Genius of the Roman People,Villa Madama, 119, 136, 137,
203n11
138, 139
humanists and humanism, 3–6
Gerino da Pistoia, 273n62
collaborative practices of, 4–5
Geymüller, Baron Heinrich von, 7, 33, 34, 167
at court of Leo X in Rome, 20–8
Ghezzi, Pier Leone, 271n41
Curial, 12, 18, 21, 22, 33, 61, 80, 83, 98
Giberti, Giovan Matteo, 95
defined, 12
Ginevra de’ Benci, 220, 220-221 288n15
field trip to Tivoli with Raphael, 26, 51, 147, 273n60
Giocondo, Fra, 45, 213n131
“humanist advisor,” role of, 5, 142, 143–51, 152, 160,
Giotto, 4
161, 162, 171, 178, 230n18, 281n35, 283n55
Giovanni da Udine, 42, 146
“humanist villa,” concept of, in relation to flowering
Giovio, Paolo, 22, 23, 47, 59, 146, 156, 163, 208n81,
of villa poetry, 8, 43, 51
212n124, 262n77, 267n54, 273n58, 280n21,
Raphael’s friendships and projects with, 24–8
282n40
renovatio imperii and neo-Latin communications
Giraldi, Lilio Gregorio, Modern Poets, 241n68
campaign under Leo X, 3
Giuliano da Maiano, 45
sodalities, 3, 12, 20, 56, 67
Giuliano di Baccio d’Agnolo, 277n99
villeggiatura, interest in, 23
Giulio Romano, 42, 142, 143, 146, 210n93, 245n115,
Hylas, 210n99
261n73, 275n79, 282n40
Hypnerotomachia Polifili, 13, 53, 92, 176, 251n43, 251n44
Polyphemus fresco,Villa Madama, 125, 128
Raphael, Self-Portrait (with Giulio Romano?), 143, 144
Goffi, Federica, 283n69 iconography/iconographic programs, 5, 9, 65, 99–101,
Golden Age, 3, 18, 20, 21, 43, 65, 66, 212n121 139, 141, 145, 146, 149, 150, 170, 173
golden apple of the Hesperides (mala aula), as Medici Ideal City panels, 93, 93
family device, 20 ideation, 7–8, 10, 12, 14, 157–8. See also invention, nature
Gombrich, Ernst, 21 of
Goritz, Johannes (Corycius), circle of, and Coryciana image and word. See word and image
anthology, 21, 23, 24, 53, 56, 59, 90, 125, 153, 163 imaginative visualization, 175, 176
INDEX 325
imprese and devices Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, Capitoline, Rome,

of Bernardo Bembo, 218, 219 210n93
of Medici family (See Medici family devices and Temple of Jupiter Tonans, Capitoline, Rome, 204n23,
imprese) 278n103
ingenium, 98, 176, 202n5, 211n109
Inghirami, Tommaso, 23, 27, 28, 67, 143, 257n24
Keller, Fritz-Eugen, 232n31
inner garden (xystus),Villa Madama, 37, 38, 39, 42, 44, 45,
Kempers, Bram, 156
89, 114, 119, 213n133, Plates iii–vi
Kleinbub, Christian, 83, 176
Innocent VIII Barberini (pope), 244n93, 275n75
Krautheimer, Richard, 93, 100
invention, nature of, 2–3, 170–8
Kuttner, Ann, 92
cross-disciplinary approach to, 8–12
cultural discourse, as part of, 14, 167, 176, 178
design process and, 9–12, 14, 142–69, 173, 174. See Lampridio, Benedetto, 52, 58, 59, 250n35, 282n40
also design process Landino, Cristoforo, 207n51
dialectical invention, 14, 142–69, 170, 172, 178 Landulfo, Agostino, 246n122
evidence for examining, 6–8 Laocoön (sculpture), 13, 24, 53, 79, 141, 175
humanism and, 3–6, 15–33, 142–69, 174. See also Lares, Giulio de’ Medici as, 204n20
humanists and humanism Larga manus, as Medici topos of praise, 207n57
ideation, 7–8, 10, 12, 14, 157–8 Lateran, Rome, papal benediction loggia, 81
invenzione/inventio, sixteenth-century understanding laurel, as Medici device, 20, 55, 106, 146, 203n17,
of, 10, 45, 99–101, 141, 173 207n63, 208n81, 217
metastructures/programs, 13, 99–141, 145, 173. See Legnaia (outside Florence),Villa Carducci, 130
also metastructures of word and image for Villa Leno, Giuliano, 145, 267n61
Madama; program, concept of Leo III (pope), 104
as poietic process, 14, 167, 178 Leo X Medici (pope; formerly Cardinal Giovanni de’
prolepsis, 13, 85–98, 171. See also proleptic character of Medici)
Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem Aimo’s statue of, 66, 125, 126
“reviving the corpse of ancient Rome” and, 12, as alter Christus, 205n36
15–46. See also “reviving the corpse of ancient Apollo, associated with, 20, 106, 109
Rome” assassination plot against, 18, 82, 171, 210n91, 262n77
selection, as mode of, 3, 11, 45, 173 Chimenti da Empoli, Jacopo, Michelangelo Presenting
Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem and, 1–3, 83, 152, 171. Leo X and Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici his
See also Sperulo, Francesco, Villa Iulia Medica Models…, 150, 150
versibus fabricata clemency demonstrated by, 18, 82, 171, 210n91,
terminological usage, 10, 12, 45, 99, 173 262n77
verbal description as, 54, 79, 83, 96, 152, 156, 173, Clement I, depicted as, 125, 127
174, 175 cosmological and astrological imagery associated with,
villa poems and, 6, 13–14, 61–84, 91, 96–8, 170–1. See 20, 203n15, 205n35, 208n80
also villa poems/villa literature Holy Land, desire to recapture, 121
Isola Bella, 112 humanists and artists at Roman court of, 20–33
Italian wars, 22, 63, 79, 83, 208n68, 208n69. See also as Jupiter, 125, 139
specific battles, e.g. Ravenna, Battle of Louis XII, alliance with, 211n104
iugum suave and yoke, as Medici impresa, 20, 212n124, Luther, Martin, and Lutheranism, 3, 18, 22, 262n83
214n143, 288n20 in Medici family tree, 62
mural paintings proposed by Sperulo for Villa Madama
Jacobus de Voragine, Golden Legend, 274n73 and, 79–84
Janus, 206n46 new cardinals named by, 212n120
Jeanneret, Michel, 168, 236n63 new Christian res publica projected by, 3–4, 18–20,
Julius II (pope), 52, 94, 143, 282n50, 285n89 140, 237n17
Michelangelo, Julius Tomb, 167, 178 Ottoman Turks, threat of and campaigns against, 3,
Julius Caesar, 66, 74, 75, 82, 94, 140, 205n33, 205n34 18, 63, 80, 102, 212n125, 260n63, 260n66,
Jupiter 262n83
Coenatio Iovis, metastructure/program for Villa patronage
Madama in, 124–6, 135, 136 of decoration at Poggio a Caiano (villa), 43
Jupiter Ciampolini,Villa Madama, 119, 122, 123, 121–4, style of, 19
135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 175, 275n75, Plate xix of Villa Madama, 17, 64–5, 147–9, 206n38, 255n2,
Leo X as, 125, 139 282n52
Sperulo misinterpreted to suggest figures of Silenus peace, Leonine program of, 18, 20, 21, 81, 121, 140,
and, at Villa Madama, 137, 278n103 212n127, 260n66
326 I NDEX
Leo X Medici (cont.) hopes for cardinalate and rooms in Vatican, 149, 281n33
Poggio a Caiano (villa), 43 as humanist-builder, 5, 146, 280n17
Raphael as Medici agent and project manager at Villa Madama,
The Arrival of Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici in Rome 145, 280n17, 280n19
in 1492 Flanked by the River Gods Arno and Tiber, in Roman court of Leo X, 22
Sistine chapel tapestry border, 67, 68 Sperulo, and involvement at Villa Madama, 146
The Capture of Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici by French villeggiatura, interest in, 23, 146
Troops in the Battle of Ravenna in 1512, Sistine Malatesta, Sigismondo, 287n16
chapel tapestry border, 79, 80 Manetti, Giannozzo, 94, 100, 266n43, 266n45
letter about ancient Rome to Leo X, 15, 24, 28, Manilius Vopiscus,Villa of, Tivoli. See also Statius, Silvae
243n86 described by Statius, 202n7, 208n80, 214n137,
Portrait of Pope Leo X with Two Cardinals, 19 247n12, 254n82
as Rex pacificus, 18, 21, 81, 140 visited by Raphael and friends, 51, 115, 273n60
site visits to Villa Madama by, 90, 163 Mantegna, Andrea, 282n40, 285n94
Sperulo, Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia xviiii (BAV, Triumphs of Caesar, 82
Vat. Lat. 2673), 13, 24, 82, 94, 101, 171, 223, Mantuanus (Battista Spagnoli), 52
225, 226–7 manuscripts
Sperulo serving, 23 Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici as patron of, 218, 223
in Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem, 63, 66, 79–84 Sperulo, Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia xviiii (BAV,Vat.
topography of Christian triumph at Villa Madama and, Lat. 2673), 13, 24, 82, 94, 101, 171, 223, 225, 226–7
101–5 Sperulo, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata (BAV,Vat.
Vida’s Christiad commissioned by, 56 Lat. 5812), 13, 54, 64, 72, 95, 154, 180, 224,
Leonardo da Vinci, 168, 232n27 216–24, Plates ix–xii
Adoration of the Magi, 285n94 “ugly manuscripts,”, 234n52
Battle of Anghiari, 79, 211n110 Manutius, Aldus, 154
Portrait of Ginevra de’ Benci, 220, 220-221, 288n15 Marcelli, Nicoletta, xx, 13, 180
Leonardo d’Arezzo, 265n38 Marcus Scaurus, Palatine home of, 210n95
Leto, Pomponio, 53, 238n28 Margarita d’Austria (“Madama”), 38, 246n122, 259n45
Ligorio, Pirro, 106, 204n23, 272n47 Marica, 211n100
Lillie, Amanda, 8, 43, 231n19 Martial, 247n2
literary framework and Renaissance villa architecture, Martines, Lauro, 9
relationship between, 8, 47–60, 178 Matteazzi, Antonio, 254n76
Livy, 79, 203n15 Maxentius (Roman emperor), 102
locational memory, 54, 176 Medici, Alessandro I de’, 38, 246n122
locus amoenus, 2, 101, 111, 167, 202n2, 203n16, 228n4 Medici, Catherine de’, 211n101, 274n65
Lods, Marcel, 178 Medici, Cosimo il Vecchio de’ (pater patriae), 52, 62, 65,
Lombard, Lambert, 16, 236n10 75, 82, 206n48, 206n50, 207n53, 207n57,
The Raising of Lazarus with Villa Madama in the 207n63, 212n124, 255n5
Background (1544), 16, 16, 164, 236n10 Medici, Cosimo I de’, 277n99
Longueil, Christophe de, 22 Medici, Giovanni de’ (cardinal). See Leo X Medici
Louis XII (king of France), 211n104 Medici, Giovanni di Bicci de’, 62, 62, 127, 206n46
Louise of Savoy, 211n105 Medici, Giovanni di Cosimo de’, 62, 207n56, 281n28,
Lucian, Dialoghi maritimi, 218, 223, Plates xiii–xiv 289n16
Lucilius, 241n68 Medici, Giuliano de’ (brother of Lorenzo il Magnifico,
Lucretius, 72, 259n42 father of Cardinal Giulio), 62, 207n64,
De rerum natura, 117 208n74, 208n75, 208n76
Lucullus, ruins of gardens of, 204n27 Medici, Giuliano de’ (Duke of Nemours), 18, 62, 66, 67,
Luther, Martin, and Lutheranism, 3, 18, 22 132, 211n103
Medici, Giulio de’ (cardinal; later Pope Clement VII)
Candor illaesus (impresa), 203n15
Machiavelli, Niccolò, 52, 206n50, 223 Chimenti da Empoli, Jacopo, Michelangelo Presenting
Madeleine de la Tour d’Auvergne, 62, 211n101, 211n102 Leo X and Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici his
Maffei, Mario Models…, 148, 149
correspondence with Giulio de’ Medici, 8, 100, 137, convivia hosted by, 58, 153
145, 147, 149, 214n138, 245n115, 268n6, dedicatory letter of Sperulo to, 2, 54, 55, 58, 59, 148,
280n17, 281n28, 285n90 202n1
design process, role in, 145 design process, involvement in, 5, 147, 148, 233n32,
dining at unfinished Villa Madama, 163 281n28
INDEX 327
on imagery used in Villa Madama, 99 villa poems associated with, 52

