The 'Stemme' on Bernini's Baldacchino in St Peter's: A Forgotten Compliment

Author(s): Philipp Fehl

Source: The Burlington Magazine , Jul., 1976, Vol. 118, No. 880 (Jul., 1976), pp. 482+484-
491
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 AMMANNATI, MICHELANGELO, AND THE TOMB OF FRANCES CO DEL NERO

archbishop of Florence and hence the spiritual head of

The parallels between the of the del Nero tomb and
the design
Florentine colony in Rome. Altoviti, that
weofrecall, numbered
the del Monte monuments in S. Pietro in Montorio
among Benavides's correspondents,71perhaps
and thus
indicateit was
that to
Ammannati had a larger share in th
Soderini's young nephew that Benavides wrote
planning of the onlatter4th
than is often suggested (Figs.i9, 31
February 1549, 'Hammi scritto, monsignor mio
In the twoReverendissimo,
designs the plinths are nearly identical, and this
Messer Bartolomeo Ammannati nostro, leidentity
amorevoli
extends accoglienze
even to the profiles of the mouldings. These
che V.S. gli hafatte, et le larghe oferte, chebases
glifasupport sarcophagi that
di continuo'. 2 are similar in form and type;
Many years later, around 1570, shortly above the sarcophagi,
after his return tabernacles
to rise from architecturall
Florence, Antonio Altoviti commissioned the
defined tomb
ledges. of his
The niches of the del Monte tombs are no
cousin, Bindino Altoviti, in the SS. Apostoli (Fig.32).73
framed by architectural orders and thus they do not require
Altoviti apparently turned to his old acquaintance, Amman- the full entablature of the del Nero monument, but the
nati, for the design (Figs.19, 23, 32), since pediments as of
early
the twoasmonuments
1591 are identical. Moreover
in Bocchi's guide to Florence it is recorded Ammannati
that the had already designed the tomb of Mario Nar
sculpture
of the tomb is 'di mano d'uno allievo dell'Ammannato'.74 Most in Florence where he employed the then unusual combinatio
likely this 'allievo' was Giovanni Battista Fiammeri, the of a standing allegory set over a reclining effigy of the de-
preferred pupil of Ammannati,7 until his departure for ceased, a format that reappears in the del Monte tombs."
Rome in 1576.7 Fiammeri worked on the Neptune fountain Many of the details that link the del Nero design with the
in Florence,77 but no independent work of sculpture can be del Monte monuments occur in the earlier tomb of Mantova
connected with his name. And, if indeed the Altoviti tomb Benavides, and, if the execution of some details in the del
sculpture offers a measure of his talents, he is of interest as an Nero tomb seems disappointing, for instance the surface
artistic personality primarily in order to isolate his r6le as a finishing of the marble and the rosettes, shell, and lionhead
collaborator. 78 masks of the sarcophagus, these are a measure of Amman-
nati's loss of control over the completion of the tomb.
71 See above n.26. One further aspect of del Nero's monument finds an echo
72 See above n.27. A further letter of Altoviti to Benavides in 'Lettere latine e
in the Roman works of Ammannati. The handsome framing
italiane', No.157, undated. Nannina Soderini, the wife of del Nero's brother,
was also the sister of Altoviti's mother, Fiametta Soderini. of del Nero's bust in an oval bracketed into a rectangular
panel
73 PAATZ: Die Kirchen von Florenz, I, pp.236, 258. Antonio Altoviti died in 1573, by perpendicular blocks becomes a characteristi
three years after his cousin. motif in Ammannati's designs,80 and he employed it in the
74 F. BOCCHI: Le bellezze di Fiorenza, Florence [1591], p.61.
75 The authorship of Andrea Calamech (PAATZ, I, p.258) cannot beupper
main- level of the side walls of the main courtyard of the
tained since he left Florence for Messina by 1565. Villa Giulia. This part of the Villa's decoration has long
76 P. PIRRI: 'L'architetto Bartolomeo Ammannati e i Gesuiti', Archivium disappeared, but it is preserved in an anonymous eighteenth-
Historicum S. J., XII [1943], pp.25-26.
77The picture that H. UTZ ('A note on Ammannati's Apennine and on the century drawing still at the Villa (Fig.30o). More memorable
chronology of the figures for his Fountain of Neptune', THE BURLINGTON of course is del Nero's bust itself and Mazzoni's uncompro
MAGAZINE, CXV [19731, pp.295-300) provides concerning the authorship of mising likeness by which del Nero chose to be remembered
the bronze satyrs and fauns of the Neptune fountain is incorrect. The satyr she
assigns to Vincenzo de' Rossi (p.299), which served as one of the two 'models' (Fig.2o). In its representation del Nero wears his reputation
for the remaining six fauns and satyrs (p.300oo), was instead cast by Manfredini for meanness, and even his nickname, the 'Cra del Pecadiglio',
on the model of the sculptor Francesco Pozzi in 1831 or 1832 (Nuova guida with a singular forebearance and with a perhaps character-
della citta e contorni di Firenze, 5th ed., Florence [1849], p.263; and A. GARNIERI:
istic obliviousness to the opinions of posterity.
Guida artistica di Firenze e dintorni, Florence [1837], p.42). Dr Utz records a
notice in the I730 edition of BORGHINI that the satyr is missing, and furthermore
in 1824, L. BIADI (Fabbriche non-finite di Firenze, Florence, p.203) noted the
absence of the satyr which, according to tradition, had been carried off to
Paris at the time of the 'Principi de' Medici', i.e., by 1743. Thus no connection
between the present bronze satyr, made in the nineteenth century, and
Vincenzo de' Rossi (1525-1587) is possible.
78 The few surviving paintings by Fiammeri in Rome and his drawings (Louvre, 7 POPE-HENNESSY, Cat., No.73.
Inv.3017; Uffizi 15108-15xx113 F, IX1883 F, 824 E, 724 O) support the belief 80so See Biblioteca Riccardiana, Ed. rar. 120, fol.35r (CittM, p.319) and fol.33r
that he worked on the Altoviti tomb. (p.3x4); also the busts in the ground floor loggia of the Palazzo Firenze, Rome

