Page - 686 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Volume 2

Chapter 13686 Such sets of drawings of Trajan’s Column were quite popular, and not least with Strada’s patrons: a copy in the form of a book, now in the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, but originally at Ambras, may well have been the copy Strada mentions in his Index sive catalogus, acquired by Archduke Ferdinand ii of Tirol after Strada’s death—if not before [Fig. 13.89–13.90]. A similar copy, this time in four volumes, is mentioned in an inventory of the Munich Kunst- kammer of 1598, together with a set of drawings after the frieze of the column of Marcus Aurelius. Perhaps these had been commissioned by Duke Albrecht V of Bavaria from Strada together with a similar set of drawings of the Column of Theodosius in Constantinople, but it is more likely that the drawings of the Theodosian column (in fact it was the column dedicated to Arcadius) were intended to complement the sets of drawings of the Columns of Trajan and Marcus Aurelius which Strada earlier may have purveyed to Fugger.98 Finally Strada supplied a copy to Vilém z Rožmberk, the Czech magnate to whom he had dedicated his edition of Serlio’s Settimo Libro. In this case the sheets had been pasted together so as to form a continuous scroll, rather than a codex: ‘<…> die Columna Trajana, die ich E.G. vorlengst presentiertt hab, nemlich des kästla mit den vieren rollen<…>’.99 This rotulus must have been very similar to the scroll from a private collection which was exhibited at the Institut Français at Florence in 1984 [Fig. 13.87–13.88]: technique and style of drawing of this set is so close to Strada’s numismatic drawings that a tentative attribution to his 98 önb-hs, Cod. 9410. In the older catalogues this volume precedes the description of the numismatic volumes by Jacopo and Ottavio Strada. The Munich copies are mentioned in Diemer/Diemer/Sauerländer 2008, 1, p. 58, nr. 153 (Marcus Aurelius) and p. 66, nr. 183 (Trajan); on the drawings of the Column of Theodosius, not included in the inventory, see below. 99 Doc. 1573-12-18; Strada wished to borrow Rožmberk’s copy to consult it for his polyglot dictionary, which indicate that at that time he did not possess a copy of his own; perhaps he took this opportunity of preparing the copy in the form of a book mentioned in the Index sive catalogus. Figures 13.89–13.90 The Column of Trajan in images from the Ambras manuscript, probably purveyed by Jacopo Strada; Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek.