DOI issue:
Nr. 3-4
DOI article:Gilbert, Creighton: Pius II, the earliest publicist of the art of his native Siena
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.48916#0211
CREIGHTON GILBERT
Yale/New Haven
Pius II, The Earliest Publicist of the Art of His Native Siena
It is generally and rightly agreed that Siena in the 15th
century lacked any literaturę of commentary on the
art of the city, in contrast to Florence, where
developments on its own art were reported in ways
that are so interesting to us. Sienese art seems to have been
discussed at that time only by the Florentine Ghiberti, and
then only in relation to the 14th century. This lack of written
sources lends special interest to the little noticed fact that
some brief lines on the subject are found among the writings
of the single most powerful person of 15th-century Siena,
Enea Silvio Piccolomini, the futurę Pope Pius II. In six
varied contexts, in letters, an oration, and his autobiography,
he presents remarks that can be classified in two groups, one
on Giotto and the other in praise of Sienese artists. Some of
these comments have been noticed, if rarely, in secondary
literaturę. The most thorough later acknowledgement, from
about one hundred years ago, was by Miintz, who printed
four of the original references, without commenting on
them;1 later, Salvini, also without comment, cited three of
the four passages on Giotto.2 Rather differently, a recent
author on the theme of Sienese culture in this period, while
citing two of the passages on Giotto, States that the pope was
interested only in the art of Florence and did not mention
Simone Martini, going on to define as spurious the passage
about the artist that another scholar had brought to
attention.3 In this article all the known passages will be
brought together in approximate chronological order, and
some inferences drawn.
The eighteen-year-old Piccolomini attended the Council
of Basel in 1433 as a secretary, and wrote about it in a letter
to the priors of Siena.4 The Council involved some dangers
for the Church, he wrote. However:
consuevit navicula Petri, quamvis magnis fluctibus
agitata, numąuam submergi, ut Jottus pinxit Romę
apud Santum Petrum.
The formula of the ship caught in a storm as
symbolising the Church in danger goes back to Tertullian
Biuletyn Historii Sztuki
R.LXI, 1997, Nr 3-4
and Ambrose.5 From the time Giotto produced his mosaic
of the theme, on such a large scalę, so public and so
dramatically effective it has remained the one chief visual
version. It could be the first choice for anyone wanting to
point out Giotto’s art, and thus is one of only two works of
his cited in the life of the artist by Filippo Villani, and the
only non-ancient work of art altogether described in
AlbertPs book on painting.6 On the other hand, someone
whose starting point was not the artist but this urban
monument might be morę likely to omit the artist’s name,
as tends to occur with the Fountain of Trevi or the Statuę of
Liberty. At first Michelangelo’s David was for Machiavelli
only „il gigante in piazza”;7 it became „Michelangelo’s” not
very much later, when other sculptures were placed nearby,
and it became part of an art installation. And we almost
always speak of „Rodin’s Thinker” or the Mole
Antonelliana, assigning the character of art to what might
be only a public object, in cases when creativity is being
registered. Pius II was lending this character to the mosaic
at St. Peter’s, conscious of Giotto as the most famous of
artists.
The second written source refers to the recent death of
a friend, which had taken place in February, 1452; it exists
in two drafts which seem to be very close in datę.
Piccolomini, who in the meantime had become Bishop of
Siena, was on a trip to Vienna. He is writing to a German
colleague, Nicholas of Ulm, to thank him for having sent
him the dead man’s letters and a painting of St. Michael.8 The
painting and Nicholas’ letter encourage Piccolomini to
praise him for his dual talent in eloąuence and painting,
which he calls, in common formula, „equal to Apelles and
Zeuxis.” He then moves to a short history of the two arts,
rising and falling together:
Mirabile dictu est, dum viguit eloquentia, viguit pictura,
sicut Demostenis et Ciceronis tempora docent,
postquam cecedit facundia et pictura. Cum illa revixit
hec quoque caput extullit. Yidemus pictura ducentorum
189
Yale/New Haven
Pius II, The Earliest Publicist of the Art of His Native Siena
It is generally and rightly agreed that Siena in the 15th
century lacked any literaturę of commentary on the
art of the city, in contrast to Florence, where
developments on its own art were reported in ways
that are so interesting to us. Sienese art seems to have been
discussed at that time only by the Florentine Ghiberti, and
then only in relation to the 14th century. This lack of written
sources lends special interest to the little noticed fact that
some brief lines on the subject are found among the writings
of the single most powerful person of 15th-century Siena,
Enea Silvio Piccolomini, the futurę Pope Pius II. In six
varied contexts, in letters, an oration, and his autobiography,
he presents remarks that can be classified in two groups, one
on Giotto and the other in praise of Sienese artists. Some of
these comments have been noticed, if rarely, in secondary
literaturę. The most thorough later acknowledgement, from
about one hundred years ago, was by Miintz, who printed
four of the original references, without commenting on
them;1 later, Salvini, also without comment, cited three of
the four passages on Giotto.2 Rather differently, a recent
author on the theme of Sienese culture in this period, while
citing two of the passages on Giotto, States that the pope was
interested only in the art of Florence and did not mention
Simone Martini, going on to define as spurious the passage
about the artist that another scholar had brought to
attention.3 In this article all the known passages will be
brought together in approximate chronological order, and
some inferences drawn.
The eighteen-year-old Piccolomini attended the Council
of Basel in 1433 as a secretary, and wrote about it in a letter
to the priors of Siena.4 The Council involved some dangers
for the Church, he wrote. However:
consuevit navicula Petri, quamvis magnis fluctibus
agitata, numąuam submergi, ut Jottus pinxit Romę
apud Santum Petrum.
The formula of the ship caught in a storm as
symbolising the Church in danger goes back to Tertullian
Biuletyn Historii Sztuki
R.LXI, 1997, Nr 3-4
and Ambrose.5 From the time Giotto produced his mosaic
of the theme, on such a large scalę, so public and so
dramatically effective it has remained the one chief visual
version. It could be the first choice for anyone wanting to
point out Giotto’s art, and thus is one of only two works of
his cited in the life of the artist by Filippo Villani, and the
only non-ancient work of art altogether described in
AlbertPs book on painting.6 On the other hand, someone
whose starting point was not the artist but this urban
monument might be morę likely to omit the artist’s name,
as tends to occur with the Fountain of Trevi or the Statuę of
Liberty. At first Michelangelo’s David was for Machiavelli
only „il gigante in piazza”;7 it became „Michelangelo’s” not
very much later, when other sculptures were placed nearby,
and it became part of an art installation. And we almost
always speak of „Rodin’s Thinker” or the Mole
Antonelliana, assigning the character of art to what might
be only a public object, in cases when creativity is being
registered. Pius II was lending this character to the mosaic
at St. Peter’s, conscious of Giotto as the most famous of
artists.
The second written source refers to the recent death of
a friend, which had taken place in February, 1452; it exists
in two drafts which seem to be very close in datę.
Piccolomini, who in the meantime had become Bishop of
Siena, was on a trip to Vienna. He is writing to a German
colleague, Nicholas of Ulm, to thank him for having sent
him the dead man’s letters and a painting of St. Michael.8 The
painting and Nicholas’ letter encourage Piccolomini to
praise him for his dual talent in eloąuence and painting,
which he calls, in common formula, „equal to Apelles and
Zeuxis.” He then moves to a short history of the two arts,
rising and falling together:
Mirabile dictu est, dum viguit eloquentia, viguit pictura,
sicut Demostenis et Ciceronis tempora docent,
postquam cecedit facundia et pictura. Cum illa revixit
hec quoque caput extullit. Yidemus pictura ducentorum
189