PHILIPP FEHL

The 'Stemme' on Bernini's Baldacc

a forgotten Compliment
For E. H. Gombrich

A CICERONE'S tale, no longer much told in our anxiously bees (Figs.35-39, 43-48). On the eighth, however, the female
head
purist age but still quite current in the thirties, points out a is substituted by the head of a baby or, to be exact, a
curious anomaly in the rendering of the stemme of Urban smiling cherub (Fig.4o). The woman's head, in a number of
VIII which decorate the outer sides of the four marble bases these representations, is contorted in pain and, if one takes
of Bernini's baldacchino in St Peter's (Fig.33). Seven of thethe shield of the stemma to represent her body, she appears to
eight stemme, the legend notes, show the head of a woman onbe in various stages of pregnancy. According to the explan-
top of the coat of arms upon which crawl the three Barberiniation offered by the legend, the pope's favourite niece was
484

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35. Baldacchino, Stemma, by Bernini. Photo Alinari. 36. Baldacchino, Stemma, by Bernini. Photo. Gallerie Musei Vaticani.

37. Baldacchino, Stemma, by Bernini. Photo. Gallerie Musei Vaticani. 38. Baldacchino, Stemma, by Bernini. Photo. Gallerie Musei Vaticani.

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39. Baldacchino, Stemma, by Bernini. Photo. Alinari. 40. Baldacchino, Stemmna, by Bernini. Photo. Gallerie Musei Vaticani.

41. Barberini Stemma. (Formerly Convent of S. Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi, 42. Borghese Stemma. (Vatican).
Florence). Photo. Alinari.

