Sena Vetus Civitas Virginis

At the top, below the top edge, is the engraved title: SENA VETUS CIVITAS VIRGINIS. At lower left is the editorial imprint: Matteo flor. for. Along the lower margin a numerical legend of 119 references to notable places and monuments, spread over seventeen columns.

Axonometric plan of the city, derived from the model drawn by Francesco Vanni and published by Peter de Jode in 1597. The sheet edited by Matteo Florimi reproposes, in simplified form and more approximate in sign, the image of the Vanni-De Jode, whose title it also takes up. In the legend, to the toponymic references directly derived from the model, it also adds those for the doors, which in the former were indicated directly in the drawing. We go, therefore, from the 110 references of the original to 119 of this derivation. Given the existing collaborative relations between Florimi and the two authors of the large map, it is possible that the date of edition of the two plates is quite close. In 1597 Florimi published the plates on The life of St. Catherine, engraved by De Jode from a drawing by Vanni. It is probable, therefore, that the map of Siena chronologically precedes, if only slightly, the other city maps published by Florimi, which can be dated between the late 16th and early 17th centuries.

The Vanni-De Jode plan “portrays the city from a very high vantage point, so that its entire shape is visible. There are no orientation markers, but the plan is laid out so that the north faces downward. Outside the walls, in front of Porta Camollia, there is a recognizable structure in the triumphal arch erected on the occasion of Cosimo I De Medici's entry into Siena in 1560. The relief should be considered practically completed in 1595 when, in a letter to Minister Lorenzo Usimbardi, Francesco Vanni asked that the publication of his drawing of Siena, which was then engraved on four branches, be favored. Some uncertainties remain about the date of the first printed edition. Collaboration between Vanni and De Jode is documented for another work in 1597, while after that date De Jode seems to have left Siena to return to Antwerp, where in 1600 he is documented as a member of the publishers' guild” (cfr. Cartografia e Topografia Italiana del XVI secolo, p. 2318).

Etching and engraving, impressed on contemporary laid virgin paper with watermark "eagle in circle with crown" (similar to Woodward no. 64), with margins, restorations in central fold visible from verso, otherwise in good condition.

Rare work, surveyed for only 13 institutional examples in Bifolco-Ronca cfr. Cartografia e Topografia Italiana del XVI secolo, p. 2320).

Matteo Florimi (Polistena c. 1540 - Siena 1613) was a publisher and merchant of books and prints. Of Calabrian origin, he settled in Siena in 1581, with a store “in Banchi”. Matteo Florimi's chalcographic activity was several times joined by master engravers such as Cornelis Galle, Arnoldo Arnoldi, Pieter de Iode, Jan Sadeler and artists such as Francesco Vanni, Ventura Salimbeni and Alessandro Casolani, with whom the printer collaborated in the preparation of religious subjects. Florimi's cartographic activity produced prints of many cities and territories around the world, which were never drawn for him, but were manipulations of already existing reliefs, or of maps published by other printers. In the second half of the sixteenth century, Florimi was far-sighted in devoting himself to the production of bird's-eye views of cities as faithfully as possible.  Florimi copied some maps by Antonio Lafreri, Claude Duchet, Abraham Ortelius. As far as map engraving work was concerned, in 1600, Matteo Florimi called the Flemish engraver Arnoldo degli Arnoldi to work in his workshop with the promise of greater compensation than that bestowed upon him by Giovanni Antonio Magini, with whom the artist was working. This offer by Florimi triggered the wrath of Magini, who, though not naming him, called him an "envious counterfeiter" for stealing such a skilled cartographer from him. The collaboration between Florimi and Arnoldi lasted only two years (1600-1602), but it was quite productive: together they printed the Stato di Siena, la Choronografia Tusciae, la Nuova descrittione della Lombardia, l’Europa, l’America and the Descrittione Universale della Terra.

Bibliografia

Bifolco-Ronca, Cartografia e Topografia Italiana del XVI secolo (2018), tav. 1196; Elisa Boffa, Un tipografo calabrese a Siena: Matteo Florimi, in “Accademia dei Rozzi” (2013): II, n. 26; H.A.M. van der Heijden, Matteo Florimi (+1613) – Landkarten und Stadtplanverleger in Siena, in “Florilegium Cartographicum”, Lipsia (1993): n. 43; Cartografia Rara (1986): n. 126; Bortolotti (1982): p. 85; Cornice-Pellegrini (2006): p. 83; Fauser (1978): vol. 2, n. 12985; Pellegrini (1986): pp. 110-114; Rombai (1980b): p. 108.