Patria, papal service and patronage: Nicolb Bonafede at Monte San Giusto in the Marches
1993; Wiley; Volume: 7; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1111/j.1477-4658.1993.tb00273.x
ISSN1477-4658
Autores Tópico(s)Renaissance and Early Modern Studies
ResumoRenaissance StudiesVolume 7, Issue 2 p. 184-206 Patria, papal service and patronage: Nicolb Bonafede at Monte San Giusto in the Marches Louisa C. Matthew, Louisa C. Matthew Union College, SchenectadySearch for more papers by this author Louisa C. Matthew, Louisa C. Matthew Union College, SchenectadySearch for more papers by this author First published: June 1993 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1477-4658.1993.tb00273.xAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onEmailFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat reference 1 R. F. E. Weissman, ‘ Reconstructing Renaissance sociology: the ’Chicago School‘ and the study of Renaissance society’, in Persons m Groups: Social Behavior as Identity Formation in Medieval and Renaissance Europe, ed. R. C. Trexler( Binghamton , 1985), 39–46. The author argues persuasively that ‘a more appropriate unit of analysis for studying Renaissance society is neither the individual nor the group, but rather, the “social relationship” that links individuals to each other and to groups' (p. 40). Google Scholar 2 The significance and complexity of personal associations has been amply demonstrated in studies of Renaissance Florence, for which see D. V. Kent and F. W. Kent, Neighbours and Neighbourhoods in Renaissance Florence: The District of the Red Lion in the Fifteenth Century(Locust Valley, N.Y., 1982), and F. W. Kent, ‘Ties of neighbourhood and patronage in Quattrocento Florence’, in.Patronage, Art and Society in Renaissance Italy, ed. F. W. Kent and P. Simons (Oxford, 1987), 79–98. Google Scholar 3 B. Zenobi, Ceti e potere nella Marca pontificia: formazione e organizzazione delta piccola nobiltà fra ‘500 e ’700(Bologna, 1976). Google Scholar 4 See Zenobi, Ceti e potere, 1S-14, 20-1 for a discussion of the juridical and historical bases of power wielded by the various political entities in the Marches. For the history of the Marches in the Renaissance period see most recently D. Hay and J. Law, Italy in the Age of the Renaissance 1380–1530 (London and New York, 1989), M. Caravale and A. Caracciolo, Stato pontifico nell'età modema in Storia ?Italia (Turin, 1978), and for the medieval background, P. Partner, The Lands of St. Peter (London, 1972). Google Scholar 5 My thanks to L. Nussdorfer for sharing with me her knowledge of papal government. Google Scholar 6 The minutes of the communal councils from this period frequently mention issues involving appeals. See, for example, M. Leopardi, Annali di Recanati con leggie costumiantichi Recanatesi e memorie di Loreto(Recanati, 1945), 31ff. Google Scholar 7 For information on the Bonafede family see M. Leopardi, Vita di Nicolò Bonafede Vescovo di Chiusi(Pesaro, 1832), Dizionario biografico degli Italiani, Il (Rome, 1969), 492-5, and Zenobi, Ceti e potere, 315. Leopardi uses the term ‘podestà’ to refer to Tomaso Bonafede's political service in Monte San Giusto (p. 1). If Leopardi used the term correctly, it may be that Tomaso brought his family to Monte San Giusto after serving as podestà, since the occupant of that office was normally brought in from outside the commune. Google Scholar 8 Zenobi, Ceti e potere, 279. The author observes that status was defined by offices and duties performed in the public sphere rather than only by inherited wealth as was more the case in later centuries. Google Scholar 9 Monte San Giusto, Archivio Storico Communale, B. 4. Registro 1523-24, fols. 2v-3 and ibid., Libro di Riformaiae 1521–1528, fob. 1, 20 and 49v. Google Scholar 10 Leopardi, Vita. Leopardi's biography is a transcription of the MS complied c. 1650 by Pietro Bongiovanni, Vita di Nicolò Bonafede de Sancto Justo Juris Utriusque Consultiss. Vescovo di Chiusi et del Sacro Imprrio Conte, which ends with the year 1522, to which Leopardi added information for the years until Bonafede's death in 1534. I located Leopardi's transcription in manuscript form in the library at the Casa Leopardi in Recanati, but was unable to locate Bongiovanni's MS. My thanks to Contessa Leopardi for allowing me to consult the library. Google Scholar 11 Chiusi is located south-east of Pienza on the eastern border of Tuscany and the present-day province of the Marches. Pius II separated Pienza and Montalcino from Chiusi into a separate diocese on IS August 1462. C. R. Mack, Pienza: The Creation of a Renaissance City(Ithaca, N.Y. and London, 1987), 199 n. 1. Google Scholar 12 Monte San Giusto, Archivio Storico Communale, Libra di Riformanze 1527–1528, fol. 58 (February 1528) and fol. 137 (December 1527-January 1528). Mallett has characterized Renaissance warfare in the following manner: ‘The objects of military aggressors were devastation and the capture of small, isolated strongholds, and these were countered by strengthening the strongholds and providing refuges for the population of the ravaged countryside.’ M. E. Mallett, Mercenaries and Their Masters: Warfare in Renaissance Italy (London, 1974), 165. Google Scholar 13 J. Woods-Marsden, ‘Images of castles in the Renaissance: symbols of “signoria”/symbols of tyranny’, Art J, 48(1989), 130ff. She discusses castles (‘fortresses’), but I would suggest that walled towns were as easily associated with local autonomy and identity as was the self-contained castle. 10.2307/776962 Web of Science®Google Scholar 14 For a stimulating revision of the relationship of art and politics in Lorenzetti's frescos see. Q. Skinner, ‘ Ambrogio Lorenzetti: the artist as political philosopher’, P Br Acad, 72 (1986), 1–56. Google Scholar 15 In his study of local rulers in Perugia, also under papal authority, Black notes that ‘pater patriae’ as a term of praise referred to the role of the guardian of a city, not its ruler, as it was applied, for example, to Malatesta Baglioni for his military exploits in defence of the city. C. F. Black, ‘The Baglioni as tyrants of Perugia, 1488–1540’, The Engl Hist R, 85(1970), 277. Google Scholar 16 For an overview of the issue in Florence, see F. W. Kent, ‘ Palaces, politics and society in fifteenth century Florence’, in I Tatti Studies: Essays m the Renaissance (Florence, 1985), II, 41–70. Giovanni Pontano is cited by both Q. Skinner, The Foundations of Modem Political Thought. I. The Renaissance (Cambridge, 1978), 127 and Goldthwaite in Kent and Simons, Patronage, Art and Society, 165-8. See also the fourth book of Baldassare Castiglione, The Courtier, trans. G. Bull (Harmondsworth, 1967), 481ff. Google Scholar 17 The document is a copy of an ‘instrument of donation’ dated 21 July 1512, Fermo, Biblioteca Communale, Manoscritti, 4.DD.2/XLI n. 1939. It contains most of the arrangements conventionally included in a will. Bonafede's official will has not been located. Google Scholar 18 Fermo, Archivio di Stato, Archivio Priorale, 1504, n. 1486. Google Scholar 19 Bonafede was acquainted with the Duke of Urbino by 1506, for which see the discussion of his military career below. For Federigo's earlier patronage see C. H. Clough, ‘ Federigo da Montefeltro's patronage of the arts’,J Warburg C, 56 (1973), 139. Pius II's first plan for Pienza, which he mentions in his Commentarii, was to erect two new buildings, a palace and a church. Mack, Pienza, 36-8. Google Scholar 20 According to Leopardi, Bonafede helped rally support among the cardinals for the election of Pius III. He would have had other opportunities to become acquainted with the Piccolomini, including the time he served as nunzio to Siena for Alexander VI in 1503. Leopardi, Vita, 44 and 56. Also, Cardinal Todeschini-Piccolomini had been appointed Cardinal-Protector of the diocese of Fermo, the diocese that included Monte San Giusto, in 1485. F. Eubel, Hierarchia catholica medii aevi (Regensburg, 1901), II, 171. Google Scholar 21 See Mack, Pienza, 35 and 55, who refers to H. Saalman, ‘Tommaso Spinelli, Michelozzo, Manettiand Rossellino’, JS Archit, 25 (1966), 151–64. For the Palazzo Ducale see P. Rotondi, The Ducal Palace of Urbino: Its Architecture and Decoration (London, 1969), pi. 511-16 that illustrate capitals from room no. 45 built c. 1466-7. The author sees noticeable Tuscan influence in this early section of the palace for which see 16ff. Google Scholar 22 See notes 21 and 34. Google Scholar 23 The description of the palace in Leopardi recalls Rome specifically, describing it as a tower ovvero altana secondo l'uso dei palazzi di Roma‘. Leopardi, Vita, 185. The tower visible in late nineteenth-century photographs of Monte San Giusto is smaller than the original structure, which Brillarelli claims appears in a seventeenth-century painted view of the city reproduced in L. Brillarelli, La terra di San Giusto (n.p., 1975), 50. Google Scholar 24 The similarities between Urbino and Nicholas V's Vatican palace are discussed in C. W. Westfall, ‘ Chivalric decoration: the Palazzo Ducale in Urbino as a political statement’, in Art and Architecture in the Service of Politics, ed. H. A. Millon and L. Nochlin (Cambridge, Mass. and London, 