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Vasari’s Praise Of Absolute Rule In The Salone Dei Cinquecento
By Mercedes Matos Carrara
The Salone dei Cinquecento (Hall of the Five Hundred) derives its present name from the five hundred members of Parliament who met there when Florence was capital of Italy (1865-71). It was known as the “Sala Grande” or Great Hall in Giorgio Vasari’s time.
The artist was about to start painting the ceiling and to fresco the long walls of the huge room for Duke Cosimo I in 1563. In his letter of March 3 to the Medici duke, Vasari declared that his work would have surpassed “any other decoration ever done by mortals in grandeur and magnificence”. 1 (G. Vasari, Le opere, Milanesi, VIII, p. 363.)
In fact, a lavish display of gold and colour is the first impression one gets when looking at the ceiling. The paintings, set inside gilded wooden frames appear to have a decorative purpose. In fact, numerous critics have emphasized the decorative aspects of the ensemble. 2( A. Lensi, Palazzo Vecchio, p. 225; P. Barocchi, Vasari pittore, 1964, p. 54.)
After carefully examining the work one can see that, besides its decorative aspects, the entire work was meant to proclaim absolute monarchy as the ideal form of government. Through the paintings, duke Cosimo I appears as the new Augustus who founded the modern Florentine state, just like Augustus had founded imperial Rome. Vasari considers the republican form of government as the initial phase in the evolution of a state, where true liberty can only exist under a prince. 3 ( B. Guarini, Trattato della Politica Libertà.)
Guarini’s treatise was written in 1599 to defend Medici rule in Tuscany and practically puts into words what Vasari had expressed through his paintings in the Sala Grande thirty years before. Like in the Roman Empire, the apotheosis or glorification of a ruler is brought back into the visual arts.
The very history of the Hall speaks of the transformation that took place in Florence after the collapse of the last Florentine Republic in 1530 and the return of the Medicis as absolute rulers. The Salone (Hall) had been built after the expulsion of Piero de’Medici in 1494 to accommodate the Great Council of 1000 members, willed both by the Republican Constitution of 1494 and by the Dominican friar Savonarola himself. It was started in 1495 and built in only one year by Simone del Pollaiuolo, called il Cronaca.
The hall should have been decorated with Michelangelo’s Battle of Cascina and Leonardo da Vinci’s Battle of Anghiari. Michelangelo only worked on the cartoon for his battle from 1504 to 1505. Leonardo started the mural decoration in 1505 and abandoned it in 1506 when the colours started to run. 4 ( Vasari, Milanesi, IV, p. 43; Anonimo fiorentino or Codice magliabecchiano, Frey, p. 114; V. P. Zubov, Leonardo da Vinci, p. 31.)
With the fall of the Republic in 1512, the Hall was turned into barracks for the mercenary soldiers hired by the Medicis to control the city. It returned to house the Great Council of the Republic in 1527, when the Medicis were banned from Florence for the last time. Alessandro de’Medici, called il Moro, made his return to the city in 1531 as duke of Florence, a hereditary title bestowed on him and his descendants by Emperor Charles V.
He belonged to the older branch of the family and, upon his murder, Cosimo I of the younger branch of the family came to power as Duke of Florence. He transferred his residence from the Medici Palace to Palazzo della Signoria (Palazzo Vecchio) to show the world that the Republic was dead.
The Great Council Hall, built for the 1494 Republic, was transformed into Cosimo’s Audience Hall, an ostentatious proof of his absolute rule over the city. The first commission was given to Baccio Bandinelli, who started the Audience Podium on the north side in 1540, thus changing the axis of the hall to the short sides. The Council Hall had had two entrances at the corners of the west wall. The one at the corner, where the west wall met the north wall, led directly into the “Udienza” (Audience Podium). Cosimo’s tribune then, was like the stage in a theatre.
The performance would begin when the duke entered the Hall from the side of the stage. The foreign ambassadors and citizens of the state would then be received by the star, surrounded by a statue gallery of Medici ancestors of the older branch of the family: his great uncles Pope Leo X and Pope Clement VII; his distant cousins Giuliano duke of Nemours, Lorenzo duke of Urbino, and Alessandro il Moro first duke of Florence. Cosimo’s younger branch of the family was represented by Cosimo’s father Giovanni delle Bande Nere and by Cosimo I himself.
In his Life of Baccio Bandinelli, Vasari tells us that the Audience Podium should have had a width of fourteen braccia (app. 27 ft.) and should have been reached by seven steps. A balustrade should have bordered it, except for the central portion with the entrance. However, it had not been started when Bandinelli died in 1560 and was never built.
Statues and podium were then finished in 1565 by Vincenzo de’Rossi and Giorgio Vasari, respectively, for the wedding celebrations of Cosimo’s son Francesco and Joanna of Austria. 5 ( G. Vasari, Vita di Baccio Bandinelli, Heikamp) The central entrance in the west wall was also done then.
