Palladio, Roman Thermae

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A Contribution of Andrea Palladio to the Study of Roman ThermaeAuthor(s): Laetitia La FolletteReviewed work(s):Source: Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Vol. 52, No. 2 (Jun., 1993), pp.189-198

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A Contribution of Andrea Palladio to the Study ofRoman ThermaeLAETITIA LA FO LLETTE University of Massachusetts-Amherst

AndreaPalladio's measuredplan of a bathcomplexon the AventineHill in Rome is of considerablenterest n viewof currentskepticismaboutthe archaeologicalccuracy f Palladio'sstudiesof baths. Thisarticlehowsfirstthatthedrawings the resultofPalladio'sownsurveyof thiscomplex, he Bathsof TrajanDecius (A.D. 249-51); secondlyit demonstratesheaccuracy f Palladio'smeasurements;nd thirdly,on thebasisofPalladio'sinscriptionn theplan, it redateshedrawingto Palladio's last trip to Rome in 1554, and arguesthat Palladiolearnedof thecomplexrom theRomanantiquarian ndarchaeologist,PirroLigorio.The plan of the Baths of Decius thus illustrates hatPalladio's nterest n Roman bathswentbeyond he mostfamousex-amples fthermae in Rome.Hissurveysshown o havebeenextremelyaccuraten measuringhe remainsofthiscomplex,whilehis inscriptionindicates hat he soughtthe mostup-to-date albeiterroneous) nti-quarian nformationforhe lesser-knownmonuments e drew.

AMONG PALLADIO'S DRAWINGS of imperial thermaes thesketch plan of a bath complex on the Aventine Hill, cataloguedas RIBA XV/1lv in the collection of the Royal Institute ofBritish Architects in London (Figs. 1 and 2). This plan, visibleon the top half of Figure 2, has been overlooked in the debateon the archaeological accuracy of Palladio's studies of baths.lOur plan belongs to a group of studies of imperial thermae hatPalladio intended for publication. The preparation or this Libro

This article s partof a larger tudyof the Bathsof TrajanDeciusonthe AventineHill in Rome,forthcomingn theJournal fRomanAr-chaeology,upplementaryeriesNumber . I am grateful o the FacultyResearchCouncil of the Universityof Massachusettst Amherst orfinancialsupport,which allowedmeto present n earlier ersion f thispaperat the FirstInternational onference n RomanBaths n Bath,Englandn March f 1992. Thanks realsodueHowardBurns HarvardUniversity) ndDouglasLewis NationalGallery f Art) or theirhelpwith the specialproblems f thisdrawing.

1. On the questionableccuracy f manyof Palladio'sdrawings fantiquities, articularlyhoseof thermae,eeJ. Ackerman,alladioHar-mondsworth, 966,repr.1978),171-72;H. Spielmann, ndreaalladiounddieAntike:UntersuchungndKatalogerZeichnungus einem achlass(Berlin,1966), 67 (hereafter ited as Andrea alladio); . Forssman,"Palladio l'antichiti,"Mostra elPalladio-Vicenza/Basilicaalladiana(Milan,1973), 20, andA. Nesselrath,"MonumentaAntiquaRomae.Ein illustrierter om-Traktat esQuattrocento," ntikenzeichnungndAntikenstudiumnRenaissancendFriihbarock,.HarprathndH. Wrede,eds.(Mainz,1989),esp.36. I thankA. Nesselrath orbringing he lasttitle to my attention.JSAH LII:189-198. JUNE 1993

delleTermespannedmost of Palladio'sadultlife, and the resultingsketches, plans, elevations, and sections constitute the most im-portant single groupof Palladio'sdrawingsof ancient structures.Unfortunately, it was only 150 years after Palladio's death in1580 that the first publication of any of these bath studies ap-peared.2In 1730, LordBurlington presenteda selection of Pal-ladio's finished drawings, which were generally plans pairedwith elevations and sections. Our drawing, a rough sketch plan,was not included in Burlington's book. Rodolfo Lanciani firstrecognized the drawing's importance and published a tracingof it in 1897.3 Lanciani correctly identified the drawing as aplan of the Baths of TrajanDecius, built in Rome in the mid-third century A.D. The first photographic reproduction of thePalladio drawing dates to 1959, when G. Zorzi published andillustrated the entire corpus of Palladio's drawings of ancientbuildings.4 Since the late nineteenth century, the bulk of thesedrawings has been kept in the Royal Institute of British Ar-chitects in London, where they were cleaned and remountedin the 1970s. As a result of this conservation work, far morecan now be read than was possible on the basis of Zorzi'sillustrations.

