DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.56731#0102
45- THE SETTING OF THE ENGLISH COURT-MASQUE AND ITS ITALIAN
ANTECEDENTS
With the appearance of Inigo Jones the English poetic Renaissance was given a visual setting,
and the Masque developed into a high art through his collaboration with Ben Jonson. For both
poet and artist the masque meant a revival of ancient drama “grounded upon antiquitie, and
solide learnings”, as Jonson put it. The collaboration began in 1605 with the Masque of Blacknesse.
In the beginning both men were equally interested in harmonizing music, scenery, dancing and
costume with the poetic conception of the masque. But later on they separated, and until the
outbreak of the Civil War Inigo worked unceasingly on the elaboration and perfection of his ideas
about stagecraft. His point of departure was the Italian stage, and his achievements, extraordinary
though they are, depended on his close contact with current theatrical ideas in Italy.
1. The Tragic Scene. Woodcut from Serlio’s Second Book on Architecture, first published in 1545.
Renaissance architects became acquainted with the arrangements and requirements of the
ancient theatre through Vitruvius’ De architectura (first printed in 1484 and often thereafter).
Vitruvius divided the mise-en-scene into three types: the tragic, the comic, and the satiric. Serlio in
his interpretation of Vitruvius gave designs of these three stock settings which had a resounding
influence throughout Europe down to the eighteenth century. His tragic scene is a Renaissance
interpretation of Vitruvius’ words, that it should be “designed with columns, pediments and
statues and other royal surroundings.”
2. Inigo Jones, The Tragic Scene. Drawing. Duke of Devonshire Coll., Chatsworth.
A comparison with Fig. 1 shows that Inigo followed the traditional Italian setting. Under
the drawing he wrote in pencil: “The Tragick a standing scene ye first sceane.” It has not been
possible to connect this design with any known play or masque.
5. The scaenae frons of the Teatro Olimpico, Vicenza. Begun by Palladio in 1580 and finished
after his death by his pupil Scamozzi.
Palladio tried in the Teatro Olimpico to re-erect a classical stage from Vitruvius’ description
and his own knowledge of such ancient theatres as that at Orange (south of France). In 1556 he
had published in Barbaro’s edition of Vitruvius a reconstruction of the Roman theatre with a
scaenae frons very similar to that of the Teatro Olimpico.
4. Inigo Jones, Design of the scaena for a theatre. Drawing. Worcester College, Oxford.
During his stay in Vicenza in 1613 and 1614 Inigo closely studied the Teatro Olimpico.
This design is not a copy of Palladio’s scaena, but part of a plan of a theatre to be built in London.
He replaced Palladio’s three doors in the scaena by one wide arch and planned behind it movable
scenery instead of the permanent perspectives of streets of the Teatro Olimpico.
5. Inigo Jones, Drawing of moon-night scenery for the masque Luminalia, or the Festivall of Light,
1638. Duke of Devonshire Coll., Chatsworth.
Inigo Jones mastered all the secrets of scene-changing and “machines” which from the end of
the sixteenth century onwards were the two elements on which the visual side of a theatrical
performance in Italy depended. Machines were the technical devices which made possible the
rolling of waves, the appearance of clouds, a tempest, the rising and setting of sun and moon. For
Luminalia he invented a night-piece with the moon probably moving across the night-sky. His
fascinating sketch for it was perhaps inspired by a moonlit landscape by the German painter
Elsheimer (known to him through an engraving), while the technique—dark grey wash—parallels
Claude Lorrain’s landscape sketches.
6. G. L. Bernini, The Sunrise. Sketch for a scene of his comedy La Marina, before 1638. Print
Room, Berlin.
The parallel development of stage-design in England and Italy becomes apparent if Inigo’s
drawing is compared with Bernini’s contemporary sketch. This scene with the slowly rising sun
staggered Bernini’s Roman audience, and was still talked of thirty years later.
7. Inigo Jones, Tethys or a Nymph. Drawing. Figure for Samuel Daniel’s masque, Tethys Festival
or the Queenes Wake, 1610. Duke of Devonshire Coll., Chatsworth.
The actors of the masques were furnished with what D’Avenant called “significant signes”,
attributes and symbols often drawn from Ripa’s Iconologia (see 41, 3), while their dresses derived
from Italian models. But among the many masquing dresses by Inigo only very few have so far
been shown to be exact copies. The general style of his costume drawings, however, is Italian, and
the Florentine counterpart (S) to Fig. 7 illustrates the similarity in draughtsmanship and in certain
other features, such as the left hand grasping the dress, the arrangement of the hair and the veil,
though the costume is quite different.
