Vite (Le) de’ pittori, scultori et architetti dal Pontificato di Gregorio XIII del 1572 in fino a’ tempi di Papa Urbano Ottavo nel 1642
[The Lives of the painters, sculptors and architects from the Pontificate of Gregory XIII in 1572 until the times of Pope Urban VIII in 1642]
Edited by Jacob Hess and Herwarth Röttgen
Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1995
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| Ottavio Leoni, Portrait of Giovanni Baglione Source: https://www.maremagnum.com/stampe/ritratto-di-giovanni-baglione/131166704 |
N.B. On Giovanni Baglione see in this blog also: Giovanni Baglione, Intagliatori [Engravers]. Edition, introduction and notes by Giovanni Maria Fara, Pisa, Edizioni della Normale, 2016
[1] Work in three volumes. The data relating to each volume are the following:
• Volume I. Reprinting
• Volume II. Variations - Postscript - Comments. First and Second Day
• Volume III. Variations - Postscript - Comments. Third Day
[2] From the Introduction by Herwarth Röttgen (Vol. II, p. 40): "This new edition, with the reprinted 1642 edition and the critical apparatus comprising the pontificates of Gregory XIII, Sixtus V and Clement VIII, is the eighth edition of Baglione, but is the first one with a commentary. The first printed edition (editio princeps) - printed ... in two runs - was released in Rome at the printing house of Andrea Fei in 1642, while the second edition was printed still in Rome by Manelfi [note of the editor: in 1649]. The third edition was printed in Naples in 1733 ... It was published again in 1739 and in 1743, again in Naples. New editions saw the light only in the twentieth century: an index of the 1649 edition appeared in 1924, without reprint, edited by C. Gradara Pesci (Velletri, 1924). In 1935 followed a reprint of the 1642 edition with an index revised by Valerio Mariani. Finally, in 1975/76 it was published in Bologna, for the prints of Arnaldo Forni, the reprint edition of 1649, with the reprint of the 1924 index in a second volume."
[3] The critical edition of the Lives of Baglione is the amazing, but still incomplete result of a job that lasted sixty years (see below note 4 and Volume II, p. 3-13). The second and third volumes gather variations, annotations and comments in relation to the first three of the five days in which the work is organized. It seems fairly unlikely that the comments on the last two days can now see the light, and it is really a pity.
[4] We report the review signed by Giovanni Morello, which appeared on the Sunday edition ‘il Domenicale’ of the daily Il Sole 24 Ore on 30.6.1996. The article is taken from Biblioteca Multimediale del Sole 24 ORE – Cd Rom Domenica 1983-2003 Vent’anni di idee (Multimedia Library Sole 24 ORE - Cd Rom - Sunday 1983-2003 Twenty years of ideas) :
DOMENICA – Lives of the Painters
Baglione commented and annotated
By Giovanni Morello
Compared to the most famous Vasari's Lives, a true treatise on the evolution of Italian art from Giotto to Michelangelo, those of Giovanni Baglione are simply compiled annals, where – instead of true biographies – you will find simple, but complete, lists of works by individual artists, with brief framing news and simple biographical notes. Baglione in his preface, addressed "to the virtuous reader", states that he wants to tie his work to the one of Vasari. He explicitly states that " what is lacking in Giorgio Vasari, and Raffaello Borghini in the Vite de’ lor Pittori, Scultori, ed Architetti (Lifes of Painters, Sculptors and Architects) is now supplemented by my work". Nevertheless, the differences between them are significant, not only in content, but also in the fundamental setting of the work itself. If Vasari’s vision is centred on Florence, Baglione instead focuses his interest on Rome, which the munificent patronage of the Popes had established as the first artistic centre of the world, and to which were attracted painters, sculptors and architects, obviously interested in the study of the old, but even more specifically to the creation of works worthy of challenging the centuries.
Born in Rome in 1566, as is clear from some documents, Giovanni Baglione performed his entire career (already young, he had been engaged among others in the decoration of the Sistine Hall of the Vatican Library) as a painter in the city of the Popes, where he died in 1643, after a rewarding career and awards (Paul V granted him the title of Knight of the Order of Christ, after the completion of the painting of the Resurrection of Tabila for one of the pillars of the St. Peter’s dome, now unfortunately lost. And for many years he was a Prince of the San Luke Academy).
