DOI issue:
Nr. 1-2
DOI article:Boczkowska, Anna: Geminae Veneres: motywy neoplatońskie w dekoracji reliefowej Kaplicy Zygmuntowskiej
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49519#0133
Geminae Feneres. Neo-Platonic Motifs in the Relief Decoration of the Sigismund Chapel 127
tree in a gesture taken from the daily life of Roman
women, as also seen, among others, in the bronze
mirror from the times of the Antonines as well as the
fresco from the mausoleum of the Villa Negroni in
Rome (ills. 2, 3).
The figure of Venus genetrix may be identified
in the statue of the young woman from the Chapel
depicted in a similar pose as in Roman prototypes,
surrounded by cupids, giving birth to one further off-
spring, embracing the branch of an acanthus tree that
clings to her body on both sides, dividing into two
opposing parts, to form a letter V reminiscent of an
initial ornament. Depiction above the altar of the
goddess personifying the virtue Fecunditas, on
which the future of the Jagiellonian dynasty de-
pended, may be acknowledged as a tribute paid to
the young royal spouse, Bona Sforza. Having given
birth in 1519 to their first daughter, on Ist August
1520 the Queen bore the eagerly awaited successor
to the throne, Sigismund Augustus. This likeness
does not, however, remain without a link with the
views of the philosopher and court doctor to
Sigismund I, Adam of Bochnia, who developed con-
tacts with the Florentine academic milieu and who in
his 'Platonic-related' Dialogue on the noblest of be-
ginnings to married life, elevated procreation to the
level of a divine force that ensured corporeal along-
side spiritual eternity, thereby establishing the supe-
rior status of marriage above that of the priesthood
as well as religious orders.
The only analogy known to scholars of the ear-
lier-mentioned composition appeared in an arras
tapestry based on a picture by Raphael from around
1515 that was commissioned by Pope Leon X - a
Medici by birth (ills. 4, 5). At the very base of the
scene is presented the figure of Ceres, typical in form
and shape of contemporaneous portrayals of Venus,
and almost in exactly the same pose as in the altar
wall in the Chapel; namely, surrounded by flora in
bloom, with a pair of cupids at her feet. This depic-
tion, furthermore, serves in a similar way to the Venus
in the Chapel as an opening theme to the candelarbre
composition. Above her in the candelarbre stand the
pair of Gemini facing each other in an analogical way
to the twin putti above the Venus portrayed in the wall
arch. Berrecci, who had been employed at the work-
shop of Giuliano de Sangallo, papal architect of
Leon X, thus referred to the same repertoire of mo-
tifs connected with the neo-Platonic cult of Venus
and symbols relating to the golden age as Raphael.
This was not the first time such a motif was applied,
since quite a long time ago attention was drawn to
the striking similarity between the image of a triton
in the company of a Nereid depicted by Raphael in
the fresco Triumph ofGalatea in the Villa Farnesina,
as well as that of the same pair from the Chapel's
wall arch above the altar that was evidently mod-
elled on the same antique prototype.
It is equally extraordinary that the figure of Venus
appears a second time in the pilasters of the same altar
wall, only this time in the pudica form, described by
Kalinowski and Mossakowski, who both recited nu-
merous examples, beginning with the works of Bellini
and Botticelli and ending on Raphael, of interpreting
the same motif in Italian art (ill. 6).
In the Chapel's altar wall the same two female
figurines were depicted in the Venus genetrix and
pudica form. Their nakedness may be interpreted as
a neo-Platonic symbol of truth and innate beauty,
depicted artificially with exterior decorations. And
thus, for example, in Botticelli's picture Calumny of
Apelles, now housed in the Uffizi, Venus pudica per-
sonifies Naked Truth, raising the right arm to point a
finger towards the sky as a sign that 'all things are
naked and revealed to the eye of God'.
The only work known to us in which two depic-
tions of Venus occur in a single composition is in the
painting by Titian dating from 1515 that hangs in the
Borghese Gallery. The symbolism of the so-called
Geminae Veneres is expressed as a personification
of two kinds of love: higher and lower; celestial and
temporal, as discussed intensely, among others, by
Marsiglio Ficino in his commentary to Plotinus's
Enneads. Drawing on the Platonie and Humanist tra-
ditions, Ficino, in his turn, endeavoured to define the
place in accordance with divine order for the life-
giving forces of nature and streams of life, both be-
ing personified by the two manifestations of Venus
discussed here, whose influence on man and the
whole of nature was time-honoured as a sacral
misterium. Both also occupied an elevated place in
the hierarchy of the model of the universe worked
out by the doctor and philosopher composed of four
spheres of successively diminishing perfection.
Venus caelestis took up the higher, supra-celes-
tial sphere of cosmic thought, indestructible and im-
mutable, comprising ideas and intelligence. As one
of these, she symbolised eternal beauty placed at the
beginnings of all forms of beauty in the world of na-
ture.
The second Venus was referred to as temporal or
natural and occupied the lowest region, lying be-
tween the spheres of thought and the sub-lunar one.
Not separated from the corporeal world, she personi-
fied cosmic power of generation (yis generandi),
giving both life and shape to all things in nature, in-
ducing her to 'multiply divine beauty in the physical
world'. Both goddesses were, as Ficino expressed it,
'venerable and praiseworthy'; but each in her own
special way.