1978), 38. For the papacy's use of family coats of arms and inscriptions, first promoted by Nicholas V, see D. Hay, The Church in Italy in the Fifteenth Century (Cambridge, 1977), 40-1 where he cites further bibliography. See also note IS. Google Scholar 25 For the fifteenth-century Roman palace architecture see particularly P. Tomei, Ľarchitettura a Roma net Quattrocento(Rome, 1977 reprint of 1942 edn), T. Magnuson, Studies in Roman Quattrocento Architecture (Stockholm, 1958), C. W. Westfall, In This Most Perfect Paradise: Alberti, Nicholas V, and the Invention of Conscious Urban Planning m Rome, 1447-ii (University Park, Pa, 1974), D. R. Coffin, The Villa in the Life of Renaissance Rome (Princeton, N.J., 1979), and D. S. Chambers, “The housing problem of Cardinal Francesco Gonzaga‘, J Warburg C, S9 (1976), 21–58. Another significant model in Rome was the papal palace at the Vatican, which was undergoing significant remodeling during the reigns of Alexander VI and Julius II. Google Scholar 26 Tomei, Ľarchitettura, fig. 27. There are differences in individual elements such as the two doors and the bifora windows at one end of the Palazzo Capranica. Google Scholar 27 Leopardi, Vita, 10ff, Macerata, Biblioteca Communale, MS 1262 Miscellanea XXVIII, and M. Morpurgo-Castelnuovo, ‘Il Cardinale Domenico Capranica’, Deputazione romana di storia patria. Archivio, 52, 1929, 102-3. The latter author also notes the detailed accuracy of Leopardi's source and agrees with his conclusion that it was in part autobiographical. See note 34. At the Collegio Bonafede would have received a conservative training in canon law and theology and probably not have received much exposure to the newer humanist learning. For a discussion of the education of the clergy see D. Hay, ‘Italian clergy and Italian culture in the fifteenth century’, The Society for Renaissance Studies. Occasional Papers No. 1 (London, 1973). Google Scholar 28 Leopardi's biographer describes it as ‘un palazzo magnifico degno di stare in Roma per alloggio, e cone de’ principi e cardinali‘. Leopardi, Vita, p. 115. The palace fits well within the conventions dictated by Cortesi for the ideal Cardinal's palace in De cardinalatu, published in 1510, including its site ’in the heart of town‘, a square court with loggie, stairs with landings at one corner of the court (at Monte San Giusto to the left after entering), the use of brick with travertine trim (here a less grand grey stone), and a general appearance more mighty and opulent than modest. Cortesi's description is phrased as a set of guidelines, and Bonafede's palace certainly deviates in many respects, most notably the lack of colonnades on the upper storey of the court. See K. Weil-Garris and J. F. d'Amico, The Renaissance Cardinal's Ideal Palace: A Chapter from Cortesi's ’De Cardinalatu‘ 2nd edn (Rome, 1980). Google Scholar 29 Each inscription is divided in two by the coat of arms: an ecclesiastical hat with tassels above a shield with the Bonafede lion. The low, wide-brimmed hat with chords and tassels was originally used only by cardinals (from 1245), but by the sixteenth century was also used by lower ecclesiastical orders, which were differentiated by the numbers of tassels and the colour of the hat worn or used in a coat of arms. See The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York, 1910), vol. VII, ‘Heraldry’. A number of the windows on this facade have been altered and at least one removed. Google Scholar 30 Angelucci suggests a starting date of 1505 based on his reading of the 1512 document, which states only that Bonafede had demolished the houses on the site before becoming bishop in 1504. G. Angelucci, La stanza del Vescovo Niccolò Bonafede Monte San Giusto, 1987), 5–6. Google Scholar 31 The original reads as follows: NICOLAUS BONAFIDES V IL CON EPS CLUSINUS SEAP LEGATIQIBUS MILITUM SEPIUS AC DEMUM INGALLOS PLURIMAR PROVINCIAR[um] BONONIEROMQ, GUBERNATIONE HONORIFICE FVNCTVS QVIETPPROPRIE ET POSTEROR[um] COMODITATI EDES HAS EREXIT 8DIRUTIS DOMVNCVLIS DECORIS CLATERIBUS IN REGIOQ.CAMPO DECORAVIT X KL NOVEMB MDXIII. I have reproduced the inscription here with as close a resemblance as possible to the original. The letters within brackets are my only additions and represent a cross bar on the tail of each letter R. My thanks to Dr John Osborne and Dr Peter Smith for their help with deciphering the inscription. Google Scholar 32 The inscription reads: NBOFI EPSCLV MRCHIE VICELNE ROMANDIOLEQ, PRESIDIS DIGNITATE FVNCTIS AC ARIMINO PVLSISTIRANNIS SEDI APCE RESTITVTO POSVIT DIE XIII AVGVSTI MCCCCCXXIIII. See Leopardi, Vita, 32, for