Media Information

 
 
 
Collection:
Catena-Historic Gardens and Landscapes Archive
Image No.:
200118
Title:
Hypnerotomachie, ou Discours du Songe de Poliphile
View:
[The fountain of Venus]
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; Hexagons
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 acrostic 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:
"The seventh column alone was hexagonal, and made from limpid Indian beryl the colour of oil, which reflected every object in reverse. It was directly opposite the middle of the two first columns; for every figure with an odd number of angles has an angle opposite the middle of each side. Having drawn a circle, construct an equilateral triangel on its radius, then draw a line from the centre through the middle of the side adjacent to the circumference; and that length gives the seven fold division of the circular figure."
Rights Type:
fair use

Hypnerotomachie, ou Discours du Songe de Poliphile