letter on decorations after death of Raphael, 42 villas at Fiesole and Poggio a Caiano as models for
Maffei correspondence, 8, 100, 137, 145, 147, 149, Villa Madama, 43
214n138, 245n115, 268n6, 280n17, 285n90 Medici family devices and imprese, 20, 38, 50, 65, 203n15,
in Medici family tree, 62 207n53, 207n63, 208n80, 208n81, 212n124,
on Ottoman Turks, 80 214n143, 217, 218, 222
as patron bitter/sour orange (mala medica), 20, 35, 208n81
of manuscripts, 218, 223 broncone, 20, 207n63, 217, 218
patronage style, 5, 19, 231n19, 281n28 Candor illaesus, 203n15
of Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem, 54, 58, 64, 89, cosmological and astrological imagery associated with
154, 218 Leo X, 203n15, 205n35, 208n80
of Villa Madama, 17, 64–5, 147, 148, 206n38, 255n2, diamond ring, 20
281n28, 282n52 Dog Star, 208n80
Poggio a Caiano (villa), 43 eternal return of spring, 43, 65, 71, 117, 207n53,
Raphael, Portrait of Pope Leo X with Two Cardinals, 19 208n78, 209n89
Sperulo, ordination of and benefices given to, 23 falcon, 20, 38
in Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem, 54, 62, 64, 66, 79, Florence, Medici alliance with symbols of, 20
127, 208n75, 208n76, 216–18 glovis, 208n78
as vice chancellor of church, 18, 147 golden apple of the Hesperides (mala aula), 20
Medici, Lorenzo il Magnifico de’ laurel, 20, 55, 106, 146, 203n17, 207n63, 208n81, 217
diplomatic and cultural exchange with Naples, 52, Le tems revient, 20, 50, 117, 207n53
250n37 yoke with motto iugum suave, 20, 212n124, 214n143,
in Medici family tree, 62 288n20
metastructures/programs for Villa Madama and, Medici family villas and palazzi. See also Poggio a
105–11, 130 Caiano;Villa Madama
as patron, 3, 19, 20, 79, 144, 260n58, 281n28 Palazzo Medici, Florence, 79, 92, 130, 260n58,
proposed statue of, at Villa Madama, 62, 105–6, 265n34, 272n44
208n73 Palazzo Medici, Rome (now Palazzo Madama), 137,
Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem and, 62, 73, 79, 207n53, 278n105
207n64, 208n73 Villa Medici, Careggi, 52
villa poems and, 52, 249n25, 249n26, 249n27, 250n37 Villa Medici, Fiesole, 43, 52, 121, 249n26
Medici, Lorenzo de’ (Duke of Urbino) Villa Medici, Rome (on Pincian Hill), 204n27
Medici dynastic hopes dashed by death of, 18 Medici Madonna, New Sacristy of San Lorenzo
in Medici family tree, 62 (Michelangelo), 285n90
metastructures/programs for Villa Madama and, 130, Medici vates (poet-seer), Sperulo claiming role of, 66,
132, 277n98 72, 95
relative chronology with Sperulo’s poem of illness and Mellini, Pietro, and Villa Mellini, 52, 58, 103, 250n35
death of, 66, 213n128, 256n11 memory palaces, 54, 90, 92
Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem and, 63, 64, 66, 210n94, metamorphic sensibility, 14, 168
213n128, 256n10, 256n11 metastructures of word and image for Villa Madama, 13,
tomb, New Sacristy, San Lorenzo, Florence, 132, 99–141, 170, 173
258n28 antiquities and spoils, generated about, 101, 133–41,
Medici, Piero de’ (son of Lorenzo, brother of Leo), 62, 172
210n99, 212n118 Coenatio Iovis, 124–6, 135
Medici, Piero il Gottoso de’, 19, 62, 207n56, 289n16 Medici ancestor gallery (proposed), 62, 64, 127–33,
Medici family 136, 206n41, 208n77, 209n85
ancestor gallery proposed for Villa Madama garden multivalence of, 124, 126, 132, 141, 174
loggia, 62, 64, 127–33, 136, 206n41, 208n77, Parnassus, 105–16, 137, 208n73
209n85 program, invenzione, or conceptual structure, concept
ancestor sculptures realized in Florence, 130, 132, 133, of, 13, 99–101, 132–3, 141, 145, 173
206n39, 277n98, 277n99 Temple of Peace, 118–24, 132, 135, 136, 140
Etruscan origins attributed to, 62, 69, 206n43, 255n1 topography of Christian triumph and, 101–5
failed conspiracy (1466) against, 207n62 Venus Genetrix, realm of, 71, 116–18, 132, 135, 140
patronage, pattern of sharing, 64–5, 206n38, 231n19, Michelangelo, 11, 20, 71, 131, 132, 147, 155, 159, 160,
255n5 167, 229n9, 231n19, 233n32, 258n28, 277n98,
public relations and assertion of authority by, 18–20 281n28
romanitas of, 20, 66–8, 73, 75, 79, 118, 131, 133, Chimenti da Empoli, Jacopo, Michelangelo Presenting
207n52 Leo X and Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici his
in Sperulo’s poem, 62, 62–6 Models…, 148, 149
328 I NDEX
Michelangelo (cont.) nymphaea

