The circular peripteral Temple of Vesta at Tivoli was built in the early 1st century BC with a cella 24 feet in diameter pierced by two windows and a doorway, and surrounded by 18 Corinthian columns of which ten have survived. Considering its importance to Dance, the Temple seems to have had little obvious influence on his work in terms of, for example, the use of the order or the unusual forms of window and door. However, a drawing for the cupola of All Hallows Church, London Wall [SM volume 19/16] designed soon after his return from Italy, shows a Corinthian capital with a large central flower and the architrave as well as the base to the columns are also Tivoli-like; but the shafts are without flutes and the cornice and undecorated frieze are unlike those of the Tivoli Temple. Then again Dance's elision within All Hallows may be based on a principle discovered at Tivoli.

Thus Soane, in his Royal Academy Lecture III, states that 'at Tivoli, under the ceiling of the inside of the peristyle, there is a small cornice only, ranging with the external cornice' (quoted in Watkin, 1996, p.511). This is correct, the inner face of the architrave and lintel being bare. Again, the festoons on the facade of the Theatre Royal at Bath are quite close to those of the Tivoli frieze though stretched to cover a greater span.

LITERATURE. Stroud pp.68,70; Kalman p.55: D Watkin, Sir John Soane: Enlightenment thought and the Royal Academy lectures, Cambridge, 1996.

Notes on [SM D3/1/2], [SM D3/1/3], [SM D3/1/5], [SM D3/1/4], [SM D3/1/6].
Dance had publication in mind when he made these and other measured drawings for he wrote to his father (10 April 1762) 'I am thinking of drawing all / the most beautiful Antique Entablatures with their Ornaments including many / fine Ornamental Freezes, Capitals & Bases pretty large & and to make out the / Ornam^ts, Measures a task of Workmanship, in the most elegant distinct & / exact manner possible together with a most elegant little Temple of Vesta / at Tivoli wch will form a Work I hope not unworthy of Publication. M^r / Hinchcliffe [John Hinchliffe, 1731-94, later Bishop of Peterborough, who studied the orders of architecture under Dance] advised me to think seriously of it as a thing that might be of the / greatest service to me & by his Interest, that of my Lord Grey and other gentlemen / I am persuaded I might get a great many Subscribers' (RIBA MSS Collection, DaFam/1/2). Again, Dance wrote to his father (30 October 1762): 'I (together with an^r Architect / and Italien) I have measur'd the Temple of the Tiburtine Sibyl which / you will find in Palladio's Second Book Plate LXIX. Palladio is very / defective in point of accuracy in this as well as many other / things - He says that the Columns incline towards the Wall in / such a manner that the Naked at the top falls perpendicular on / the Naked at the Bottom of the shaft towards the inside, which is / absolutely false. He says likewise that the Capitals are wrought / with Olive leaves whereas the leaves are so unlike Olive that if / he had seen them One wou'd think he cou'd never have made such a / mistake for they are different from any leaves I ever saw upon / any Capital whatsoever. I have made a Study of the Capital as large as / the original which is all measured with the greatest / exactness - Palladio's Capital is not the least like the Original.' Perhaps the drawing Dance refers to is D3/2/7. The Italian architect who assisted Dance seems to have been Giovanni Stern (1734-94) who made cork models of celebrated antiquities including the Temple of Vesta at Tivoli (P. Thornton & H. Dorey, A Miscellany of Objects from Sir John Soane's Museum, 1992, p.80).

Group

If you have any further information about this object, please contact us: drawings@soane.org.uk