The statues of Giuliano duke of Nemours and Lorenzo duke of Urbino were never done. They would have been dressed as Roman centurions, just like Michelangelo had represented them in the New Sacristy of San Lorenzo. Only the statues of Alessandro il Moro, Giovanni delle Bande Nere, and Cosimo I were represented in Roman military garb. Cosimo’s father had been a great mercenary captain and his dress is adequate for the antique-minded Renaissance. Alessandro il Moro is seen as the new Julius Caesar and Cosimo I as the new Augustus.
That Cosimo commissioned a statue of Alessandro is certainly not a coincidence. Lorenzino de’Medici murdered Alessandro and was hailed as the new Brutus. His death signalled the end of the older branch of the family as rulers of Florence and the emergence of the new branch in the person of Cosimo I.
The most radical transformation of the room took place between 1563 and 1572 under the direction of Giorgio Vasari (fig. 1) The height of the walls was increased, the ceiling was painted, and the side walls were frescoed. The program was devised both by the humanist Vincenzo Borghini and the court historian Giovambattista Adriani. The work was described in great detail by Vasari in his Ragionamento Unico, a dialogue between the artist and Francesco I, Cosimo’s son and heir. The paintings show three steps in the evolution of the Florentine state. The north and south ends show the Republic of 1343, when Florence and its subject cities were divided into quarters after the expulsion of the Duke of Athens. The second phase illustrates the Florentine Republic of 1494-1512 with the Conquest of Pisa, both on the west wall and the ceiling panels over it.
The third part is dedicated to the Conquest of Siena by Cosimo I on the east wall, linked to the ceiling panels over it. The central tondo in the ceiling with the Apotheosis of Cosimo I (fig. 2) is the key to the entire room, since every statue on the podium and every panel on the ceiling is directed towards it. In Vasari’s words “all the struggles and divisions in Florence and its subject cities are but a ladder leading to Cosimo I’s present happiness and glory”. 6 (Vasari, Milanesi, VIII, p. 221.)
The first step in this symbolic ladder starts in the north and south sides. Both are decorated by a round, central panel surrounded by four rectangular ones . The circular ones show allegorical representations of the city’s quarters: Santa Croce (Holy Cross), Santo Spirito (Holy Spirit), Santa Maria Novella, and San Giovanni Battista (St. John the Baptist), flanked by their subject cities.
Each quarter is personified by the figure of a Roman centurion, two in each roundel, with a semicircular balustrade behind them. Both tondos show the flying figure of Florence directed towards the central tondo. The duke is surrounded by the crests of the seven Major and the fourteen Minor Guilds that form a submissive circular balustrade around him. Before Cosimo, only citizens living in Florence and members of the seven Major or Fourteen Minor Guilds enjoyed political rights.
When Cosimo gave Florentine citizenship to all subject cities everyone could belong to the Guilds. Thus their role as granters of political rights was abolished. Vasari has represented the entire population of the Florentine state through the emblems of the Guilds, arranged in a circle emphasizing the unification of Tuscany under the leadership of one man.
After the short sides, the ceiling is divided into three areas. The central portion, with the
Apotheosis of Cosimo I is dedicated to episodes in the history of Florence, from its legendary origins to the 15th century. For Vasari the Foundation of Florence took place in 43 B.C. during the triumvirate of Augustus, Lipidus, and Mark Anthony. 7 ( M. Carrara, Vasari e il suo messaggio politico nel Salone dei Cinquecento) This panel is essential for his political message claiming the superiority of absolute rule as Cosimo is compared to Augustus.
However, Augustus founded Roman Florence with two other men before he became the first Roman emperor. Cosimo, the new Augustus, organized and reformed the new Florentine state all by himself and, in Vasari’s words, should consider himself more fortunate than Emperor Augustus himself! Cosimo’s resemblance to Emperor Augustus was always emphasized by the erudites in his service. Augustus and Cosimo both started ruling at seventeen after their predecessor’s murders.
When Julius Caesar was killed by Brutus and Cassius, Augustus came to power. Alessandro il Moro’s murder was compared to that of Julius Caesar because it brought the new Augustus to the fore. Cosimo I and Augustus both had Capricorn as their ascendant and dearly loved their wives. 8 (Vasari, Milanesi, VIII, p. 221.)
The last and most important aspect of the side panels and frescoes on the east and west walls is the direct confrontation between the republican war for the Conquest of Pisa and Cosimo’s war for the Conquest of Siena. The artist immediately claims the superiority of absolute rule describing how the republican war against Pisa lasted fourteen years whereas Cosimo’s war against Siena only lasted fourteen months.
The octagonal panel on the west side with Antonio Giacomini’s Speech to the Great Council shows the leader of the Florentine troops inciting the Great Council to continue the war against Pisa that the Signoria wanted to interrupt. The allegorical figure of Nemesis or Vengeance flies over Giacomini and the Great Council. The octagonal panel with Cosimo Preparing the Conquest of Siena on the east side, shows the Duke at his work table with a wooden model of Siena and its fortress below. In the republican panel only the flying figure of Nemesis appears above the Great Council, whereas Cosimo is surrounded by the virtues of Patience, Prudence, Fortitude, and Silence. In his letter of March 3, 1563 describing his future decorations for the Hall, Vasari had thought of depicting Cosimo I surrounded by advisors. Cosimo did not approve the project and, in his letter of March 14 asked the artist to eliminate the advisors “perché noi soli fummo” [we did it all by ourselves]. 8 (Vasari, Milanesi, VIII, p. 569.)