Cresti da Passignano, Domenico, Michelangelo Arcinelli (Tivoli), in villa near, 115, 273n60
Presenting his Model to Pope Paul IV, 148, 150 Colonna Nymphaeum, Genazzano, 43, 120, 121, 164,
Julius Tomb, 167, 178 273n59, 274n70, 285n93
Medici Madonna, 285n90 Villa Madama
New Sacristy, San Lorenzo, Florence, 68, 131, 132, fishpond as nymphaeum, 115
206n39, 211n103, 258n28, 277n98, 281n28 plans for rustic nymphaeum at, 273n59
Milvian Bridge (Ponte Milvio)
Constantine’s Battle of, 79, 81
O’Connor, Joseph, 100
Raphael, Battle of the Milvian Bridge, 79, 102, 164, 166,
omphalos (navel of the world), 104
211n110, Plates xv–xvi
oral publication, 154
road to Villa Madama from, 34, 38, 101, 102, 103,
orality, 20, 100, 170, 282n48
104–5, 261n70, 270n30
orange, bitter/sour (mala medica), as Medici family device,
symbolism of Villa Madama’s siting in relation to,
20, 35, 208n81
101–5
Oratorio della Croce (on Monte Mario), 103, 103
topography of Christian triumph and, 101–5
orders, architectural
view of/from Villa Madama, 38, 63, 63, 81, 97, 102,
Raphael’s specification of, for Villa Madama, 160,
261n70, 269n19
284n78
Mitchell, W. J. T., 11
sixteenth-century codification of, 235n58
mnemonic practices and habits of mind, 54, 90, 105, 176
Orsini, Alfonsina, 278n105
Montaigne, Essais, 168
Orsini, Clarice, 67, 257n21
Monte Mario, 17, 34, 103, 104, 105, 106, 132, 261n72,
Orsini, Fulvio, 161, 162, 162
270n26, 270n33, 271n38
Orti Oricellari, Florence, 52, 249n28
monumentum, 229n5
otium, 47, 208n73
Moscioni, Romualdo, 78
Ottoman Turks, threat of, 3, 18, 63, 80–1, 102, 206n44,
musaeum, 108–16, 136
208n71, 212n125, 256n10, 260n63, 260n66,
Muses, 105, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113,106–15, 175,
262n83
208n73, 271n41, 272n45
Ovid, 130, 252n55
myrtle, 55, 72, 204n18, 217
Fasti, 204n21, 256n8, 258n29
Metamorphoses, 229n5
Nagel, Alexander, 160, 230n14
Naldi, Naldo, 207n51 Pacciani, Riccardo, 154
Naples Pacioli, Luca, 150
Villa Mergellina (of Jacopo Sannazzaro), 52 Palazzo dei Conservatori, Capitoline, Rome, 66, 79,
villa poems, exchanges of, 52–3. See also Pontano, 125, 155
Giovanni; Sannazzaro, Jacopo Palazzo Ducale, Urbino, 43, 130
Villa Poggioreale, 43, 45, 52, 213n134, 246n122, Palazzo Medici, Florence, 79, 92, 130, 260n58, 265n34,
273n59 272n44
Narbonne, Cathedral of, 155 Palazzo Medici, Rome (now Palazzo Madama), 137, 278n105
nature of invention. See invention, nature of Palazzo Ottieri, Rome, 278n105
Navagero, Andrea, 26, 27 Palazzo Vaticano. See Vatican Palace
Navarro, Pietro/Pedro, 212n114 Palazzo Vecchio, Sala del Cinquecento, Florence, 131, 133
navel of the world (umbilicus mundi or omphalos), 104 Palladio, Andrea, 121, 178, 272n48, 272n49, 274n71
Nemours, Duke of. See Medici, Giuliano de’ Palladio, Blosio
neo-Latin, 3, 18, 22, 89, 98, 147, 170, 171 oration to commemorate Aimo’s sculpture of Pope
Nero (Roman emperor), 82, 94, 140 Leo, 257n18
Neroni, Dietisalvi, 207n62 proleptic poetry and, 91, 95, 264n25, 267n53
New Sacristy, San Lorenzo, Florence, 68, 131, 132, in Roman humanist circles, 21
206n39, 211n103, 258n28, 277n98, 280n20, Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem and, 257n18
281n28 villa poems and, 52–3, 58, 59, 91, 95, 203n12, 252n56,
Nicholas V (pope), 94, 100, 266n45 252n58, 254n82, 257n19
Niobide (sculpture), 106, 112, 113 Pandolfini, Pier Filippo, 265n38
non-finito (unfinished) in architecture, 90, 159, 163–9, panegyric, 49–50, 93–4, 95, 172
178 Panofsky, Erwin, 100, 274n67
notional ekphrasis, 92, 95, 172, 176, 265n33 Pantheon, Rome
Numidian marble column, described by Sperulo for Villa bronze appropriated from, 244n93
Madama, 75, 125, 205n33, 259n54, 259n55 dome of, 124
INDEX 329
tomb of Raphael in, 4 Pius IV (pope), 273n58