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 THE 'STEMME' ON BERNINI' S BALDACCHINO IN ST PETER S

expecting a child but her pregnancy was

trust the difficult
ever-ready and
explanation that the oddity of the stemme
dangerous. Urban VIII therefore vowed to dedicate
on the baldacchino is merely thearesult
great
of the free exercise of
the artist's
altar in St Peter's if she would be safely fancy. Knowing
delivered. His that both Bernini and Urban
prayer
VIII were poets in earnest,
was granted and in consequence he commissioned we owe it
Bernini toto them to look for a
build the baldacchino and record the more happy story by
reasonable explanation inconsidering
the the flexibility of
sculpture of the stemme.1 meaning in the decorative arrangement of stemme in the
To follow the story in its proper sequence, Seicento.4 we must start
in front of the baldacchino with the stemma on our left and
A stemma is normally composed of two parts: the stemm
emblazoned shield proper, and an outer part, the fram
proceed clockwise around it. We first see the young woman
in a happy state of health (Figs.35-43) and then encounter cartouche around the shield. The heraldic design on t
her in the various stages of her difficult pregnancy shield is, of course, carefully prescribed and its mean
(Figs.36-39, 44-48). When we have walked all around the precisely defined. (In the case of the Barberini bees,
baldacchino the pope's niece's time is up and we behold, wholesome attributes are legion and explainable ad itf
in the cherub, the happily delivered infant (Fig.4o). tum.5) The cartouche, however, like all ornament, live
History, with good reason and even better taste, has the land of fancy. Here artists were free to invent variati
rejected this curious tale which, like a weed, kept on growing and luxuriate in the exercise of playfulness. Because
about the baldacchino and mingling with its ornaments.2 cartouche has no 'significant meaning', iconographer
The fact remains, however, that the inventors of the tale, not normally discuss what it shows. Nonetheless, the c
fanciful though their explanation was, were good noticers. touche is an important part of the stemma it decorates. In
but the dullest renderings its relation to the shield expan
It is, after all, odd that only one of the eight stemme shows the
papal coat of arms in its most familiar elaborated form with the meaning of the device in a fashion that is curiously a
a winged cherub supporting the keys - as for example we engagingly complementary.6 Without the sensibly rel
find it in the perfection of a finely chiselled cameo-like
elegance in our Fig.4I - while the other seven glory in the
fanciful extravagance of a grimacing woman with an course, are still very exalted ones. But the cherub is from God. Under the
apparently distended belly. circumstances he is, we might say, God's own emblem and reserved, in this
instance, for the stemma above His miraculous image. A similar sense of heraldic
Stemme matter to patrons and are not to be dealt with order involving the Barberini arms seems to have prevailed in M. Ferrabosco's
lightly, especially when they are monumental in size and in design for a papal altar and choir screen involving the original Constantinian
the very centre of St Peter's.3 There is, therefore, no need to twisted columns that was eventually abandoned in favour of Bernini's baldac-
chino - see GIOVANNI DOMENICO ROSSI: Urabano VIII Barberini . . . in Vaticano
tumulum, Rome [1685], pl.XXVII, and LAVIN, pl.79, pp.45-46. With the
exception of the two papal stemme which crown it, the work is strictly sym-
metrical. On the left the stemma is framed by two sphinxes whose wings join in
I The story appears first to have been committed to print by AUGUSTUS HARE:
a knot that nearly forms an ionic capital on which rests the papal crown. This
Walks in Rome, London [1883], 1I, p.252 (not in the edition of London stemma
[1876]is above a relief showing Christ's charge to Peter: 'Guard my sheep'.
as reported by LUDWIG VON PASTOR, see n.2, below). Hare's piquant elabora- The stemma is supported by two angels in rather busy poses. In the corres-
tion that the pope's niece was a maiden whom Bernini 'had aspired toponding marryplace on the right the supporting angels (with laurel branches in their
in vain' (ed. London [i9gog], p.51 I) does not seem to have found favour hands)
with are commodiously at rest and the papal keys as well as the tiara are
later carriers of the tale in print. Among them note SIR RENNELL RODD:supported Rome of by a cherub happily located inside the shield. This, the fully angelic
the Renaissance and Today, London [1932], pp-292-93; MARGRET NAVAL: device, In Romis placed above a relief showing Christ giving the keys to Peter, obvi-
