To an approximate scale of 1:90

Tres. Colu[m]nae. Sub. palatio. maiore. (‘The three columns below the great palace’); [measurements]

• c.1513/14
  Datable to c.1513/14

Pen and brown ink and grey-brown wash over stylus lines

Bernardo della Volpaia

In spite of what is shown, the caption makes it clear that the drawing’s subject is the ‘three columns’ on the southern side of the Roman Forum, the remnants of the early first-century Temple of Castor and Pollux (LTUR 1993–2000, 1, pp. 242–25; Nielsen-Poulsen 1992), which, following the publication of the second edition of Lucio Fauno’s Della antichita (1552), was often referred to as the Temple of Jupiter Stator (see Platner–Ashby 1926, pp. 102–05; Campbell 2004, 1, p. 114). The surviving three columns formed part of the eastern (left-hand) flank of the temple which dates from the early first century CE, and backs onto the scarp of the Palatine Hill, this explaining the reference in the caption to the ‘great palace’. The drawing, however, omits one of the columns, and shows the two others in a disappointingly schematic manner. Although it indicates that the shafts are fluted, the columns are poorly proportioned and the overlarge Corinthian capitals are of a simple generic kind rather than the unusual variety actually used for this building that has interlocking tendrils at the middle of each face, while the bases are of the simple Attic variety instead of those actually employed, which are more complex variants of the ‘Pantheon’ type (with an extra astragal above the upper torus) and are recorded in a later drawing (Fol. 81r/Ashby 135). The unseen podium beneath them, uncovered much later, is of course not included. The entablature is represented in typically simplified form, to indicate the architrave, frieze and cornice, although this is remedied by a much more detailed representation of it again on another page (Fol. 50r/Ashby 85). Despite all these shortcomings, however, the accompanying measurements (in braccia) are surprisingly accurate, suggesting that the drawing served mainly to convey these measurements and indicate where they were taken. A surviving drawing of the ‘three columns’ from around the same time by Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo is likewise annotated with measurements (also in braccia) which are close, although not identical, to those recorded here. Giovanni Francesco’s drawing, however, is a much more carefully observed representation of the standing remains, correctly showing the proportions of the columns, the design of the capitals (although not that of the bases), and the detailing of the entablature, and even recording how much of the entablature had actually survived.

The drawing is executed according to the codex’s usual conventions of combining an elevation, viewed from the right, with a raking view of the side. It was probably positioned beside the one next to it of the Temple of Vespasian because both were studies of columns rather that investigations of temple design, and they precede further drawings of columns on the two following pages. It was partly copied by Michelangelo, although his drawing is restricted just to the left-hand column and the entablature above it.

RELATED IMAGES: [Michelangelo] London, BM, 1859-6-25-560/2v (De Tolnay 1975–80, 4, pp. 45–46; Agosti–Farinella 1987, pp. 100–01)

OTHER IMAGES MENTIONED: [Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo] Lisbon, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, inv. 1713 (Buddensieg 1975, pp. 93–94 and 103)

OTHER DRAWINGS IN CODEX CONER OF SAME SUBJECT: Fol. 50r/Ashby 85; Fol. 81r/Ashby 134

Ashby 1904, p. 38
Census, ID 48306

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.

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