8. Giulio Parigi (?), Figure in masquing dress, probably 1608. Bibl. Nazionale, Florence.
ANTECEDENTS
With the appearance of Inigo Jones the English poetic Renaissance was given a visual setting,
and the Masque developed into a high art through his collaboration with Ben Jonson. For both
poet and artist the masque meant a revival of ancient drama “grounded upon antiquitie, and
solide learnings”, as Jonson put it. The collaboration began in 1605 with the Masque of Blacknesse.
In the beginning both men were equally interested in harmonizing music, scenery, dancing and
costume with the poetic conception of the masque. But later on they separated, and until the
outbreak of the Civil War Inigo worked unceasingly on the elaboration and perfection of his ideas
about stagecraft. His point of departure was the Italian stage, and his achievements, extraordinary
though they are, depended on his close contact with current theatrical ideas in Italy.
1. The Tragic Scene. Woodcut from Serlio’s Second Book on Architecture, first published in 1545.
Renaissance architects became acquainted with the arrangements and requirements of the
ancient theatre through Vitruvius’ De architectura (first printed in 1484 and often thereafter).
Vitruvius divided the mise-en-scene into three types: the tragic, the comic, and the satiric. Serlio in
his interpretation of Vitruvius gave designs of these three stock settings which had a resounding
influence throughout Europe down to the eighteenth century. His tragic scene is a Renaissance
interpretation of Vitruvius’ words, that it should be “designed with columns, pediments and
statues and other royal surroundings.”
2. Inigo Jones, The Tragic Scene. Drawing. Duke of Devonshire Coll., Chatsworth.
A comparison with Fig. 1 shows that Inigo followed the traditional Italian setting. Under
the drawing he wrote in pencil: “The Tragick a standing scene ye first sceane.” It has not been
possible to connect this design with any known play or masque.
5. The scaenae frons of the Teatro Olimpico, Vicenza. Begun by Palladio in 1580 and finished
after his death by his pupil Scamozzi.
Palladio tried in the Teatro Olimpico to re-erect a classical stage from Vitruvius’ description
and his own knowledge of such ancient theatres as that at Orange (south of France). In 1556 he
had published in Barbaro’s edition of Vitruvius a reconstruction of the Roman theatre with a
scaenae frons very similar to that of the Teatro Olimpico.
4. Inigo Jones, Design of the scaena for a theatre. Drawing. Worcester College, Oxford.
During his stay in Vicenza in 1613 and 1614 Inigo closely studied the Teatro Olimpico.
This design is not a copy of Palladio’s scaena, but part of a plan of a theatre to be built in London.
He replaced Palladio’s three doors in the scaena by one wide arch and planned behind it movable
scenery instead of the permanent perspectives of streets of the Teatro Olimpico.
5. Inigo Jones, Drawing of moon-night scenery for the masque Luminalia, or the Festivall of Light,
1638. Duke of Devonshire Coll., Chatsworth.
Inigo Jones mastered all the secrets of scene-changing and “machines” which from the end of
the sixteenth century onwards were the two elements on which the visual side of a theatrical
performance in Italy depended. Machines were the technical devices which made possible the
rolling of waves, the appearance of clouds, a tempest, the rising and setting of sun and moon. For
Luminalia he invented a night-piece with the moon probably moving across the night-sky. His
fascinating sketch for it was perhaps inspired by a moonlit landscape by the German painter
Elsheimer (known to him through an engraving), while the technique—dark grey wash—parallels
Claude Lorrain’s landscape sketches.
6. G. L. Bernini, The Sunrise. Sketch for a scene of his comedy La Marina, before 1638. Print
Room, Berlin.
The parallel development of stage-design in England and Italy becomes apparent if Inigo’s
drawing is compared with Bernini’s contemporary sketch. This scene with the slowly rising sun
staggered Bernini’s Roman audience, and was still talked of thirty years later.
7. Inigo Jones, Tethys or a Nymph. Drawing. Figure for Samuel Daniel’s masque, Tethys Festival
or the Queenes Wake, 1610. Duke of Devonshire Coll., Chatsworth.
The actors of the masques were furnished with what D’Avenant called “significant signes”,
attributes and symbols often drawn from Ripa’s Iconologia (see 41, 3), while their dresses derived
from Italian models. But among the many masquing dresses by Inigo only very few have so far
been shown to be exact copies. The general style of his costume drawings, however, is Italian, and
the Florentine counterpart (S) to Fig. 7 illustrates the similarity in draughtsmanship and in certain
other features, such as the left hand grasping the dress, the arrangement of the hair and the veil,
though the costume is quite different.
8. Giulio Parigi (?), Figure in masquing dress, probably 1608. Bibl. Nazionale, Florence.