Palladio'sdrawingsof imperialthermaenclude groundplans-both site sketches and reconstructedplans-and reconstructedelevation and section drawings. That the drawings in the lattergroup are not archaeologically accurate has long been recog-nized, for they quite clearly do not represent the state of theremains as Palladio saw them, but rather his own inventivereconstructionsof facades and roofing. The plans, on the other

2. RichardBoyle,4th Earlof Burlington ndCork,Fabbrichentichedisegnatea AndreaPalladioVicentinoLondon,1730). For a generaldiscussion f Palladio'sdrawingsof imperial hermae,ee G. Zorzi,IDisegni elleAntichitdiAndreaalladioVenice,1959),64-73 (hereaftercited asI Disegni).Accordingo Spielmann,Andrea alladio, 6), thecollectionof bathstudiesacquired y LordBurlington romthe col-lectionpreserved t the VillaBarbaro t Maserrepresentsne quarterof Palladio'sdrawings f ancientbuildings.Spielmann's ates or thedrawings ave not beenwidelyaccepted, ndmuchworkstillneeds obe done on the datingof the individual heets. See D. Lewis,TheDrawings fAndrea alladio(Washington,D.C., 1981),3-10 and129-40 (hereafterited as TheDrawings).3. R. Lanciani,The RuinsandExcavationsofAncientRome BostonandNew York, 1897,repr.1967),542-47 with Figure210.4. Zorzi,I Disegni, 3; ourdrawing s his Figure145.189


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190 JSAH, LII:2, JUNE 1993

Fig. 1. AndreaPalladio, olio RIBAXV/11 recto, London, ?)1554,courtesy f the BritishArchitecturalibrary, oyalInstitute f BritishArchitects,London.The upperhalf of the sheetshowsapartial lanofthe Flavianpalace nthe PalatineHill inRome, nscribed(upside own)termedi palaciomazore.

hand, have been relied upon since their initial publication in1730, on the groundsthatmuch more of the baths waspreservedin the sixteenth century. However, students of Palladio nowrealize that at least some of these plans do not appearto havebeen based on Palladio's own survey of the remains, but onprevious graphic sources,earlierplans that Palladio studied andcopied in the studio.Now that the reliability of the plans as a group is subjecttoscrutiny, it becomes especially importantto distinguishbetweenthe types of plans executed by Palladiowhich have come downto us. While the dating and evaluation of Palladio'sbath plansare still very much in progress, a better understanding of hisworking methods should help to distinguishbetween those plans

5. For a discussion f some of Palladio'sources, ee H. Burns,"Idisegni," MostradelPalladio-Vicenza/BasilicaPalladiana(Milan, 1973),136 andLewis,TheDrawings,8. Lewisis one of the few who hasattemptedo distinguishystematicallyetweenPalladio's rchaeolog-icallyaccurateplans,his more anciful econstructions,ndhisdrawingsbasedon earlierprototypes,ee forexamplehis discussion n pp. 131and 137 of catalogue numbers 75 and 80.

based nearlierdrawings nd hosewhichreflecthis ownsurveyof the remains.At present,we candistinguishhreesuccessivestages n Palladio'sworkingprocedurewhen he surveyed nddrew a building.Theseincludea firststage n which a sketchof the buildingwas drawn reehandon the site and liberallyannotatedwithmeasurements;secondstage n whichthe fieldsketchwastranscribeddirectlywith the aidof a straight dgeand otherequipmentback in the studio;and a thirdstageinwhich this cleanpreparatoryrawingwasthentranslatedntoa reconstructedplanof the complex.6n somecases, herecon-structedlementsof thisfinal-stage lanwouldbedistinguishedfromthoseelementsPalladiohadactually eenon the site,butmore oftentheywere not.This schematicsummaryimplifiesPalladio'sworkingpro-cedure o a certain xtent,sincealterationo andelaboration fthe planof a Romanbuildingcould takeplaceat any of thethreestages,as Palladiosoughtto make senseof the planandto experimentwithreconstructions.7urthermore,otallthreeworking stagesaredocumented or everybath Palladiodrew:for some it is the freehand ite sketch which is missing(forexample, heBathsof Trajan,Diocletian, ndConstantine);orothers it is the preparatorytudiodrawing for example, heBathsof Nero/SeverusAlexander).8 nd for still others,onlyonestageof thethree-partrawing equencespreserved. hus,for the Baths of Helena,we haveonly the preparatorytudiodrawing stage wo);for the Bathsof Decius in Figure2, andexaminedhere,we haveonly Palladio's reehand ite sketch(stageone).9Although hereliability f each of Palladio'splansmust be provenon an individual asis,on the whole it is thefreehanditesketcheswhichseem oincorporatehe eastamountof alterationo the remains ctuallyeenbyPalladio ndshouldthereforebe consideredhe mostreliable.

