|
Overview | Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six | Part Seven | Part Eight Robert
A. Baron The theme of "Creation" in Petrarch’s ~~~ Part Eight of Eight |
|
Outline for development
of
I.
Augustine concept of the Trinity III. Image of Eternity
. B. Scève and Trinity and Time
Some notes for themes regarding images of Eternity The Augustinian idea of the Trinity may have influenced certain of the tri-cephalic images we have discussed. In these, the three-headed configuration would seem to signify the divine mystery of the triune God -- three Persons in One. A similar, but distinctly different notion of God also could have been implied by the triune face, however -- that of God’s omnivoyance, or his multifaceted simplicity -- as it is developed most notably in the work of Nicholas of Cusa. Yet, such an idea need not, in itself, imply a reference to the Trinity. If Petrarch was one of the first in the Renaissance humanist tradition to revive the veneration of St. Augustine, he was certainly not the only one to do so. To Petrarch, Augustine was the "dearest among thousands," NOTE: Petrarch, De secreto conflictu curarum suarum, Prefatio. Quoted from Cassirer, Individual and Cosmos, p. 98. and was similarly regarded by the neo-Platonists among the Florentine Academy. Yet, at the same time there were powerful forces bent upon eroding Augustine’s influence. Misc: idea notes: --for N. of Cusa: Time is an image of Eternity. If Salomon’s tri-cephalic head develops out of Nicholas of Cusa’s concept of a godhead, then an image of Time (three heads) can signify Eternity. --Petrarch’s Triumphs are sequences in time. It is fitting that the sequence ends with an image of Eternity fashioned out of Time. (i.e. past-present-future). But there is also a circular (repeating) component. --Note circular engraving (French 16th c.) combining Triumph of Fame/Triumph of Eternity attributed to Jean Duvet. See Essling-Müntz, Petrarque, 1902, p. 242-3. Return to typescript copy: [Paragraph marked as deleted: Although one might argue plausibly that the iconographic innovations of Salomon’s Petrarch illustrations are indebted to a humanist interest in comprehending the text and restoring a relationship between the text and the images used to illustrate it, these very same elements require us to search beyond Petrarch’s text to determine the contemporary significances and associations of these curious images. That is, Salomon’s 1) representation of the triumphs as emblems instead of the usual triumphal processions, 2) iconographic and syntactical dependence upon the hieroglyphic devices of Janot’s Trionfi and 3) use of a medieval iconographical tradition of allegorical triumphs, have each been informed by a contemporary knowledge of the classical allegorical tradition. These elements are symptomatic, not only of the current humanist interest in Petrarch's text, but also of the desire to bring Petrarch into the fold of contemporary neo-Platonic and pietistic thought.]
Petrarch, himself, provides few distinct visual clues upon which artists may depend. Accordingly, in order to develop a Petrarchan iconography, artists had to search elsewhere. For instance, Salomon’s three-headed image of "Eternity" suggests at attempt to imply youth, middle age and old age: the brow becomes more lined from left to right. It is doubtful that such an image derives from Petrarch’s characterization of Eternity as one "who rules [the heavens] by motion of his brow." (line 55: Qui che doverna il ciel solo col ciglio, ...) Certainly Petrarch’s characterization of God’s will as a cerebral activity will not surprising an audience imbued with neo-Platonic ideals. What is surprising, however, is how the three-faced image Salomon uses comes to mean "Eternity." Similar three-headed images of men portrayed as the three ages have a long history and were usually taken as an allegory of Prudence. This tradition has been the subject of discussions by Erwin Panofsky and others in its relation to Titian’s Allegory of Prudence from about 1565. NOTE: Erwin Panofsky and Fritz Saxl, "A Late Antique Religious Symbol in works by Holbein and Titian," Burl. Mag., vol. 49, no. 283 (Oct. 1926), p. 177 ff. Erwin Panofsky, "Signum Tricuput" in Hercules am Scheidewege un andere antique Bildstoffe, Berlin, 1930, p. 1.ff. Erwin Panofsky, "Titian’s Allegory of Prudence: a postscript," in Meaning in the Visual Arts, Garden City, N.Y., 1955, p. 146 ff. Erwin Panofsky, Problems in Titian: Mostly Iconographic, New York, 1969, p. 102 ff. See also Jean Seznec, The Survival of the Pagan Gods, New York, 1961, p. 119 ff. The results of these researches must be reconsidered, for they undoubtedly hold the key to the meaning of Salomon’s three-headed deity. However, before embarking on such a pursuit, it should be helpful to survey and, perhaps, dismiss other such tri-cephalic images that were available to humanists and artists of that time. [End of typescript copy.] [Start of manuscript copy, with note: REPLACE THIS SECTION] There is some similarity between Salomon’s figure of Eternity and the three-headed figure found in the 1546 Aldine edition of Alciati’s emblems (leaf 11v; fol Biiiv; Green No. 28) inasmuch as it signifies the power of concord or unity. The text identifies this figure as Geryon, the giant of the western island of Erytheia. It was Geryon who owned the herd of red cattle stolen by Hercules in one of his twelve labors. Ovid (Metamorphoses, IX, 184, Loeb ed.) describes him as made of three bodies, but the artist of the Aldine edition fumbles somewhat in his attempt to juggle the triple anatomy, however he does clearly indicate three heads of different ages. This image is surprising in this regard because the text makes no mention of the giant’s relation to Time, only to the power of unity:
Although two earlier illustrated editions of Alciati’s work had already appeared (Augsburg: Steyner, 1531 and Paris: Wechel, 1534) neither of these collections included an illustration for this emblem. Likewise, it was omitted from the de Tournes edition of 1547 (attributed to Bernard Salomon), but appeared redrawn in 1548 in Lyon when it was included in the Rouillé series (Green No. 31), p. 42. NOTE: See H. Green: Alciati’s Emblems in their full stream, where is republished the Rouillé 1551 Latin edition. Here the figure is recast, the three heads are joined into one, as are the heads in Salomon’s 1547 triumph of Eternity; the figure now has a single trunk, but six arms and six legs. Although the three bearded faces are quite close to Salomon’s version of a year earlier, it is not clear whether the artist of the Rouillé Alciati (probably Pierre Eskrich, but once assumed to be Bernard Salomon) intended to differentiate their ages. There are similar three-headed figures, such a the relief by the school of Antonio Rossellino representing Prudence (London, V&A) or Titian’s so-called Allegory of Prudence, c. 1565 (London, N.G.) NOTE: See Panofsky, Titian, figs. 117 and 119. The Titian clearly differentiates the ages of the figures, but it is not clear whether he intended to show three ages of man, or a single figure who knows past, present and future, that is, an image of Time. I would assume the former is more likely because Titian represents three separate heads with separate physiognomies, but the separateness of the heads may have been a reaction to the monstrosity that would have been born were the heads fused. Whatever Titian’s intention, the three ages make allegorical sense for an image of Prudence, but so would the three directions: left, forward, and right as a symbol of past, present and future. The trouble is that one implies the other. Bernard Salomon’s image of Eternity (it predates Titian’s picture) must be dependent upon an earlier image that equated the ages of man with the parts of time. What is startling is the logic by which an image of man in time becomes transformed into an image of a deity outside of time. But if the artist of the Aldine Alciati found himself representing Geryon as the three ages of man wrapped in one body when neither text nor meaning suggested such an image, then one may be led to conclude that the triple image of man and the "three faces of time" had become so closely associated in the popular imagination (perhaps due to Petrarch), that it would have taken an intentional effort to disassociate them. The two headed image of Janus signifies Prudence in the Emblem books. Among the editions of Alciati, he first appears in the 1546 Aldine edition. Janus looks into past and future and in the Aldine edition one face is youthful and the other bearded and aged. A similar figure had already appeared in Guillaume de la Perrière’s Le Theatre des Bons Engins (Paris, Janot, 1539 and Lyon, de Tournes, 1545; the latter is Salomon’s) Janus is the first emblem in the collection of one hundred. La Perrière explains its significance as follows: Le dieu Ianus iadis à
deux visaiges, The London 1614 edition of La Perrière (Richard Field) renders this verse as follows: Ianus is figur’d with
a double face, In the Venice Alciati, Janus is shown seated as if in thought; the youthful face contemplates the ground (the earth) and the elderly regards the heavens -- as if to add an extra dimension to the significance of knowing the past and future. Here he is made into a philosophical figure consistent with his significance as Prudence. He holds a key, the attribute of Janus the gatekeeper. NOTE: See Guy de Tervarent, Attributs et symbols dans l’art Profane: 1450-1600, col. 100. Alciati’s verse reads like a Hellenistic epigram: Iane bifrons, qui
transacta futuraq*’; calles, In the 1549 French Alciati published in Lyon by G. Rouillé, this verse is rendered as follows:
To this is added the following explanation: La Sapience est au
chef, & Pource The image of Janus that appears in the Rouillé Alciati is quite different from the seated figure one finds in the Aldus edition and in the standing image of the La Perrière emblem book. Rather, a double head, each side bearded, is superimposed over a landscape, making of it an abstract and surreal specter. This kind of abbreviation is common enough in emblem books and it would not be worth noting here were it not for the fact that the Bernard Salomon image of Eternity in the Triumph of Petrarch, published one year earlier, similarly presents a truncated, but triple image, and is all the more remarkable because all the other allegorical manifestations of this figure are represented as full bodied.
