Campidoglio

Etching, 1569, titled, signed, and dated at top: CAPITOLII SCIOGRAPHIA EX IPSO EXEMPLARI MICHAELIS ANGELI BONAROTI A STEPHANO DVPERAC PARISIENSI ACCVRATE DELINEATA ET IN LVCEM AEDITA ROMAE ANNO SALUTATIS ∞ DLXIX

Example in the first state of five for Rubach (first of two for Alberti), before Claudio Duchetti's address. Rubach describes later reprints edited by Giovanni Orlandi and Hendrick van Schoel.

Magnificent proof, richly toned, printed on contemporary laid paper with "tulips in shield with star" watermark (see Woodward nos. 124-125), trimmed to copperplate and with contemporary margins added, in excellent condition.

This plate engraved by Etienne Duperac for Lafreri in 1569 is derived from the similar engraving the French engraver made the year before (1568) for the publisher Bartolomeo Faleti (cf. Marigliani n. VI.5). In the second state printed by Claudio Duchetti (datable to 1581-85) the Trophies of Mario are added on the balustrade of the terrace.

“The publication of the architectural works that Michelangelo carried out within the Eternal City was publicized through a series of engravings through the initiative of his inner circle: Calcagni, Vasari and de' Cavalieri. Tiberio Calcagni himself was commissioned to prepare the prints for publication. But after the editorial failure of the first engraving the Chapel of the King of France in St. Peter's for the types of Vincenzo Luchino in 1564 the project was picked up by Étienne Du Pérac who produced it for Antonio Lafréry, who had great commercial ability. Du Pérac as with the engravings of St. Peter's also in those of the Capitoline Hill roughly based himself on Michelangelo's ideas. Undoubtedly, the engravings can hardly be considered an exact reproduction of a drawing by Michelangelo's hand; to what we know, he never gave substance to his ideas in a definitive design for any of his buildings. Dupérac certainly attempted to combine the recognizable parts of the still unfinished buildings with what he had known or imagined of Michelangelo's intentions, obviously restoring the main features of the design correctly. The statues placed above the balustrade were intended to convey a propaganda message, passing on both the passion of collecting and the connection to the greatness of the history of the Eternal City. Missing from this engraving are the so-called Mario trophies, added in later variants” (translation 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), n. 91; cfr. Peter Parshall, Antonio Lafreri's 'Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae, in “Print Quarterly”, 1 (2006); B. Rubach, Ant. Lafreri Formis Romae (2016), n. 364, I/V; A. Alberti, L’indice di Antonio Lafrery (2010), n. A. 144, I/II; Marigliani, Lo splendore di Roma nell’Arte incisoria del Cinquecento (2016), n. VI.6, I/II; cfr. D. Woodward, Catalogue of watermarks in Italian printed maps 1540 – 1600 (1996).