Seite - 70 - in Jacopo Strada and Cultural Patronage at the Imperial Court - The Antique as Innovation, Band 1

Chapter 270 In the following paragraphs some hypothetical explanations of this choice will be advanced. For more advanced, talented Northern artists of Strada’s generation a visit to Italy was becoming far from exceptional, and many of them actually settled in Italy. But it was far less common for Italians to settle in the North, unless— like Leonardo, Serlio or Primaticcio—they already had made a name for themselves, and could expect patronage of an exalted kind—in their case the French King. Exceptions are the architects, in particular the military architects, whose specific know-how was in demand wherever there was a war—that is to say almost everywhere in Europe—and the builders and master-masons from Lombardy who had traditionally been working on either side of the Alps, of- ten for generations within the same family. Strada’s background does not con- form to this, so the reasons why he went to Germany remain somewhat of an enigma. The scanty documentation on Strada’s earlier years does not allow us to resolve the problem, but a review of some hypothetical explanations will, I hope, make his choice more comprehensible. The most obvious possible motive for Strada’s transfer to Germany is its rela- tive proximity to Mantua, which had always maintained good contacts with the Empire: the town was situated on the principal road from the Brenner to the Po, to Bologna and to Rome. So in case Strada was looking for an oppor- tunity to perfect his technique as a goldsmith it came natural to him to try his luck in Nuremberg, widely renowned for the quality and technical virtu- osity of its goldsmiths. Less likely, but not impossible, is the supposition that Strada—who at a later date would be in trouble with the Inquisition—as early as 1542 maintained sufficiently heterodox opinions to have lost his nerve in the general panic that followed the sensational defection and flight of Bernardino Ochino, General of the Capuchin Order, which forced so many Italian evan- gelicals into exile.8 It is, on the other hand, perfectly possible that Strada was expressly invited to come to Germany by Hans Jakob Fugger, a member of the Augsburg banking dynasty, who would be Strada’s principal patron in the 1540s and with whom he would remain in regular contact until Fugger’s death. Strada may have first met Fugger during the latter’s stay in Italy, for instance in Bologna, where Fug- ger, who was Strada’s exact contemporary, attended the university from 1534 to 1535. Unfortunately, we have no positive indications of such a meeting, and any formal employment by Fugger implied by such an invitation is perhaps 8 On Ochino’s flight and the Italian Reformation in general, see Cantimori 1939; Welti 1985b; on Strada’s religious position, see below, Ch. 11.5.