Here, as a personification of January, Janus hold keys and is represented in full body. (See discussion of Janus and Time in Macrobius’ Saturnalia, Book I.) Be that as it may, none of these images and none of the texts present Janus as an image signifying Eternity, although the context of past, present and future imagery has been absorbed by Salomon and is clearly related to the formulation of the Janus figures. Besides images of Janus, there were other multi-cephalic images that may have influenced Salomon’s image of Eternity. Three-headed hermae were common in antiquity. One of these figures is represented in the Hypnerotomachia. It is carried by satyrs in procession to the amphitheater. The text describes it as representing nature, and the image shows Priapus’ characteristically large phallus. Hermes, related to Priapus, was also associated with fertility, and, like Paiapus, was often represented on a "Herm." with a large phallus, as one can see in the 1546 Aldine Alciati where the figure has several heads. He is presented as patron of the arts & métiers and is called upon as a remedy to the vicissitudes of Fortune (an alternate to Petrarch’s prescription.) It does not seem likely that either the image of Priapus or that of the four-headed Hermes (his number is four) has contributed anything to the concept of Eternity with which this discussion is concerned. Nor does the three-headed
God of the Sabines presented in 1551 by Claude Paradin (the author of the
quatrains attached to Bernard Salomon’s Old Testament illustrations, and
brother of the famous Lyon historian Guillaume) in his collection of
impresse called Devises heroïques, seem to be associated with
the Petrarchan notion of Eternity. The emblem representing Vlterius
Tentare Veto (p. 77, 1551 ed.) is composed of a three-headed figure
rising from a block of stone. The 1557 edition adds a commentary in which
it is explained that the Sabine god worshipped on the Capitoline is an
example of how the Trinity was prefigured in pagan ritual. The god was
called "Sanctus Fidius & Semipater." Although Paradin’s figure does
connect the notion of a three-headed figure to the idea of divinity and
the Trinity, there is no reference in the explanation to concepts of time
and eternity. (The drawing is usually credited to Bernard Salomon.) The path leading to the creation of the three-faced image of Eternity probably led indirectly through a route that may, indeed, begin with Janus as having vision of past and future. The image illustrating Petrarch’s ultimate triumph in de Tournes’ Trionfi, nonetheless, seems unique to Petrarch iconography. However, its distinctiveness does not, in itself, preclude the possibility of unearthing the nature of its meaning and formation. It seems that this image might have resulted from a conscious fusion of several traditions, some pictorial, some literary. These include the double-headed Janus as a symbol of Past and Future, the image of the three headed face of the Trinity, and, quite surprisingly, most importantly the three-headed image of Cerberus, the three-headed dog of Hades, as demonstrated below. [RAB: the demonstration is missing.] NOTE: Discussed by R. Pettazoni, "The pagan origins of the three-headed representations of the Christian Trinity," J.Warb., vol. 9, 1946, p. 135 ff. NOTE: See Guy de Tervarent, Attributs, col. 406-07, for a history of this image.
Erwin Panofsky and Fritz Saxl. "A Late Antique Religious symbol in works by Holbein and Titian," BM, vol. 49, no. 283 (Oct, 1926), p. 177 ff. Erwin Panofsky, "Signum Triciput" in Hercules am Scheidewege und andere Antike Bildstoffe in der neuren Kunst. (Studien der Bibliothek Warburg) Berlin, 1930, p. 1 ff.
[The promised discussion on the relation of Nicholas Cusanus to Scève and Petrarch and notions of Time, Eternity, and Omnivoyance seems to be lacking. Are there notes for this?]
