Page - 550 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 2

Chapter 11550 of Hessen—who entertained Strada and his elder son Paolo sometime in the mid-1570s—would likewise have been added to the album [Fig. 11.13].5 As a source Strada’s description of his ‘Memoria di casa mia’ is supplement- ed by his son Ottavio’s more conventional Stammbuch. In his copy of a set of beautiful wood engravings by Virgil Solis illustrating Aesop’s fables, printed posthumously in 1566 by Strada’s later printer, Sigmund Feyerabend, Ottavio had the highest-ranking members of his acquaintance write their name and motto or device [Figs. 11.5–11.9]. The entries date from 1572 until 1598 and in- clude many leading members of the aristocracy of the Habsburg dominions, of the Imperial government and of the ecclesiastical hierarchy, as well as some visiting princes and diplomats, among whom the English poet Sir Philip Sidney [Figs. 11.9–11.10].6 Ottavio Strada was quite ambitious, as is evident from the portrait print he commissioned from Martino Rota [Fig. 11.11].7 Nonetheless before the ac- cession of Rudolf ii in 1576 Ottavio had hardly an independent position. The court in the wake of his assumption, against the Emperor’s wishes, of the title of Grand Duke of Tuscany. 5 Marburg, Hessisches Staatsarchiv, Bestand 4n, Nr. 265, Paolo Strada to Moritz, Landgrave of Hessen-Kassel, Vienna 23 December 1594: ‘Genedigister Fürst und Herr, mit was gros- sen Gnaden und für: wolthaten weillend der auch durchleuchtigist und hochgeborne Fürst, Eur: Für: Gn: Geliebter Herr Vatter hochlöblichister Gedechtnus, noch vor verschien 20 Jarn, mein lieben Vatter Jacobo Strada Röm: Kaij: Mt: Hofdiener und Antiquario seligen, in Iren fürstlichen Schloss und Burchth zu Cassel begegnet, dessen wais ich mich noch, als der der hochgedachter Ir. Für: Gn: hochlobigister Gedechtnus, gnedigister Tractation, zuglaich mei- nem lieben Vatter seligen Genossen, in underthenigister schuldigister Danckbarkeit, wol zu entsinnen<…>’. 6 Prague, National Library, Ms. 5 J 38; the basis of the Stammbuch is a copy of Aesopi Phry- gis Fabulae, elegantissimis iconibus verus animalium species ad vivum adumbrantes Ioannis Posthij Germershemij Tetrastichis illustrata, Frankfurt am Main 1566. It was printed by Sig- mund Feyerabend, who in 1575 would print Strada’s editions of Caesar’s Commentaries and Serlio’s Settimo Libro. Some examples: four bishops from the Habsburg lands entered their names opposite p. 39, fable 46 ‘Leo et Ursus’; three leading courtiers (Hans Trautson, Le- onhard von Harrach, Iohann Baptist Weber) opposite p. 47, fable 40 ‘Vates’; the Marquis of Finale (opp. p.  51, emblem 44); Philip Sidney (‘Philippus Sideneus’, with his motto ‘Quo me fata vocant’) and two other Englishmen, both friends of Sidney’s, Ricardus Scelleius (Richard Shelley, nephew and assistant to the prior of St John of Jerusalem in England) and the diplo- mat Robert Corbett (opp. p. 101, fable 94, ‘Fures’). It should be noted, however, that they may not all be autograph: perhaps Ottavio occasionally documented a visit after the fact, or one visitor wrote the names of himself and his friends (I have my doubt about Sidney’s). 7 This in contrast to his father: though portrayed by Titian, no other effigies of him are known, though a portrait engraving by one of the many wood-engravers he employed in his publish- ing projects could have been expected; and for a numismatist of Strada’s fame it is surprising that the court-medalist, Antonio Abondio, who portrayed so many other learned members of Maximilian’s entourage, does not seem to have produced a portrait medal of Strada.