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Rare architectural terms in a Neo-Latin collection

Neven Jovanović
University of Zagreb, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences

Il lessico latino dall'umanesimo all'età moderna, Frascati, 29 giugno 2024

Address of this page: http://croala.ffzg.unizg.hr/eklogai/2024-rare-frascati/

This paper is part of a project that has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme (GA n. 865863 ERC-AdriArchCult): Architectural Culture of the Early Modern Eastern Adriatic, AdriArchCult

The research question

How do Renaissance authors writing in Latin use rare architectural terms? How might they have learned these terms?

Croatiae auctores Latini: the collection

http://croala.ffzg.unizg.hr

Latin texts connected with Croatia, written 976–1984.
First published in 2009.
The latest release: 559 documents, 5.8 million words.

Six passages, five authors

Four terms

Clatratus = set with bars

Marko Marulić / Marcus Marulus (1450–1524) describes the royal palace of the Biblical king David (in verse, Dauidias Book 8, 12-41; 1510-1517).

CroALa: clatrat.+

Regia Dauidis ędificatur

Interea struitur domus ipsi congrua regi.
Fundamenta locant, patet ingens area largo
Complexu, iam saxa trahunt cementaque malta
Miscentur, surgit propero molimine murus.
Tigna ligant, grauibus subdunt laquearia tectis,
Imbricibus positis tegularum finditur ordo,
Prona per impluuium cęlestis flumina lymphę
Vt possint puteos labendo implere capaces.
Atria marmoreę circumdant lata columnę,
Quas superiniecti pręsserunt fornicis arcus.
Stat testudinea subter caua porticus umbra,
Hic asarota nitent uariis distincta figuris
Picturasque suas paries crustatus ophite
Et Phrygio et Parii monstrat candore lapilli.
Portarum spacium solidis consistere pilis
Mirari poteras, nisi saxa ingentia docti
Artificis superasset opus, qui scalpserat omnem
Progeniem Iudę, deductam tempus adusque
Virginei partus nostrique crepundia Christi.
Cernere erat uiuos non uiuo in marmore uultus
Molliaque in duro consurgere membra metallo
Motu quęque suo et mutas expromere uoces.
Quod si saxa loqui possent, ea posse putares.
Accepit reliquas tandem noua regia partes:
Andron et exedras, gynecia, septa, dietas
Erectosque gradus, diuersa cubicula, longe
Lateque effusas aulas crebrasque fenestras
Clatratas ferro quasdam, quasdanque patentes
Cum podiis. Numerare graue est illa omnia, nedum
Enarrare decus rerumque exponere formas.

Meanwhile a house is built for the king
A massive lot in wide enclosure stands,
They lay foundations, mix cement, haul rocks,
From speedy effort soon a wall does rise.
They bind beams, panelled ceilings under roofs,
The imbrices divide the ordered tiles,
Rainwater channels through the impluvium
That by its trickling cisterns it might fill.
Wide atria the marble columns ring,
Supporting arches of the vault above.
Below's a portico with shaded dome,
Mosaics gleam distinct with many forms,
The wall, embossed with Phrygian marble, shows,
Reliefs, in radiance of Parian stone.
You'd marvel at the solid pillared doors
Had not the expert craftsman's work surpassed
The massive stones, for he had sculpted all
The progeny of Judah throughout time
Until Christ's Virgin birth and infancy.
One saw in lifeless marble living faces,
In hardened metal supple limbs take shape,
Which in their flow express their voices mute.
If rocks could speak, you'd think these able to.
The palace new receives its other parts:
Exedras, hallways, women's quarters, walls,
And stairways, different bedrooms, courts set far
And wide, and frequent windows, some with bars
Of iron lattice, others opening
To balconies. It's hard to count them all
To tell their elegance, express their form.

(Translation by Edward Mulholland, 2024)

Clatratus in a commentary on Plautus (1500, J. B. Pius)

https://books.google.hr/books?id=-rVNmwaqOKcC&pg=PP478

Giovan Battista Pio (1460–1543): (Clatrata fenestra.) Clatrata, cancellata: ferrea: cancellis ferreis cancellatim plagosa instar maculosi retis. (Clatri et clatra.) Clatros appellamus ligna transuersaria: dicimus et Clatra. Propertius libro elegiaco quarto: Et canis in nostros nimis experrecta dolores / Cum fallenda meo pollice clatra forent. Mendum est in codice Seruiano, ubi ita ante nos legebatur „plena per insertas fundebat luna phenestras”; subdit Seruius: Insertas aut caelatas aut non serratas. Tu scribe ex antiquis exemplaribus: aut non clatratas. Cato in libro de re rustica: Bubilia bona: bonas praesepis: Faliscas: clatratas. Clatros inter se oportet pede distare. Columella libro octauo: ea septa distinguntur uelut Clatris intercurrentibus calamis: ita ut ab utroque opere singulos aditus habeant. Idem libro decimo. Vbi uero neutrum patrisfamiliae conducit: ratio postulat uacerris includi. Sic enim appellatur genus clatorum(!). Idque fabricatur ex robore querceo uel subero. Satis est autem uacerras inter pedes octonos defigere: sertisque transuersis ita clatrare: ne spatiorum laxitas: quae foraminibus interuenit: pecudi praebeat fugam. Sed hoc subdamus praeter significatum Columellae uacerram palum nuncupari: ad quod equi religantur. hanc ipsam uacerram Lucius Apuleius libro quarto metamorphoseon ansulam iis dictitat. At illi canibus iam aegre cohibitis arreptum me loro quam ualido ad ansulam quandam destinatum: rursum cedendo confecissent.