Time and Eternity Thus we must conclude that it is unlikely that Petrarch’s literary images alone are the plausible iconographical source leading to the invention of Salomon’s Trionfi cycle. Except for the formal sources in manuscripts and early book illustrations we have already discussed, no earlier illustrations interpreted the cycle as an allegorical and theological program, and, accordingly, one must ask why it is that such close attention is being paid to Petrarch at this time and place. The answer to this question must lie, of course, partly within the scope of the revival of Petrarchism by Lyon’s Petrarchist poets, most notably Maurice Scève. Scève took active interest in the publication of his contemporary poets. He contributed to de Tournes’ edition of the poems of Marguerite de Navarre. NOTE: See Scève, Délie, dz. 254, 255. His own Saulsaye, depends in part upon the tale of the nymphs turned into willows as told by Marguerite. The edition de Tournes produced of La Saulsaye even repurposes one of Salomon’s illustrations originally used to illustrate Marguerite’s tale. Scève worked on de Tournes’ edition of Dante, which de Tournes, in return, dedicated to Scève in 1549 (Cartier, No. 79), and he also received de Tournes’ dedication in the 1545 edition of Petrarch. NOTE: The edition of 1545, published only one year after the appearance of Délie, appeared without emblems in the Trionfi. De Tournes’ Petrarch was first illustrated in the 1547 edition. Perhaps this circumstance sheds light on the curious phrase in the permission of Délie, which states that the poem may be published with, or without emblems. Scève’s interest in the relationship between visual images, emblems, and, to be more accurate, their poetic statements, appears as early as the publication of Délie in 1544, in which he included fifty emblems. Scève’s interest continued afterwards in his work on the Entry of Henri II into Lyon in 1548 in which Bernard Salomon was his collaborator. NOTE: In 1536 Janot, one of the leading Parisian publishers of illustrated books, published Scève’s translation of Juan de Flores. Janot’s edition of Petrarch dates from two year later. There is little reason to reject the possibility that the sophisticated and individualistic emblems used here to illustrate the Triumphs of Petrarch were not the result of Scèvian ideas. They contain the precise blend of abstract emblematic and classical ideas that exemplify Scève’s own outlook. NOTE: Many of Pontus de Tyard’s thoughts on the relationship between poetry and imagery are due to Scève’s influence on Tyard. Tyard was another of de Tournes’ authors. For further details see Francis Yates, Academies. The de Tournes Petrarch emblems follow in the wake of Scève’s Délie, for as in this work, they tend to characterize the text and prepare the reader for what is to follow. They convey a middle ground somewhere between pure illustration and standard emblem books. NOTE: In 1540 Scève was commissioned to write the "ystoires" for the entry of Cardinal Hippolyte D’Este to Lyon. The artistic aspects of this entry were conducted by Benedetto dal Bene. Among the painters employed is listed Bernard Salomon. See the Salomon documents. Guégan, Scève, 1927, p. xix ff., n. 5, p. xx. In view of Maurice Scève’s close connection with de Tournes’ publications of this period, it may not be surprising that it is Scève himself who may provide the tool needed to help our understanding of the significance of the "secularized" image of Eternity appearing in the Salomon/de Tournes edition. Although Petrarch, himself, presents his image of Eternity in a secularized form, it is obvious that his "Eternity" is but a thin mask for an Augustinian interpretation of the Deity. Illustrators of the Trionfi either saw through Petrarch’s secular veneer or never noticed it at all, as we have seen. These artists almost uniformly represented the "Triumph of Eternity" as a "Triumph of Divinity" using customary forms of the Trinity. Salomon’s image makes the task of understanding its significance more difficult for the observer; the image is secular, it does not necessarily refer to the Christian "Divinity." Since the connection of Salomon’s image to "Divinity" is not explicit, to pierce its mask one must refer to Scève’s last poetic work -- his Micrososme which de Tournes published in 1562, but which was finished supposedly earlier -- in 1559. NOTE: Ruth Mulhauser, Scève. (Twayne), p. 107. She notes that the reference in Microcosme to universal peace in the last three lines of the poem is usually taken as a reference to the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis of 1559. In many ways the Microcosme epitomizes the directions of Lyonais Renaissance thought from the time of Marguerite de Navarre to Scève. Marguerite created a blend of Medieval pietism and Renaissance neo-Platonism. Scève, likewise, fuses the new and old. His concept of man in the Microcosme is man made in the image of God -- a microcosm of his perfection -- the idea developed by Italian neo-Platonists such as Ficino and Pico, but this man is Adam, and Adam, Scève’s protagonist, is the initiator of the fall from grace. Man, therefore, was created by God as a microcosm of the Divine, but the microcosmic relationship applies only in his innocent state before the fall. Man can reclaim his original state only through Christ. In other words, Christ for Scève is the means by which harmony in the universe is to be restored. NOTE: This analysis follows Mulhauser, Scève (Twayne), p. 109 ff. Thus vs. 147-48 reads: Ce Microcosme vif, en
