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Drawing 1: Doric capital and entablature from a tomb once near Ponte Nomentano
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Reference number
SM volume 115/75a
Purpose
Drawing 1: Doric capital and entablature from a tomb once near Ponte Nomentano
Aspect
Cross section and raking view of front, with measurements
Scale
To an approximate scale of 1:10
Inscribed
post. pontem. lamentaneum./ et. nota. quod. Gociolatorius./ cadit. 2. minuta. uocata. est/ corona tusciana. siue. Hopera (‘Beyond the Ponte Nomentana; and note that the soffit of the corona drops by 2 minutes; it is called a Tuscan cornice or [Tuscan] work’); crassitudo. Colu[m]n[arum] sunt. M[inutae]/ 68 (‘The diameter of the columns is 68 minutes’); [measurements]
Signed and dated
- c.1513/14
Datable to c.1513/14
Medium and dimensions
Pen and brown ink and grey-brown and brown wash over stylus lines and compass pricks
Hand
Bernardo della Volpaia
Notes
The details belong to the tomb represented in a plan (by a seventeenth-century hand) found earlier in the codex (see Cat. Fol. 5r/Ashby 8). The tomb was once situated, as an annotation here indicates, on the far side of the Ponte Nomentano over the River Aniene, although it has long since perished. The same details of the original travertine facing are recorded in several other early images, and they presumably belong to a portion of the revetment then still in situ. None of them records the lower parts of the facing, and all of them show the Doric entablature as being surmounted by a succession of mouldings presumably belonging to the base of a plinth or pedestal from a storey above.
The earliest of these representations were produced by Giuliano da Sangallo and included in his Taccuino Senese and Codex Barberini, and these differ from their Coner successor both in various particulars, such as the number of guttae above the triglyphs and the number of upper mouldings, as well as in their representational format, which is frontal rather than showing a raking view. They illustrate what purports to be the corner of the building, with the pilaster capital and entablature seen in near orthogonal projection, but with the receding underside of the corona with its guttae shown from below. Most later images combine an accurately measured section with a perspectival view of the elevation, which features the capital of a half-column rather than a pilaster, and the Coner version is the earliest of these to survive. This format, however, does not convey the relationship at the corners between the pilasters and the triglyphs above them, which were not centrally aligned and resulted in bays of differing width (see Drawing 2), and nor does it indicate very clearly that the mouldings of the capitals were continued between and behind their front faces, although this is what is being illustrated, in the section through the capital, by the capital’s frontal profile being matched by an identical profile to its rear near the sheet’s right-hand edge.
This new format is generally consistent with those adopted for several other drawings in the codex, and the format of this particular drawing is especially like that used for four others featuring portions of Doric entablatures, each of which includes two triglyphs and an intervening metope (Fols 43r/Ashby 71, 44r/Ashby 73, 45v/Ashby 76 and 48v/Ashby 82). Various images of the tomb produced later on are of comparable format and these include a drawing by Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo in Lisbon (annotated by his cousin Antonio the Younger), a woodcut illustration in Book Three of Sebastiano Serlio’s treatise (1540), and an early copy drawing by Andrea Palladio. This all suggests that the new format was introduced at some point before the Coner drawing was produced, and that a new and pioneering drawing was made of the tomb, perhaps when it was re-inspected and re-measured, which was then adapted for the Coner depiction and also served as the ultimate source for the later images.
A lengthy annotation on the drawing testifies to the early observational engagement with the tomb. It begins by noting that the underside of the corona slants a little, as is also shown in the drawing, and it then states that the entablature can be thought of as being ‘Tuscan’. Precisely what was meant by this is not clear, especially as the drawings by Giuliano da Sangallo in the Taccuino Senese and by Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo in Lisbon both describe it specifically as ‘Doric’. This term ‘Tuscan’ could possibly refer to the unorthodox design of the very simple capital, which has a pair of astragals rather than annuli beneath the echinus and lacks the usual neck. Similar capitals were used for the Temple of Hercules at Cori, a building Antonio da Sangallo also described as Tuscan (see Günther 1988, p. 194, and Della Torre–Schofield 1994, p. 73). Very similar capitals also feature elsewhere in the codex (Fols 71r/Ashby 120 and 72r/Ashby 122).
The drawing’s format is not entirely successful, since the far-left edge of the view is not well resolved, this being because there was not enough space to depict the cornice above the rear triglyph, which led to a decision to terminate it at the edge of the intervening metope. The drawing was copied by Michelangelo.
