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Drawing 2: Colosseum (one-bay segment at ground level)
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Reference number
SM volume 115/3b
Purpose
Drawing 2: Colosseum (one-bay segment at ground level)
Aspect
Plan
Scale
To an approximate scale of 1:190
Signed and dated
- c.1513/14
Datable to c.1513/14
Medium and dimensions
Pen and brown ink and grey-brown wash over stylus line, compass pricks and black chalk
Hand
Bernardo della Volpaia
Notes
This drawing of a wedge-shaped sector of the plan corresponds with one of the building’s eighty peripheral bays. It was considered by Ashby to have been the first of the two drawings executed on the sheet, begun as part of very detailed plan of the building and abandoned in favour of the quarter plan next to it, but it was actually an afterthought intended to fill an otherwise empty corner of the page. The side walls are not shown in full, and the one on the left is truncated so as not to interfere too much with the quarter plan, with a small overlap indicating that the main drawing took precedence. There are no measurements as these were included already on the main drawing.
An almost identical wedge was previously included in Giuliano da Sangallo’s Taccuino Senese and another drawing of one of the wedges appears a little later in the Codex Mellon, where it is combined with a larger portion of the plan and shown angled on the page, although in this case the chosen wedge includes elements from one of the main-axis entrances rather than the standard one recorded in the Coner drawing.
OTHER IMAGES MENTIONED: [Giuliano da Sangallo] Siena, BCS, Ms. S.IV.8 (Taccuino Senese), fol. 5v (Borsi 1985, p. 254); [Domenico Aimo (Il Varignana), attr.] New York, Morgan Library, Codex Mellon, fol. 40v
OTHER DRAWINGS IN CODEX CONER OF SAME SUBJECT: Fol. 2r/Ashby 2; Fol. 3r/Ashby 4; Fol. 3v/Ashby 5; Fol. 25r and flap/Ashby 39; Fol. 25 verso of flap/Ashby 39A; Fol. 25v/Ashby 40); Fol. 26r/Ashby 41; Fol. 66r/Ashby 113; Fol. 66v/Ashby 114; Fol. 83v/Ashby 137
An almost identical wedge was previously included in Giuliano da Sangallo’s Taccuino Senese and another drawing of one of the wedges appears a little later in the Codex Mellon, where it is combined with a larger portion of the plan and shown angled on the page, although in this case the chosen wedge includes elements from one of the main-axis entrances rather than the standard one recorded in the Coner drawing.
OTHER IMAGES MENTIONED: [Giuliano da Sangallo] Siena, BCS, Ms. S.IV.8 (Taccuino Senese), fol. 5v (Borsi 1985, p. 254); [Domenico Aimo (Il Varignana), attr.] New York, Morgan Library, Codex Mellon, fol. 40v
OTHER DRAWINGS IN CODEX CONER OF SAME SUBJECT: Fol. 2r/Ashby 2; Fol. 3r/Ashby 4; Fol. 3v/Ashby 5; Fol. 25r and flap/Ashby 39; Fol. 25 verso of flap/Ashby 39A; Fol. 25v/Ashby 40); Fol. 26r/Ashby 41; Fol. 66r/Ashby 113; Fol. 66v/Ashby 114; Fol. 83v/Ashby 137
Literature
Ashby 1904, p. 13
Günther 1988, p. 337
Census, ID 43741
Günther 1988, p. 337
Census, ID 43741
Level
Drawing
Digitisation of the Codex Coner has been made possible through the generosity of the Census of Antique Works of Art and Architecture Known in the Renaissance, Berlin.
If you have any further information about this object, please contact us: drawings@soane.org.uk