a brief discussion of the events. Google Scholar 33 Leopardi, Vita, 193 and Macerata, Biblioceca Communale, MS 534, Di varie famiglieforestieri I, fasc. VII, ‘Appunti sulla vita di Nicoló Bonafede da S. Giusto’, fols. 78–82. Google Scholar 34 Leopardi, Vita, 89–110, where it is stated that Bonafede's recommendation and the meeting of the allies occurred in Perugia. This is confirmed by L. Pastor, Storia deipapi dallafine del medioevo (Rome. 1959), III, 710. He writes that Julius II arrived on 13 September to meet with the Duke of Urbino, and the Marquis of Mantua arrived on 17 September and stayed for eight days. The account of Bonafede's participation in the Bologna campaigns in Leopardi is quite specific and conforms in all details of place and date with Pastor's account, as do all other military campaigns described. This lends credence to Leopardi's claim that Bonafede's biographer received his information either from Bonafede himself or had access to an autobiographical account. See also note 28. Google Scholar 35 Leopardi, Vita, 115–20. Google Scholar 36 Ibid. 123–63. Giovanni de Medici (‘delle Bande Nere’) was not present and his troops were led by his capo Paolo Ciasca. Leopardi's biography provides a detailed description of Bonafede's role in the battle, which is especially useful because so little evidence exists for the role of commissary generals and other high officials in actual battles. After formulating the battle strategy with his officers and overseeing the deployment of the troops, Bonafede, on horseback, addressed the assembled multitude with a ‘stirring speech’. After the speech he retired a little behind the lines with fifty halbediers ‘so as not to cause confusion during the battle’. See 152-4. The general outlines of the event are confirmed in Pastor, the only place in his account where Bonafede is mentioned by name, vol. iv, (1960), 288-89 and by records of the communal council of Fermo from 1520 in Fermo, Archivio di Stato, Archivio Storico del Comune di Fermo, transcribed and summarized by ‘Marini’ in a useful MS available at the archive, fols. 418-20. See also ‘Cronache della città di Fermo’ in Oocumenti di storia itaUana, Deputazione di storia patria per le provincie di Toscana, dell'Umbria e delle Marche, 4 (1870), 255–61, and G. de Minicis, Biografia di Ludovico Euffreducci (Rome, 1840). Google Scholar 37 Leopardi, Vita, 159–63. In addition to the communal records cited in the previous note, see Macerata, Biblioteca Communale, MS 534 for an inscription on the city gate where Bonafede entered Fermo after his victory. Google Scholar 38 Very little is known about his activities as bishop aside from the most general mention in Leopardi of his concern for the proper exercise of his pastoral responsibilities. see C. Eubel, Hierarchta catholica medii aew‘(Patavii, 1960), HI, 171, and Archivio Segreto Vaticano, Schedario Garampi, XLII, ’Vescovi‘, fols. 110v-111, where the transfer of another bishop to the diocese of Chiusi on 13 January 1534 seems to confirm the accuracy of Leopardi's death date for Bonafede of 6 January 1534. Google Scholar 39 Leopardi, Vita. 184. Google Scholar 40 It seems less likely that the mention of the demolition in the inscription was a defensive reaction to criticism raised by uprooting families from their homes, as was Leopardi's insistence that proper remuneration was provided. Any concern for the displacement of those who previously lived on the site would have been mitigated by the fact that at least some of the property already belonged to the family. However, given the ‘almost sacred’ regard for family houses mentioned by Kent, it is surprising how easily that author dismisses the implications of dislocation for those whose family property turned out to be less important. Kent, ‘Palaces, politics and society’, 47 and 55. Google Scholar 41 According to the description in Leopardi, one passed through the courtyard to arrive at the orto pensile‘, but no orientation is given. Leopardi, Vita, 184-5. Enough of the original carved and painted wooden ceilings and fresco decoration have survived to merit a separate study, and length precludes any discussion here. For the decoration of one particularly interesting room on the ground floor see Angelucci, La stanza.. Google Scholar 42 For Domenico della Rovere's garden see David R. Coffin, Gardens and Gardening in Papal Rome(Princeton, N.J., 1991), 12. Google Scholar 43 Described in Leopardi, Vita, 185-6 where the dimensions are given as 40 piedion each side. See Brillarelli, La terra, 80-2 and Coffin, The Villa, 63–110 for a discussion of suburban