Page - 353 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 1

353Projects for Emperor Ferdinand i particular for ceilings, chimneypieces and doorways; his cosmopolitan experi- ence and the materials of his Musaeum would make him the obvious person to provide such representative detailing. The importance of such necessarily trendsetting decoration has not been recognized because next to nothing of it has survived. Likewise nothing has been preserved of the Tanzhaus, a temporary ball- room erected for the 1560 Habsburg family gathering on the Burgbastei, the bastion just in front of the Hofburg. But we do have an image of it: a print by an unidentified engraver, the monogrammist FA [Fig. 6.16] again preserved in Francolin’s description of the festivities.23 Many artists must have been involved to prepare the designs for the various events, which included jousts and battles whose cartels were of an allegorical nature and based on legenadary tales of the gods and heroes of classical Antiquity. Strada may well have been among them: we know that he did contrib- ute to costume designs on at least two later occasions. Certainly Strada was sufficiently close to Hans von Francolin, the Imperial Herald who served as 23 Francolin 1561; Holzschuh-Hofer 2014(a), pp. 126–127. The plan is moreover visible in (the copy of) a plan of the Burgbastei by Pietro Ferrabosco, illustrated ibidem, Abb. IV.40. Figures 6.�4–6.�5 Eight designs for timber ceilings, from Sebastiano Serlio Die gemaynen Reglen von der Architectur uber die funf Manieren der Gebeu, Antwerp 1542.