Baglione published in 1642, shortly before his death, Le Vite de’ pittori, scultori ed architetti. Dal pontificato di Gregorio XIII del 1572 in fino a’ tempi di Papa Urbano VIII nel 1642 (the Lives of painters, sculptors and architects. Since Pope Gregory XIII in 1572 to Pope Urban VIII in 1642). Previously, already in 1639, he had given to the print another work: Le Nove chiese di Roma... Nelle quali si contengono le historie, pitture, sculture, architetture di esse (The nine churches in Rome ... In which are contained their histories, paintings, sculptures, and architectures). Very knowledgeable about the artistic life in his time’s Rome, Baglione with his work (divided into five days and following the chronology of the popes, from Pope Gregory XIII to Pope Urban VIII) passed on accurate and largely reliable information about the artistic production in Rome, giving rise to a genre that, although criticized, would find countless imitators and successors in the various art guides that appeared after him. Nevertheless until now no critical edition of the Lives of Baglione existed, nor any edition with a commentary, and even less one edition published with the manuscript annotations and additions, which are found in some copies of the volume of Baglione, stored in different libraries.
The endeavour was taken over sixty years ago by Jacob Hess, a German scholar , repaired to Italy after the seizure of power by Hitler and hired as a "contributor " at the Vatican Library, exact to prepare a critical edition of Baglione on the basis of an annotated specimen, the Ottob. Let. 2977. That critical edition sees the light only now.
In the famous series "Studies and Texts" of the Apostolic Vatican Library, has in fact appeared in three volumes (I Reprinting. II. Variants, Annotations, Comments on the First and Second Day III. Variants , Annotations, Comments on the Third Day) the work Le Vite de’ Pittori, Scultori et Architetti... scritte da Giovanni Baglione Lives of the work ' Painters, Sculptors Architects et ... written by Giovanni Baglione, edited by J. Hess and H. H. Röttgen. "The edition took shape with great difficulty and had a very challenging existence", as attested by father Leonard Boyle, Prefect of the Vatican Library, in a documented reconstruction of its long and complicated stages, which is published at the beginning of the second volume of this edition.
With the outbreak of the war, Hess was forced to flee to London, where he continued his work among many difficulties, including of economic nature , the work became more and more complex, even for the discovery of other important documents, such as the detection, in the Vatican Library, of a code containing a largely handwritten text of the Lives (Chig. G. VIII 22).
Meanwhile, after the end of hostilities, Hess had returned to Rome and back to the Vatican Library, with a contract of assistant editor for the realization of the work, which, however, failed to take off. In 1969, Hess died, but previously, the Hertzian Library had placed side by side to him Herwarth Röttgen, just to help him in the completion of his work. Röttgen is now releasing the first two volumes of commentary of the volume of Baglione, respectively on the First and Second Day and on the Third one. In fact, despite the long time elapsed, the work is not over yet and we are expecting the other two, or more volumes of commentary on the Fourth and Fifth days, which form inter alia, the bulk of the Lives. But already the first two volumes of commentary, now published, give a sense of the importance of this work for the studies on Roman Mannerism and the Birth of Baroque; the one hundred pages containing the index of names and locations provide a concrete witness.
We will not enter into the vast sea of news and precious information (a summa, not only in terms of bibliography, on the art in Rome between the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century, that the two volumes of commentary on Baglione’s Lives provide not only to historians and connoisseurs of art, but also to amateurs and people of culture), although some difficulty in consultation, due to the complexity of the work, might at first glance discourage the reading.
But a publication that has taken more than sixty years of efforts deserves some more attention in than usual.
[5] The critical edition of the work is, among its many virtues, based on a comparison of the printed edition with the manuscript classified as Codex Vaticanus Chigianus G. VIII 22, preserved in the Vatican Library, Fund Chigiano. The comparison displays useful indications on the genesis of the work. It even becomes clear that on many occasions Baglione had prepared two parallel versions of the biographies of the architects that he considered. All variants are marked in volumes II and III with the letter V. The examination of the footnotes also deserves some further clarification: in his Preface (Volume II, p. XII) Jacob Hess lists specimens of the 1642 edition equipped with handwritten notes and examined: "the Vatican Library, Ottob. 2977 (authors of annotations: Bellori, Resta, Bottari); Rome, Accademia dei Lincei, Corsinianus 31 E 15 (Bellori , Bottari) ; ibid., 31 E 14 Corsinianus (Resta, Bottari); Venice, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana , Marcianus It. IV, 125; old location 5574 (Resta); ibid., Marcianus 56 D 62 (Malvasia), Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale, Pal. (11 ) C. 10/06/14 ( Spada). Other specimens with notes in the margins [editor's note: not examined] are found in the Vatican Library, Cicognara IV in 2190 (perhaps written by Cicognara), ibid, Capponi IV 622 (ed. 1649) and the National Library in Milan (Brera), 25/16 P 6. I have not seen the copy of the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris ... (only the second edition with the 3885 K mark is accompanied by marginal notes)." The footnotes are indicated in volumes II and III with a capital P and a subsequent letter that identifies the volume of provenance (see Introduction by Röttgen, Volume II, p. 39). Finally, the comments have been marked with the letter C. In fact (as noted by Röttgen, Volume II, p. 39) Hess’comments were still unchanged after 1954 and have been updated by Röttgen roughly until 1988. When Röttgen’s opinions differ somewhat from those of Hess, the comments appear closed in square brackets and marked with an R.