sa pure innocence Pure simplicity, without art or knowledge ...) is created in the image De celui qui viendrait réparer son injure (Of him who would come to repair his sin.) Essential to Scève’s poem is the notion of the Trinity, but it is not expressed as the traditional division of Father, Son and Spirit, but in terms close to Petrarch’s own concept of Eternity. The 3003 (!) lines of the Microcosme begin as follows: Dieu, qui trine en un
fus, triple est, et trois seras, (God, who in one was,
triple art and three will be ...) Qui seule en soy de plait, et seule se contente Non agente, impassible, immutable, invisible Dans son Eternityé, comme imcomprehensible, Et qui de soy en soy estant sa jouïssance Consistoit en Bonté, Sapience, et Puissance (...And who, of self
and in self finding enjoyment
At the beginning of the Micrososme Scève extends the idea of the triune in one, the ruling paradox of the poem, into a temporal reference. Like the Trinity itself, past, present and future are combined into one essence, which, itself, consists of triple attributes: Goodness, Wisdom and Power. This Trinitarian formula was popular among Protestants. "Liberal Protestantism, while retaining the traditional terminology [of the Trinity], regards the Three Persons only as divine attributes, such as power, wisdom and goodness." NOTE: Quote from P.J. Hamell, "Trinitarian Controversy" in New Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. XIV, 1967, p. 291 ff. The incomprehensibility of the paradox sounds like it derives from the work of Cusanus. See Staub on Scève’s Micrososme. See also Augustine. Compare Pico, Heptaplus, Bk. 5, Proem: Speaking of the role of the Trinity during the creation Pico says "The power of the Father, creating everything, distributes his own unity to all; the wisdom of the Son, setting all in order, unites them and ties them together, and the love of the Spirit, turning everything toward God, attaches the whole work to its maker by the bond of charity. (Italics added. Tr. Douglas Carmichael, in Library of Liberal Arts edition, p. 139.) At the end of the Micrososme Scève returns to its beginning; the final two lines before the final triplet read as follows: Louans celuy, qui fut,
qui est, et qui sera,
There is no proof that Scève’s ideas concerning the relationship between the triune deity and the suspension of time had developed as early as the publication of the Petrarch’s Triumphs in 1545, but certainly de Tournes’ dedication to Scève must be taken as acknowledgement of Scève’s interest in its content. We know that under the patronage of François, Ier, Scève had already involved himself in the search for the tomb of Laura in Avignon (1533-34).
About the time Scève was editing de Tournes’ Petrarch, he must have recently finished the Délie. In this poem Scève equates his notion of Eternity with the virtue to be achieved from the passion of love, through reason. Dizain 444 reads as follows: NOTE: Hallett, Scève’s Délie, trans., p. 25. Nature au Ciel, non
Peripatetique, (Nature in the
Heavens, non Peripatetic It is physical love which is the cause of the poet’s perfection, but only in the light of the Virtue perceived in the object of love. In the last dizain this kind of love is equated with Eternity, because it unites with the eternal love given by God. NOTE: Hallet, op. cit. p. 25 ff. Flamme si siancte en
son cler durera, (A so holy flame will
remain, in its brightness,
The Petrarchan system of eternal time finds its own manifestation in Délie. Here Délie is the fusion of past, present and future. In this unity she surpasses Death. ... Mais comme Lune
infuse dans mes veines (But as the Moon,
flowing in my veins,
The Petrarchan image of Eternity in Salomon’s version shows the Trinity surrounded by Flames. This motif completes the circle begun in the first triumph, when Cupid appears midst the consuming flames of love. The cycle leading from the flames that consume to the flames that enrich correspond to specifically neo-Platonic ideas. The motivations that inspire Cupid are the same that inspire love of God. And this, of course, is the central motif of Scève’s Délie. Dizain no. 51 and emblem no. VI in Délie may be taken as an illustration of this paradox: The emblem shows the sun outshining a candle. The motto reads: "A tous clarté a moy tenebres," which corresponds to line 10: As translated by Hallet it reads: "But when I see her face in its noon-time, Upon everyone else it throws light, but upon me it casts shadows. The tri-cephalic image presented in Salomon’s last Petrarchan emblem of triumph is close enough to the ideas later articulated in the Microcosme, and similar enough to the spirit of Délie to warrant regarding its particular iconography as one stage in the genesis of Scève’s later ideas. Considering the purpose to which emblems were put in the Délie of 1544, one may wish to speculate that the images fashioned by Bernard Salomon were either produced directly under Scève’s direction in order to emphasize Scève’s new reading of Petrarch, or were influential for the articulation of Scève’s ideas regarding the Trinity and Eternity in the Microcosme. An even more exciting possibility is that both of the above speculations are true; that is, that Scève’s genesis of thought at this time proceeds through a fusion of concept and image. As for Salomon’s image of the Triumph of Eternity, it is obviously set to look like an emblem, that is, as "a philosophical maxim illustrated by a visual image;" but, is not one also justified in saying that it operates like a visual allegory: "a visual image invested with philosophical connotations." [RAB: are these not identical?] NOTE: Panofsky, "Titian’s Allegory of Prudence: A postscript" Meaning in the Visual Arts, p. 147.
