To an approximate scale of 1:16

.q[uarta]. pars. apud. S. prasedem. (‘Quarter part [of a capital] near Santa Prassede’); [measurements]

• c.1513/14
  Datable to c.1513/14

Pen and brown ink and grey-brown wash over stylus lines, traces of black chalk and compass pricks

Bernardo della Volpaia

This Doric capital, described in the caption as being near Santa Prassede, could well be the one referred to as being used as the base of a column in the church (in santa presepia per basa a una cholona a uno pozo messo sotto sopra) in one of two drawings of it in the Codex Strozzi (GDSU, 1600 Av), or the one mentioned as being ‘under the column’ (sotto alla Colonna) of the church’s door in a slightly later drawing by Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo. Four very similar capitals serving as column bases were discovered in the 1930s inside the church’s Carolingian atrium on Via San Martino ai Monti (Caperna 2014, p. 35, fig. 32; Pensabene 2015, pp. 402–29).

The capital is distinctive in having a pair of astragals, rather than conventional annuli, under the echinus and, as such, it is virtually identical to the specimen drawn next to it, and to the capitals of the mausoleum near to the Ponte Nomentano (Fol. 45r/Ashby 75), as well as very similar to two of the drawings on Fol. 712/Ashby 120 (Drawings 4 and 5). It was depicted orthogonally by Giuliano da Sangallo in the Codex Barberini and by Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo subsequently, and, although also shown orthogonally in the Codex Strozzi, the drawings there record just half the capital, as in the Coner drawing. The Coner drawing’s composite format, combining a section with a raking view, cuts through the top of an imagined shaft and also shows a fictitious dowel hole.

The capital’s profile was copied by Michelangelo.

RELATED IMAGES: [Michelangelo] London, BM, 1859-6-25-560/1v (De Tolnay 1975–80, 4, pp. 47–48; Agosti–Farinella 1987, pp. 94–95)

OTHER IMAGES MENTIONED: [Giuliano da Sangallo] Rome, BAV, Barb. lat. 4424 (Codex Barberini), fol. 70r (Hülsen 1910, p. 72; Borsi 1985, p. 242); [Anon.] Florence, GDSU, Codex Strozzi, 1597 Ar and 1600 Av (Bartoli 1914–22, 6, p. 27); [Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo] Florence, GDSU, 1650 Ar (Bartoli 1914–22, 6, p. 103; Frommel–Schelbert 2022, 1, p. 196)

Ashby 1904, p. 61
Census, ID 52134

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