erzahlt man . . . Legenden, Anekdoten, Kuriositdten, Vienna [1938], pp.54-56; ouslyand,
the more important of the two reliefs dominating the architecture of the
of late, in a curious revival, GEORGINA MASSON: The Companion Guide to papal
Rome,altar and choir screen.
London [1970], (first published London [1965]), p.528. The story 4 On Bernini's responsibility for the design of the baldacchino and the role of
is also
repeated, with a concern for clinical accuracy, by JAMES LEES-MILNE: Sthis Peter's:
assistants in his execution of the work see especially RUDOLF WITTKOWER:
The Story of St Peter's Basilica in Rome, London [1967], p.252. TheGian legend
Lorenzo Bernini, London [1955], p.188. In 1628 Bolgi was paid for 'the
(without the benefit of the love story) parallels in some ways the more authentic
touching up of the marble coat of arms of the pedestals'. On I8th December
story of the cause for the dedication of Bramante's tempietto at San Pietro in
1627 Agostino Radi, 'scarpellino', received payment for preparing the models
Montorio. For an early account see POMPILIO TOTTI: Ritratto di Roma Moderna for the marble reliefs. See OSCAR POLLAK: Die Kunsttditigkeit unter Urban VIII,
(dedicated to Cardinal Antonio Barberini), Rome [1638], p.49. Vienna [Ig93i], II, pp.342 f. On the r6le of Borromini see THELEN: Enstehungs-
2 GAETANO BOSSI: La Pasquinata: Quod non fecerunt barbari fecerunt Barberini, geschichte, pp.54-55, and idem. Francesco Borromini: Die Handzeichnungen, Graz
Rome [1898], p.8 I, n.I, allows that the suggestion of pregnancy may have beenpp.79-86. See also LAVIN: Bernini and the Crossing, p.47, and the review
[I967],
intended: 'Fu un semplice capriccio del Bernini, oppure un bizzarro augurio cheby l'artista
JENNIFER MONTAGU, Art Quarterly [1971], pp.490 f. Maffeo Barberini, the
later Urban
intese fare con cio alle nozze di D. Taddeo Barberini che allora si andavan trattando e VIII, expressed himself as a poet on the significance of the bees
che poi si concchiusero il 24 ottobre 1627?'. LUDWIG VON PASTOR rejects the on his
storystemme. For his most explicatory bee poem see his Poemata, ed. Paris
outright: History of the Popes, XXIX, London [1938], p.467, n.3, 469[1642], n. Seep.143. His poems were sumptuously decorated with engravings designed
also STANISLAO FRASCHETTI: Il Bernini, Milan [19goo], p.65: SCHUELLER-PIROLI: by Bernini, surely according to exact directions from the poet-patron, in
2000 Jahre Sankt Peter, Olten (Switzerland) [1950], p.665; HEINRICH THELEN: Maphaei S. R. F. Card. Barberini nunc Urbani VIIIpoemata, Rome [163 ]. See also
Zur Entstehungsgeschichte der Hochaltar-Architektur von St Peter in Rom, Berlin[ 1967], History, XXIX, p.4o10
PASTOR:
P.55. As a rule, however, scholarly studies of the baldacchino simply5 do Among
not outstanding champions of the bee-image note FRANCESCO BRACCIOLINI
refer to the matter. DELLE API: L'elettione di Urbano Papa VIII, Rome [1628], and GIOVANNI FERRO:
3 That Urban VIII was seriously concerned with what may be called stemma- Teatro d'Imprese (dedicated to Maffeo Barberini, the later Urban VIII),
etiquette in St Peter's appears to be demonstrated by the arrangement of the Venice [1623], esp. pp.426, 636. The significance of the heraldic devices on the
stemme over the great niches in the four pillars supporting the dome. Two of baldacchino itself was particularly praised by JOHANNES GUILLELMUS VERNEREY:
these - the ones above the statues of St Andrew and St Longinus - have but a Urban VIII P.O.B. Erectis Aeneis in Vaticana Basilica Quatuor Columnis, Rome
simple shell beneath the papal crown and keys (and above the Barberini bees). [1629], and L. GUIDICCIONE: Ara Maxima Vaticana ..., Rome [I633].
Another, above St Helena, has in its stead a scroll formed by the bands of the 6 On the changing pattern of the relationship between shield and cartouche
papal crown, and the last - above St Veronica - the head of a cherub. This in Italian coats of arms, see ADALBERTO RICOTTI BERTAGNONI and GIACOMO
sequence would seem to correspond nicely to the difference in the order of C. BASCAPt: Stemmario italiano dellefamiglie nobili e notabili, Bassano del Grappa,
precedence which governs the arrangement of the relics housed in the bal- Vol.I [1970], pp.2-3. The first great experimenter in playfully and yet earnestly
conies above the niches. (See IRVING LAVIN: Bernini and the Crossing of St Peter's, joining the world of the cartouche and the impresa proper was, perhaps,
New York [1968], pp.24-25, and HANS KAUFFMANN: Giovanni Lorenzo Bernini: Albrecht Diirer, whose engravings and woodcuts of fancy shields must have
diefigiirlichen Kompositionen, Berlin [1970], pp.85-Io8). The lesser decorations, of captured the imagination of all later inventors in the field. For a collection

