The Grimani Cameos

Complete series of three engravings, circa 1550/55, lacking signature and editorial indications.

The plates, which reproduce a series of gems from the Grimani collection, are attributed by scholars, starting with Bartsch, to Enea Vico from Parma. Battista Franco also produced engravings (Bartsch XVI, p. 146, nos. 81-93) derived from these gems.

Examples in the first state of three for Rubach (first of two for Alberti), ahead of Claudio Duchetti's address. Rubach also describes Giovanni Orlandi's issue of 1602.

It is not known whether Vico engraved the plates on Lafreri's commission or whether the plates were later acquired by the printer; they appear in the Index (1573, nos. 260-261) described as Tre tauole de diuersi intagli de Camelli fragmenti doue di uedono di molte sorte de sacrifitii & altre cose uarie. Possibly dated to after 1551, when the Grimani family regained possession of the treasures that had been pawned.

Magnificent proofs, richly toned, imprinted on contemporary laid paper with watermarks "deer in a shield with cross" (on Huelsen 84, cf. Woodward nos. 51-53) and "crown" (on Huelsen 85-86, cf. Woodward nos. 259-261), with wide margins, in perfect condition.

“The prestigious Grimani Collection appeared in the work Ex gemmis et cameis antiquorum aliquot monumenta. The gems were confiscated by some creditors from Marino Grimani only to be returned, in Orvieto, in 1551 to his family. The engraving is attributable to Enea Vico because of the curiosity with which he investigated Roman antiquities, statues, paintings, sarcophagi, not to mention his studies on medals published in the volume Le immagini con tutti i riversi trovati et le vite de gli Imperatori tratte dalle medaglie et dalle historie de gli antichi (1548). Such a careful scholar could not have missed the relevance of carved gems and ancient cameos" (translate from C. Marigliani, Lo splendore di Roma nell’Arte incisoria del Cinquecento).

The work belongs to the Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae, the earliest iconography of ancient Rome.

The Speculum originated in the publishing activities of Antonio Salamanca and Antonio Lafreri (Lafrery). During their Roman publishing careers, the two editors-who worked together between 1553 and 1563-started the production of prints of architecture, statuary, and city views related to ancient and modern Rome. The prints could be purchased individually by tourists and collectors, but they were also purchased in larger groups that were often bound together in an album. In 1573, Lafreri commissioned a frontispiece for this purpose, where the title Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae appears for the first time. Upon Lafreri's death, two-thirds of the existing copperplates went to the Duchetti family (Claudio and Stefano), while another third was distributed among several publishers. Claudio Duchetti continued the publishing activity, implementing the Speculum plates with copies of those "lost" in the hereditary division, which he had engraved by the Milanese Amborgio Brambilla. Upon Claudio's death (1585) the plates were sold - after a brief period of publication by the heirs, particularly in the figure of Giacomo Gherardi - to Giovanni Orlandi, who in 1614 sold his printing house to the Flemish publisher Hendrick van Schoel. Stefano Duchetti, on the other hand, sold his own plates to the publisher Paolo Graziani, who partnered with Pietro de Nobili; the stock flowed into the De Rossi typography passing through the hands of publishers such as Marcello Clodio, Claudio Arbotti and Giovan Battista de Cavalleris. The remaining third of plates in the Lafreri division was divided and split among different publishers, some of them French: curious to see how some plates were reprinted in Paris by Francois Jollain in the mid-17th century. Different way had some plates printed by Antonio Salamanca in his early period; through his son Francesco, they goes to Nicolas van Aelst's. Other editors who contributed to the Speculum were the brothers Michele and Francesco Tramezzino (authors of numerous plates that flowed in part to the Lafreri printing house), Tommaso Barlacchi, and Mario Cartaro, who was the executor of Lafreri's will, and printed some derivative plates. All the best engravers of the time - such as Nicola Beatrizet (Beatricetto), Enea Vico, Etienne Duperac, Ambrogio Brambilla, and others  - were called to Rome and employed for the intaglio of the works.

All these publishers-engravers and merchants-the proliferation of intaglio workshops and artisans helped to create the myth of the Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae, the oldest and most important iconography of Rome. The first scholar to attempt to systematically analyze the print production of 16th-century Roman printers was Christian Hülsen, with his Das Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae des Antonio Lafreri of 1921. In more recent times, very important have been the studies of Peter Parshall (2006) Alessia Alberti (2010), Birte Rubach and Clemente Marigliani (2016).

Bibliografia

C. Hülsen, Das Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae des Antonio Lafreri (1921), nn. 84-86; cfr. Peter Parshall, Antonio Lafreri's 'Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae, in “Print Quarterly”, 1 (2006); B. Rubach, Ant. Lafreri Formis Romae (2016), nn. 347-349, I/III; A. Alberti, L’indice di Antonio Lafrery (2010), n. A 138-140, I/II; Marigliani, Lo splendore di Roma nell’Arte incisoria del Cinquecento (2016), nn. VI.75-77; cfr. D. Woodward, Catalogue of watermarks in Italian printed maps 1540 – 1600 (1996); Bartsch XV, p. 318, nn. 100-103.