Panvinio, Onofrio, 161, 162, 281n35 Plato, 54, 115
papacy. See also specific popes by name, e.g. Julius II Timaeus, 264n23
topography of Christian triumph and, 101–5 Pliny the Elder, 109, 121, 140, 203n17, 205n28, 210n93,
Villa Madama as papal hospitium, 3, 16, 43, 57, 64, 81, 210n95, 210n98, 214n137, 247n2, 273n51,
104–5, 116, 117, 141, 147, 167, 223, 270n30, 276n92
278n112 Pliny the Younger, 13, 33, 39, 43, 47, 48, 54, 56, 73, 87,
paragone, 55, 66, 83, 177, 210n93, 211n108, 211n110 92, 94, 124, 137, 247n2, 266n43
Parnassus, 141, 203n17, 274n65 Plotinus, 288n11
Monte Mario/Vatican hill/Villa Madama as, 105–16, Plutarch, 79, 247n2
137, 143, 208n73 poetic furor and ingenium, 55, 59, 98, 202n5, 254n82,
Raphael, Parnassus fresco, Stanza della Segnatura, 255n83
Vatican Palace, 24, 27, 50, 51, 106, 107, 115–16 poets and poetry. See also ekphrasis; silva/sylva; villa poems
Parrhasius, 50 assemblage metaphor connecting buildings, poems,
Pasti, Matteo de’, 159, 287n16 and bodies, 246n128
Pastor, Ludwig von, Geschichte der Päpste (1907), 6 blacksmith, poet as, 69, 202n6
patrons and patronage. See also under Leo X Medici; building with words, 59, 229n5
Medici, Giulio de’ design tool, poetry as, 152–3, 174, 175
Lorenzo il Magnifico as patron, 3, 19, 20, 79, 144, Exegi monumentum topos and longevity of words and
260n58, 281n28 marbles, 55, 177, 202n4, 252n56
Medici pattern of sharing, 64–5, 206n38, 231n19, 255n5 improvisation of, 27, 59, 159, 170, 254n82
role in Renaissance art and architecture, 5, 230n18 literary framework and Renaissance villa architecture,
of Sperulo’s Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata, 54, 58, relationship between, 8, 47–60, 178
64, 89, 154, 218, 253n68 master builder, poet as, 54, 95, 96, 176
of Villa Madama, 5, 17, 64–5, 147, 255n2, 255n5 performance, poetry as, 21, 27, 59, 91, 153–5, 171
St. Paul, 54 poetic correspondence, 90, 153
Paul IV (pope), 148, 151 practical action, poetry as, 9
peace. See also Temple of Peace ruins, poetry about, 53, 167, 175
antiquities and spoils as symbol of, 118 sculpture, poems about, 53, 175
Leonine program of, 18, 20, 21, 81, 121, 140, 260n66 social context of poetry, 9
Sperulo’s Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia xviiii on speed of execution, 58, 202n5, 254n82
clemency of Leo X leading to, 82, 226–7 Poggio a Caiano (villa), Florence
Sperulo’s sermon on, 23 Ariosto’s poetry as a basis for decorations at, 146
Sperulo’s Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata on Leo decorations planned in tandem with Villa Madama,
as peace-bringer, 65, 66, 74, 75, 80–1, 117, 43, 146
208n71, 212n125, 212n127, 262n83 decorative imagery of, in relation to Villa Madama,
as subject of Villa Madama’s architecture and 106, 116, 206n46, 208n80, 208n81, 214n139,
decorations, 43, 63, 75, 109, 118–24 271n36, 274n67
Pendaglia, Bartolomeo, 231n20 depicted as “modern ruin” in background of
Percier, Charles, 109, 167 Leonardo’s Adoration, 285n94
Pérez-Gómez, Alberto, 174, 286n4 Laurentian villeggiatura as a model for Villa Madama
performance and, 43, 106, 124
design process as, 153–5 Lorenzo the Magnificent pruning mulberry trees at,
humanist discourse as, 21, 170 281n28
poems as, 21, 27, 59, 91, 153–5, 171 Pontano’s De hortis hesperidum in relation to decoration
Raphael’s letter and Sperulo’s poem as scripts for at, 208n81, 267n54, 280n21
performing ground plans, 89, 153–5 proleptic character of villa poems and descriptions of,
Pergamum, “unswept floor” mosaic, 214n137 90, 249n23, 263n21, 267n54
Perotti, Niccolò, 50 villa poems and, 52, 249n23, 271n36
Peruzzi, Baldassare, 4, 42, 45, 235n58 Poggioreale (villa), Naples, 43, 45, 52, 213n134, 246n122,
Petrarch (Francesco Petrarca), 15, 53, 176, 203n17 273n59
Philostratus, Immagines, 75, 92 poiesis/poietic process, 14, 167, 178
Pico della Mirandola, Giovanfrancesco, 93 Poliziano, Angelo, 19, 50, 52, 71, 90, 95, 117, 203n17,
Idea quaedam, 46 206n46, 249n26, 252n58, 263n21, 267n54
Pindar, 171, 250n35 Silvae, 264n23, 268n65, 271n36
Olympian Odes, 229n5 Stanze, 50, 71, 204n18, 207n52, 207n64
Pinelli, Antonio, 149 Pollius Felix,Villa of, near Sorrento (described by
Pinnius, 238n30 Statius), 247n12. See also Statius, Silvae
Pitti, Luca, 207n62 Polybius, 203n15
330 I NDEX
Polyphemus fresco (Giulio Romano),Villa Madama, 125, authorship of villa claimed by, 158
128 background and education, 24
Polyphemus group at Sperlonga, 112, 125, 129 collaborative aptitude of, 4, 143–51
Pomona, 20, 63, 214n139 as divine healer, 15, 17, 175, 236n5
Pontano, Giovanni, 5, 52–3, 95, 230n18 forging new visual language akin to neo-Latin
De hortis hesperidum, 208n81, 267n54, 280n21 communications of renovatio imperii under Leo
De magnificentia, 230n18, 249n30 X, 4, 33, 170
Ponte Milvio. See Milvian Bridge friendships and projects with humanists, 24–8, 147,
Popes. See papacy; specific popes by name, e.g. Julius II 148, 281n26
Porcari, Camillo, 257n24 as impresario, 143, 170, 229n7
Porsenna, 62, 206n43 multimedia designs across space and time, 5, 10, 12, 42,
portraiture, concepts of, 176 101–5, 116, 143
praeteritio, 87, 88, 89, 90, 153, 213n130, 213n135, 263n15 poems at his death, 15, 16, 28
Pratolino (villa), Florence, 274n65 as polymath, 4
prescriptive visual images, 93, 286n99 as Prefect of Marbles, 4, 28–33, 73, 137, 140, 157
Prevedari, Bernardo (after Bramante), Interior of a ruined “reviving the corpse of ancient Rome,” association
church or temple with figures (engraving), 164, 165 with concept of, 15, 17, 46, 175, 179, 287n9
program, concept of, 13, 99–101, 132–3, 139, 141, 145, selection and composition as source of creativity in
150, 170, 173. See also metastructures of word painting and architecture, 3, 11, 45, 173
and image for Villa Madama significance of Villa Madama commission for, 2
Progymnasmata, 54 in Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem, 73, 79, 83, 91, 98,
proleptic character of Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem, 13, 107, 111, 156
85–98, 171 as urbanist and landscape planner, 101–5
as design proposal, 6, 11, 83, 89, 91, 96–8, 145, 152–3, as visionary. See vision and the visionary
171, 202n1, 213n136 Raphael (and associates), works. See also Raphael’s letter
engagement of Sperulo with villa planners, 87, 89, 90, describing Villa Madama;Villa Madama
98, 153 drawings and engravings
epistemology of the imaginary shaping the real, 176 A Landscape with Figures and the Ruins of a Column
as hortatory ekphrasis, 13, 90–3, 95, 98, 133, 172, 175, (drawing), 32
178, 203n11 Quos Ego for Virgil’s Aeneid (engraving), 25, 26
as intertextual discourse, 90 single paintings
as inventive assemblage of literary and rhetorical “buddy portraits,” 26, 26, 27, 28, 29, 143, 144
genres, 93–6 Galatea fresco in Villa Farnesina, 46
literary antecedents, paucity of, 91–3 Madonna di Foligno, 240n52
Raphael’s letter about Villa Madama compared, 85–90 Portrait of Pope Leo X with Two Cardinals, 19
relative chronology with Raphael’s letter, 85–8, 96 Transfiguration, 81, 83, 155
Sperulo’s knowledge of Raphael’s letter, 85–8, Vision of Ezekiel, 82, 83, 210n93, 261n73
213n130, 213n135 visionary altarpieces, 83, 176
visionary/prophetic aspects, 61, 66, 68–72, 82–4, 176, Sistine Chapel tapestries, 67, 68, 80, 80, 211n111
211n110 Stanze,Vatican Palace, frescoes, 4, 33, 81, 104, 105, 143,
Propertius, 109, 229n5 170, 244n96
Elegies, 210n99 Sala di Costantino, 68, 81, 105, 146, 164, 167
prophetic fictions, 68–72, 82–4, 176, 211n110 Battle of the Milvian Bridge, 79, 102, 164, 166,
prosopopoeia, 72 211n110, Plates xv–xvi
protreptic discourse, 94–5, 172 Etruria, home of the Medici, 69
Prudentius, 203n16 Foundation of Old Saint Peter’s and Constantine’s
Presentation of the Plan to Pope Silvester, 148, 148
Pope Clement I (with Features of Leo X), 125, 127
Quintilian, Institutio oratoria, 50, 176, 255n83, 264n23
Vision of Constantine, 176, 270n33
Quirites, 205n32, 212n127
Stanza della Segnatura, 27, 143, 164
Quos Ego engraving for scenes from Virgil’s Aeneid
Disputation over the Sacrament (Disputa), 24, 164, 166
(Raphael), 25, 26
Parnassus, 24, 27, 50, 51, 106, 107, 115–16
School of Athens, 118
Raffaello Sanzio. See Raphael Stanza dell’Incendio, 260n68
Raimondi, Marcantonio, 25 Coronation of Charlemagne, 104, 270n26
Ramón de Cardona (Spanish Viceroy), 212n115 The Fire in the Borgo, 269n19
Rangone, Ercole (cardinal), 23, 24 Stanza di Eliodoro, 164
Raphael stufetta of Cardinal Bibbiena,Vatican Palace, frescoes,
Apelles, compared to, 83, 207n65, 256n16 27, 147, 148, 280n12
INDEX 331
theater design: staging of I suppositi, 27, 31, 146, 176, Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem, literary and rhetorical
243n84, 262n85 models for, 47–54, 72, 79, 91–3
writings, 24 Riario, Girolamo, 150
certa Idea letter (attrib.), 45–6, 147, 242n73, 243n85 Riario, Pietro, 58, 153, 248n18
letter to Leo X about Roman antiquities, 15, 24, 28, Riario, Raffaelle (cardinal), 5, 82, 150, 230n18, 262n77,
96, 147, 169, 243n86, 267n60 262n79
Raphael’s letter describing Villa Madama, 6, 24, 33–5, 38, Riccardiana Virgil, 265n34
43, 86, 89–90, 102, 124, 208n81, 213n136 Rice, Louise, 244n93
architectural orders mentioned in, 160, 284n78 Ricoeur, Paul, 176
authorship of villa claimed by, 158 rimembrare, Petrarch’s concept of, 15. See also
Castiglione, intended to be edited by, 28, 34 re-membering
conflating elements of U 273a and U 314a, 109, 136, Rimini, Tempio Malatestiana, 159
213n134 Ripanda, Jacopo, 66, 79
coordinated with verse villa descriptions, 153 river gods. See also Father Tiber
dating of, 85–8, 96, 136, 172, 262n2 personification of
function of, 6, 90, 171 in poetry, 55, 61, 67–9, 72, 74, 83, 91, 155, 156, 172,
intended for Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici, 34, 154, 176, 203n11, 214n143, 215n144, 257n19
282n47 in theater intermezzi, 67, 257n21
models for, 47, 263n12 in visual imagery, 68, 67–8, 69, 70, 79, 80, 211n111,
as performance, 90, 153, 154, 155, 171 258n28, 258n30
as proleptic, 89–90, 96 Raphael, The Arrival of Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici
Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem and, 85–90, 97, 124, in Rome in 1492 Flanked by the River Gods
213n130, 213n133, 213n135, 263n15 Arno and Tiber, Sistine chapel tapestry borders,
as verbal analogue of master plan, 85, 89 67, 68
Ravenna, Battle of (1512), 20, 79, 80, 205n35, 211n110, Robert, Hubert, Draughtsman Sketching at the Villa
211n111, 212n114, 212n115, 212n117, 262n83 Madama, 138
rawdiyyāt, 53 Roman Academy, 21, 53, 67, 238n28. See also sodalities,
Ray, Stefano, 8, 232n31, 253n65 Roman humanist
rebirth/revivification, language of, 15–17, 65, 175, Rome. See also Capitoline; Milvian Bridge; Pantheon;
214n139. See also “reviving the corpse of “reviving the corpse of ancient Rome”; St.
ancient Rome”; Le tems revient Peter’s Basilica; Temple of Peace; Temple of
Reiss, Sheryl E., 38, 147, 149, 231n19, 233n32, 255n2, Venus Genetrix;Vatican Palace;Villa Madama
281n28 Albertini’s guide to, 94, 285n89
re-membering, 7, 46, 175. See also rimembrare Castel Sant’Angelo, 269n19
renovatio imperii, 3, 4, 170 ceremonial entry into, by way of Villa Madama, 104
res publica, concept of, 3, 4, 18, 140, 237n17 cross of Monte Mario (croce di Monte Mario), 38,
reverse ekphrasis, 268n1 101–5
“reviving the corpse of ancient Rome,”, 12, 15–46, Domus Aurea, 90, 140, 167
175–6, 179 Forum, 75, 104, 205n33
ancient Roman villas,Villa Madama intended to Forum of Augustus, 130, 277n93
surpass, 1 Forum of Julius Caesar, 74, 75
archeological and topographical studies, 28–33 Forum of Trajan, 204n24
architecture–body metaphor, 46, 246n128 humanist sodalities in, 3, 12, 20, 56, 67. See also
as collective enterprise of patrons, humanists, and Roman Academy
artists, 15–33 Lateran, papal benediction loggia, 81
‘exquisite corpse,’ related to, 175, 287n9 Medici, romanitas of, 20, 66–8, 73, 75, 79, 118, 131,
friendships and projects between Raphael and 133, 207n52
humanists, 24–8 Monte Mario, 17, 34, 103, 104,105, 106, 132, 261n72,
Medicean ideology in Rome and, 18–20 270n26, 270n33, 271n38
as organizational metaphor, 15–17 Palazzo Medici (now Palazzo Madama), 137, 278n105
Prefect of Marbles, Raphael as, 4, 28–33, 73, 137, 140, Palazzo Ottieri, 278n105
157 pilgrimage route traversing Monte Mario, 103
Raphael’s association with concept, 15, 46 Raphael
Raphael’s Lazarus,Villa Madama as, 16, 17, 17, 33–46 as Prefect of Marbles in, 4, 28–33, 73, 137, 140, 157
rhetoric. See also hortatory ekphrasis urban/suburban plan linking Villa Madama and the
design process characterized in terms of, 149 Vatican Palace, 101–5
epideictic, 93, 154, 266n41 ruins, poetry about, 53, 167, 175
inventive assemblage of literary and rhetorical genres, Sack of Rome (1527), 11, 22, 37, 280n17
93–6 Sant’Agostino, St. Anne altar commission, 53
332 I NDEX
Rome (cont.) scenario planning, 175