487

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 THE STEMME' ON BERNINNI S BALDACCHINO IN ST PETER'S
telling difference
cartouche a stemma, at best, is like a sculptured fountain with between the two Barberini crowns. The
the water turned off. one to our left (Fig.48) shows the Barberini bee and, in the
row below, the smiling cherub characteristic of the most
Short of the female head, the most striking feature in the
cartouches for Bernini's stemme on the baldacchino is the exalted type of the arms of Urban VIII. In the
distorted face of a flayed satyr which drapes over thecrown
lower on the right (Fig.4o), however, the place of
edge of the frame. The leathery skin of this creature cherub's head is filled by a blossoming flower and the cher
is the material from which the cartouche has been fashioned,
himself, now fully transformed from ornament to life, h
and his elaborate horns imperceptibly merge with it so as todown and taken his accustomed place at the top
flown
form a type of scrolled frame. But in spite of - or, perhaps,
the cartouche, from where, smiling, he watches the Barber
even because of - the dematerialization of the gruesome
bees in the busy concert of their happy progress across t
aspect of the triumph over monstrosity alluded toshield.
in this
This, athe most glorious stemma on the baldacchino,
ordering of the stemma, the satyr's flayed face has at once
presents,
threatening life and the macabre dignity of defeat and death it would seem, at once the high point and the
cast over its features.7 overture of a little allegorical tale. As we walk around the
This motif of the flayed satyr's skin as the apparent baldacchino with our eyes open to the game of the world of
material of the cartouche surrounding a stemma on a papal heraldic ornament, we see in the no-man's land of double
coat of arms was traditional in Bernini's day, as, for example, existences captive female figures whose bodies are also the
we may see in a characteristic rendering of the arms of Paulshields of the stemme proper. As the bees go about their
V in the Vatican (Fig.42). It represents an evil or element-business of being Barberini emblems, with all that this
arily destructive principle which is overcome by the presence mission implies for the good of Christianity, the women
of the cherub, the virtuous principles of the device on the appear to be agitated in various and possibly increasing
stemma and the very weight of the papal keys. For the forms of discomfiture. It is not until we return to the front of
Barberini arms the imagery is fully developed in the titlethe baldacchino and face the first of the Barberini crowns
page of Francesco Bracciolini dell'Api's L'elettione di Urbano (Fig.48) that we may confidently say we see a stemma truly
Papa VIII (Fig.49) where Apollo's flaying of Marsyas issuggesting peace. And even that representation of a felic
alluded to both by allegorical figures and two flayed satyr's tous reign is improved upon when, in the stemma with the
heads which support angels holding papal arms.8 other Barberini crown (Fig.4o) the female, as we have noted
The placing of a menacing female head rather than a above, is replaced by the smiling cherub observing the bees
cherub above the shield is equally conventional, though bycrawling on what is now but their proper shield. Our circui
no means as frequently encountered. For example, a is thus completed and brought to a happy and lasting resolu
Medusa- or siren-like head crowns but of course does not
tion. We moved along a road depicting a transformation
rule the shield of Cardinal Borghese in the ceiling ofwhich
the is quite comparable to that of giving birth: from
Cappella di Sta Silvia of San Gregorio Magno (Fig.5o).confusion
In to knowledge, from agitation to quietude, from