The depicting on the Sigismund chapel altar wall
of these two types of Venus, which it is difficult to
tree in a gesture taken from the daily life of Roman
women, as also seen, among others, in the bronze
mirror from the times of the Antonines as well as the
fresco from the mausoleum of the Villa Negroni in
Rome (ills. 2, 3).
The figure of Venus genetrix may be identified
in the statue of the young woman from the Chapel
depicted in a similar pose as in Roman prototypes,
surrounded by cupids, giving birth to one further off-
spring, embracing the branch of an acanthus tree that
clings to her body on both sides, dividing into two
opposing parts, to form a letter V reminiscent of an
initial ornament. Depiction above the altar of the
goddess personifying the virtue Fecunditas, on
which the future of the Jagiellonian dynasty de-
pended, may be acknowledged as a tribute paid to
the young royal spouse, Bona Sforza. Having given
birth in 1519 to their first daughter, on Ist August
1520 the Queen bore the eagerly awaited successor
to the throne, Sigismund Augustus. This likeness
does not, however, remain without a link with the
views of the philosopher and court doctor to
Sigismund I, Adam of Bochnia, who developed con-
tacts with the Florentine academic milieu and who in
his 'Platonic-related' Dialogue on the noblest of be-
ginnings to married life, elevated procreation to the
level of a divine force that ensured corporeal along-
side spiritual eternity, thereby establishing the supe-
rior status of marriage above that of the priesthood
as well as religious orders.
The only analogy known to scholars of the ear-
lier-mentioned composition appeared in an arras
tapestry based on a picture by Raphael from around
1515 that was commissioned by Pope Leon X - a
Medici by birth (ills. 4, 5). At the very base of the
scene is presented the figure of Ceres, typical in form
and shape of contemporaneous portrayals of Venus,
and almost in exactly the same pose as in the altar
wall in the Chapel; namely, surrounded by flora in
bloom, with a pair of cupids at her feet. This depic-
tion, furthermore, serves in a similar way to the Venus
in the Chapel as an opening theme to the candelarbre
composition. Above her in the candelarbre stand the
pair of Gemini facing each other in an analogical way
to the twin putti above the Venus portrayed in the wall
arch. Berrecci, who had been employed at the work-
shop of Giuliano de Sangallo, papal architect of
Leon X, thus referred to the same repertoire of mo-
tifs connected with the neo-Platonic cult of Venus
and symbols relating to the golden age as Raphael.
This was not the first time such a motif was applied,
since quite a long time ago attention was drawn to
the striking similarity between the image of a triton
in the company of a Nereid depicted by Raphael in
the fresco Triumph ofGalatea in the Villa Farnesina,
as well as that of the same pair from the Chapel's
wall arch above the altar that was evidently mod-
elled on the same antique prototype.
It is equally extraordinary that the figure of Venus
appears a second time in the pilasters of the same altar
wall, only this time in the pudica form, described by
Kalinowski and Mossakowski, who both recited nu-
merous examples, beginning with the works of Bellini
and Botticelli and ending on Raphael, of interpreting
the same motif in Italian art (ill. 6).
In the Chapel's altar wall the same two female
figurines were depicted in the Venus genetrix and
pudica form. Their nakedness may be interpreted as
a neo-Platonic symbol of truth and innate beauty,
depicted artificially with exterior decorations. And
thus, for example, in Botticelli's picture Calumny of
Apelles, now housed in the Uffizi, Venus pudica per-
sonifies Naked Truth, raising the right arm to point a
finger towards the sky as a sign that 'all things are
naked and revealed to the eye of God'.
The only work known to us in which two depic-
tions of Venus occur in a single composition is in the
painting by Titian dating from 1515 that hangs in the
Borghese Gallery. The symbolism of the so-called
Geminae Veneres is expressed as a personification
of two kinds of love: higher and lower; celestial and
temporal, as discussed intensely, among others, by
Marsiglio Ficino in his commentary to Plotinus's
Enneads. Drawing on the Platonie and Humanist tra-
ditions, Ficino, in his turn, endeavoured to define the
place in accordance with divine order for the life-
giving forces of nature and streams of life, both be-
ing personified by the two manifestations of Venus
discussed here, whose influence on man and the
whole of nature was time-honoured as a sacral
misterium. Both also occupied an elevated place in
the hierarchy of the model of the universe worked
out by the doctor and philosopher composed of four
spheres of successively diminishing perfection.
Venus caelestis took up the higher, supra-celes-
tial sphere of cosmic thought, indestructible and im-
mutable, comprising ideas and intelligence. As one
of these, she symbolised eternal beauty placed at the
beginnings of all forms of beauty in the world of na-
ture.
The second Venus was referred to as temporal or
natural and occupied the lowest region, lying be-
tween the spheres of thought and the sub-lunar one.
Not separated from the corporeal world, she personi-
fied cosmic power of generation (yis generandi),
giving both life and shape to all things in nature, in-
ducing her to 'multiply divine beauty in the physical
world'. Both goddesses were, as Ficino expressed it,
'venerable and praiseworthy'; but each in her own
special way.
The depicting on the Sigismund chapel altar wall
of these two types of Venus, which it is difficult to