The frescoes appear like tapestries on the walls. The Conquest of Pisa and The Capture of the Siena Fortress face one another in front of the Podium, the duke’s scenario in the audience room. In the Pisan fresco Antonio Giacomini indicates the sieged city and is about to conquer it when a messenger arrives with a letter from the Signoria. Giacomini does not read it, puts it on his hat, and conquers Pisa. The message ordered him to return to Florence. That piece of paper does not speak of republican shrewdness… In fact, Giacomini was fined, even if he had reconquered Pisa. The Capture of the Siena Fortress on the right wall is a nocturnal scene that almost appears like a celebration, not the initial phase in the conquest of Siena. The Marquis of Marignano, leader of the Florentine troops, does not even have his helmet on. It is carried by Pietro Barbino, Cosimo’s court dwarf!
Vasari tells us that he got his inspiration for the battle scenes from Giulio Romano’s Battle of Constantine in the Vatican and also from the Columns of Trajan and Marcus Aurelius in Rome. Columns and triumphal arches were the receptacles used by Roman sculptors to commemorate the emperor’s victories. With the fall of the Roman empire these triumphs disappeared from the visual arts and returned in the sixteenth century with the rise of absolute monarchies. The interior of the Great Hall can be imagined as a gigantic triumphal arch with a huge scale stemming from the central panel with the Apotheosis of Cosimo I. The frescoed side battles act as scale dishes, the right dish tipping toward Cosimo I and his authoritarian rule.
After he finished the frescoes, Vasari did not work on the lower part of the wall. However,
he integrated Bandinelli’s sculptural decoration of the Udienza with his paintings. All the sculptures (fig. 3) on the audience podium look toward the central tondo with the Apotheosis of Cosimo I on the ceiling or to the spot where Cosimo’s throne used to be. Giovanni dalle Bande Nere, Cosimo’s father, is in the left niche of the central wall. Leo X Blessing seems to point toward the central tondo. Pope Leo X or Giovanni de’Medici, Lorenzo the Magnificent’s second son, had christened Cosimo. Alessandro il Moro appears on the right niche. His glance and pose lead to Cosimo’s throne. It was his murder that brought Cosimo I, the new Augustus, to the fore.
The last two sculptural groups related to the battle scenes appear in front of the frescoed walls. Michelangelo’s Genius of Victory perhaps originally intended for the Tomb of Pope Julius II, was never used by the artist when a smaller version of the monument was set into place at San Pietro in Vincoli in 1545.
When Michelangelo died in 1564, his nephew Leonardo Buonarroti donated it to Cosimo I, just when Vasari was decorating the Hall. It was placed by the east wall with the Conquest of Siena and was moved to the central niche, across from the Udienza in 1944, where the empty niche is today.
Florence Triumphing Over Pisa by Giambologna was commissioned by Cosimo’s son and heir Francesco I to be placed by the west wall, in direct confrontation with Michelangelo’s Genius of Victory. 9 (F. Vossilla, Il Salone dei Cinquecento in Palazzo Vecchio, p. 183) The marble original is now in the Bargello. The serpentine, allegorical figure of Florence glances in the direction of the Podium.
Michelangelo’s Genius of Victory was set back to face Giambologna’s group of Florence Triumphing Over Pisa in 1980. 10 (P. Barochi, Introduction in Palazzo Vecchio: committenza e collezionismo medicei.) Its spiral stance once more directs the viewer to the Podium, where Duke Cosimo I used to sit, in front of the statues of his father Giovanni delle Bande Nere, his godfather Leo X, and his predecessor Alessandro il Moro.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Anonimo Fiorentino or Codice Magliabecchiano, ed. C. Frey. Berlin: 1892.
Barochi, Paola, Introduction in Palazzo Vecchio: committenza e collezionismo medicei, Firenze e la Toscana dei Medici nell’Europa del Cinquecento. Florence: Electa Editrice, 1980.
Vasari pittore. Milan: Club del Libro, 1964.
Carrara, Mercedes, Vasari e il suo messaggio politico nel Salone dei Cinquecento, Antichità viva, number 2. Florence: Editrice Edam, 1979.
Guarini, Giovanni Battista, Trattato della Politica Libertà, Venice, 1818.
Lensi, Alfredo, Palazzo Vecchio. Milan: Bestetti e Tuminelli, 1929.
Vasari, Giorgio, Le opere, ed. G. Milanesi, Florence, 1878-82.
Le vite de’più eccellenti pittori, scultori e architettori: Vita di Baccio Bandinelli scultore fiorentino, ed. D. Heikamp. Milan: Club del Libro, 1964.
Vossilla, Francesco, Il Salone dei Cinquecento in Palazzo Vecchio Officina di opere e di ingegni Milan: Silvana Editoriale, 2006.
Florence News - a8.10.10.20.28
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