A Description of the Sistine Chapel under Pope Sixtus IV

Author(s): John Monfasani

Source: Artibus et Historiae, Vol. 4, No. 7 (1983), pp. 9-18
Published by: IRSA s.c.
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JOHN MONFASANI

A Description of the Sistine Chapel under Pope Sixtu

The known documentation concerning the completion

in the Chapel for the first time4. Since one would expec

of the Sistine Chapel under Pope Sixtus IV is relatively

pope to have waited for the feast of the Assumption to

sparse'. We still do not know for certain when work onthe

thefirst mass said, Gherardi gives us a terminus ante qu

Chapel was begun and when it was completed2. Thebut

connot the date of completion5. Previously, he had
temporary chronicler, lacopo Gherardi, records that
the
mentioned
the Chapel twice in 1481 to say that work
pope attended vespers in the Chapel on 9 August 14833
andon there6. Of the literary sources, the two un
going

that about a week later, on the feast of the Patroness of

the of Aurelio Brandolini are too vague to be help
poems

Chapel, the Assunta, 15 August 1483, mass was celebrated

while the description in Sigismondo de' Conti's Histor
I wrote this article while a fellow of the Leopold Schepp

4 Ibid., lines 16-18.

Foundation and of Villa I Tatti, the Harvard Center for Renaissance

5 It is worthwhile noting that Gherardi does not say that the

pope blessed, dedicated, or consecrated the Chapel on the feast of
the Assumption 1483. This is quite odd. For even though the pre1 After the standard work of E. Steinmann, Die Sixtinische
Sixtine chapel was already dedicated to the Assunta (the miniature
Kappelle, 2 vols., Munich, 1901-1905, 1, p. 117 sq., the more recent
discovered by Shearman proves this; see note 41 below), an ancient
discussions of the building of the Chapel are D. Redig de Campos,
I
canon
requires that 'si motum fuerit altare, denuo consecretur
Palazzi Vaticani, Bologna, 1967, p. 64 sq.; R. Salvini, E. Camesasca,
ecclesia; si parietes mutantur et non altare, salibus tantum exorC.L. Ragghianti, La Cappella Sistina in Vaticano, 2 vols., Milan,
cizetur' (Gratian's Decretum, c. 19, D. I de cons., eds. A. Richter and
1965, 1, p. 123 sq. (Camesasca's Appendice); L.D. Ettlinger, The SisA. Friedberg, Leipzig, 1879, repr. Graz, 1959, p. 1299). Even if the
tine Chapel Before Michelangelo, Oxford, 1965, p. 12 sq.; and J.
altar was not moved, the walls of the Chapel were certainly knocked
Shearman, Raphael's Cartoons in the Collection of Her Majesty the
down. In any case, the Chapel was already being used for the divine
Queen and the Tapestries for the Sistine Chapel, London, 1972, p. 3
office before the feast of the Assumption.
Studies, Florence. To Richard Sherr I owe not only help but also the
initial impulse to write.

6 See notes 33 and 34 below.

sq.

2 1 am doing no more than repeating the old complaint of

E. Mintz, Les arts B la cour des papes pendant le XVe e le XVle

7 Redig de Campos, I Palazzi Vaticani, p. 64, dates the first

the two poems to 1477 but without any evidence, perhaps be
of an inattentive reading of Steinmann, I, p. 123. For the verse

siecle, III, Paris, 1882, p. 136.

3 11 Diario romano di Jacopo Gherardi da Volterra, ed. E.
now G. De Luca, 'Un umanista fiorentino e la Roma rinnovata da
Carusi, Rerum Italicarum Scriptores, XXIII. 3, CittL di Castello, 1904, Sisto IV,' La Rinascita, I (1933), pp. 75-90, at pp. 85-86.
p. 121-23 sq.
9

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demonstrably written after Sixtus' death8. Robert Flemmyng's Lucubraciunculae Tiburtinae of ca. 1477 at least
provides a terminus post quem for the construction of the
Chapel since it prophesies how beautiful the Chapel will
look once completed9. The most important documentary
evidence concerns the fresco paintings in the Chapel 10. In a

Chapel by Andreas Trapezuntius. At the very least, Andr

provides the earliest detailed description of the Chapel
hitherto known. Depending on how one dates it and how
much credence one gives to it, Andreas' account may a
significantly affect our understanding of the history of th
Chapel.

contract of 27 October 1481 Sandro Botticelli, Domenico

Ghirlandaio, Perugino, and Cosimo Rosselli committed

themselves to completing prout inceptum est ten istorie
with their painted tapestries below before 15 March 1482 or
suffer a penalty of fifty ducats for every contravention. Later,Andreas Trapezuntius was one of Pope Sixtus IV's

two private secretaries16. He himself never amounted to

in a compromissum of 17 January 1482, the same four
much as a humanist, having, as far as I can tell, only an
painters agreed to a price of 250 ducats for each of the
opuscule in the Plato-Aristotle controversy and some letters
quattuor prime istorie facte in cappella maiori along with
their attendant wall tapestries and papal portraits. and
Butprefaces to his credit17. His father, however, Georgius
these documents are not without their ambiguities. Are
Trapezuntius, or, as he is usually called, George of Trebizond, played an important role in the history of Renaisthe ten wall scenes specified in the contract of 27 October
sance humanism '. Inter alia he translated Ptolemy's
1481 the last ten of the sixteen originally found in the
Almagest and wrote a massive commentary on the sam
Chapel, as Steinmann", Camesasca12, and Ettlinger13

finished both works in December 1451, but the conbelieve, or the first ten, as Groner vigorously argued 14. George
Nor

troversy surrounding the commentary triggered a chain of

do the documents speak of Luca Signorelli, who, Vasari
says, painted the last two scenes in the Moses cycle15. events which resulted in his temporarily being forced out o