such instances the head must be comprehended as part the of
labours of the Barberini bees under adverse circumstance
to the
the cartouche which is overcome by the beneficent power of arrival of the cherub and the successful establishment
of the rule of Urban VIII.
the device on the shield and the cardinal's hat or papal
crown, as the case may be. In other words, even though If it
I read it rightly, the story of the stemme is the same a
that
appears above the shield, the female head is no more than told on an heroic scale in Pietro da Cortona's immense
a counterpart of the satyr's head below.9 fresco in the Barberini Palace (Fig.34). Both works celebrate
When we look at Bernini's eight stemme the presence the
of aadvent of the Barberini papacy. On the ceiling Divin
riddle is announced to us in the marked contrast between Wisdom sends forth three swift super-bees in the form of th
the ease and pleasure beaming forth from the two whichBarberini
we emblem to bring peace and prosperity to a world
first encounter when we approach from the nave and ruled the by vices, war, and ignorance." On the support of th
spectacular discontent of the others. As we wonder about baldacchino, the tale is told in the language of miniature and
this discrepancy, we may come to notice that the two papal banter, and the bees, happily, are not much larger than life
crowns above the stemme in front are also decorated differ- The stemme do not present the story directly, but only by
ently from the others. These alone show the bee of the allusion. Nothing more is offered, I think, but the suggestion
of a tale capable of supporting the majestic and joyfu
Barberini emblem; the other crowns, though elaborately
ornamented, are heraldically neutral.'0 Moreover, there is adignity of the whole structure of the baldacchino, like a
flute accompaniment which for a moment frees itself with
sweet jubilation from the orchestration of a concert only th
more fully to affirm that it is a part of it.
of here relevant examples, see especially the spirited engravings by FILIPPO
JUVARRA: Raccolta di targhefatti da professori primari in Roma, Rome [1732]. Obviously, the primary purpose of the stemme is to name
On the origins and meaning of the conventional image of the flayed satyr's
skin see PHILIPP FEHL: 'Realism and Classicism in the Representation of thea donor and affirm, in the entirety of the baldacchino, his
Painful Scene: Titian's Flaying of Mar.yas in the Archiepiscopal Palace at
Kromeriz', Czechoslovakia Past and Present, The Hague [1969], pp. 387-415-
8 The reference to the context of Apollo and Marsyas was particularly aptKUNZLE:
in 'Zur obersten der drei Tiaren auf Raffaels Disputa', Rdmisch
the case of Urban VIII who was, in his capacity as a poet, also a disciple of
Quartalschrift [1962], pp.244-45.
Apollo. References to the sun, a favourite emblem of Urban's, also abound11onThe programme of the painting as well as the 'historia' of the stemme seem
the baldacchino. See KAUFFMANN: Bernini, pp.92-93, 95. to accord with BRACCIOLINI DELL'API'S poem on the bees. For a resum6 of it
1 For a demonstration of the rule of this principle in the Barberini armscontents,
see including Rospigliosi's additions to the edition of 1628, see es
the elaborate engraving in FERRO: Teatro d'imprese, II, p.72. PASTOR: History, XXIX, pp.423-24. See also JAKOB HESS: Die Kiinstlerbiographie
10 On the subtle differences in the decoration of papal crowns see esp. PAUL
von Giovanni Battista Passeri, Leipzig [1934], P-379.

488

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 44. Detail of Fig.37. 45. Detail of St
43. Detail of Fig.35. Photo. Gallerie Musei Vaticani. Musei Vati

46. Detail of Stemma, Bernini's Baldacchino. Photo. Gallerie 47. Detail of Fig.38. Photo. Gallerie Musei Vaticani. 48. Detail of F
Musei Vaticani.

