The Drawings of Michelangelo and His Followers in the Ashmolean Museum

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274 WHOLLY OR PARTIALLY AUTOGRAPH SHEETS CATALOGUE 56

them as cornices or string courses of some description,

because between the lower and the middle clusters, he

drew two windows of original design and heavy form.

They are similar to a window on CB 85 A/B 101 /Corpus

620 (black chalk, 125 × 70 mm, fragmentary), an iso-

lated sketch that seems to be contemporary with the

PortaPia. Here, the window on the left carries a tri-

angular pediment; that on the right, a segmental one.

Whether these were to alternate, or whether Michelan-

gelo intended one rather than the other is conjectural.

Carpiceci, making more precise a connection envisaged

byParker and de Tolnay, interpreted these as sketches for

the interior drum windows of St. Peter’s, but the com-

piler finds this improbable: The windows sketched here

are considerably squatter than the windows of the drum,

and the relation of pediment and aperture is very different.

Another possibility, the windows of the Conservatori, is

also unlikely: As executed they all carry segmental pedi-

ments, and their forms are lighter – and less imaginative –

than these.

These three clusters of lines therefore would appear to

define the piano nobile and upper storeys of a fac ̧ade. In

which case, if we assume this fac ̧ade to be that of the Con-

servatori, it would have been planned as a three-storey

building. But although it is not impossible that Michelan-

gelo should have considered a three-storey fac ̧ade, it is

highly unlikely because that would have diminished com-

paratively the Senatori, which was always the focus of the

piazza and which does have a three-storey fac ̧ade. This

opens the question as to whether the present drawing

might have been made for the Senatori because whatever

plans Michelangelo had had for that fac ̧ade a decade ear-

lier – work on it was abandoned c.155 0,savefor the con-

struction of the staircase – would surely not have been left

unchanged. Above the rusticated dado, whose full height

is occupied by the great double staircase, the fac ̧ade of

the Senatori is divided into two storeys of similar height.

Thus, in principle, the three clusters of lines on the present

page could define the upper two storeys of the Senatori.

However, no representation of Michelangelo’s design for

the fac ̧ade of the Senatori – which was in any case never

carried out – shows it with windows shaped like these,

with alternating pediments, or with the storeys separated

bycornices or mouldings, and all show it articulated

vertically by giant pilasters, although these might have

been a last-minute decision. Therefore, tempting though

it might be to connect these line-clusters and window-

sketches with the Capitoline palaces and especially the

Senatori, any such linking must be treated with extreme

reserve.

The third element on this verso, not previously

observed, is found when the sheet is inverted. Employing

the clusters of lines that cross the page as horizontals,

and the ruled line that defines the inner wall of the

larger fac ̧ade drawing and the free-hand line that defines

the outer wall of the smaller one, as framing verticals,

Michelangelo has drawn the elevation of a grand door,

with double, subdivided leaves. Above this, taking the

second group of horizontals as a storey-division, is a

balustraded balcony above which there seems to be a

great window, framed at each side by narrow rusticated

pilasters. There may be further forms sketched above

this, but these cannot be distinguished with clarity. Once

again, it would be tempting to connect this drawing with

the Capitoline, but, once again, the compiler can see no

ready way of doing so. The sequence of the double-leafed

door and the balcony has obvious similarities with the

Palazzo Farnese, but that is very different in form, and

Michelangelo’s contribution to that building had been

completed several years earlier. The rusticated pilasters on

thepiano nobilemight rather suggest a suburban setting,

and the Villa Giulia, with whose design Michelangelo

washeavily involved, might seem appropriate. But the

forms do not correspond, and, once more, the Villa Giu-

lia had been completed some years before this drawing

wasmade. One possibility that occurs to the compiler is

that the drawing might have been produced to assist Bar-

tolommeo Ammanati – whom Michelangelo liked and

respected and who finally executed the stairway of the

Laurentian Library – with his design for Palazzo Grifone

in Florence. However, the scheme shown in this drawing

differs so much from that of the palace’s doorway as built

that any connection must remain entirely conjectural.

Roman numerals in red chalk of the type found on the

versoofthis sheet occurs on several other sheets either

in, or with a direct provenance from, Casa Buonarroti:

VIII: CB 73 Abis verso/B 164 /Corpus 615

XV: BM W 37 verso/Corpus 554

XVII: Frankfurt 392 verso/Corpus 322

XVIII: CB 17 Arecto/B 113 /Corpus 579

XX: CB 7 Frecto/B 122 /Corpus 301

XXXI: CB 79 Arecto/B 87 /Corpus55 9

XXXII: CB 20 Arecto/B 118 /Corpus 578

The significance of these numerals eludes the compiler;

they were no doubt applied after Michelangelo’s death but

probably still within the sixteenth century.

Drawn Copies

The pedimental zone of the recto was copied in a simpli-

fied form, which is understandable given the complexity

of the overlays, by Francesco Buonarroti on Uffizi534 8A,

left side, d.