Rome and thereafter being engaged in a running battle with

In this paucity of evidence I thought it would be useful
to bring to the attention of art historians a description of one
the of the great figures of Quattrocento Italy, Cardina

covered
and edited by H. Pogatscher in Steinmann, I, p. 634,
8 Storie de' suoi tempi dal 1475 al 1510, 2 vols., Rome, 1833,
1,
reedited
by Ettlinger, pp. 122-123. The documents are in the re
p. 205. Ettlinger, p. 23, is wrong to speak of Conti's reference
to
ter Obligat. et Solut. 79A, ff. 15r-17r, of the Archivio Segreto V
Perugino's painting of the Virgin over the altar as being of 1482.
cano.
Conti's description of the Chapel is part of his review of Sixtus'
11 Steinmann, pp. 188-189.
accomplishments after the point in his Storia where he reports
Sixtus' death.
12 Camesasca, Appendice to La Cappella Sistina,
13 Ettlinger, p. 16 sq.
9 Despite the date of 5 December 1477 in the colophon to the
14 'Zur Entstehungsgeschichte der Sixtinischen Wan
second part of Flemmyng's poem, the final date of the whole work
Zeitschrift
fur Christliche Kunst, an. 1906, cols. 164-170, 193-202,
is problematic. The incunabulum (Hain 7130) shows clear signs
of
author's revisions in the first part in comparison to the text227-230,
in the especially parts I and II of the article.
15 See Le Vite, ed. R. Bettarimi, II, Florence, 1971, p. 638. On
codex unicus, MS Vienna Nationalbibliothek, lat. 2403, which carries almost the identical colophon. Flemmyng's praise of the future Signorelli see C. Kury, The Early Work of Luca Signorelli: 1465beauty of the Sistine Chapel is in the first part of the poem (see V. 1490, New York, 1978.
Pacifici, Un Carme biografico di Sisto IV del 1477, Tivoli, [1923], p.
16 The other - and more important - private secretary was
26). For an excellent discussion of the problems see A. Campana,
'Roma di Sisto IV. Le Lucubraciunculae Tiburtinae di Robert FlemLeonardus Griffus. See W. Hofmann, Forschungen zur Geschichte
myng,' Strenna dei romanisti, [IX] (1948), pp. 88-89. I myselfder
suskurialen Beh6rden vom Schisma bis zur Reformation, 2 vols.,
Rome, 1914 (repr. Turin, 1971), II, p. 123.
pect that the original reference to the librarian of the Vatican library
in the poem was always to Platina, even before Flemmyng revised
17 See my George of Trebizond: A Biography and a Study of
and expanded it. See also R. Weiss, Humanism in England during
His Rhetoric and Logic, Leiden, 1976, pp. 115-116, 139, 216, 236,
the Fifteenth Century, 3rd ed., Oxford, 1967, p. 101.
and passim. I edit Andreas' letters and prefaces in Collectanea
10 The contract was discovered by D. Gnoli, 'Contratto per
gli
Trapezuntiana,
Binghamton, New York, forthcoming in 1983, pp.
777-804. His contribution to the Plato-Aristotle controversy will apaffreschi nelle pareti laterali della Cappella Sistina', Archivio storico
pear I,
in my forthcoming edition of the Latin texts of the controversy.
dell'arte, VI (1893), pp. 128-129, and reedited by Steinmann,
18 See the first reference in the previous note.
p. 633; and Ettlinger, pp. 120-121. The agreement on price was dis10

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Bessarion 19. George had once formed part of the Bessarion

circle at Rome; so too had Francesco della Rovere, O.F.M.,
the future Sixtus IV20. Indeed, della Rovere's rise in the Curia

owed not a little to the patronage of Bessarion. When della

Rovere became pope in 1471, Andreas Trapezuntius had
already been a papal secretary for a number of years, succeeding his father in the post despite, according to George,
Bessarion's opposition21. Bessarion died in 1472, George
that year or soon after22. So neither was probably around
when Sixtus chose Andreas as his private secretary23.
Whether either of these two Greek 6migr6s would have
appreciated the irony of such a choice is a moot question.
In any case, the text that concerns us here is Andreas'
preface to Sixtus, dedicating precisely his father's commentary on the Almagest 24. As Andreas states25, the year before

he had dedicated to Sixtus his father's translation of the

Almagest26. One can still leaf through the sumptuous presen-

tation copies of both dedications at the Vatican27. To be

sure, in writing the prefaces, Andreas did not lose the opportunity of vindicating his father against their old nemesis,

Bessarion. Nor did he omit speaking about the works he

was dedicating. But, as one would expect, large portions of
both prefaces were given over to the exaltation of the dedi-

catee, Sixtus IV. Describing Sixtus' achievements as a

builder in the second preface, Andreas reached the Sistine
Chapel28:

adiiceretur, funditus diruisti, dignissimum excitasti, novum atque admirabile tanto studio et celeritate in maxi-

mo illo contra Florentinos bello absolvisti ut parietibus

quoque interioribus auleis auroque vestitis et cancellis

inauratis, transversa marmora illa sculptilia decurrentibus, in admirabilitatem videntibus cedat. Tanta enim mu-

rorum amplitudo, tanta ipsius testudinis laxitas et latitu-

do, tanta religiosorum ornamentorum copia et pulcritudo est ut quamvis absolutum omni ex parte homines intueantur, absolvi tamen in tantis erarii angustiis potuisse
non credant. Addidisti picturam utriusque legis, paribus
redditam figuris, pulchritudine, suavitate, ac omni artis
felicitate plenam ut non adumbrata et muta, sed viventia
et pene spirantia corpora penitillo videantur. lactet Grecia summe illam tenuitatis lineam ex colore per tabulam
ductam miraculo extitisse. Quid cum linea una? At hec

