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#0214
CREIGHTON GILBERT
naturę which, nevertheless, neatly illustrates his career in a
half-humanist, half-clerical life while also expressing his
urgent wish to articulate his admiration.
The sixth and last passage is found in his long description
of Pienza, the town he named for himself, where he built
grandly. In a well known study, Heydenreich underlined his
rare sensibility for the relation of architecture and
landscape.21 A brief phrase reports on the altarpieces he
commissioned for four side altars in the cathedral:
in reliąue ąuattuor altaria pictis omata tabulis erexerunt,
illustrium quos Sene produxerunt pictorum operibus.22
Van Os has studied these altarpieces in their setting fully,
and rightly noted the campanalismo in which the pope had
each one executed by a different Sienese artist: Matteo di
Giovanni, Giovanni di Paolo, Sano di Piętro, Vecchietta.23
They were certainly the best choices within that stipulation.
However, in contrast, the pope tumed to a Florentine architect.
Pius’ comments on Sienese artists and on Giotto are quite
different in tonę. With the Sienese he is truły engaged, actually
hiring them in this case, vividly looking at the details of the
work in Orvieto; even the remark on Simone, if generalized,
stands out as an opinion only once on record elsewhere, and
then indirectly. The allusions to Giotto make him a token of
high standing, with little morę immediacy than similar ones
to Apelles; the most active passage on him is the one that
makes him a key name in a network of art history.
There may well be other passages not yet noticed.
Muntz cited some in descriptions of German cities and a
sculptured tomb.24 The fme edition of his letters, which
facilitated discoveries in them, goes no further than the year
1454, because later dispatches were published in the
quattrocento. These and his geographical writings might be
surveyed. Even with what is seen here, Pius widens our
profile of the aesthetics of his time.
k k k
Excursus
In the context of comments on Sienese painters in humanistic
texts, it may be helpful to cite a further example, too smali to
merit its own study. Uberto Decembrio, active in Milan until
his death in 1427, wrote the unpublished De Re Pubblica in
four books, on the standard subject of advice to a young
ruler. At the very end he is told that he should also choose
painters well, and these are then named in three groups.25
Following the names from antiquity, Parrhasius, Apelles and
Zeuxis, and preceding the contemporaries, Gentile da
Fabriano, Michelino da Besozzo and Jean d’Arbois, two
artists are cited from „avorum nostrorum temporibus”:
„Zoto florentino et Johanne de Senis.” As in Pius’ oration,
Giotto and a Sienese artist are paired, but the minor role of
the latter is evoked in the name, which is clearly a mistake
arising from poor memory. The one scholar who has taken
up this puzzle considers it certain („he must mean”) that
Simone Martini is intended, on the grounds of the coupling
with Giotto.26 It is maybe that what he had in mind was the
fact Petrarch had named them together; a possibility, but
hardly a certainty, with such slight evidence. The very fact of
Simone’s famę in literary contexts, through a series of praises
by Petrarch („Ma certo il mio Simon fu in paradiso...”)
would have the effect of making it relatively likely that a
humanist would remember his name. If it was forgotten, the
shift to another would seem fairly unlikely to lead to
something as far from the correct name as that of Johannes.
The answer must be a painter of Siena, who could be
considered major in some way, yet not so major that his
name would certainly be remembered, and perhaps with a
name fairly similar to Johannes. The presence of Michelino
da Besozzo on the writer’s list suggests that he indeed might
be less famous than the statement claims. The fact that
Uberto had spent a month in Siena earlier27 would have
increased the rangę of names he knew; he did have an
interest in art, as suggested by his comments elsewhere on
Michelino.28 A surprising possibility is Guido da Siena
(Duccio seems to fit the criteria less well), although today it is
generally assumed that he had been forgotten. Nevertheless,
the chronicie of Angelo del Tura (known in a manuscript of
1442, but much earlier) cites his signature, and he was then
named by Tizio (d. 1528). His role as the founder was thus
noted by the local erudite.
NOTES
1. E. MUNTZ, Les arts a la cour des papes pendant le et
le XVIe siecle, 3 vols., 1878-82, reprint in 1 vol„ Hildesheim,
1983, 1: pp. 100, 222, 224, 353.
2. R. SALVINI, Giotto: bibliografia, Romę, 1:1938, nn. 23, 29;
2: 1973 (with co-author C. de Benedictis), n. 4.
3. C. STREHLKE, „Art and Culture in Renaissance Siena,”
[in] Painting in Renaissance Siena, New York, 1988, p. 35,
notę 44. On some problems in the reporting here of several
of the Piccolomini texts, see further notes 4, 8, 11 and 13
below.
4. A. S. PICCOLOMINI, Briefivechsel, ed. R. WOLKAN, 1
Abteilung, 1441-5, Band 1, Privatbriefe (=Fontes Rerum
Austriacarum, 2 Abteilung, lxi Band) 1909, p. 23. The
letter bears the datę 17th November 1433 with a
postscript of 5th December of that year; the events
mentioned took place at the Council of Basel between 13th
192
naturę which, nevertheless, neatly illustrates his career in a
half-humanist, half-clerical life while also expressing his
urgent wish to articulate his admiration.
