Seite - 87 - in Wiener Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte, Band LIX

The Entwurff einer historischen Architec-tur (Outline of an Historical Architecture, 1721), produced by the Viennese court architect, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, has long been recognized as a pivotal work in the litera- ture of architecture.1 The actual development of the book has proven difficult to sort out, howev- er. A unique unfinished version of the book, sent by the Habsburg court antiquarian, Carl Gustaf Heraeus, to the Tessin family of architects and collectors in Stockholm in 1720, provides some insight into these difficult problems. This copy demonstrates that much of the work was still unfinished even in the last months before pub- lication. A number of the plates were evidently not yet prepared, and others, which had been en- graved years earlier, were still awaiting revision. The Tessins’ copy also bears conflicting dates of 1710 and 1712, suggesting that the work was perhaps to have been published about a decade before it became available. Although it is possi- ble that there was a small earlier edition, it seems likely that this was never produced. Furthermore, the incomplete book sent to the Tessins facilitates a substantial revision to our understanding of the development of the work, particularly in regard to the collaboration of Fischer and Heraeus, as well as illustrating the rather close link between the courts in Stockholm and Vienna. The Entwurff draws heavily on the Renais- sance tradition of architectural reconstruction of ancient monuments. Fischer himself cites Pirro Ligorio, Andrea Palladio, and Juan Bautista Villalpando, all active in the 16th century, as models. The antiquarian work of Giovan Pietro Bellori is also very evident. Fischer knew Bellori in Rome in the 1670s and 1680s, and copied some of the medals in his collection showing FISCHER VON ERLACH’S ENTWURFF EINER HISTORISCHEN ARCHITECTUR BEFORE 1720 Kristoffer Neville This article expands my earlier discussion of the early reception of the Entwurff. – K. Neville, The Early Reception of Fischer von Erlach’s Entwurff einer historischen Architectur, in: Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 66, 2007, pp. 154–169, lays out the pre-1712 development of the project and the precise mechanism that brought the book to Stockholm in greater detail than can be done here, with further references. This elaboration is possible because of a discussion in the summer of 2008 with Professor Johan Mårtelius of the Royal Technical University in Stockholm, who had seen an unusual version of Fischer von Erlach’s book that forms the basis of this article. My deepest thanks for his contribution. Versions of this paper were presented at the University of Vienna and at the Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte in Munich in June and July of 2009. My thanks to Dr. Friedrich Polleroß and Professor Hellmut Lorenz, Vienna, and to Drs. Iris Lauterbach, Peter Prange, and Peter Heinrich Jahn, Munich, for their helpful questions. An Academic Senate Research Grant from the University of California, Riverside, allowed me the time and travel pursue the topic. 1 For the Entwurff, see A. Ilg, Die Fischer von Erlach. Leben und Werke Joh. Bernh. Fischer’s des Vaters, Vienna 1895, pp. 522–581. – J. Schmidt, Die Architekturbücher der beiden Fischer von Erlach, in: Wiener Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte 9, 1934, pp. 147–156. – G. Kunoth, Die Historische Architektur Fischers von Erlach, Düsseldorf 1956. – H. Sedlmayr, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, Stuttgart 1997, pp. 228, 320–324. – H. Lorenz, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, Zürich 1992, pp. 42–48. – P. Prange, Entwurf und Phantasie. Zeichnungen des Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach (1656–1723), Salzburg 2004.