incrustata pictura non unius, sed infinitarum in eadem

tabula linearum, ubi non modo diversarum in uno est

corpore linearum artificiosa designatio, sed colores pre

terea suaves et appositi ut iam iam loqui illa et non hu-

mana manu facta, sed celo delapsa videatur, quandoquidem omnis picture ratio et ars perfecta ibi atque ab-

soluta prestetur ac, quod omnium in pictura difficillimum

est, extremitatum ad totius corporis figuram ingeniosa et

consummata conformatio. Stravisti quicquid in sacello

soli est non vulgari materia, ut populariter erat, sed
marmore minutato arteque tectoria ut quid in eo potissimum efferatur obstupescamus. Laudet nunc mihi antiquitas luxuriosa assaretis pavimenta vermiculata vel ab
inventore Zenodaro Pergami strata. Nonne huius tui sacelli pavimentum testulis non quidem coctilibus sed

marmoreis et versicoloribus, tanto artificio mirifice distinctis ac inter sese tortuosis recursibus ad venustatem
flexilibus, omne artificum ingenium iudicio omnium facile superat?

Tu sacellum in apostolico palatio, parietibus labenIn rendering these lines I have striven more for accuracy
tibus, tecto tabullato et desidenti, ex parte omni deformato ut vix, immo ne vix quidem, pontificulo Campanie than elegance:

19 George of Trebizond, pp. 73-75, 175-176, and passim, and

blank). The register proves that Andreas acted as the pope's private
Collectanea Trapezuntiana, pp. 671-687.
secretary at least from 1477 onwards, but is not decisive for the
20 For.Sixtus' early career see E. Lee, Sixtus IV and Men of
earlier period.
Letters, Rome, 1978. For a text illustrating Sixtus' earlier member24 Collectanea Trapezuntiana, pp. 796-804.
ship in the Bessarion famiglia overlooked by Lee see G. Vitaletti, II'
25 Ibid., p. 796, sect. (1): 'Cum anno superiore Ptolomei
Bessarione e una derisoria coronazione sul monte Catria', ArAlmaiestum ab... Georgio Trapezuntio, patre meo e Greco converchivum Romanicum, VIII (1924), pp. 268-280.
sum tuo nomini, Xyste, pontifex maxime, dedicassem...'
21 George of Trebizond, p. 191.
26 Ibid., pp. 789-795.
22 Ibid., pp. 234-235; Collectanea Trapezuntiana, Addenda to
27 For a discussion of the manuscripts see ibid., pp. 786, 788these pages in George of Trebizond.
789. The presentation copy of the translation is MS Vatican, Vat. lat.
23 Reg. Vat. 550 of the Archivio Segreto Vaticano bears the
2054; that of the commentary is Vat. lat. 2058.
28 The passage is excerpted from my edition in Collectanea
title, 'Liber bullarum secretarum Sixti 4 apud Trapesuntium' (fol. IIr).
Most of the documents in the register date from 1477-1479; the
last
Trapezuntiana,
pp. 800-801, sects. (25)-(27). For the textual
is dated 1484 (fol. 370v); and there are a few dated 1475-1476,apparatus
but
I refer the reader to this edition. The preface had previthese generally show signs of having been back dated (in many
ously been published by M. Fuiano, 'Astrologia ed umanesimo in
due prefazioni di Andrea Trebisonda' Atti dell'Accademia Ponother bulls of the register the space for the date has been left
taniana..., N. S., XVII (1967-1968), pp. 385-412 at pp. 405-412.
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You completely demolished the chapel in the apos-

tolic palace. With its walls collapsing and its roof falling

down and being supported by scaffolding29, it was so

deformed in every respect that scarsely, indeed not even

scarsely would it be conferred upon a priestling of the

Campania. You [then] raised it up as something most

worthy, completing it new and wonderful with such care

and speed in that supreme war against the Florentines

ments vermiculated or paved with assereta by the inventor [of such pavements] Zenodarus of Pergamum32. But
does not the pavement of your chapel with its marble,
not baked, tiles, and multi-colored ones at that, marvel-

ously and so skilfully arranged, with their complicated,

intertwining swirls, which make for beauty, easily surpass

in the opinion of all every capacity of its makers?

that viewers fall into wonderment before its interior walls

draped in tapestries and gold and its gilded railings

coursing over those transverse marble sculptures. For so

Andreas Trapezuntius wrote a convoluted, recherch6

Latin, but in its main points the text is clear enough. First
and foremost, Andreas is saying that the Chapel was

large is the extent of the walls, so great the width and

breath of the vault, so copious and beautiful the religifinished down to the last detail. Three times he drove this
ous decorations that even though it is in every way completed, nevertheless people do not believe that it could
point home using various forms of the word absolvere
have been completed in such stringent financial cirsolvisti;
absolutum omni ex parte; and absolvi). His flor
cumstances. You added a pictura of both Laws, rendescription
of the pavement unintentionally tends to conf
dered by matching figures, filled with beauty, sweetness, and every felicity of art so that by the work of thethis interpretation. For the tessellated pavement is the par
brush the bodies do not seem painted and mute, but livof the Chapel which one would expect to have been the
ing and almost breathing. Greece brags that there once
was a line of supreme delicacy wonderfully drawn in or one of the last parts done lest it be damaged by the sca
color on a tabula 30. What, just a line? But this pictura is folding and materials used for work on the ceiling, wa
incrusted not with one but with an infinite number of difand floor structures such as the Cancellata. The contempor
ferent lines in the same tabula 31, where not only is there
ary chronicler, lacopo Gherardi33, refers to the Chape
a skilful disposition of lines in one body but also sweet
unfinished at the end of 1481 precisely because the work
and apposite colors so that it now seems to talk and not
to have been done by human hands but to have fallen
installing the pavement and painting the fresco cycle
from heaven and all the more so because it exhibits
still going on continuo 34. He thus proves that the inlayin
every knowledge and perfect art of painting and, what is
the floor constituted a final stage in the decoration of
most difficult of all in painting, an ingenious and consumChapel,
and that this work was going on contemporaneate conformity of the extremities [of the body] to the
shape of the whole body. You have paved the floorously
of the
with the fresco painting, all of which indicates the
chapel not with common material, as is the vulgarpapal
way,
determination in late 1481 to see the Chapel finished
but with miniature marble and [floor-] covering art so
as soon as possible35. More significantly, Andreas mentions
that we are stupified by the powerful impression it
the painted tapestries covering the lowest part of the Chapel
makes. Now antiquity praises to me the luxurious pave-