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 L ELETTIONE DI VRBANO PAPA VII
DELL' AP J

ALL DIIF!RANCESCO
" ou "S' IL 1RACCIOLINI
S'CARDINALE
BARB ERN O

CON GLI ARGOMENTI

A CIASCVNVO CANTO

DI GIVLIANO BRACCIOLINI
DELL API

50. Stemma of Cardinal Borghese. (Ceiling, Oratorio of Santa Silvia

49. L'elettione di Urbano Papa VIII, by Francesco Bracciolini dell'Api. at San Gregorio Magno, Rome). Photo. Eugene Du'er.
Title page (engraving). Photo. Biblioteca Hertziana, Rome.

i. Tomb of Urban VIII, by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. (St Peter's, Rome). 52. Engraving of Tomb of Urban VIII, illustrated in Fig.51.

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 THE 'STEMME' ON BERNINI'S BALDACCHINO IN ST PETER'S

monument
dedication to the service of God. The do we seeof
little aside thethe
stemma of Urban VIII once
story
more,
of the stemme is nothing but a tale but now
within in itswithin
a tale fullest splendour
a (Fig.52)
angels in
tale.12 The cicerone legend which alerted usconcert
to it lift
was,it as
up and
so bear the memory
pope's
often, responsive to the suggestiveness of reign- and histhough
art even loyal beesitas well - to the r
Heaven everlasting:
distorted the sense of the tale by inventing a pacifying, if
piquant, fable. If we have unravelled its Ubi est mors victoria tua?
meaning more
Ubi
correctly, it may perhaps also serve to remindest mors us,
stimulusintuus?these

days of eager earnestness, that men who were secure in their

faith could engage in the most committeed pious
appears rather definitely purposes
as a final touch and would seem to post-date the death
of their lives with a smile and a wink.13 of the Pope in 1644. For the plan of 1627 see THELEN: Handzeichnungen, pp.
45-48. The distress of the bees is remarked upon in an anecdote told by FILIPPO
When Bernini undertook the mournful task of completing
BALDINUCCI: Vita del Cavaliere Bernini, Rome [1682], p. I8. See also the pasquin-
the tomb of Urban VIII (Fig.5I), he returned with a heavy
ade in FRASCHETTI: Bernini, pp.157, 158 n. A suitable parallel is provided by
heart to the playful rhetoric of emblems with which heTHOMAS
had MOUFFET [MUFFET]: The Theatre of Insects, London [1658], I, ch.3, p.901 :
'Sadnesse and Melancholy also doth very much distemper and disturb them,
celebrated the advent of the Barberini papacy. With arising
a sad sometimes from the death of the King or Master Bee, sometimes of
finality Death inscribes the cartella for the monument with
their young ones, sometimes of their keeper; neither will a day cease their
the name of Urban VIII, and the three Barberini bees, no conceived sorrow, but they take it to heart, that their bodies pine away and it
consumes them to skin and bone. Neither will tinging or tinkling of the brasse
longer contained within their accustomed stemma, in loneli- pan, or any harmony whatsoever delight them (which yet when they are mad,
ness crawl about the tomb seeking their dead master.14 and dote so that they known not what they do, is wont to cure them) there is
Only at the very top of the niche which enshrines the no plague or disease that can be named, that is more deadly to them than this'.
For a different view of the significance of the bees on the sarcophagus see
KAUFFMANN: Bernini, p.127. See also PHILIPP FEHL: 'Bernini's Triumph of
12 The bees, as well as the other Barberini devices, are repeated again and Truth over England', Art Bulletin, 48 [1966], p.405. The often noted deliberate
again, in ever new variations of an interplay with the august purpose of the contrast between (and harmonization of) the tombs of Paul III and Urban
work, on all parts of the baldacchino. The climax of the ornamental play - VIII also includes a play on the stemme, the flying Barberini emblem far
where a declaration of highest purpose and the most daring playfulness are outshining the simply stationary one of the Farnese.
joined - is reached at the very top of the baldacchino where four bees congre- 15 For contemporary celebrations of this aspect of the work see ANDREA
gate and seem to support the sphere upon which is planted the cross of Christ. TAURELLUS: Heros in Solio Divinitatis Panegyricus . . . Urbano VIII consecratus,
13 Particularly telling, in its joyful and presumably pious self-confidence, is the Rome [I638], pp.57 f., and ALPHONSUS CIACOGNIUS: Vitae et Res Gestum Pontificum,
introduction of three golden Barberini bees to the restored apse mosaic of Rome, IV [1687], col.5io. Among modern writers see especially ERWIN
SS. Cosma e Damiano on the Roman Forum. They swarm quite naturally PANOFSKY: 'Mors Vitae Testimonium: the Positive Aspect of Death in Renais-
about a 'Byzantine' flower which grows near the foot of Pope Felix IV. sance and Baroque Iconography', Studien zur Toskanischen Kunst: Festschrift fair
14 On the stages of the development of Bernini's design for the tomb see Ludwig Heinrich Heydenreich zum n23. Mdrz I963, Munich [1964], pp.221-22,
particularly HEINRICH BRAUER and RUDOLF WITTKOWER: Die Zeichnungen des and idem.: Tomb Sculpture: Its Changing Aspects from Ancient Egypt to Bernini,
Gianlorenzo Bernini, Berlin [1931], pp.24-25. The introduction of the bees London [1964], PP.94-95.

