Media Information

 
 
 
Collection:
Catena-Historic Gardens and Landscapes Archive
Image No.:
200081
Title:
Hypnerotomachie, ou Discours du Songe de Poliphile
View:
[The queen's table support for the feast]
Dates:
1561
Location:
Europe--France--Ile- de-France--Paris
Location Type:
Creation
Culture:
French
Period:
Renaissance
Creator:
author
Colonna, Francesco
Attributed
1433/34-1527
Italian
Materials:
paper
Techniques:
woodcut (process)
Measurements:
33.8 x 22.2 cm
Repository:
New York, NY, USA, Private Collection, New York
Category:
Villas
Work Type:
Books
Subjects:
Romances; Pleasure gardens; Dreams; Queens; Royal palaces; Tripod tables; Centerpieces (furnishings); Scrolling foliage; Festoons; Cupids; Banquets
Work Notes:
Collation: a6 A-Bb6 Cc8 = 164 ff., complete. With engraved woodcut title-page and 181 woodcuts illustrating the text, of which 13 are full-page, several crible initials in preliminary text, large 9-line floriated arabesque initials forming an acrostict throughout, Kerver's unicorn device (Renouard 515) on verso of final leaf. Folio, 338 x 222 mm, bound in nineteenth-century calf, marbled endpapers.

A superb French Edition of the most famous illustrated book of the Renaissance. A large number of these magnificent illustrations are dedicated to gardens. The designer of the original 1499 Aldus woodcuts remains unidentified although speculation has included artists such as Mantegna and Giovanni Bellini. Nor has the author of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili been identified with certainty. It was probably written by Francesco Colonna, a Dominican from Treviso, in Latin about 1445. Its two main themes are the allegorical dream-journey of Poliphilus in search of his love Polia, and the praise of Antique art and culture.
Image Notes:
"First, a tripod of the following design was set up before the Queen. It had a round base of the best jasper with fine mouldings, holding three uprights. The latter, where they joined the base, turned into fierce lion's claws of gold with exquisite foliage that embraced the columns. Above that they were clothed in detailed foliage, and in the middle they had cherub's heads affixed to them, flanked by outspread wings. From one head to another there hung a swag of massed branches, swelling in the middle and supplied with various fruits. At their summits, the uprights had a projection made to support the round table-top before the Queen. This sup-port never altered, but the round tables were quickly exchanged, just as the material of the vessels changed at each new course."
Rights Type:
fair use

Hypnerotomachie, ou Discours du Songe de Poliphile