To an approximate scale of 1:7

[Drawing] 63 (late sixteenth-century hand); Antonij. S. G[alli]. (‘Of Antonio da Sangallo’); [measurements] [Mount] 82 [x2]

• c.1513/14
  Datable to c.1513/14

[Drawing] Pen and brown ink and grey-brown wash over stylus lines; on laid paper (233x165mm), rounded corners at right, inlaid (back to front with respect to original foliation) [Mount] Frame lines, in pen and dark brown ink, 10mm apart; window (225x159mm)

Bernardo della Volpaia

See recto

Ashby correctly concluded that this drawing, labelled Antonii S. G., was of a Doric entablature and capital designed by Antonio da Sangallo the Younger, and he also observed that the entablature was very like that of the portal of Palazzo Baldassini, which Sangallo is known to have designed. Bernardo della Volpaia worked in Sangallo’s immediate orbit, thus explaining the familiarity of referring to him by his first name, as is also the case with three other drawings Fols 67r/Ashby 115 and 68r/Ashby 116 Drawings 5 and 9).

The order and entablature, as drawn here, differ in in certain minor respects from that of the Palazzo Baldassini portal: the supporting shaft is a pilaster rather than a half-column, the soffit of the corona between the mutules does not have coffers, the lip immediately above the guttae does not continue across the face of the upper fascia, and the capital has an echinus that is ‘S’-shaped not quadrant-shaped, this being like the capital Sangallo used for the larger but nearly contemporaneous entrance of Palazzo Farnese (c.1515). That the Palazzo Baldassini identification is correct, however, is supported by the dimensions (miscalculated by Ashby) which correspond almost exactly with those of the portal published by Paul Marie Letarouilly (ed. 1984, pl. 3). In date, the design of Palazzo Baldassini also tallies very neatly with the Coner drawing. Palazzo Baldassini was probably begun soon after the patron was ennobled as conte palatino in 1513 and obtained a position at the university of the Sapienza (Cogotti–Gigli 1995, p. 8), this date thus corresponding exactly with when the Codex Coner was being compiled. It seems highly likely, therefore, that the Coner drawing is a copy of a project drawing for the palace that was then modified before execution.

Ashby noted, too, that the cornice is very like one drawn by Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo that was of antique origin and found in the foundations of St Peter’s, which, according to the caption, Bramante reburied in the same place (Günther 1988, pp. 336 and 377). The discovery of this entablature at St Peter’s, where Sangallo had been working, may suggest that this ancient entablature was the model Sangallo used for his Palazzo Baldassini scheme. The Coner drawing is on a sheet that was originally a recto and followed on immediately from the previous depictions in the compilation of Doric orders. It was copied by Michelangelo, although he adjusted the angle of the raking view.

RELATED IMAGES: [Michelangelo], Florence, CB, 4Ar: left side (De Tolnay 1975–80, 4, p. 49; Agosti–Farinella 1987, pp. 124–25)

OTHER DRAWINGS MENTIONED: [Giovanni Francesco da Sangallo] Florence, GDSU, 1652 Ar (Bartoli 1914–22, 6, p. 100; Frommel–Schelbert 2022, 1, pp. 196–97)

Ashby 1904, pp. 43–44
Günther 1988, p. 337

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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