DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.31769#0046
most important literary text behind the picture makes re-
peated allusions to the subject of marriage, even to the
fact that in those days the bride frequently had little or
no say in the choice of husband, and therefore might well
have felt the marriage to be an act of violence committed
against her. 5°
It is not only the literary sources that La Primavera
draws on which reveal it to be a wedding picture. This is
also suggested by the mformation mentioned above re-
gardmg its origmal location m the old townhouse of the
Medici family in the Via Larga in Florence. There, in
a camera (room) next to Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’
Medici’s own, the painting was integrated into the
headboard structure of a lettuccio. Thus, La Primavera was
intended for the bride’s chamber. Its symbolism is in
keeping with that of the so-called “lettuccio pictures,”
while in broader terms the work also has much in com-
mon with paintings created in conjunction with the
spalliere (see p. 15), which drew on the tradition of dec-
orative frescoes in secular surroundings. The actual
occasion for the commission of this work was the
wedding we have already mentioned between Lorenzo
di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici and Semiramide Appiani.
Following this same line of thought, it is also possible
to identify a clear order of ìmportance in the pictorial
iramatis personae involved in this work; thus Zephyrus re-
presents Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici and Flora
the bride, Semiramide Appiani, for in Ovid’s Fasti these
two are named as husband and wife. It must be said,
however, that these figures are not clearly identifiable by
virtue of the similarity of their features to their real-life
equivalents. If anything, these are allegorical portraits
which rely for their effect less on physiognomic recog-
nizability than on the readily comprehensible ordering
45
peated allusions to the subject of marriage, even to the
fact that in those days the bride frequently had little or
no say in the choice of husband, and therefore might well
have felt the marriage to be an act of violence committed
against her. 5°
It is not only the literary sources that La Primavera
draws on which reveal it to be a wedding picture. This is
also suggested by the mformation mentioned above re-
gardmg its origmal location m the old townhouse of the
Medici family in the Via Larga in Florence. There, in
a camera (room) next to Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’
Medici’s own, the painting was integrated into the
headboard structure of a lettuccio. Thus, La Primavera was
intended for the bride’s chamber. Its symbolism is in
keeping with that of the so-called “lettuccio pictures,”
while in broader terms the work also has much in com-
mon with paintings created in conjunction with the
spalliere (see p. 15), which drew on the tradition of dec-
orative frescoes in secular surroundings. The actual
occasion for the commission of this work was the
wedding we have already mentioned between Lorenzo
di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici and Semiramide Appiani.
Following this same line of thought, it is also possible
to identify a clear order of ìmportance in the pictorial
iramatis personae involved in this work; thus Zephyrus re-
presents Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici and Flora
the bride, Semiramide Appiani, for in Ovid’s Fasti these
two are named as husband and wife. It must be said,
however, that these figures are not clearly identifiable by
virtue of the similarity of their features to their real-life
equivalents. If anything, these are allegorical portraits
which rely for their effect less on physiognomic recog-
nizability than on the readily comprehensible ordering
45