Scale
bar scale inscribed English feet of 1/5 in to 1 ft (approximately) but probably to a scale of Roman palmi
Inscribed
as above, Cortile and dimensions given
Signed and dated
Medium and dimensions
Pen, sepia wash, pencil within single ruled border on laid paper (709 x 492)
Hand
Soane
Watermark
J Whatman, fleur-de-lis within crowned cartouche with GR below
Notes
Measured were the most readily accessible parts of the Palazzo: the entrance vestibule on a segmental plan, the long entrance corridor and the courtyard with two Doric porticos. The marked dimensions tally with the scale of 'English feet'. The scale also relates to Roman piedi if compared, for example, with the bar scale of the measured drawing for the theatre at Herculaneum (q.v.). P. du Prey commented (in a note, 14 January 2009) that 'I measured out the accessible parts of the loggia in feet and inches and Soane's measurements agreed with mine so someone clearly measured the accessible parts in feet and inches which no Italian would have done. Maybe Soane copied the plan, left in the scale bar, but supplied measurements of his own making. The Pietro Massimi palace was designed by Baldassare Peruzzi ,1532-6. Built after the sack of Rome in 1527 for the brothers Pietro, Luca and Angelo Massimo: 'the palace takes its name from the great antique columns which were the distinguishing feature of its predecessor .... It was probably as a reminder of these that Peruzzi created the exquisite columned portico which is the principal feature of the façade'. (G. Masson, Companion guide to Rome, 1980, p.154).
Literature
P.du Prey, John Soane's architectural education 1753-80, 1977, pp.269-70
Level
Drawing
Digitisation of the Drawings Collection has been made possible through the generosity of the Leon Levy Foundation
Sir John Soane's collection includes some 30,000 architectural,
design and topographical drawings which is a very important resource for
scholars worldwide. His was the first architect’s collection to attempt to
preserve the best in design for the architectural profession in the future, and
it did so by assembling as exemplars surviving drawings by great Renaissance
masters and by the leading architects in Britain in the 17th and 18th centuries
and his near contemporaries such as Sir William Chambers, Robert Adam and
George Dance the Younger. These drawings sit side by side with 9,000 drawings
in Soane’s own hand or those of the pupils in his office, covering his early
work as a student, his time in Italy and the drawings produced in the course of
his architectural practice from 1780 until the 1830s.
Browse (via the vertical menu to the left) and search results for Drawings include a mixture of
Concise catalogue records – drawn from an outline list of the collection – and
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