Via Triumphalis, 103, 103, 104, 105 scribal publication, 9, 154, 286n108
Villa Farnesina. See Chigi, Agostino, and Chigi villa sculpture
Villa Giulia, 139 antique. See antiquities and spoils
Villa La Magliana (papal hunting lodge), 115, 273n62, as generative for architectural design, 133–41
277n95 poems about, 53, 175
Villa Medici (on Pincian Hill), 204n27 sculptural set pieces, 145, 173
Rosa, Salvator, The Dream of Aeneas, 69, 70, 258n30 in Villa Madama. See under Villa Madama
Rossi, Aldo, 157 Sebastiano del Piombo, 155
Rossi, Luigi de’ (cardinal), 19 self-reflexive discourse, design as, 14, 178
Rovere, Felice della (daughter of Julius II), 52 Seneca, 247n2
Rucellai, Bernardo, 52–3 De clementia, 82, 94
Rucellai, Giovanni, 274n73 Serlio, Sebastiano, 121, 178, 235n58, 246n128, 274n71
ruins Settis, Salvatore, 149
ancient ruins, 28, 32, 68, 73, 101, 121, 164, 236n8 Shearman, John, 6, 57, 85, 87, 89, 154, 204n23, 231n22,
as bodies, 15 255n2, 267n60, 279n6
of gardens of Lucullus, 204n27 shield of Achilles (Homer, Iliad), 71, 92, 178, 283n61
modern/new ruins, 16, 165, 166, 163–9, 175, 178 shield of Aeneas (Virgil, Aeneid), 69, 71, 72, 83, 202n6,
poetry about, 53, 167, 175 202n9
Raphael’s approach to, 33, 46 Sidonius, 247n2, 264n28
as source of building materials, 29, 140 signature (closing mark), 223, 224, 225, 289n24
as stimulus to completion/creation, 16, 164, 175 Silenus, 137, 205n28, 278n103
Silius Italicus, Punica, 203n10
silva/sylva, 50–52, 91, 98, 155, 177, 255n83, 264n23,
Sabadino degli Arienti, Giovanni, 223 268n65
Sack of Rome (1527), 11, 22, 37, 280n17 Sistine Chapel tapestries, 67, 68, 80, 80, 211n111
Sadoleto, Jacopo, 22 Sleeping Cleopatra (Ariadne; sculpture), 53, 141
Sala del Cinquecento, Palazzo Vecchio, Florence, 131, 133 Smith, Christine, 100, 251n48, 267n54
Sala di Costantino (Hall of Constantine),Vatican Palace, sodalities, Roman humanist, 3, 12, 20, 56, 67
68, 81, 105, 146, 164, 167 Sorrento,Villa of Pollius Felix near (described by Statius),
Battle of the Milvian Bridge, 79, 102, 164, 166, 211n110 247n12. See also Statius, Silvae
Etruria, Home of the Medici, 69 sour/bitter orange (mala medica), as Medici family device,
Foundation of Old Saint Peter’s and Constantine’s 20, 35, 208n81
Presentation of the Plan to Pope Silvester, 148, 148 Spagnoli, Battista (Mantuanus), 52
Pope Clement I (with Features of Leo X), 125, 127 Sperlonga, grotto of Tiberius’ villa, 112, 125, 129
Vision of Constantine, 176, 270n33 Sperulo, Francesco
San Lorenzo, Florence Ad Leonem X de sua clementia elegia xviiii (BAV,Vat. Lat.
Chimenti da Empoli, Jacopo, Michelangelo Presenting 2673), 13, 24, 82, 94, 101, 171, 223, 225, 226–7
Leo X and Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici his background, education, and career, 10, 23–4
Models…, 148, 150 complete works of, xx
coordination between artists on Medici projects, 146 engagement of with planners of Villa Madama, 87, 89,
exhortation to complete façade, 266n50 90, 98, 153
New Sacristy, 68, 131, 132, 206n39, 211n103, 258n28, handwriting, 55, 180, 217, 223, 224, 225, Plates ix–xi
277n98, 280n20, 281n28 as “humanist advisor” for Villa Madama, 145–6, 171
Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem, resonances with New Maffei, and involvement at Villa Madama, 146
Sacristy, 131, 206n39, 211n103, 258n28, 277n98 Medici vates (poet-seer), Sperulo claiming role of, 66,
Sanctuary of Hercules Victor, Tivoli, 43 72, 95
Sangallo, Antonio da, the Elder, 20 Sperulo, Francesco, Villa Iulia Medica versibus fabricata
Sangallo, Antonio da, the Younger, 7, 33, 51, 124, 142, 145, (The Villa Giulia Medicea Constructed in Verse),
148, 148, 158, 160, 213n131, 269n19, 273n59, xxv, 13, 61–84, 171
274n64, 275n85, Plate vi ambulatio (leisurely walk), as inspiration for poetry, 54,
Sangallo, Francesco da, 7 64, 204n22, 209n84
Sangallo, Giovan Francesco da, 7, 142, 145, Plate v on ancient sculpture and spoils, 30, 62, 73–9, 101,
Sangallo, Giuliano da, 275n85 133–9, 145, 172
Sannazzaro, Jacopo, 52–3 architectural vocabulary in, 89, 124, 202n1, 202n7,
Sansovino, Andrea, 53 204n26, 209n87, 213n136, 263n15
Sant’Agostino, Rome, St. Anne altar commission, 53 as assemblage of literary and rhetorical genres, 93–6
Santi, Giovanni (father of Raphael), 24, 242n70 authorial voices/spokespersons in, 72, 98, 176
Sanzio, Raffaello. See Raphael compared to painted and medallic portraits, 176
Sassetti, Francesco, and Villa di Montughi (currently La competitive/agonistic aspect of, 156–7, 172–3
Pietra), 52 critical edition, translation, and gloss, 13, 180–201
INDEX 333
dating of, 65, 85–8, 96, 154, 172, 256n11, 263n21 architectural discourse/practice in Fabbrica of, 7, 9,
dedicatory letter to Giulio de’ Medici, 2, 54, 55, 58, 145, 156, 158, 267n61
59, 64, 69, 83, 148, 153, 177, 216, 217, 278n112 axial view designed from benediction loggia of,
as design proposal, 6, 11, 83, 89, 91, 96–8, 145, 152–3, 269n19
171, 202n1, 213n136 construction site of, as new ruin, 164, 285n91
Father Tiber as narrator of, 55, 61, 67–9, 72, 74, 83, 91, descriptions of, 92, 94, 266n50, 282n50
155, 156, 172, 176, 203n11, 214n143, 215n144, design process at, 148, 156
257n19 as destination of pilgrimage route encompassing Villa
in hexameter, 6, 54, 61, 89, 95, 98, 154, 171, 177, 216 Madama, 103–4
as hortatory ekphrasis, 13, 90–3, 95, 98, 133, 172, 175, meaning/symbolism in architecture of, 100, 244n96
178, 203n11 medals commemorating building of, 221, 222
invention/poiesis/bringing-into-existence, thematized Michelangelo ensuring own designs for, 159
in, 83, 167, 178 Raphael as chief architect of, 4, 145, 156, 158
knowledge of villa poem tradition reflected in, 55, 60 Raphael’s new visual language for, 4, 33, 170
literary and rhetorical models, 47–54, 72, 79, 91–3 spoliated ancient materials for use in building, 29, 137,
Medicean imagery in, 65–6, 203n17, 205n37, 206n50, 140, 204n23, 244n93
207n52, 207n53, 207n57, 207n63, 207n64, Stanza della Segnatura,Vatican Palace, 27, 143, 164
208n78, 208n80, 208n81, 209n89, 212n121, Disputation over the Sacrament (Disputa), 24, 164, 166
212n124, 214n139, 214n143 Parnassus, 24, 27, 50, 51, 106, 107, 115–16
Medici family members commemorated in, 55, 62, 62, School of Athens, 118
66, 79–84, 127–32 Stanza dell’Incendio,Vatican Palace, 260n68
metastructures/programs generated by. See Coronation of Charlemagne, 104, 270n26
metastructures of word and image for Villa The Fire in the Borgo, 269n19
Madama Stanza di Eliodoro,Vatican Palace, 164
mural paintings proposed, 63, 73, 79–84, 145, 157, Statius
211n108 application of epideixis to poetry, 93, 266n41
battle scenes, 63, 79–81, 88, 97, 102, 205n35, ekphrasis and, 92, 266n44
211n110, 211n111, 213n129, 256n10 improvisational or performance context of poetry,
Triumph of Clemency, 63, 81–2, 209n86, 209n90, 255n83
210n93, 261n72 on paragonal nature of visual and verbal, 177
patronage of, 54, 58, 64, 89, 154, 218, 253n68 putative image of, in Raphael’s Parnassus fresco, 50
praeteritio, 87, 88, 89, 90, 153, 213n130, 213n135 recitation of poetry to mark special occasions, 58, 154
presentation manuscript (BAV,Vat. Lat. 5812), 13, 54, Silvae
64, 72, 95, 154, 180, 217, 224, 216–24, Plates Epithalamium in Stellam et Violentillam (Silvae i, 2),
ix–xii 72, 203n13, 252n58
proleptic character of, 13, 85–98, 171. See also proleptic equation of poem and villa (Silvae i, 3 and ii, 2),
character of Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem 177
publications and translations, xx, xxv, 6, 231n22 Hercules Surrentinus Polli Felicis (Silvae iii, 1), 247n12