Palladio'sdrawingof the Baths of Deciusbelongsto thecategoryof freehand ite sketches,which I havecalled"stageone" n Palladio'stypical urveying rocedure.WhetherornotPalladio verprogressedeyond hisfirst tage orthe BathsofDeciuscannot,atpresent,be determined.Possiblyhe didnot,for the remains f the complexcannotbe classifiedamong hemostimpressiveuins n sixteenth-century ome.All author-

6. G. De Angelis D'Ossat,"Invitoallo studiodei 'DisegnidelleAntichita'," ollettinoelCentronternazionaleistudi iarchitetturandreaPalladio1 (1979):41-53, esp.46-47.7. One clearexample f suchexperimentationsthefreehandtudiodrawingwhichplayswithvarious econstructionsf the Baths fAgrip-pa (RIBAVII/6v):Zorzi,I Disegni, 2, Fig. 142; Spielmann,AndreaPalladio,9-81, 166-67, andFig. 103; Lewis,TheDrawings,31.8. Bathsof Trajan,Zorzi,I Disegni, 7, Fig.106;Spielmann, ndreaPalladio,4-75, 163(cat.nos.168-69);Diocletian:Zorzi, Disegni, 0,Fig. 126;Spielmann,Andrea alladio, 1-72, 162 (cat.no. 156), Fig.86; Constantine: orzi,I Disegni, 4-65, Fig. 84; Spielmann,AndreaPalladio, 5-77, 164 (cat.no. 175), Fig. 97; Bathsof Nero/SeverusAlexander,econstructedplan:Zorzi, Disegni, 6, Fig.96;Spielmann,AndreaPalladio,166 (cat. no. 185), Fig. 99; sketchplan:Zorzi, I Disegni,Fig. 97; Spielmann,AndreaPalladio,165 (cat. no. 177).9. Baths of Helena: Zorzi, I Disegni,72, Fig. 144.


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LA FOLLETTE: PALLADIO AND ROMAN THERMAE 191

Fig.. Andrea alladio,o"ioRIBAXV/1 1verso,London, )1554, courtesyf theBritishArchitecturalFig.2. Andreaoyalnstitute f BritishArchitects, London, ?)1554,courtesyplan of theAventinebathssh rchitecturalLibrary,oyal nstitutef BritishArchitects,ondon. heplanof theAventineathssat thetop,inscribed(upsidedown)terme arianeu lo aventino. he bottomhalf of the sheetrepresents ntiquitiesin andaroundRome(Pantheon,Templeof the Sun,AmphitheatertZagarolo).ities agree in assigning the existing sketch to Palladio's ownhand; since it is both autographedand has no known graphicsource, it appearsto be an on-site study by Palladio himself.10

10. Zorzi,I Disegni, 3;Spielmann, ndreaalladio,3 and168,cat.no. 197. Both Dr. HowardBurnsandDr.ArnoldNesselrath ave oldmeprivatelyheyhaveno doubt hat hedrawings nderdiscussionrein the handof AndreaPalladio.

As I shall show, the detailed measurements on the drawingconfirm that the survey representedis Palladio's own. A com-parison of Palladio's measurements with those of the remainsstill visible on the site today further demonstrates the highdegree of accuracyof Palladio'ssurvey. Finally, Palladio's iden-tifying inscription for the complex provides insight into hisantiquariansources and furnishes us with a probable date forthe drawing. Let us turn, therefore, to examine the sheet itself.

. f V1 : I ,o I- ?


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192 JSAH, LII:2, JUNE 1993The drawing

Palladio's plan of the Baths of Decius was sketched in irongall ink on a sheet 425 mm high and 279 mm wide.11The planitself measures 102 x 185 mm and, as currently mounted, oc-cupies the upperhalf of the verso of the sheet (Fig. 2). It is seenin detail in Figure 3. The sheet was originally folded in half,probablyto facilitatedrawing on a sketchboard n the field, thuscreating a total of four drawing quadrants, wo on the recto andtwo on the verso, each about the size of an eight-and-a-half byeleven inch page. The measurements and legends in each quad-rant readas if Palladio rotated the sheet as he drew. A secondarycrease, running vertically, may have been produced when thesheet was folded for transportationor storage.Both handwritingand ink seem consistent throughout. There are no obvious in-stances of later notations, additions, or corrections in anotherhand.