The sixth and last passage is found in his long description
of Pienza, the town he named for himself, where he built
grandly. In a well known study, Heydenreich underlined his
rare sensibility for the relation of architecture and
landscape.21 A brief phrase reports on the altarpieces he
commissioned for four side altars in the cathedral:
in reliąue ąuattuor altaria pictis omata tabulis erexerunt,
illustrium quos Sene produxerunt pictorum operibus.22
Van Os has studied these altarpieces in their setting fully,
and rightly noted the campanalismo in which the pope had
each one executed by a different Sienese artist: Matteo di
Giovanni, Giovanni di Paolo, Sano di Piętro, Vecchietta.23
They were certainly the best choices within that stipulation.
However, in contrast, the pope tumed to a Florentine architect.
Pius’ comments on Sienese artists and on Giotto are quite
different in tonę. With the Sienese he is truły engaged, actually
hiring them in this case, vividly looking at the details of the
work in Orvieto; even the remark on Simone, if generalized,
stands out as an opinion only once on record elsewhere, and
then indirectly. The allusions to Giotto make him a token of
high standing, with little morę immediacy than similar ones
to Apelles; the most active passage on him is the one that
makes him a key name in a network of art history.
There may well be other passages not yet noticed.
Muntz cited some in descriptions of German cities and a
sculptured tomb.24 The fme edition of his letters, which
facilitated discoveries in them, goes no further than the year
1454, because later dispatches were published in the
quattrocento. These and his geographical writings might be
surveyed. Even with what is seen here, Pius widens our
profile of the aesthetics of his time.
k k k
Excursus
In the context of comments on Sienese painters in humanistic
texts, it may be helpful to cite a further example, too smali to
merit its own study. Uberto Decembrio, active in Milan until
his death in 1427, wrote the unpublished De Re Pubblica in
four books, on the standard subject of advice to a young
ruler. At the very end he is told that he should also choose
painters well, and these are then named in three groups.25
Following the names from antiquity, Parrhasius, Apelles and
Zeuxis, and preceding the contemporaries, Gentile da
Fabriano, Michelino da Besozzo and Jean d’Arbois, two
artists are cited from „avorum nostrorum temporibus”:
„Zoto florentino et Johanne de Senis.” As in Pius’ oration,
Giotto and a Sienese artist are paired, but the minor role of
the latter is evoked in the name, which is clearly a mistake
arising from poor memory. The one scholar who has taken
up this puzzle considers it certain („he must mean”) that
Simone Martini is intended, on the grounds of the coupling
with Giotto.26 It is maybe that what he had in mind was the
fact Petrarch had named them together; a possibility, but
hardly a certainty, with such slight evidence. The very fact of
Simone’s famę in literary contexts, through a series of praises
by Petrarch („Ma certo il mio Simon fu in paradiso...”)
would have the effect of making it relatively likely that a
humanist would remember his name. If it was forgotten, the
shift to another would seem fairly unlikely to lead to
something as far from the correct name as that of Johannes.
The answer must be a painter of Siena, who could be
considered major in some way, yet not so major that his
name would certainly be remembered, and perhaps with a
name fairly similar to Johannes. The presence of Michelino
da Besozzo on the writer’s list suggests that he indeed might
be less famous than the statement claims. The fact that
Uberto had spent a month in Siena earlier27 would have
increased the rangę of names he knew; he did have an
interest in art, as suggested by his comments elsewhere on
Michelino.28 A surprising possibility is Guido da Siena
(Duccio seems to fit the criteria less well), although today it is
generally assumed that he had been forgotten. Nevertheless,
the chronicie of Angelo del Tura (known in a manuscript of
1442, but much earlier) cites his signature, and he was then
named by Tizio (d. 1528). His role as the founder was thus
noted by the local erudite.
NOTES
1. E. MUNTZ, Les arts a la cour des papes pendant le et
le XVIe siecle, 3 vols., 1878-82, reprint in 1 vol„ Hildesheim,
1983, 1: pp. 100, 222, 224, 353.
2. R. SALVINI, Giotto: bibliografia, Romę, 1:1938, nn. 23, 29;
2: 1973 (with co-author C. de Benedictis), n. 4.
3. C. STREHLKE, „Art and Culture in Renaissance Siena,”
[in] Painting in Renaissance Siena, New York, 1988, p. 35,
notę 44. On some problems in the reporting here of several
of the Piccolomini texts, see further notes 4, 8, 11 and 13
below.
4. A. S. PICCOLOMINI, Briefivechsel, ed. R. WOLKAN, 1
Abteilung, 1441-5, Band 1, Privatbriefe (=Fontes Rerum
Austriacarum, 2 Abteilung, lxi Band) 1909, p. 23. The
letter bears the datę 17th November 1433 with a
postscript of 5th December of that year; the events
mentioned took place at the Council of Basel between 13th
192