[6] Among the many exemplars annotated there is no doubt that the most famous is the Corsinianus 31 E 15, which contains some poisonous considerations of Bellori on Baglione’s work. Bellori had written in his youth an appreciative song of the Lives of Baglione which was published in the 1642 first printed edition (princeps). After more than twenty years Bellori writes that he has repented of that song, he excuses himself for it and indulges in a series of malevolence, which give us the bleak picture of a Roman artistic world in the grip of low-alloy jealousies and teasing of (and Bellori is certainly not extraneous to such an environment). Baglione would have written the Lives only as a revenge against Gaspare Celio , as the latter did not deem necessary to mention the former in his Chiese di Roma (Churches of Rome). And in fact even he might have even not been the author, but Ottavio Tronsarelli, Roman poet and man of letters, might have written the Lives. If, on the subject of the motivations that led Baglione to write the Lives, both Hess and Röttgen agree to exclude the spirit of revenge against Celio, Hess feels the need to give Tronsarelli a greater role in the preparation of the work than Röttgen does. Hess argues that Tronsarelli himself has prepared a part of the biographies and intervened stylistically on the other one; Röttgen to the contrary limits the contribution of Tronsarelli to some stylistic tweaks or additions of scholarly content.
[7] It remains to understand what has been and what will be implications and meaning of the Lives within the framework of the Italian literature on arts. The assessment by Schlosser is well known in the Letteratura artistica: "His book [note of the editor: by Baglione] ... is only an annalistic work, forced in the setting of one of the usual local guides; it opens with a dialogue between a "stranger” and a "gentleman from Rome"; the narrative is divided into five days. Not less formalistic is the chronological arrangement, characteristic and very convenient for the Roman environment" (pp. 460-461). In our opinion Röttgen expresses a much more balanced and convincing assessment (Introduction, Volume II, p. 23-24): "What are, then, the Lives of Baglione? These are the memories of a Roman painter, who lived as a faithful member of the Academy of Saint Luke, in the middle of the artistic production of his city. Memories that materialise in the figures of his contemporaries. He was closely tied to the academy, which is always felt clearly. Certainly he devoted himself to this work, because he was driven by a personal need; he also did not remain outside the usual experience of disputes and offences. At the time he wrote his work, that is, between 1635 and 1640, Baglione was already thirty years behind his contemporaries. Also for this reason he was no longer in a position to describe the path of an evolution that had already overtaken his generation. Around 1640, Raphael was back to being seen, since long time, as the supreme law. The late sixteenth century, to which Baglione belonged, tended to be considered more and more as a period of decline. The Lives are therefore no history [editor's note: Röttgen refers to Vasari’s judgement] or art-theoretical idealization of a rule [editor's note: he refers here to Bellori], they are rather memoirs dedicated to the artists [editor's note: over two hundred], already dead of the same generation of the author, they are the justification of an era in which some artists already were in danger of falling into oblivion."
[8] Whatever opinion on the Lives, Baglione’s exquisite attributing ability cannot be denied. He made sometimes recourse to other sources, then unpublished (e.g. Mancini), other times he referred to his memory, knowledge, and what reportedly by a third party. In any case, Baglione provides a range of extremely reliable news, which would make the happiness of the authors of the Roman guides in subsequent years (and, of course, art historians in modern times).
[9] It's avalaible online a review to the work by Joseph Connors published under the title Review of editions of Baglione Passeri, Pascoli in Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians , 57, 1998:
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/991466?uid=3738032&uid=2&uid=4&sid=21103506126193
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