In the upper half of the recto (Fig. 1) are two measuredsketches of partsof the Flavian palace or Domus Augustanaonthe Palatine Hill in Rome, labelled termedipalaciomazore.Thelower half is devoted to measuredprofiles of decorated columnbases at Frascati(questabasasie afrascata); n the Baths of Neroin Rome (in le termedi neron),and a third location (basach'eaS[anta] maria de trastevere).'2 The verso, Figure 2, shows oursketch with its inscription upside down in the upperhalf, whilein the lower half are representeda number of different monu-ments. Moving clockwise from the bottom left, these includea plan of one of the triangular staircasesin the Pantheon inRome (scaladi s[anta]mariarotonda); n elevation of the porticoof the Temple of the Sun, also in the Campus Martiusin Rome(de a basilicadedomiciano); section of the dome of the Pantheon

11. The information n the compositionof the ink andthe mea-surements f thedrawingwasgraciouslyrovided ythe RIBADrawingcollection staff.12. The transcriptionsdiffer slightly from those given by Zorzi and

Spielmann, cf. Zorzi, I Disegni, 61 (no. 15.2), p. 73 (no. 9.2), 77 (no.5.6), 98-99 (nos. 6.1 and 1.1), and 104-5 (no. 2.4) with Figs. 145 and242; Spielmann,AndreaPalladio,166 (no. 187), 168 (nos. 197 and 199).Two of the four bases ketched n the rectocome fromthird-centurybaths n Rome.The one in the Bathsof Nero is lateSeveran,ince hatcomplex was entirely rebuilt under Severus Alexander (A.D. 222-35),while the base in Sta. Mariain Trastevereshould be associatedwith thematerialaken romthe librariesn the Bathsof Caracalla hichwerealso completed under the later Severans(A.D.218-35), see D. Kinney,"Spolia rom the Bathsof Caracallan Sta. Marian Trastevere," rtBulletin68 (1986): 386-87, with Fig. 23. Thus Palladio's hoice ofmonuments n this sheet is hardlyrandom: t least half of the archi-tecturerepresentedates o theobscure ears f thethirdcenturyrecto:base rom he libraries f the Bathsof Caracalla,.D. 218-35; base romBathsof Nero/SeverusAlexander, .D. 222-35; verso:Bathsof TrajanDecius,A.D. 249-51; porticoesof Aurelian'sTempleof the Sun,A.D.270-75.)

showing the annularrings (markedsongradi18), and a plan ofthe amphitheaterat Zagarolo, nearPalestrina(azagarolo [n]ternavignadels[ignore] amilocolona/ sia questo nfiteatro).Also shownare another elevation, perhapsof another section of the porticoof the Temple of the Sun, and a schematic semi-circulargroundplan, both without identifying captions. The fact that all of themonuments drawn on the sheet are located in or around Romesuggests that the drawings were made during one of Palladio'strips to Rome, and therefore in or before 1554, the date of hislast visit there.13

The lack of known plans of the Aventine complex earlierthan this one by Palladio, coupled with the fact that the sketchwas done freehand on a folded sheet of paper and is coveredwith detailed measurements, leads to the supposition that ourplan is a field drawing, the result of Palladio's own survey ofthe site. Two measurements in particularsupply corroboratingevidence. The first is visible at the right edge of the plan onthe verso (Fig. 2) and the bottom of the detail (Fig. 3). It readsp, for per[tiche],9 p[iedi] 1/2. The pertica s a unit of six feet inmany independent North Italian measuring systems; in Vicen-tine feet, each of which measures0.357394 m), the dimension9 pertiche11/2 feet comes out to 55.5 Vicent"-e feet or 19.83meters.14 The other dimension is also legible on Figure 2, abovethe circularroom at the top of the drawing on the left side. Itconsistsof the number"25" positioned sideways, from top (left)to bottom (right). Only the number is visible here. These twodimensions, 19.83 m and 53.60 m, indicate the position of thebath complex as measuredout to unidentified fixed points. Suchmeasurementsarea standard eatureof any site survey, but theywould have been useless information to copy from a previousdrawing. Finally, just above the bath complex on Figure 2,midway between its two rotundas, s afaintly sketchedrectangle.This rectangle seems to be an existing fabric on the northeastside of Piazza del Tempio di Diana. These three features thushelp to confirm the drawing as a survey sketch by Palladio.Palladio provides a measurement for the overall width of thecomplex, legible at the bottom of the sketch on Figure 2, andon the left side on the detail, Figure 3, asper[tiche] 2 p[iedi]5,or seventy meters. He also supplies detailed measurementsfornearly every room drawn here. In order to arrive at a depth ofthe complex from front to back,we must addup the dimensionsgiven for the individual rooms and wall thicknesses at the topof the detail, Figure 3. Palladio measuredthe inside of many of

13. Zorzi,I Disegni,17;see alsoL. Puppi,Andrea alladio(Englishtranslation,London,1975), 13-14, 19 and 231 on the chronologyofPalladio'strips o Rome(hereafterited asPalladio).14. Onthe sizeof theVicentineoot, see,R.E.Zupko, talianWeightsandMeasures(Philadelphia,981), 189-92.

