Page - 567 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 2

567Strada’s Circle It is difficult to judge the sincerity of this protestation: even if he were a sincere and devout Catholic, Strada would not have obtruded his convictions in his dealing with the Austrian and Bohemian nobility, considering that the major- ity were Protestant at the time. But his outward Catholicism may have had more pragmatic causes: it is obvious that he did not wish to lose the possibil- ity of ecclesiastical preferment for his sons. Thus he managed through Duke Guglielmo of Mantua to have his son Paolo elected to a benefice in Mantua cathedral, thanks to the insistent recommendation of Maximilian ii; Rudolf ii would later recommend his second son Ottavio to a benefice in a cathedral chapter in Germany. But Strada’s outward Catholicism was not particularly convincing to the Holy Office. Ironically, at the very moment when Duke Guglielmo conceded the benefice to Paolo Strada, Jacopo was in Mantua and was caught up in the clamorous persecution of heretics in that town launched in 1567 by the Do- minican friar Camillo Campeggi. It involved many high officials of the Gonzaga administration and even some members of minor branches of the dynasty. There is evidence that Strada was in contact with Mantuan evangelicals, including Lucretia Manfrona Gonzaga and Vittoria Gonzaga Martinengo, who ‘privately abjured’ in the presence of, among other gentlemen, one ‘dottor Strada’, who appears to have been Jacopo.38 Strada’s colleagues, the Duke’s prefetto delle fabbricche, Giovanni Battista Bertani, and the engraver Giovanni Battista Scul- tori, with both of whom he was collaborating at that time, were also among the accused.39 Strada himself attributed his persecution to the ill-will of the Papal Nuncio at the Imperial Court, Zaccaria Dolfin, whom he had once re- fused a substantial loan.40 Strada appealed for protection for himself and the people he employed to Duke Guglielmo, who notwithstanding the Emperor’s express recommendation appears not to have dared to give him a safe-conduct, a visitarmi; et di questo il mondo ne puol far giudicio perchè ultimamente morse mia moglie (Iddio habbi l’anima sua) io la feci interrare al modo nostro; et mi costò piu di 300 talleri il mortorio, et Sua Maestà Cesarea con la Maestà del Re vi mandorno accom- pagnarla gli gentilhuomini della Camera, et vi era un monte di signori. Et pel contrario, s’io fosse stato de altra religione, la mandavo fuori della terra alla loro chiesa; con x L. la sotteravo, si come fanno le gentildonne loro della loro religione.’ 38 Docs. 1567-06-1 and 1567-06-30; Davari 1879, pp. 34 and 68–69; Pagano 1991; Berzaghi 2011, p. 10. 39 On Campeggi, see Marchetti 1974; on his mission in Mantua, see Pagano 1991. 40 Docs. 1568-00-00: Strada’s undated draft for a letter to an unnamed collaborator in Man- tua, who had likewise been forced to flee the Inquisition: ‘Ma poi che voi cominciate a cantare, dite tutto l’historia, e dite come il Delfino Cardinale [‘patriarca’ crossed out, cor- rected into: ‘essendo Vescovo’], non gli volendo prestar mille <duca>ti, ne tampoco farla sigurtà, esso à fatto questo ufitio; ma ancora lui è conossiuto’.