29 1. e., tabullato. For a clear contemporary instance where the

word is used in the sense of scaffolding or a stand see II Diario

romano di Jacopo Gherardi da Volterra, ed. Carusi, p. 96, line 4:

'tabulata'. Cf. also R. E. Latham, Revised Medieval Latin Word List

from British and Irish Sources, London, 1965: 'tabulla... Scaffold-

plank 1412, 1413'. Du Cange's Glossarium Mediae et Infimae

diximus, nondum sacellum maius est absolutum. Continuo enim

emblemate et pictura ornatur'. Kury, Signorelli, p. 100, n. 47,

suggests that emblema here means the papal arms in gesso on the
two end walls. But the two coats of arms, besides probably not even
having been done in the Chapel but rather carried to it and attached
after having been made elsewhere, really are too trivial for Gherardi

to list - indeed, to put before - the vast program of fresco paintLatinitatis in this instance was not as helpful.
30 Cf. Pliny HN 35.81 1 did not translate tabula because though ing as a cause for the delay in the completion of the Chapel. Emhere, following his source, Andreas means a panel, in the next sen- blema as mosaic work, opus tessellatum, is the dominant meaning
one finds in dictionaries of classical and medieval Latin.
tence he uses the word in a broader sense as any sort of framed
34 Normally continuo would mean 'immediately', but in
painting.
context it can only mean 'continually' or 'without pause'. Ea
31 For tavola (Italian for tabula) as a word applied even to freson, for 11 March 1481, he had used the word quotidie (p. 40. 2coes by Vasari, see Ettlinger, p. 23.
'... quandoque quousque aliud maius [viz., sacellum] erit in32 Cf. Pliny HN 36.184. Andreas is confusing Zenodorus, a
creator of monumental statutes at Rome, with Sosus, named by
stauratum, quod egregio opere et magno sumptu reedificatur
quotidie'.
Pliny as the creator at Pergamum of a new type of floor called
35 There was, of course, no reason why Gherardi should
asaroton oecon ('unswept room'). Misunderstanding the transliterdescribe how the floor mosaicists and the painters shared the
ated Greek, Andreas apparently wrote assaretis in the belief that
Chapel. Perhaps each worked in separate halves of the Chapel and
this was the plural, ablative form of some sort of floor cube or tile.
then switched halves. In any event, the scaffolding for painters
33 Gherardi, pp. 83.34-84.1, for 24 December 1481: 'ut sepe
would have occupied a relatively narrow strip along the walls.
12

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glories of the Chapel, the Cantoria set into the right wall,
January 1482 concerning the painting of the ChapelPerugino's
walls
painting of the Assumption over the altar, and

walls. The well known documents of 27 October 1481 and 17

specify the painting of the tapestries (cortine) as a taskthe

to series
be
of papal portraits in the uppermost register of the

done together with the historical frescoes. The artists

were
walls.
He specifically describes the walls of the Chapel as
paid separately for each scene and the cortina immediately
being painted (parietibus quoque interioribus auleis aubelow it in the same bay. It is, in fact, technically unlikely
reque vestitis), but only calls the ceiling vast in size (tanta
that the artists would have completed the decoration ipsius
of the
testitudinis et latitudo)39. Pointedly, neither he nor
bottom register before turning to the representational any
paintof the other contemporary commentators on the new

ings above. So if Andreas speaks of the painted tapestries

chapel (Brandolini, Conti, Flemmyng, and Gherardi) felt any
covering the Chapel walls, he again is unintentionally
conneed
to compare the Chapel to Solomon's Temple, which is
firming that he saw the Chapel in its final, finished state.
His if, as Battisti argues40. the Sistina was built in constrange
use of the singular, pictura, in reference to the whole fresco
scious imitation of Solomon's Temple. All these contemporcycle of the Sistine Chapel corresponds perfectly with
arythe
writers were knowledgeable members of the papal court
way the word was used apropos the same fresco cycleand
bywould have liked nothing better than to have been able
the document of 27 October 1481, by lacopo Gherardi36,
to praise Sixtus for equalling Solomon if equalling Solomon
and by the contemporary historian, Sigismondo de' Conti
was an important consideration of Sixtus in building the
speaking about Sixtus' constructions after his death37.
The Moreover, Andreas provides some indication that
Chapel.
iconographic program of the fresco cycle is too integrated
the Solomonic proportions Battisti found in the "Sistina"
not to have been planned whole from the start. In any case,
may derive from the original chapel of Pope Nicholas Ill.
as the pope's private secretary at the time, Andreas would
Andreas praises Sixtus for having rebuilt the old chapel, but
certainly have been aware of any further plans for not
thefor having significantly expanded it. Indeed, the miniaChapel and he hardly could have waxed eloquent to ture
the of the pre-Sistine papal chapel first published by
pope on the Chapel's finished appearance had there Shearman
been
bears a striking resemblance to the "Sistina"
large undecorated spaces remaining to be painted. Sowith
it isits large expanse of wall space, mullioned windows,
difficult to escape the conclusion that all the frescoes inand
the
a painting of the Assumption over the altar41.
Chapel, including those of Signorelli, were finished by If
the
one interprets Andreas' Latin sentence structure
time Andreas wrote.