Fig. 3. AndreaPalladio, detail of folio RIBA XV/11 verso, bath sketch plan, London, (?) 1554, courtesyof the British ArchitecturalLibrary,RoyalInstitute f BritishArchitects,London.Note the detailedmeasurementsn Vicentine eet. (Thedetailhas beenrotated90 degrees.)


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Fig.4. Detail of the AventineHill, fromLapianta iGiambattistaolli del1748,after he VaticanCityeditionof 1932. North is at the top,withthe Tiberatuppereft andthe CircusMaximus tupper ight.The site of the baths s shownat no. 1078, in center eftbetween hewordsMonteandAventino,outhof S. Sabina1077,upper eft)andwestof S. Prisca 1059,centerright).the rooms on this side of the complex, but in the case of theroom at the upper left here, he provided an outside measure-ment, including the length of the room andthe wall thicknessesbetween it and the adjacentroom (= 34/2 p[iedi]).One suspectsthat the inside of this room was filled with earth, or was oth-erwise inaccessible in Palladio's day. This would explain notonly why he measuredthe outside here, but also the lack of anyindication of doorways in most of the rooms.15 f we addup thedimensions provided for the rooms at the top of Figure 3, thetotal comes to 123/4 Vicentine feet, or forty-four meters forthe depth of the complex front to back.16The building Palladio sketched was clearly symmetrical, aswere all imperial thermaen Rome. However, the dimensionsPalladioprovided make it clearhe did not reconstructone wingfrom the other. We may note, for example, that on Figure 3,the detailed measurementfor the left corner room at the bottomreads as thirty-four Vicentine feet (3 + 4 + 20 + 7), including

15. The only exceptions, the four openings shown in each of therotundae,probablyrepresentwindows rather than doorways.16. Dimensions on the top of Figure 3, moving from left to rightand including wall thicknesses: 341/2+ 26/4 + 4 + 19 + 21/4+ 35 +21/4= 12314 Vicentine feet or 44.00025 m.

the thickness of the wall between it and the adjacentroom. Itsopposite number, the left corner room at the top, is shown asmeasuring thirty-four-and-one-half feet for the same dimen-sion, albeit taken outside rather than inside the room, as wehave seen. The difference of one-half Vicentine foot, or 17.9cm, is lessimportantthan the evidence this discrepancyprovides,namely that Palladio measuredkey elements of both sides ofthe complex and did not reconstructone side from the other.But how exact were Palladio's measurements?To answer thisquestion, let us turn to the remains on the site.The remains

As early as the Nolli plan of 1748 (Fig. 4), ancient remainswere noted on Jesuit propertyon the Aventine Hill in Rome.17The Jesuit property,marked GiardinodellaCasaProfessa e'Ge-suiti, lies south of the church of S. Sabina, and occupies ap-proximately the middle of the Aventine Hill. Two L-shaped

17. Forreproductionsof the Nolli plan, see Romaal tempo i BenedettoXIV: La pianta di CiambattistaNolli del 1748 riprodotta a una copiavaticana, ol. 6 of Lepiantemaggiori iRomadeisecc.XVI-XVIII riprodotteinfototipiaa curadellabiblioteca aticana(VaticanCity, 1932), and A. P.Frutaz,Lepiantedi Roma(Vatican City, 1932), (Rome, 1962), 1: 234-36; 3: pl. 407, (hereaftercited as Lepiante).


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? -.-....- -.-. -.......--. 1..20. A43.20 VIADl S. DOMENICO 42.20

Fig. 5. Baths of Decius, Rome (Aventine Hill), A.D. 249-51, stateplanof remainswith surroundingtructuresasof 1985).The remains reshown n bold anddottedoutline,northwest f thePiazzadelTempiodi Diana.(StephenTownsend)

buildings on the property are shown in black; within one ofthem is a chapel, delineated in white and given the number1078 and the designationcapella i S. MariaMaggioren Aventino.Today, these two buildings stand on the private property ofPrincipessaGiulia Torlonia Borghese, northwest of the Piazzadel Tempio di Diana (Fig. 5). The interest shown by the Nolli

plan in the small chapel of S. MariaMaggiore, delineated by ablack outline on Figure 5, is perhapsmore understandablewhenone realizesthat an expanseof ancient Roman brickworkmakesup its back wall. As illustratedin Figure 6, this is an exedra,orniche, eleven meters wide which risesover six meters above thechapel floor, but also continues another four meters below themodern floor level.18 The modern plan, Figure 5, shows indotted outline the remains of more of the bath complex on thislower, basement level. The plan and measurements of theserooms, shown in Figure 7, shows them to correspond to therooms at the upper left of Figure 3, namely the westernmostroom on the southwest facade,and the rooms adjacentto it onthe northeast and southeast. These rooms represent approxi-