ROBERT ENGGASS

Introducing Girolamo Pesci

GIROLAMO PESCI is one of the artists who needs to be on the basis of the Life of Pesci that Nicola Pio wrote during
studied if ever we are to determine who painted
the
what
artist's
in lifetime (here published for the first time2),
early eighteenth-century Rome. In his own lifetime as well as the early guidebooks, and with the addition of one
he won
commissions for frescoes in Rome's churches, for easel or two works that appear nowhere in the literature but carry
paintings in her palaces, and even for altar-pieces as far off the artist's signature, we can provide at least a rough sketch
as Piedmont. And of course he painted canvases for visiting of the man and his work.
Englishmen. But up until this time no article has ever been Pesci, who was born in 1679, is one of the relatively few
written on Girolamo Pesci nor, so far as I could determine, artists who was Roman by birth.3 Like almost all aspiring
has anyone ever published any illustration of his work.1 Nowpainters who grew up in late Seicento Rome he studied with
Carlo Maratti, whose calm, dignified, rhythmic style had,
1 Of the many people who have helped me in my efforts to assemble thisby the turn of the century, come to dominate the entire
material, my thanks are due first and foremost to Dr Eduard Safarik, to whose
generous assistance I owe my knowledge of the whole group of Pesci's works field of painting. What differentiates Pesci from many of his
that are now in Czechoslovakia, and for making arrangements for me to seecontemporaries is that he left Maratti to study with an artist
Pesci's Sacrifice of Noah in Rome (a work also called to my attention by Dr who worked in a more modern manner: Francesco Trevisani.
Luigi Salerno). For help received while I was investigating the work by Pesci
in and around Turin I am most grateful to Prof Franco Mazzini, Soprinten- While Pesci's painting shows occasional traces of his ap-
dente alle gallerie di Piemonte. It was Prof Mazzini who put me in touch with
Dr Carlo Arduino, to whom I am indebted not only for a delightful tour of the
monuments of Carignano but also for the discovery of the documents for 2 Pio's Life of Pesci is published at the end of this article. It was completed by
Pesci's important altar-piece in that city. To Padre Bruno Brazzarola, Father 1724, the date on the title-page of the manuscript from which the section on
Superior of the Maddalena, I owe special thanks for facilitating my work inPesci is taken. Alessandro Baudi di Vesme was aware of Pio's Life of Pesci
that church. (Schede Vesme, l'arte in Piemonte dal XVI al XVIII secolo, Turin [1963-68], III
Pesci's bibliography consists chiefly of brief references in the guidebooks.p.824) but concerned himself only with the one sentence in Pio that deals with
Some of these appear in the entry on Pesci in THIEME-BECKER (XXVI [1932],Pesci's work in Piedmont.
p.462) which, even including the literature, comes to less than zoo words. 3 The facts of Pesci's early life (up to 1724) come entirely from Pio.

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33. Baldacchino, by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. (St Peter's, Rome). Photo Alinari. 34. Ceiling painting, by Pietro da Cortona. (Pa

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