strictly, then he seems to be saying that Sixtus levelled the

old chapel, raised up the new one, and completed it (diruisti... excitasti... absolvisti) during the Florentine War,
which began in July 1478 and ended 3 December 148042.
chapel before Sixtus rebuilt it is no doubt a bit overdone,
Concerning the completion of the Chapel Andreas is debut the reference to scaffolding supporting the roof seems monstrably exaggerating. Gherardi and the contract of 27
too specific to be an exaggeration. He describes the Cancel- October 1481 prove that there was still a great deal of delata or rood screen in the Chapel, but apparently did not corative work to be done in the Chapel at the end of 1481.
consider worth mentioning, in comparison to the other
He is also exaggerating if he means that work on the Chapel

Andreas confirms the generally accepted view that

Sixtus built his chapel ex novo on the site of the old papal
chapel38. His description of the lamentable state of the

36 See note 33 above.

37 See note 14 above.

38 That the site was the same was already clear from Gherardi's complaining that the pope had to use the smaller (minor)
chapel or some other place because the new sacellum maius was
not yet ready. In addition to the authorities cited in note 1 above see
the fundamental study of F. Ehrle and N. Egger, Der Vaticanische
Palast in seiner Entwicklung bis zur Mitte des XV. Jahrhunderts,
Vatican City, 1935, p. 71.

39 On the question of whether the ceiling was painted or not

see Ettlinger, pp. 15-16.

40 E. Battisti, 'll Significato simbolico della Cappella Sistina'.

Commentari. Rivista di critica e storia dell'arte, VIII (1957), pp. 96104. Cf. the comments of Shearman, Raphael's Cartoons, p. 8.
41 Shearman, Raphael's Cartoons, fig. 4.
42 See L. Pastor, Storia dei papi dalla fine del Medio Evo, 4th
ed., tr. A. Mercati, II, repr. Rome, 1961, pp. 519-529.

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first began during the war. Rober Flemmyng's Lucubraciun-

culae Tiburtinae of ca. 1477 praises the Chapel in construction43. Yet we cannot totally discount Andreas' dating. As a
panegyrist, he would have been permitted to stretch the
truth a bit, but not to an implausible degree. After all, in a
simple matter of chronological fact, he was writing to the
very builder of the Chapel in a text meant to circulate
amongst the cognoscenti of the papal court. As it is, the
fabric of the Chapel must have been pretty much completed
during the war otherwise decoration could not have begun
in 1481. The "cold war" phase of the Florentine War went
back at least to the autumn of 147744; and given Andreas'
emphasis on the speed with which the Chapel was built
(tanto... celeritate) and the sense of urgency in the two references by Gherardi in 1481 (on 11 March work was going
on quotidie; on 24 December the work was continue)45, it is
reasonable to suppose that Sixtus began to build the Chapel
ca. 1477 rather than the generally accepted date of 1475 or
even earlier. For rhetorical effect Andreas clearly lumped
together the construction of the Chapel with its decoration.
However, it is important to note that he did so exclusively in

Otranto46. This brings us to late October 148147. At another

place he refers to the "Indian" ambassadors' arrival in
Rome, an event of early November 148148. For a terminus
ante quem we must do with an argument ex silentio, but in

this case it is a powerful one. In listing Sixtus' successes

Andreas did not fail. nor could he fail, to record the pope's

martial triumphs. Thus, Sixtus' "victories" over the Florentines and the Turks are duly illustrated in the preface. Yet,
Sixtus' greatest victory, and the one with which he was most

personally connected, the battle of Campo Morto against

Neapolitan troops on 21 August 148249, is never mentioned.
Indeed, in the preface Andreas shows no knowledge of
events after mid-May 1482. For him the War of Ferrara (late
May-December 1482)50 and the subsequent war with Venice
(1483-1484) do not exist. Andreas was closely linked to
events at the start of the War of Ferrara51. On 1 June 1482,

soon after the war had commenced, he suddenly appeared

in Venice on a secret mission to convey Sixtus' urgent request for military aid, and especially the dispatch to Rome
of the Venetian Captain General, Roberto Malatesta. It was,
in fact, Malatesta who saved Rome a few months later at the

the context of the Florentine War and no other war. That is

Battle of Campo Morto. I do not know when Andreas reto say, for Andreas the Sistine Chapel was an accomplishturned to Rome from Venice, but the crisis atmosphere in
ment of the period of the Florentine War, give or take Rome
a yearthat whole summer hardly recommended itself as a
or so at either end, i. e., ca. 1477 to 1481/early 1482. It would
propitious moment to dedicate his father's Almagest com-

have done Sixtus great credit to have been able to carry

though the work on the Chapel during the War of Ferrara,
but Andreas knows no such accomplishment.
This interpretation is confirmed by the date of Andreas'
preface. As we will see, the preface is best dated to sometime between April and mid-May 1482. Leaving aside for the
moment any evidence connected with the frescoes, we have
two references in the preface which give firm termini post

quem. At one point Andreas speaks of the failure of the

Latin fleet to sail to Vallona after helping in the recapture of

43 See note 13 above.

44 Pastor, II, p. 505.

45 See notes 33 and 34 above.

mentary to the pope. Already from the end of May the troops

of Alfonso of Calabria together with his allies, the Colonna

and Savelli clans, posed a physical threat to the City52. Contemporary witnesses such as Gherardi and Conti later spoke
of the 'terror' and 'fear' investing the City the summer of
1482 until Malatesta saved her from the new 'Hannibal' just
outside the gates53. Moreover, whereas Andreas is deliberately nasty in referring to the Florentines54, Sixtus' opponents in the only Italian war Andreas discusses, his tone is
friendly or, at least, neutral the two times he speaks of King

51 See the documentation collected in Collectanea Trap

tiana, in the Addenda to p. 236 of George of Trebizond.
52 See note 50 above.