Conclusion In conclusion it may be stated that the triune visage never appears within the tradition of previous illustrations to Petrarch’s "Triumph of Eternity," but when it does appear in other contexts in France of the sixteenth century, the image may suggest the presence of the Trinity at the Creation, which is a part of the traditional iconography of Petrarchan scenes of the "Triumph of Eternity or Divinity." The text of Petrarch’s poem, and the Augustinian framework in which it is set, suggest that the tri-cephalic image may indeed carry connotations of Eternity. There is no Augustinian picture, however, that had come to signify "Eternity;" but, in the Middle Ages a tri-cephalic image, usually composed of three heads of varying ages had come to stand for past, present and future, signifying either "Time" or "Prudence" -- ideas certainly related to St. Augustine’s concept of time, but stated in such an homogenized context that the reference to St. Augustine’s writings is vague. The image of Prudence is typical of the medieval desire to pictorialize abstract concepts. But such an image could have easily come to mean "Eternity," or would seem to mean such when placed in direct contact with Petrarch’s poem. This formulation is bolstered somewhat by Nicolas of Cusa’s use of a three-faced icon of an omnivoyant god to signify the Godhead. In Maurice Scève, the poet so closely connected to Salomon’s work at this time, is found (Microcosme) further influence of Nicolas of Cusa, and, importantly, the confluence of the Trinity with a rather Petrarchan sense of "Eternity" in which past, present and future are combined into a unity. Which of these threads is the one that leads directly to the meaning of Salomon’s image? One cannot say with certainty. The tri-cephalic image was used in numerous contexts, several of which, as we have seen, are not contradictory to the meaning of Petrarch’s text or the previous images used to illustrate it. Perhaps all these threads interact to weave a continuous fabric of association, thus presenting the observer with an image of an Omnivoyant Godhead, Eternal, the God of timeless Eternity, the infinitely large expressed as the infinitely small (N. of Cusa), an idea so well suited to the spiritual content of the miniature woodcut, and the Trinity, that is, the Trinity of the mystery of three in one, and the Trinity that created the universe and who will recreate the world eternal. But none of these ideas focus on the one great contribution of Maurice Scève, who, in his poetry, and no doubt in this cycle of six emblematic triumphs, ties these abstract and august visions of the deity to his own concept of love: if the object of love is virtue, then the condition to which love inspires is analogous to the spiritual timeless of the Trinity itself. The Triumph of Cupid is inextricably tied to the Triumph of Eternity over Time. In this state of bliss the first and last triumphs are as one. Whatever the implication of this final image, one sees that Salomon has taken a rare motif and has given it immense power and vast cosmological import, heightened even by its small scale. That this image is just an emblem is no small wonder, for it seems to be much more. If the impressa, the device, or emblem is "a philosophical maxim illustrated by a visual image," as certainly this is, can one not truly say that it also operates as an allegory, that it is "a visual image invested with philosophical connotations"? NOTE: Panofsky, "Titian’s Allegory of Prudence: A Postscript," Meaning in the Visual Arts, p. 147. At some point these opposite definitions collide, the small is the large, and the large is small. In Salomon’s image we find ourselves at the crossroads between the emblematic and the allegorical languages of the Renaissance. In the small, he thinks large, in the particular he thinks of the universal, in the microcosm he sees the macrocosm. This is the philosophy of Nicolas Cusanus: Deity is found at the confluence of opposite extremes. The oxymoronic character of the ineffable is handed through Cusa and Petrarch to Scève who makes it a hallmark of his style, and some of the irony may be discerned in these images which Salomon made, no doubt, under the tutelage of Scève himself. [RAB: Why is the chapter on Nicolas Cusanus missing? ]
Bibliography
|
|
Overview | Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six | Part Seven | Part Eight |