18. On the basementevel,thiswall measures .90 m in height floorto ceiling) o which the 6.60 m heightof thewall in thechapelon theground loormustbeadded. f we estimate n additional 0 cm for thecontinuation f the wall between he floorof the chapelandthebase-ment evelceiling,the heightof this brick-faced allcomes o a min-imum of 10 meters.This is the dimensionup to the springing f thesemi-dome;he semi-dome tself spreservedtillhigher,butcouldnotbe accuratelymeasuredn the courseof our 1985survey.

Fig. 6. Bathsof Decius,central ectionof the chapel/exedraf roomE preservedt ground evel of the Torlonia-Borgheseroperty.TheRomanbrickwork ontinues eft andrightof the sectionshownhere,andanother m below the modern loor, ora totalheightof over 10m andwidthof 11 m. (Author)

mately one-third of the rooms shown on Palladio'splan. WhenPalladio's measurements for these rooms are compared to thedimensions of these rooms today, Palladio'saccuracy s extraor-dinary.In instances where Palladio'sexplicit dimensions can bechecked against the remains, Palladio's dimensions are eitherabsolutely correct (as in the depth of room E, Fig. 7, whichcorrespondsto the upper left corner room on Fig. 3, or 12.30m), or the difference is of 10 cm (the depth of room D is 9.50m in the survey and 9.40 m in Palladio). There is only onelargerdiscrepancyof 30 cm for the width of room E, adimensionPalladio does not supply, but which can be reconstructedfromthe width he gives for room D on his plan.19Palladio's sketchplan can therefore be consideredhighly reliable documentationfor the state of the remainsof the Baths of Decius on the mid-sixteenth century. The plan, translated into meters and posi-

19. RoomE widthca. 13.90 m accordingo Palladio'sketch sincehe givesthe width of adjacentoom D asthirty-nineVicentine eet),versusa dimension f 14.20m in the modern urvey.

II


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. II 1-43 20_ , VIA 0D S DOMENICO..o-, ._ ..........

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ilIl.:

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1 2 3 4 5m

Fig.7. Bathsof Decius,stateplanof ancient ooms D-F)preservedtthe basement evel of Torlonia-Borgheseroperty.These roomscor-respondo the three rooms n the upper eft of Palladio'splan,Figure3. (StephenTownsendandJoanneSpurza)

tioned so that these rooms correspondwith the upperleft roomsof Palladio's plan in Figure 3, permits us for the first time todetermine the precise topographical position of these thermaeon the Aventine. Figure 8 illustrates the result when the metricconversion of Palladio's plan is laid over the cadastralmap ofRome in this area. One may note the differences between thisreconstructionandthat shown on the most recentmapof ancientRome, published by Scagnetti-Grandein 1979, Figure 9.20TheBaths of Decius were in fact far smaller, only seventy by forty-four meters, half the size they are shown on Figure 9. They arealso positioned further to the northeast, since they occupy alarge portion of the Piazza del Tempio di Diana.

Palladio does not identify the complex as the Baths of Decius,built between A.D. 249-51. Now that the characterandaccuracyof the field sketch have been established, we may turn to theinscription.Inscription and date

The date of the sheet, and of our drawing, is problematic.According to Howard Burns, the hand is that of Palladio's ma-ture years, after 1548; Zorzi, however, dated the sheet to theperiodof Palladio'slongest stayin Rome, 1545-47, while Spiel-mann placed it after 1560.21 The last seems impossible if the

20. F. Scagnetti-G. Grande, Roma UrbsImperatorum etate(Rome,1979).21. HowardBurns'opinion, rompersonal ommunicationn a dis-cussionn frontof thedrawingn London,May1985;Zorzi,I Disegni,26;Spielmann, ndreaalladio,68(cat.no. 197).There s a watermarkon the folio, a laddern an ovalabove/belowa six-pointed tar,butatpresenthismark annotbe dated.Evenwhentheycan bedated, uchmarks nlyprovidea terminusostquemfordrawings, ince the dateofthe drawing s necessarilyater than the manufacturef the paper,