46 Collectanea Trapezuntiana, pp. 799-800, sect. (21).

53 For the mood in the city that summer see, in additi
Pastor, Conti, Storia, I, p. 137 sq. ('Erat omnino misera re
47 Pastor, II, pp. 542-543.
48 Collectanea Trapezuntiana, p. 799, sect. (17), p. 803, facies...'),
n. (17)1. and Gherardi, pp. 102.32-35, 103. 19-22, 105. 4-7,
and 19 sq. (great relief at the arrival of Roberto Malatesta
49 Pastor, II, pp. 558-560.
especially
50 Ibid., II, pp. 549-563. The Neapolitan and Ferrarese
ambas- 109. 5 sq., apropos Malatesta: 'terrorem maximam
depulerit. Insultabat quotidie Calaber portis Ur
sadors left Rome on 14 May. By the end of the month theviculis
forcesnostris
of
Colonna and the Savelli, who sided with the opponents of tamquam
the pope,novus Hannibal pluries et Romanos et curiales non
formidare coegerat'.
were conducting raids up to the gates of Rome.
54 Collectanea Trapezuntiana, p. 799, sect. (18), which beg
'Florentini libertatis ecclesiastice violatores...'

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Ferdinand of Naples55, the leading enemy of the pope in the

War of Ferrara. Finally, in the preface Andreas praises

Sixtus for the era of tranquillity he had brought to the city of

Rome56. This is not really something Andreas could have

said during the War of Ferrara57. So on these grounds we
are left with late May 1482 as the terminus ante quem of
Andreas' preface.
Such an argument ex silentio may seem to leave room
for doubt, and all the more so because it also requires us to
believe that Sixtus waited some fifteen or more months (un-

til August 1483) before inaugurating the Chapel. But all the
other evidence that can be brought to bear on the issue
supports this dating.
First of all, it does no good to argue that, yes, a date
during the War of Ferrara is impossible, but a date some-

pened to the Florentine War (1478-1480)? One may conten

that Andreas did not mention the war out of prudence
because it was going on at the time, i. e., in 1480. But the
one has to say that the second preface, where Andreas de
scribes the Sistine Chapel as completed, was written at th
end of 1481, i. e., at a time when the four painters of th
contract of October 1481 were frescoing the walls and th
mosaicists had not yet finished installing the pavement. I

makes far better sense to place the prior preface in the first
half of 1481 when the Turkish seizure of Otranto compelled
Sixtus to try to unify the Italian states against the common

danger62. Only in that period would Andreas not have bee

free to attack the Florentines nor have been able to sing o
Sixtus' triumphs over the Turks. Once Otranto was reco-

time later, i. e., in 1483-84, would work because then, with

vered on 10 September 1481 and all hope of further concerted action against the Turk given up, Andreas could have

Sixtus at peace with Naples and at war with Venice, Andreas

still chosen to remain silent about the Florentines, but he

would have silently passed over events of the War of Fer-

certainly would not have ignored the great victory over the

rara. But if out of discretion Andreas did not speak ill of King

Turks, least of all when Sixtus played a major role in that

Ferdinand of Naples, by the same reasoning he should have

said nothing against the Florentines since from the early

triumph. But if the prior preface is most plausibly dated to

the first half of 1481, then the second preface is of 1482 and
specifically the first third of 1482, as we showed above.

spring of 1483 onwards they were papal allies58. Also, if Andreas was writing in 1483-84, it is odd that he would think to

mention the arrival of the Ethiopian ambassadors in Rome

This dating of the two prefaces is confirmed by a remark

in the second preface. After praising the construction of the

church of S. Maria del Popolo, Andreas noted that 'also on

the seventh day' Sixtus went to pray before 'the sacred image' which he adorned with gems and gold63. The only sacBut the most telling corroborative evidence comes from
red image Andreas could plausibly be referring to is that of
putting this preface of Andreas in relation with his earlier
the Virgin in S. Andrea de Aquarizariis which was disone to the translation of the Almagest. Since Andreas himto be miraculous in 1480 or 1481 and quickly reself tells us that it was written the year before the prefacecovered
to
named, along with its church, S. Maria della Virtu64. On
the commentary60, this prior preface cannot be earlier than
i. e., the seventh day of the week, Sixtus normally
1480 in as much as its sequel speaks of events at the endSaturdays,
of
visited S. Maria del Popolo65. But one such Saturday foray is
1481. But if the prior preface is no earlier than 1480, why
especially noteworthy. For on Saturday, 28 July 1481 Sixtus
apropos Sixtus' political achievements does it only mention
appeared in public for the first time after a long illness. He
the reign of tranquillity found in Sistine Rome61? What hapin 1481 but omit the defeat of the conciliarist Andreas

Zamometiv in 1482 9.

55 Ibid., sect. (20): in recapturing Otranto 'regi Fernando

sepius subvenisti'; and sect. (21): defeated at Otranto the Turks
'pacem a rege quam facillime impetrarunt'.
56 Ibid., p. 801, sect. (29).
57 See note 53 above.

62 Pastor, II, p. 530 sq.

63 Collectanea Trapezuntiana, p. 800, sect. (23): 'Atque
sanctam illam imaginem quam septimo quoque die pro salute
populi Christiani suppliciter coram veneraris auro gemmisque inornasti'.