RELATED IMAGES: [Michelangelo] Florence, CB, 4Ar: right side (De Tolnay 1975–80, 4, p. 49; Agosti–Farinella 1987, pp. 126–27)
OTHER IMAGES MENTIONED: [Giuliano da Sangallo] Siena, BCS, Ms. S.IV.8 (Taccuino Senese), fol. 14r (Borsi 1985, pp. 267–70); [Giuliano da Sangallo] Rome, BAV, Barb. lat. 4424 (Codex Barberini), fol. 38v (Hülsen 1910, p. 55; Borsi 1985, pp. 198–200); [Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo] Florence, GDSU, 2054 Av (Bartoli 1914–22, 6, p. 102; Frommel–Schelbert 2022, 1, p. 215); [Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo] Lisbon, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, inv. 1713 c; Serlio 1619, 3, fol. 84v; [Andrea Palladio] London, RIBA, Palladio 10, 16r (Zorzi 1958, pp. 102–03)
OTHER DRAWINGS IN CODEX CONER OF SAME SUBJECT: Fol. 5r/Ashby 8; Fol. 45r/Ashby 75 Drawings 2 and 3
The earliest of these representations were produced by Giuliano da Sangallo and included in his Taccuino Senese and Codex Barberini, and these differ from their Coner successor both in various particulars, such as the number of guttae above the triglyphs and the number of upper mouldings, as well as in their representational format, which is frontal rather than showing a raking view. They illustrate what purports to be the corner of the building, with the pilaster capital and entablature seen in near orthogonal projection, but with the receding underside of the corona with its guttae shown from below. Most later images combine an accurately measured section with a perspectival view of the elevation, which features the capital of a half-column rather than a pilaster, and the Coner version is the earliest of these to survive. This format, however, does not convey the relationship at the corners between the pilasters and the triglyphs above them, which were not centrally aligned and resulted in bays of differing width (see Drawing 2), and nor does it indicate very clearly that the mouldings of the capitals were continued between and behind their front faces, although this is what is being illustrated, in the section through the capital, by the capital’s frontal profile being matched by an identical profile to its rear near the sheet’s right-hand edge.
This new format is generally consistent with those adopted for several other drawings in the codex, and the format of this particular drawing is especially like that used for four others featuring portions of Doric entablatures, each of which includes two triglyphs and an intervening metope (Fols 43r/Ashby 71, 44r/Ashby 73, 45v/Ashby 76 and 48v/Ashby 82). Various images of the tomb produced later on are of comparable format and these include a drawing by Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo in Lisbon (annotated by his cousin Antonio the Younger), a woodcut illustration in Book Three of Sebastiano Serlio’s treatise (1540), and an early copy drawing by Andrea Palladio. This all suggests that the new format was introduced at some point before the Coner drawing was produced, and that a new and pioneering drawing was made of the tomb, perhaps when it was re-inspected and re-measured, which was then adapted for the Coner depiction and also served as the ultimate source for the later images.
A lengthy annotation on the drawing testifies to the early observational engagement with the tomb. It begins by noting that the underside of the corona slants a little, as is also shown in the drawing, and it then states that the entablature can be thought of as being ‘Tuscan’. Precisely what was meant by this is not clear, especially as the drawings by Giuliano da Sangallo in the Taccuino Senese and by Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo in Lisbon both describe it specifically as ‘Doric’. This term ‘Tuscan’ could possibly refer to the unorthodox design of the very simple capital, which has a pair of astragals rather than annuli beneath the echinus and lacks the usual neck. Similar capitals were used for the Temple of Hercules at Cori, a building Antonio da Sangallo also described as Tuscan (see Günther 1988, p. 194, and Della Torre–Schofield 1994, p. 73). Very similar capitals also feature elsewhere in the codex (Fols 71r/Ashby 120 and 72r/Ashby 122).
The drawing’s format is not entirely successful, since the far-left edge of the view is not well resolved, this being because there was not enough space to depict the cornice above the rear triglyph, which led to a decision to terminate it at the edge of the intervening metope. The drawing was copied by Michelangelo.
RELATED IMAGES: [Michelangelo] Florence, CB, 4Ar: right side (De Tolnay 1975–80, 4, p. 49; Agosti–Farinella 1987, pp. 126–27)
OTHER IMAGES MENTIONED: [Giuliano da Sangallo] Siena, BCS, Ms. S.IV.8 (Taccuino Senese), fol. 14r (Borsi 1985, pp. 267–70); [Giuliano da Sangallo] Rome, BAV, Barb. lat. 4424 (Codex Barberini), fol. 38v (Hülsen 1910, p. 55; Borsi 1985, pp. 198–200); [Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo] Florence, GDSU, 2054 Av (Bartoli 1914–22, 6, p. 102; Frommel–Schelbert 2022, 1, p. 215); [Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo] Lisbon, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, inv. 1713 c; Serlio 1619, 3, fol. 84v; [Andrea Palladio] London, RIBA, Palladio 10, 16r (Zorzi 1958, pp. 102–03)
OTHER DRAWINGS IN CODEX CONER OF SAME SUBJECT: Fol. 5r/Ashby 8; Fol. 45r/Ashby 75 Drawings 2 and 3
Literature
Ashby 1904, p. 42
Günther 1988, p. 338
Census, ID 44828
Günther 1988, p. 338
Census, ID 44828
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