36.00 VIA Dl S. MELANIA

I. ,iDA1 o,1* / 10 20 340 SOm

0) P,E'Fig.8. Andrea alladio, ath ketchplanRIBAXV/1 lv translatedntometersandsuperimposedn stateplanof Bathsof Deciuson the Av-entineHill in Rome.(StephenTownsend)

sketch of the Baths of Decius represents Palladio's own sitesurvey, for Palladio's final trip to Rome took place in 1554.22Since all the other monuments depictedon the sheet also appearto be site sketches made in or aroundRome, the drawings musthave been executed during one of Palladio's trips to Rome andtherefore in or before 1554. Palladio visited Rome in 1549 and1554, so the sketches of our sheet could be assigned to eitheryear. The name Palladio gives the Aventine bath complex mayhelp to determine which visit was the more likely occasion.All earlierauthorities cite the inscription as terme eriane u loaventino, but the reading terme variane su lo aventino (with an "a"in variane)seems equally possible upon close inspection of thedrawing, Figure 3.23 In fact, the first vowel in the secondword looks more like an "a" than an "e." Palladio wrote his"e" with a distinctive crossbarending in a clear upward curvewhich terminatedabove the line of the other letters. After writ-

perhaps ubstantiallyater.Lewis,TheDrawings,6 (cat.no. 15) citesa similar,houghnot identical,markdatedbyBriquetbefore1540(C.M. Briquet, Lesfiligranes.Dictionnairehistoriquedes marquesdu papier(Paris,1907), 2: no. 5933.) Briquet'snos. 5922-24 arecloserto theconfigurationof our mark(5922: Augsburg 1506-10 with variant sim-ilar to ours; Siena 1495-1524; 5923: Florence 1513-14; 5924: Vienna1538, Fabriano 532.)22. Puppi, Palladio,231.23. Zorzi andSpielmann oth read he legendas termeerianeu loaventino:Zorzi, I Disegni, 73; Spielmann, AndreaPalladio,168, cat. no.197.

'I,-, ,

"D


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Fig. 9. Detail of the Aventine Hill, after the map of ancient Rome by F. Scagnetti-G. Grande, UrbsRomaeImperatorumetate Rome 1979). Northis at the top, with the Tiber at upper left and the Circus Maximus at upperright. The Baths of Decius are shown in center, above the words MonsAventinus.

ing an "e," Palladio's pen stopped. The second letter of thesecond word of the inscriptionshows no such crossbar,nor doesthe upwardcurve of that letter indicate a pauseof the pen. Theform of this letter is more closely comparableto the letter "a"shown in the word aventino han it is to the "e" in that word.The reading"terme ariane"(Latinthermaevarianae)s farmore

likely than "terme eriane"(Latinthermaeverianae) n topograph-ical grounds as well. The thermae erianae renowhere attested,but the thermae arianaeappear in some codices of the fourthcentury A.D. Regionary Catalogues of Rome. The name therereflects a medieval corruption of the Latin for the Baths ofSura-thermaesurianae-which became the thermae rianaewhenthe initial "s" was droppedand was finally corrected,or rathercorrupted,to thermae arianae.24 his corruption seems to havebeen responsible for the creation by Renaissancetopographersof a fictitious bathcomplex on the Aventine, the thermae arianae.The first appearanceof these baths on a map of Rome occurs

24. For the corruption,ee R. Valentini,G. Zucchetti,Codicetopo-grafico ella ittadi Roma Rome,1940), 1: 181 and 245 with note 2(hereaftercited as Codice); ompare H. Jordan, TopografieerStadtRomin Altertum(Berlin, 1871), 1.1, 296.

on Bartolomeo Marliani'smap of 1544, where it is shown onthe Aventine along with the thermae ecianae, r Baths of De-cius.25The most vociferous champion of this fictitiouscomplexwas Pirro Ligorio, one of the most famous antiquariansandarchaeologists of Palladio's day. In 1553, Ligorio published asmall book on the antiquities of Rome, which argued at somelength thatthe prominentruins of a bath on the Aventine shouldbe identified as the thermae arianae,not the thermae ecianae.26

25. B. Marliano,UrbisRomaeTopografiaeecondedition (Rome, 1544),see fold-out plan opposite p. 10. Frutaz,Lepiante,1: 56-57; 2: pl. 21,alsoillustrateshis mapof Rome,wherethe Th[ermae]ec[yanae]ndthe Th[ermae]ar[ianae]reboth notedon theAventineHill.26. PirroLigorio,Delle ntichitdiRoma. .coneParadosseelmedesimoauttorequaeconfutanoa communeopinione opravarii luoghidella cittddiRoma(Venice,1553),fol. 49, pp.v-50 r:"Schiochezzapurdicoloro,che fanno le Therme di Decio Traiano nel colle Aventino; conciosiacosa che quello imperatorenon edificassemai Therme, e nell'Aventinomassimamente: dica pur che vuole Pomponio Leto; ma SpartianodicecheDecioTraiano mperatoreistaur6e Thermedi Agrippaenze armentione,che egli ne edificasse e nuove, e qualise puregli havesseedificate,PublioVittorecosi diligentescrittorenon l'avrebbeasciatenella penna, senza fame mentione,ben'e vero che nella Regionedell'Aventinoono e ThermeVariane nonDeciane."Thispassagesan interesting example of sixteenth-century antiquarianmethod, since