Raphael in, 73, 79, 83, 91, 98, 107, 111, 156 importance for Renaissance conception of
Raphael’s letter about Villa Madama and, 13, 85–90, silva/sylva, 48, 50–3, 91, 255n83, 264n23
97, 124, 213n130, 213n133, 213n135, 263n15 as model for assemblage of literary and rhetorical
river imagery, 55, 61, 67–9, 72, 79, 80, 211n111, 257n19 modes, 95, 267n52
on romanitas of Medici, 66–8, 73, 75, 79, 118, 131, 133, as model for poetic furor and speed, 59, 254n82
207n52 as model for [protreptic] panegyric, 49, 56, 91, 94,
scope and structure, 55, 61–73 248n18
site visit as inspiration for, 1–2, 54, 64 as model for villa description, 13, 48, 50–51, 54, 87,
specific event, possibly linked to, 59, 90, 97, 153–5, 171 91, 247n12, 252n58, 264n28
villa areas planned for, 62, 63. See also under specific as source of Medici imagery of Venus and eternal
subheads diaeta (winter), garden loggia as return of spring, 72
Medici ancestor gallery, Leo’s central loggia, Villa Surrentina Polli Felicis (Silvae ii, 2), 247n12
towers, under Villa Madama Villa Tiburtina Manili Vopisci (Silvae i, 3), 51, 202n7,
visionary/prophetic nature of, 61, 66, 68–72, 82–4, 208n80, 214n137, 247n12, 254n82, 288n20
89, 176, 211n110 site visit as occasion for writing poetry by, 54,
Vulcan/Hephaestus as authorial voice in, 69–72, 155, 254n82
156, 202n6 Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem and, 55, 56, 72, 73,
spoils. See antiquities and spoils 87, 91, 125, 202n7, 202n8, 202n9, 203n13,
St. Anne altar commission, Sant’Agostino, Rome, 53 208n80, 210n99, 214n137, 214n143, 259n42,
St. Peter’s Basilica 288n20
Antonio da Sangallo the Younger as co-adiutore in Thebaid, 50
Fabbrica of, 145, 148, 158 Studio Romano (now Università di Roma), 22
334 I NDEX
stufetta of Cardinal Bibbiena,Vatican Palace, 27, 147, 148, Uccello, Paolo, Battle of San Romano, 79, 260n58
280n12 “ugly manuscripts,”, 234n52. See also editorial theory
Suetonius, 73, 75, 205n33 umbilicus mundi (navel of the world), 104
I suppositi, staging of, 27, 31, 146, 176, 243n84 unfinished (non-finito) in architecture, 90, 159, 163–9,
Synnadic marble, 204n24 178
Syracuse, Siege of, 203n15 “unswept floor” mosaic, Pergamum, 214n137
Urbino
court culture of, 24, 150, 176
Tafuri, Manfredo, 100, 269n9
Palazzo Ducale, 43, 130
Tanner, Marie, 100, 121
Urbino, Duke of. See Medici, Lorenzo de’
Tebaldeo, Antonio, 2, 6, 27, 29, 52, 57, 58, 82, 90, 153, 171,
ut architectura poesis/ut lingua architectura, 11, 169, 173, 177
178, 243n83, 250n35, 253n65, 253n68, 263n21
ut pictura poesis, 24, 265n33
Tempio Malatestiana, Rimini, 159
Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, Capitoline, Rome, 210n93
Temple of Jupiter Tonans, Capitoline, Rome, 204n23, Valeriano, Pierio, 21, 23, 26, 147
278n103 Dialogo della volgar lingua, 22, 58, 90, 153, 163, 208n81,
Temple of Peace (now identified as Basilica of 254n76
Constantine and Maxentius), Rome, 120 Varro, De re rustica, 238n30
as appropriate site for public display of sculpture, 140 Vasari, Giorgio, 4, 151, 164, 229n9, 243n83, 282n40,
as basis of metastructure/program for Villa Madama, 285n90
118–24, 132, 135, 136, 140 vates (poet-seer) for Medici, Sperulo claiming role of,
collapsing on birth of Christ, 121, 274n73 66, 72, 95
colossal seated sculpture of Constantine from, 121, Vatican Palace. See also Sala di Costantino; Stanza della
275n75 Segnatura; Stanza dell’Incendio
as formal model for Renaissance architects and artists, Belvedere Statue Court, 141, 143, 175
121, 124 Cortile del Belvedere (Belvedere Courtyard), 105, 143,
Pliny on, 121, 140 164, 167, 273n59, 289n18
Temple of Venus Genetrix, Rome Stanza di Eliodoro, 164
erotes tauroctonoi relief from, 72, 74–5, 76, 77, 78, 78, stufetta of Cardinal Bibbiena, 27, 147, 148, 280n12
79, 118, 119, 135, 139, 140, 172, 175, 205n30, Villa Madama and Vatican projects, interrelated designs
205n31 for, 79, 81, 101–5, 106, 116, 125, 208n80,
identified by Raphael school, 75 211n110, 260n68
Numidian marble columns in, 259n55 Villa Madama as pastoral outpost of, 5, 33, 43, 141
Le tems revient (Lorenzo de’ Medici motto), 20, 50, 117, Veneziano, Domenico, 289n16
207n53 Venus
“textual villas,”, 8, 47–54, 176, 177 myrtle sacred to, 55, 72, 204n18, 217
theater,Villa Madama, 35, 36, 213n131, 270n30, 274n64 Venus Victrix, 68, 75, 274n66
“third nature,”, 214n140 Venus Genetrix, 274n66, 274n69. See also Temple of
Thoenes, Christof, 8, 164, 286n101 Venus Genetrix, Rome
time and design process, 158–60, 163, 167 Botticelli’s Primavera as, 274n67
Tivoli. See also Hadrian’s Villa in Medicean visual–verbal imagery, 20, 71
Arcinelli, villa near, 115, 273n60 realm of, as metastructure/program for Villa Madama,
field trip of Raphael and humanist friends to, 26, 51, 71, 116–18, 132, 135, 140
147, 273n60 Venuti, Domenico, and 1783/6 inventory of Villa
prospect villas, ruins of, 43 Madama, 272n45
Sanctuary of Hercules Victor, 43 verbal restoration, 175
villa of Manilius Vopiscus, 51, 115, 273n60 Verdi, Giuseppe, 264n23
topography of Christian triumph and Villa Madama, Verino, Michele, 249n23, 263n21
101–5 Verino, Ugolino, 52
topothesia, 92 Vespasian (Roman emperor), 140
towers,Villa Madama, 35, 38, 63, 63, 64, 81, 209n82, Via Triumphalis, 103, 103, 104, 105
209n86, 261n72, 263n15, 275n85 Il Vicentino (Ludovico degli Arrighi), 223, 289n22
Trachtenberg, Marvin, 157, 159, 160 Vida, Marco Girolamo, 2, 6, 90, 153
Trajan (Roman emperor), 94, 266n43 Christiad, 56
transformist philosophy, 168 Genius Falconis Villae, 2, 6, 56–7, 153, 171, 178, 253n68,
Triumph of Clemency (mural painting proposed by 263n21
Sperulo for Villa Madama), 63, 63, 81–2, Vignola, Giacomo Barozzi da, 161, 162, 162, 178
209n90, 210n93, 261n72 Villa Aldobrandini, Frascati, 112, 274n65
INDEX 335
Villa Carducci, Legnaia (outside Florence), 130 as Medici ancestor gallery, 62, 64, 127–33, 136,
Villa di Montughi (of Francesso Sassetti, currently Villa 206n41, 208n77, 209n85
La Pietra), Florence, 52 Polyphemus fresco (Giulio Romano), 125, 128
Villa Farnese, Caprarola, 161, 162, 160–3, 178, 281n35 sculptural decorations and architectural spoils, 73.
Villa Farnesina, Rome. See Chigi, Agostino, and Chigi See also sculpture, antiquities, and spoils below,
villa this entry
Villa Giulia, Rome, 139 as Temple of Peace, 120, 121, 118–24, 132, 135, 136, 140
Villa Lissago (of Paolo Giovio), Como, 23, 47 garden with sour orange trees and fountain
Villa Madama (unexecuted), 35, 38, 208n81
aerial view, 39 inner garden (xystus), 37, 38, 39, 42, 44, 45, 89, 114, 119,
ancient prototypes, intended to surpass, 43, 112, 125, 213n133, Plates iii–vi
147, 171, 256n16 Leo’s central loggia (or Tiber loggia) overlooking
chapel, 35, 38, 209n82, 209n86, 261n72 Milvian Bridge road (unexecuted), 35, 36, 38,
circular courtyard, 35, 38, 104, 131 63, 63, 79, 80, 88, 97, 102, 168, 209n87, 261n70
decorative scheme, 42, 96, 101–39, 206n40 master plan, 11, 33, 85, 89, 110, 119, 135, 172, Plates
design and construction timeline, 37, 96, 136, 172, 273n57 v–vi
design sources, 43–6 metastructures/programs for. See metastructures of
diaeta (winter), 35, 38, 81, 209n82, 209n86, 261n72, word and image for Villa Madama
261n74 models/reconstructions of, 33, 34, 36, 36, 168
diaeta with fountain (summer), 38, 119, 123, 136 mural paintings proposed by Sperulo, 63, 73, 79–84,
drawings/ground plans for, 7, 33 145, 157, 209n86, 211n108
Ashmolean drawing, (possible preliminary idea for battle scenes, 63, 79–81, 88, 97, 102, 205n35,
Medici villa project), 279n6 211n110, 211n111, 213n129, 256n10
U 273a, 33, 63, 89, 96, 101, 107, 108, 112, 119, 123, Triumph of Clemency, 63, 63, 81–2, 209n86,
