Page - 270 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 1

Chapter 5270 35 First published in Schönherr 1876; JdKH 11, 1890, ii, p. clv, Regest 7143; discussed in Lippmann 2001, p. 117; and Simons 2009, p.105. The other passages stressing Archduke Ferdinand’s participation read: <in 1555> ‘Hat disen stain legt vnd fundirt / Das werk er- dacht vnd circulirt / Mit seiner tuyren rechten hant / Von Oesterreich erzherzog Ferdi- nand’ and: ‘<On 27 June 1555> haben der durchlauchtigiste, hochgeborn fürst vnd herr, herr Ferdinand, erzherzog zu Osterreich <…> gegenwurtig werk selbst erdacht, mit aigner hand abgmessen vnd circulirt, den ersten stain in das fundament gelegt, demselben werk den namen zum Gulden Stern gegeben vnd [es] damit geeret’. 36 önb-hs, Cod. min. 108. The set consists of plans of all floors and a section (no elevation); both their character, their state of preservation and the Italian inscription on the first plan strongly suggest that it was intended to document the design for posterity; perhaps it was made on the occasion of the laying of the foundation stone the inscription refers to, or of the completion of the building. 37 Below we shall encounter some other examples of the topos—derived from classical sources—presenting a prince designing something or planting a tree etc. ‘with his own hand’. This may incline one to think that Ferdinand’s inscriptions were mere variations on the topos and therefore must necessarily have been false. But that seems unlikely: carv- ing a deliberate untruth into stone—or even just to write it down—for posterity to read Abgemessen, gemacht und circulirt Darzu mit ersten stain fundirt Von einem fürsten lobeleich Ferdinand, erzherzog von Osterreich. Its proportions were decided, it was designed and drawn with compasses / And then its foundation stone was laid / By a laudable prince / Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria. The contention that the Archduke actually made the measured drawings for the building is repeated in the other rhymes, as well as in the Latin epi- gram and in the German prose text, one of which was probably intended to be inscribed in a stone commemorating the foundation of the building.35 The contemporary drawings of Hvězda that have been preserved are presenta- tion drawings and are probably not in Archduke Ferdinand’s own hand [Figs. 5.22–5.24; 5.55].36 Technically, the elementary geometry and proficiency in the use of ruler and compasses as taught in the humanist curriculum, would have been sufficient to sketch the basic concept worked out in these designs, when coupled to some interest in architecture. The Archduke certainly possessed this interest, witness the very idiosyncratic character of the building he com- missioned. So unless concrete evidence to the contrary would come to light, there is no reason to doubt that Ferdinand was responsible for the concept of this unusual building, including its proportional system. Of course this does not imply that he would have designed it without professional help and that he himself would have made—or even could have made—the detailed working drawings necessary to construct it.37