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198 JSAH, LII:2, JUNE 1993It seems likely that Palladio took the erroneous name for thecomplex from Ligorio, either from his book of 1553, or fromLigorio personally, if the two men did indeed meet in Rome,as has often been suggested, on the occasion of Palladio's lasttrip there in 1554.27 I suggest, therefore, that our sheet shouldbe dated to 1554, the occasion of Palladio's final trip to Rome.

Ligorio cites a number of authorities. For a recent discussion of Ligorio'santiquariansources, see H. Burns, "Pirro Ligorio's Reconstruction ofAncient Rome: The Anteiquae Urbis Imago of 1561," in PirroLigorio,Artist and Antiquarian,R. W. Gaston, ed., 10 (Florence: Villa I Tatti,The HarvardUniversity Center for Italian RenaissanceStudies, 1988):119-92. Burns, however, is more concerned with Ligorio'smapof 1561than with his book of 1553 cited here. The Pomponius Leto whomLigorio cites in this passagewas a Renaissancephilologist (1428-97);the work to which Ligorio refers to this passage is probably Leto'sAntiquitates,which included an appendix pairingancient sites with theirmodern names. The Antiquitates ould have been available to Ligorioin the Italiantranslationpublished in Venice in 1550 by G. Papera,seeE. Cochrane, Historians ndHistoriographyn theItalianRenaissance(Chi-cago, 1981), 42-43, 51, 430 and 514 with note 81. Spartianus s one ofthe bogus authors of the HistoriaAugusta,a work now recognized asthe product of one late fourth-century writer, who presents it underthe names of six different men, including Spartianus,with the pretensethat it was compiled over a century before, see T. D. Barnes, TheSourcesof the HistoriaAugusta(Brussels, 1978), 13-18. The passage to whichLigorio refers does not exist in the work as we have it and probablynever did. It appearsLigorio is misremembering a passagein the H.A.which lists repairsto the Baths of Agrippa(Hadrian19.10, a restorationof the baths, interalia, by the emperor Hadrian).Publius Victor, on theother hand, is not a real author at all, but the name given to an earlyedition of the Regionary Catalogues, see Valentini-Zucchetti, Codice,201-6; and E. Mandowsky and C. Mitchell, PirroLigorio'sRoman An-tiquities(London, 1963), 15-16. Since the Regionary Catalogues domention the Baths of Decius, Ligorio is either using an incompleteedition or is misremembering again.27. The suggestion that Ligorio and Palladio met in Rome in 1554

The sketch plan of the terme variane su lo aventino indicatesthat Palladio's interest in Roman thermaewas hardly limited tothe most famous examples in Rome. As demonstrated here, thedrawing reflects Palladio's own survey of this complex, whicheven today is poorly known. When compared with the remainsstill preserved on the site, Palladio's survey is extraordinarilyaccurate, which is all the more remarkable when we considerhe was measuring a half-buried building.28 Finally, the inscrip-tion Palladio provides for the baths indicates that he sought themost up-to-date information for the lesser-known monumentshe studied. As we have seen, it is Palladio's survey in the mid-sixteenth century that allows us to determine both the archi-tectural plan and the proper topographical position of these bathson the Aventine. The drawing thus proves that Palladio's free-hand site surveys can indeed supply crucial evidence for thereconstruction of imperial thermae and other ancient buildingsin Rome.

was made first by Zorzi, I Disegni,21-23; it has been deemed likely byE. Forssman,Palladio'sLehrgebdude:tudien uber enZusammenhangonArchitekturundArchitekturtheorieei A. Palladio(Stockholm, 1965), 72,and Puppi, Palladio,25 with note 116, andpassim.On the basis of hisstudy of their drawings of ancient monuments, Howard Burns, AndreaPalladio 1508-1580: ThePorticoandTheFarmyardLondon, 1975), 268with cat. no. 498, considers the two men "certainlyin touch with eachother in 1554."28. Compare Serlio's reaction, cited in Burns, "I disegni," 137, toanother late Roman bath complex, the Baths of Diocletian. Serlio de-cided not to sketch the Baths because, he said, they were badly ruined,hard to measure, and not the work of good architects.

Palladio, Roman Thermae

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