136, 137, 213n134, Plate v 209n90, 210n93, 261n72
U 314a, 33, 35, 38, 96, 101, 107, 108, 110, 112, 119, names for, 38
123, 136, 137, 145, 154, 160, 213n134, 232n31, nymphaea
272n48, Plate vi fishpond as nymphaeum, 115
U 1054a, 275n85 plans for rustic nymphaeum at, 273n59
U 1267a, 274n64 as papal hospitium, 3, 16, 43, 57, 64, 81, 104–5, 116, 117,
U 1356ar, 232n29 141, 147, 167, 223, 270n30, 278n112
Elephant Fountain, 42, 119, 164 as pastoral Vatican, 5, 33, 43, 141
entrances planned for, 34, 38, 102, 204n22, 261n70, patronage of, 5, 17, 64–5, 147, 255n2, 255n5
270n30 poems about, 2, 6, 56–9, 153, 178, 263n21. See also
façade, 38, Plates xvi–xvii Sperulo, Francesco, Villa Iulia Medica versibus
fishpond (peschiera), Plates iii–iv, 38, 42, 45 fabricata; villa poems
changes to design between U 273a and U 314a, post-Medici history, 37
108, 112, 119, 136, 213n134, 273n57 as Raphael’s Lazarus, 16, 17, 16–17, 33–46
completion of, 37 Raphael’s letter describing. See Raphael’s letter
dining area adjacent to, 38, 109, 118, 119, 126 describing Villa Madama
as ensemble encompassing ambulatory, grottoes, and roads to/from, designed by Raphael, 34, 38, 101, 102,
sculpture niches, 114, 115, 116, 108–16, 117, 118, 103, 104–5, 261n70, 270n30
119, 136, 272n48, 272n49 sculpture, antiquities, and spoils, 7, 73, 137
as grotto of the Muses, 108–16, 136 ancient models for installation of, 43, 112, 126
models for, 43, 51, 115, 126, 213n134, 273n59, 273n60 Bandinelli colossi, 42, 119
as musaeum all’antica, 108–16, 136 erotes tauroctonoi relief, Temple of Venus Genetrix, 72,
as nymphaeum, 115 74–5, 76, 77, 78, 79, 118, 119, 135, 139, 140, 172,
as Parnassus, 108–16, 136 175, 205n30, 205n31
Raphael’s description of, 35, 88, 124 Genius Augusti, 131, 134, 135
sculptures of Muses planned for, 106–15 Genius of the Roman People, 119, 136, 137, 138, 139
seating/steps around (unexecuted), Plate v, 108, 119, Jupiter Ciampolini, 119, 122, 123, 121–4, 135, 136, 137,
136, 213n134 138, 139, 175, 275n75, Plate xix
Sperulo on, 63, 89, 213n133 Medici family and proposed ancestor sculptures, 62,
as water theater, 112, 115, 126, 273n59, 274n64 64, 73, 127–33, 136, 206n39, 206n41, 208n77,
garden loggia, 38, 39, 41, 42, 44, 63, 119, 121, Plates vii, 209n85
viii, xviii, xix Muses, 106–15, 175, 208n73, 271n41, 272n45
as Coenatio Iovis, 124–6, 135, 136 Numidian marble column, described by Sperulo,
construction timeline, 97 75, 125, 205n33, 259n54, 259n55
Forum of Augustus as model for, 130, 277n93 post-Medici dispersal of, 259n45
336 I NDEX
Villa Madama (cont.) villas. See also Medici family villas and palazzi; villa
Sperulo proposals for, 30, 62, 73–9, 98, 133–41, 172 poems/villa literature; specific villas
Temple of Jupiter Tonans, Capitoline, marble from, as building type closely associated with literary
204n23, 278n103 culture, 8, 51
siting of, 34, 87, 105, 245n101 as cultural ideal, 8, 178
theater, 35, 36, 213n131, 270n30, 274n64 exchange of ideas among villa patrons, 52
towers, 35, 38, 63, 63, 64, 81, 209n82, 209n86, 261n72, notions of the “humanist villa,” 8, 43, 51
263n15, 275n85 owned by humanists, 23, 47, 52, 247n5, 281n24
unfinished villa, site visits to, 163 “textual villas,” 8, 47–54, 176, 177
urban/suburban plan of Rome, importance in, 101–5 wall-writing associated with, 238n30
Vatican Palace and, interrelated design projects for, 79, villeggiatura, 23, 43, 49, 60, 146, 208n73
81, 101–5, 106, 116, 125, 208n80, 211n110, Virgil
260n68 Aeneid, 25, 26, 48, 66, 67, 68, 70, 71, 72, 75, 83, 92, 141,
Venus Genetrix, as realm of, 71, 116–18, 132, 135, 140 202n6, 205n36, 257n19, 257n20
vestibule (extant), 38, 40, 97, 208n77 on Augustus’ collection of ancestor images, 130
vestibule(s) (proposed), 204n22, 204n23, 284n78 Eclogues, 49, 53
views of/from, 35, 43, 63, 97, 102, 105, 261n70, Georgics, 49, 53, 130, 213n131, 214n142
269n19, 270n30, 270n33, Plate i as model for cinquecento poetry, 21, 49, 53, 56, 79
widespread contemporary interest in, 11, 16, 178 notional ekphrasis and, 176
Villa La Magliana, Rome (papal hunting lodge), 115, Quos Ego engraving for scenes from Aeneid (Raphael),
273n62, 277n95 25, 26
Villa Medici, Fiesole, 43, 52, 121, 249n26 Riccardiana Virgil, 265n34
Villa Medici, Rome (on Pincian Hill), 204n27 Virgilian hexameter, 6, 95, 98, 171
Villa Mergellina (of Jacopo Sannazzaro), Naples, 52 virtual completion, 175, 179
Villa near the Arcinelli (Tivoli), 115, 273n60 vision and the visionary
Villa of Manilius Vopiscus (Tivoli) Augustinian imaginative vision, 176
described by Statius, 202n7, 208n80, 214n137, power of creative visualizations to shape the real, 14, 176
247n12, 254n82. See also Statius, Silvae proleptic visions, 72, 90, 176, 177
visited by Raphael and friends, 51, 115, 273n60 Raphael, Vision of Ezekiel, 82, 83, 210n93, 261n73
Villa of Pollius Felix, near Sorrento (described by Raphael and associates, Vision of Constantine, 176
Statius), 247n12. See also Statius, Silvae relative power of word and image to envision, 11, 176,
villa poems/villa literature, 6, 13, 47–60 178, 210n93, 211n110
combination of genres and techniques in, 49, 93–5, Sperulo as poet-seer (vates), 66, 72, 95
266n41, 267n52 in Sperulo’s Villa Madama poem, 61, 66, 68, 72, 82
compared to painted and medallic portraits, 176 visionary altarpieces of Raphael, 83, 176
coordination/competition of compositions about visual language, 4, 33, 170
same building, 58–60, 90, 153–7 Vitali, Giovanni Francesco, 223, 289n22
exchanges of, 52–3 Vitruvius, 26, 34, 46, 56, 71, 87, 89, 148, 150, 157, 202n4,
as intertextual, 53, 56, 59, 90, 202n9 213n136, 263n12
literary models for, 47–54, 247n2 Volpato, Giovanni, 42, 132, 271n41, Plates xviii–xix
on Medici villas, 52, 53 Vulca di Veio, 210n93
poets and subjects, 50–2. See also specific poets, poems, Vulcan/Hephaestus, 69–72, 155, 156, 202n6
and villas
rawdiyyāt, possible connection to, 53
Renaissance composition of, 47–54 Wallace, William E., 231n19
Renaissance villa poetry, flowering of, 51–3 wall-writing, early modern, 21, 238n30
as self-reflexive discourse, 178 water theater, 112, 115, 126, 273n59, 274n64
silva/sylva form and, 50–2, 91, 98, 177, 255n83, Williams, Robert, 286n104
264n23 Wilson, Richard, Rome from the Villa Madama (1753),
site visits as occasions for, 54–60, 254n82 Plate i
“textual villas,”, 8, 47–54, 176, 177 Wood, Christopher, 160
as theme of convivia, 58–9, 90, 97, 153–5 word and image, 170–9. See also metastructures of word
on Villa Madama, 54–8, 61–84, 171, 178 and image for Villa Madama
Villa Poggioreale, Naples, 43, 45, 52, 213n134, 246n122, as agonistic, 2–3, 11, 156–7, 173, 177
273n59 architect as author, 24, 157, 174
INDEX 337
Exegi monumentum topos, 55, 177, 202n4, 252n56 xystus (inner garden),Villa Madama, 37, 38, 39, 42, 44, 45,
paragone between, 55, 83, 177 89, 114, 119, 213n133, Plates iii–vi
poet as master builder, 54, 95, 96, 176
relative power to envision, 11, 176, 178, 210n93, yoke with motto iugum suave, as Medici family device,
211n110 20, 212n124, 214n143, 288n20
restoration/revivification in, 175
as sister arts, 157, 235n59 Zeuxis and the maidens of Crotona, 46
tools of architectural design, words as, 152–3 Zuccaro, Federico, Federico Zuccaro and Vincenzo Borghini
ut architectura poesis/ut lingua architectura, 11, 169, 173, 177 Discuss the Decorative Program for the Dome of
ut pictura poesis, 24, 265n33 Florence Cathedral, 151, 152, 282n41
visual language, 4, 33, 170 Zuccaro, Taddeo, 281n35
workshop practice, 4, 143, 144, 158 Zucchi, Francesco, Pietro Bembo in Villa Bozza, 49

