SERMARTELLI Michelangelo Alcune composizioni di diversi autori in lode del ritratto della Sabina, Scolpito in Marmo dall’Eccellentissimo M. Giovanni Bologna, posto nella piazza del Serenissimo Grand Duca di Toscana.

USTC 805784 ; Mortimer, Italian, II, 478 ; Cicognara, I, 1016 ; Thieme-Becker, IV, pp. 249, 252.

First edition, never reprinted. One of the most important books in the history of sculpture.

Exceptional copy with the first section (the preface) in its original condition, with printing errors corrected in brown ink, which are also found corrected in the British Library copy. This variation in condition has not been noted in bibliographies to date.

Eager to distinguish himself on the Florentine art scene, Giambologna wanted to prove his skill by arranging three figures in balance in a vertical spinning movement and created a work that was to be viewed from different angles. The sculptural group depicts a young man lifting a young girl in his arms, but during his act, the man is blocked by an old man between his legs. The work, which reaches a height of 4 metres, was sculpted by the artist from a single block of marble in 1583 and, in addition to being a masterpiece of Italian Mannerism, it can boast of being the first in the history of European sculpture to be designed without a dominant viewpoint: the observer can appreciate its beauty from multiple angles. The effect is created by the spiral movement of the figures and the irregularity between the large masses and the voids. When it was completed, the marble sculpture aroused the admiration of Grand Duke Francis I of Tuscany, who had it placed in the Loggia dei Lanzi, replacing Donatello’s Judith and pairing it with Benvenuto Cellini’s statue of Perseus.

It was the scholar Vicenzo Borghini who suggested giving the statue its current title, The Rape of the Sabine Women, inspired by the famous episode in Roman history.

Giambologna (1529-1608) was the greatest Italian Mannerist sculptor. This monumental sculpture, which he created, is considered by Henry Ogden Avery to be ‘the pinnacle of his career as a marble sculptor’ (Avery Architectural Library).

Bernardo Vecchietti (1514-1590), Giambologna’s famous patron, financed the publication of this book in October 1583. The work includes poems praising the sculptor’s masterpiece. They were written by Vincenzo Alamanni (1536-1590), the Medici ambassador to the French court, Bernardo Vecchietti, Bernardo Davanzati (1529-1606), translator of Tacitus, Cosimo Gaci (1550-1619), poet who translated the works of Teresa of Ávila, the knight Gualtieri, poet from Arezzo, Piero di Gherardo Capponi, etc.

Illustration

The book is illustrated with three full-page engravings, two of which show the sculpture from two different angles, and one showing a detailed view of the famous Piazza della Signoria with the new sculpture installed alongside the existing ones.

USTC has located only 11 institutional copies of this rare original edition. Well represented in Italian libraries (6 copies, including one in the Vatican), it has located 2 in France (BnF), 2 in the United Kingdom (BL and Bodleian), and only 1 in the United States (NYPL).

Minor stains.

Provenance: Bernard Malle (discreet stamp on the last flyleaf) – Alain Moatti (bookplate).