villas in the Roman context. Google Scholar 44 Coffin, The Villa, ch. 1–3 and Coffin, Gardens and Gardening.. Google Scholar 45 Weissman, ‘ Reconstructing Renaissance sociology’ and Kent, ‘Palaces, politics and society’, who observes that Florentines ‘could find precious little peace and privacy in their … palaces, where clients beseiged them and all eyes were upon them’, econstructing Renaissance sociology‘ and Kent, ’Palaces, politics and society‘, who observes that Florentines ’could find precious little peace and privacy in their … palaces, where clients beseiged them and all eyes were upon them‘,’, 61–2 and 69–70. Google Scholar 46 Camillo's recognition by Julius II is referred to in the 1512 property arrangements according to which Camillo is to inherit all of his father's property. See note 18 for the document. Google Scholar 47 In his discussion of the sacredness of family houses Kent reasserts the importance of lineage in the symbolism of palace building as a corrective to Goldthwaite's claim that Renaissance palaces were symbols of a newly nuclear family structure. Kent, Palaces, politics and society‘, 44-8. Google Scholar 48 For a particularly well-balanced account of nepotism in the Renaissance papacy see M. Mallett, The Borgias(London, 1971). Google Scholar 49 In 1512 he was still not of age and a student in Perugia where his father had also studied in his youth. In 1520 he participated in his father's military campaign against Euffreducci after which he was made an honorary citizen of Fermo. Document of 1512 and ‘Marini’ at Fermo, Archivio di Stato, cited in note S6. Google Scholar 50 The document is cited in note 18. The grant was made before Bonafede was made a bishop because he is described only as notary and governor. The church is described as ‘vacantem’ and may well not have been in operation as a parish at the time of the grant. It is not mentioned in the communal records extant for the years 1523-4 or 1527, but it is mentioned as ‘Ste. Me. Talusiani’ in an entry dated Christmas 1528 under expenses incurred by the commune for candles for the feast of the Nativity. Monte San Giusto, Archivio Storico Communale, Libro di Riformanze 1527–1528, fol. 202v. Google Scholar 51 The church was rededicated on 12 September 1529 according to G. de Minicis, ‘Sopra un dipinto di Lorenzo Lotto’, Monumenti d Fermo, 8 (1841), 266-7 n. 9. He mentions as his source'old parish records' but gives no citation or location. A more recent author, whose information is usually undocumented, states that Bonafede rebuilt the church ‘from its foundations’, which could mean a complete interior renovation rather than a demolition and rebuilding. G. Cicconi, Per un insigne opera di arte - la ‘Crocefissione’ di Lorenzo Lotto in Monte San Giusto (Fermo, 1923), 5–6. An inventory of the church dated 1781 associates the renovation with the year 1524, see Fermo, Archivio Vescovile, B. Inventory di 1728, 1768 e 177 … Collina S. Giusta, fasc. ‘Invent. 1781’. Google Scholar 52 A pastoral visit of 15S6 lists property owned by Camillo providing income for the chapel of S. Caterina, and property of ‘Matteo’ endowing the chapel of S. Bernardino. Fermo, Archivio Vescovile, Visite Pastorali, B. II P/2 1536, fols. 2–3. Pastoral visits in the 1530s and 1540s list six altars in addition to the high altar. The ‘Rev. et dominus Thymalion Bonafides’, presumably a relative, is listed as a canon in the pastoral visit of 1541-2. Ibid. B. P/5, fols. 57r-v‘. Google Scholar 53 For the description see Fermo, Biblioteca Communale, Manoscritti 4.DD.2/XLI n. 939. The two vessels were a chalice and a paten, each with eighteen small roundels (‘tondini’) in silver with black enamel depicting the life of the Virgin and the Passion of Christ and coats of arms of Bonafede. The paten was also decorated with a ‘figura della Pietà. There is a small wooden statue of the Pieta (Christ lying across his mother's lap), still in the church, that appears to date from the fifteenth century, if not earlier, but I have found no information about how long it has been in the church. Google Scholar 54 His plans are revealed in the document of 1512. The project was to be overseen by a friar from the Observant monastery of the Annunciation near Fermo and the site is described as ‘in agro ipsius donatoris posito in Terra St. Justi iuxta vinea magnam ipsius donatoris’, which may mean that it was close to Bonafede's casino. I have found no evidence that the project was carried out. Google Scholar Volume7, Issue2June 1993Pages 184-206 ReferencesRelatedInformation
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