See W. Buchowiecki, Handbuch der Kirchen Roms, 3 vols.,

58 Pastor, II, p. 566. Obviously Andreas would have known64
that
1970, III, p. 68; M. Dijonghe, Roma Sanctuario Mariano,
the pope was negotiating such an alliance well before it Vienna,
was pubBologna, 1969, pp. 112-113, 121. For the dates 1480-1481 see note
lished on 30 April 1483.
66 below.
59 See ibid., p. 551 sq.
60 See note 25 above.
65 Gherardi, p. 57. 28-29: 'Pontifex ad edem beate Virgini
Popularis, quolibet fere sabbato religionis causa profiscitur...'
61 Collectanea Trapezuntiana, p. 792, sect. (13).
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proceeded to S. Maria del Popolo; then, on the way back

cording to this later chronology would have been composed

and apparently for the first time, he stopped at S. Maria dellaa full one to two years after the termination of the Florentine
Virtu' where he offered thanksgiving before the holy imWar? Only if we place the two prefaces in 1481 and 1482
can we save Andreas from such absurdities.
age66. Thereafter, visiting this image of the Virgin after attending services in S. Maria del Popolo became something

Furthermore, since the first preface has nothing in it

of a routine for Sixtus67. We cannot doubt his devotion to

which hints at a date later than 1480-1481 and the second

the sacred picture. During the War of Ferrara (May-De-

preface reflects exclusively emotional attitudes in Rome in

cember 1482) he vowed to build a new church for it if his

prayers for peace were answered. Hence, on 13 December
1482, the day after the peace treaty with the King of Naples,
he returned to S. Maria della Virtui and, as a chronicler put
it, 'baptized' it S. Maria della Pace68. Before the month was

late 1481 - early 1482 (disappointment at the return of

papal fleet from Otranto, joy at the visit of the Ethiop
emissaries, rancor towards the Florentines for the recent

war, satisfaction with the reign of tranquillity in Rome), for

out he laid the cornerstone of the new church. Now if we

anyone to insist that the prefaces are each respectively one

to two years later than 1481 and 1482 is tantamount to as-

assume, as is reasonable, that Sixtus first adorned the

serting that in two successive prefaces Andreas consis-

image with precious stones and gold after his visit of 28

Julyand to no apparent purpose tried to recreate the
tently
1481 in thanksgiving for his recovery, and if we date the
first in Rome one to two years earlier. The reductio ad
situation
preface to the first half of 1481 and the second to the absurdum
first
cannot be carried any further.

We now need to consider the document of 27 October

third of 1482, then we can understand why Andreas ignored
the image in the first preface, and in the second preface
1481 by which Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Perugino, and Rosse
praised Sixtus only for embellishing it but not for honoring
contracted to paint ten istorie in the Sistine Chapel wi

it with a new church. To date the two prefaces respectively their cortine by 15 March 1482 or otherwise suffer a seve
financial penalty. Given the terminus ante quem of May 1
of the image inexplicable.
for Andreas' second preface and given the fact that we mu
We have still further confirmation that the first preface
is a certain amount of time for clean-up and any f
allow
of early 1481 and the second of early 1482 from Andreas'
details, even if the painters were punctual in meeting t
insistence in the second preface that Sixtus completed
the
deadline
- and we cannot be sure that they did meet th
Chapel in the time of the Florentine War. How could hedeadline
have
-, we must conclude that Andreas wrote the p
written this in 1483 or 1484 after the War of Ferrara? To
face no earlier than April and no later than May 1482.
praise Sixtus for a building achievement in one war previous
This conclusion brings in its wake three corollaries. Th
first is the obvious one that the ten narrative frescoes conto the most recent war and to miss the chance of praising
tracted for at the end of October 1481 must have been the
him for carrying through to completion the decoration of
the Chapel despite the terrible threat to the City in the sumlast ten frescoes and that the first six istorie had alread
mer of 1482 makes no sense in a panegyrical text like Anbeen completed. Whatever Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Perugi
dreas'. Worse, if Andreas wrote this praise in 1483 or 1484
and Rosselli were doing between the early spring of 1482
and if he considered, as clearly he did consider, the Chapel
and the early fall of that year when they turn up in Fl
an achievement of the period of the Florentine War, why did
ence69, they were not painting the Sistine istorie. In the ca
he not mention the Chapel in the earlier preface, which ac- of Ghirlandaio, the fact that he had completed his respo
1482 and 1483 or even later would make Andreas' treatment

66 Ibid., p. 62.22 sq.: (returning from S. Maria del Populo)

'ad
Christiani'
(the Turks still held Otranto at the time). Andreas brings
sacellum Virginis quod de Virtute appelant divertit, cuius nunc
up the holy image immediately after talking about S. Maria del
primum plura miracula referuntur. Depositus est a lecticariis Popolo.
pontifex et ante aram constitutus, adorata Virgine, actis quoque pro
67 Gherardi, pp. 115.25, 117.3-4, 122.17 and 30, 129. 10.
restituta valitudine gratiis cum summa veneratione genibusque
68 Buchowiecki, Handbuch, Ill, p. 68.
semper incumbens inixus in sellam iterum est sublatus...' Though
69 Ettlinger, Sistine Chapel, p. 29; J. Mesnil, 'Botticelli &
the date ca. 1480 is used for the start of the miracles, Gherardi's
Rome', Rivista d'arte, III (1905), pp. 112-113, at pp. 113 and 120;
words, 'cuius nunc primum plura miracula referuntur', point to
M. Canuti, II Perugino, 2 vols., Siena, 1931, p. 127; and H.D. Gronau
mid-1481. Probably to make Sixtus appear more as the servant of
in Theime-Becker, XXIX (1935), p. 35, col. i, who cites a document
Christendom Andreas speaks of him praying 'pro salute populi
of 25 November 1482 placing Rosselli in Florence.
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sabilities in the Sistine Chapel no later than April 1482

would explain why, as generally supposed, he returned to

took place. The martial setting of 15 August 1482 simply was

not the right moment to have a joyous inauguration of the

Florence to get married that spring 70.

Chapel. Since his arms appear many times over in painting,

stucco, and marble throughout the Chapel, Sixtus had little
fear of losing the honor of having been the builder of the
Chapel even if he were to die in the course of the next year.