Architectural Invention in Renaissance Rome Artists, Humanists, and The Planning of Raphael's Villa Madama

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Architectural Invention in Renaissance Rome Artists, Humanists, and The Planning of Raphael's Villa Madama

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ARCHITECTURAL INVENTION IN RENAISSANCE ROME

Villa Madama, Raphael’s late masterwork of architecture, landscape, and

yvonne elet is Associate Professor of Art History at Vassar College. She

Cambridge University Press is part of the University of Cambridge.

Illustrations in this book were funded by a Society of Architectural Historians/Mellon

List of Plates page ix

INTRODUCTION: THE NATURE OF INVENTION,

1 REVIVING THE CORPSE 15

4 ENCOMIA OF THE UNBUILT 85

5 METASTRUCTURES OF WORD AND IMAGE 99

Temple of Peace 118

6 DYNAMIC DESIGN 142

CONCLUSION: BUILDING WITH MORTAR AND VERSE 170

Color plates are to be found between pp. 6 and 7

1 Lambert Lombard, The Raising of Lazarus with Villa Madama in the

13 Villa Madama, model of the reconstructed plan of the building, 1983;

29 Salvator Rosa, The Dream of Aeneas, 1663–4, etching and drypoint,

61 Villa Madama, garden loggia, watercolor, c. 1927. (From W. E.

77 Hubert Robert, Draughtsman Sketching at the Villa Madama, which records

advising of my dissertation to the thought-provoking conversations we have

ABB R E V IAT ION S

ASF Archivio di Stato di Firenze

Francesco Sperulo, The Villa Giulia Medicea Constructed in Verse

sometimes congenial, sometimes adversarial endeavor to design the Medici

Raphael, who rocketed to prominence as the leading artist and architect in

and agency have fostered long-standing practices of studying attribution at the

and social contexts. My enterprise considers the agency of a group of planners,

II Villa Madama, view of the complex looking southwest.

XIX Giovanni Volpato (1738–1803),Villa Madama, garden loggia looking southwest;

considering the architect’s writing in relation to contemporary poetry, and

Frommel notes, the villa project exemplifies the complexity of determining

by making a detailed consideration of literary and archeological evidence; and

were common to architects and humanists, who selected fragments of ancient

appearance, as envisioned and as built. The following chapter introduces Sperulo

REVIVING THE CORPSE

Baldassare Castiglione, Carmen on the Death of Raphael, c. 1520.1

as a personal model; on returning to Liège, Lombard composed a Raphaelesque

PATRO N S, H U MA N IS T S, A N D A RT IS T S IN LEO NINE RO M E

Leo’s and Giulio’s formation in Laurentian Florence was fundamental to

Poliziano (1454–94), who served as a kind of “Medicean house-philologist”

No form of association produces a greater bond of friendship than din-

Friendship and competition were both essential elements of this performative

administrators and propagandists.37 The Dialogo contra i poeti of Francesco Berni

their works in the Coryciana anthology of Latin poems by humanists in Goritz’s

published, notably a poem on the finding of the Laocoön,61 several poems in

5. Raphael, Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, 1514–16 (debated), Paris, Louvre.

through his collaboration with letterati on projects related to the study of

7. Raphael, Portrait of Tommaso Inghirami, c. 1510–11 (debated), Florence, Pitti Gallery.

to inscriptions, or anachronistically to make Raphael a superintendent with

To Raphael of Urbino: Since it is greatly in the interest of the construc-

9. Cristofano dell’Altissimo, Portrait of Ludovico Ariosto, c. 1552–68, Florence, Uffizi.

inscribed with written records which often display some outstanding

RAPH AEL’S L A Z A RU S : T H E M E D IC I V I LLA PRO JEC T

Just as Curial humanists revived Ciceronian Latin as a fundamental tool of

probably intended to be polished by Castiglione,99 and it was surely directed

road, into a magnificent courtyard with ceremonial stairs; another proposed

most important representational space constructed within the villa building:

17. Villa Madama, vestibule.

18. Villa Madama, garden loggia.

manifesto. Whether one accepts this letter as representing Raphael’s own

S i nc e antiquity, the vi l la had b e e n th e bui l di ng ty pe mo st

Grapaldo’s De partibus aedium, a text of 1494 that interpreted such Plinian