Second, contrary to the received opinion but quite in

line with the thesis put forward by Kury71, Signorelli and
Bartolomeo della Gatta were called to Rome to help the
other painters meet their deadline. Whatever may have been
Signorelli's relationship with the other four major painters in

the Chapel, we are forced by this chronology to concede

He could afford to wait. Moreover, 15 August 1483 was not

the first time Gherardi mentioned the Chapel in use. On 9

that he finished his contribution at approximately the same

August of that year he reported that Sixtus attended vespers

in the Chapel extra ordinem75. In other words, what

time as did the other painters, in the spring of 1482. Also we

Gherardi found remarkable was not that the Chapel was f

need to suppose that Signorelli came to Rome within a

nally ready for use, but that the pope attended extra ordinem

month or so of the contract of 27 October 1481. Otherwise

Otherwise he would not have even mentioned the use of the

he would have been very hard put to finish in time the two
Chapel. For Gherardi the sense of novelty at seeing the
frescoes generally attributed to him. As Kury rightly argued,
Chapel completed had long since passed away. Whereas he

Signorelli's election to the town council of Cortona on 25

twice explained in 1481 that the pope could not use the
August 1481 is not proof that he remained there for the next
Chapel because work was still going on in it76, in 1482 and
twelve months72. The fact that he was assigned the last two
1483 he never makes this point, which leads to the suggesscenes in the Moses cycle indicates not that all the other
tion that it was no longer a valid excuse.
This is, in fact, the case. For even if we assume Andreas
scenes were already done, but merely that they had already
been assigned. In this reconstruction, Vasari's assertion that to be exaggerating the completed state of the Chapel in the
the pope himself rather than the other painters called
spring of 1482, we must still concede that the Chapel was
Signorelli to Rome would seem very dubious.
virtually completed by the feast of the Assumption 1482. We

Third, and what is most difficult of all to accept, Sixtus

did not inaugurate the Chapel until fifteen or sixteen months
after its completion. This is an uncomfortable conclusion,

but a necessary one. Gherardi tells us that on the feast of

know from Andreas and from Gherardi77 that the mosaic

floor must have been finished well before mid-August 1482.

We know also that the four contractees of October 1481 had

time in the Chapel and that the pope then endowed it with
indulgences which immediately attracted the people of

finished fourteen scenes before leaving Rome and that th

had all returned to Florence by the early fall of 1482. Indeed
while still assuming Andreas to be inaccurate, we have to
suppose that the three Florentine painters and Perugino7

Rome to come73. Why did Sixtus wait so long? If we assume

had left Rome well before the fall of 1482. In alliance with

that he was determined to inaugurate the Chapel on the

feast of the Assunta, to whom the Chapel is dedicated, we
have a sufficient cause for the delay in the war crisis of

Naples Florence was at war with Rome from the late spri
of 1482. Even if mere political considerations did not mo

the Assumption, 15 August 1483, mass was said for the first

1482. For precisely on 15 August 1482 the troops of Roberto

Malatesta marched into Rome, were blessed by the pope,

and then marched out again to face the enemy in the Roman Campania74. Six days later the battle of Campo Morto

the painters, the crisis at Rome in the summer of 1482 with

their government supporting the attackers of the City ce
tainly would have had some effect. And if by some extraordinary devotion to their work and to the pope, they did sta
through the summer, why then would they have quit on

70 Ettlinger, Sistine Chapel, 28, and Mesnil, ' Botticelli', p. 119, 73 Gherardi, p. 121.3 sq. See also note 5.
speak with confidence of May 1482. But this date, though approxi- 74 Gherardi, p. 102.22 sq. Kury, Signorelli, p. 92, notes the
mately correct, is only an inference from document recordingsame.
the
baptism of Ghirlandaio's child on 5 February of the next year (Mes- 75 Gherardi, p. 121.16-18.
nil, ibid.) and the report of G. Milanesi in his edition of Vasari (111,76 See notes 33 and 34 above.
Florence, 1878, p. 279) that Ghirlandaio married Costanza di Bar-77 See note 33 above.
tolomeo Nucci in 1482.
78 For his long periods in Florence and his many commissio
71 Kury, Signorelli, pp. 86-95.
there, including from the Signoria, Perugino may at least be co
sidered semi-Florentine.
72 Ibid., pp. 87-88.
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Rome was saved and they themselves were only two fres-

Thus, short of arguing that Andreas' second preface

coes away from completing their contract? It would not

dates from 1483 or 1484 - and we have seen the difficulties

have taken them much longer to finish, and the generous to which that argument leads - conceding that Andreas
exaggerated about the frescoes being completed leaves
open only the possibility that the last two scenes of the
incentive. So even conceding that Andreas was exaggerating and that Signorelli had not yet come to Rome, we must
fresco cycle were not yet done when he wrote. But since the
conclude that by the feast of the Assunta 1482 the Sistine
main argument for insisting that he exaggerated, namely
Chapel was completed save for two scenes with their tapes- that Sixtus would not have left the completed Chapel untries in one of the corners of the Chapel furthest away from
used for over a year, has proven surprisingly weak, and
the altar. But such a blemish can hardly be considered suffisince everything we know about the lives of the five master
cient cause for Sixtus not inaugurating the Chapel that day.
painters of the Chapel accords perfectly well with their
So if he did not inaugurate the Chapel that day, it was befinishing the fresco cycle in the spring of 1482, I see no
reason why we ought not take Andreas at his word 79. Unless
cause of the troops marching into the City. Hence, whether
evidence to the contrary emerges, we ought to consider the
we take Andreas at his word or not, we are brought to the
Sistine Chapel to have been completed omni ex parte by
conclusion that for over a year Sixtus chose not to inauguApril or May 1482.
rate the completed or virtually completed Sistine Chapel.
pay of 250 ducats per fresco would have provided adequate

79 An indication of his caution in describing projects com- discovered by Mentz, Les arts, III, pp. 132-135, for work in the lipleted may be seen in the fact that he ignored the Vatican library brary are dated 1481. If the first preface was written in early 1481, and
in the first preface but spoke of it at length in the second preface the second in 1482, then the addition of the library in the catalogue
(Collectanea Trapezuntiana, p. 800, sect. (22)). The last payments of Sixtus' completed accomplishments only in the second preface
is reasonable.

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