Clatratus in Grapaldi, De partibus aedium

Francesco Maria (Mario) Grapaldi (Grapaldo), (c. 1464–1515), De partibus aedium (1494), I, 3: Coenaculum (1501 edition) https://books.google.hr/books?id=Jt6b6D83RmMC&pg=PA65.

(Fenestra) (...) Verum addere prius oportet claustra e tabulis quae super cardines ueluti de foribus dictum est deuoluantur, ea tamen arte compacta ut per rimas tabularum aer nocturnus intrare et dormientibus obesse non possit; hinc Subsucudes primis tabulis aeque immittuntur; Cancelli namque appellantur ligna modicis interuallis inter se intransuersum annexa: quibus muniuntur fenestrae. Diuus Hierony.: Solomonis Prouerbiorum septimo De fenestra domus meae per cancellos prospexi iuuenem uideo paruuulum. Et cancellis distincta est cutis elephantorum; inde cancellata dicta a Plinio in octauo sic scribente: sed cancellata cutis et inuitans id genus animalium odore: ergo cum extenti recepere exanimata arctatis in rugas tepente cancellis compraehensas enecant. Antiqui etiam cancros dixerunt unde Hyppocoristicos(!) cancelli: a quibus cancellare uerbum deductum ex inductione Linearum transuersarum, et ab eo cancellarii qui scribae grammateique uocantur, et clatrii quoque quibus aliquid munitur aut sepitur nuncupati. His utimur ad fenestras; inde Clatrata fenestra apud Plautum in milite cum inquit: mirum est facinus quomodo haec hic transire potuerit: nam certo neque solarium apud nos est neque hortus ullus, neque fenestra nisi clatrata. Clatri apud M. Catonem in re rustica ligna sunt cauearum quibus hae muniuntur.

Cuba = dome, cupola

Italian cuba cupola, volta (TLIO c. 1360)

CroALa: cubis

Antun Vrančić / Antonius Verantius (1504–1573) in his Iter Buda Hadrianopolim, 1553, describes Ottoman city of Sofia in Bulgaria.

(Sophia / Zophia) Domus in ipsa nulla est insignis, nulla ferme lapidea. Omnes humiles et humo tenus tectae et ligneae. Et si quae sunt nobiliore structura, ex formato quidem latere factae sunt, sed incocto, et cuppis tantum coctilibus operatae (!). Templis dumtaxat ornata est turcicis, et eminentibus eorum columnis cocleis, quae in campanilium nostrorum morem evectae eminentius, praebent speciem urbibus non indecorem. Ex quibus sacerdotes eorum horas diei et orandi tempora clamoribus denunciant validissimis tam die quam nocte. Nec aliis in aedificiis molestiorem curam ponunt, quam templorum, balneorum, pontium et publicorum hospitiorum, quae Kervan Zarai vocant, quasi caravanarum palatia, contenti in reliquum ab coeli tantum injuriis tutos esse. Templa et balnea, et pontes diligenter et aeternitati ex quadrato lapide quadrata construunt, eaque rotundis et plumbatis cubis cooperiunt forma a Graecis et a Romanis accepta. Nec frontem templorum, hoc est, sanctuaria orienti sed meridiei opponunt, cocleas Africo, quae est plaga inter meridiem et occasum; easque ibidem XIII. numeravimus.

(Sophia) In the city there is not one house of high quality, almost none of stone. All of them are low, covered all the way to the ground, and made of wood. And if some are built better, they are of formed bricks, but unfired ones, only covered by burned tiles. The sole ornaments are Turkish temples and their high spiral columns, which rise to the height of our bell towers, and provide an agreeable appearance to cities. From the columns their priests shout the time of day and time of prayer; their shouts are extremely loud by day and by night. The Turks do not pay any attention to other buildings, except to temples, baths, bridges and public inns, which they call Kervan Zarai, meaning „palaces for caravans”; for anything else they are content just to be sheltered from the elements. The temples, baths and bridges they construct carefully and suitable to eternity, from a well-shaped stone, covering them with rounded and leaden domes, whose form they received from the Greeks and Romans. Faces of temples, that is, their shrines, they do not orientate towards the east, but towards the south, and the spires towards the African wind, that is, the quarter between the south and the west; there we counted thirteen of them.

Juraj Dalmatinac (Giorgio da Sebenico)

CroALa: cuvarum

Juraj Dalmatinac, an inscription on the Šibenik cathedral, 1443: Hoc opus cuvarum fecit magister Georgius Mathei Dalmaticus.

This apse structure was built by master Georgius, son of Matheus, Dalmatian

Cuva 'vault, apse' in some Eastern Adriatic archival documents

1442-08-01, Rijeka: Quam cuuam debet ligare cum muro

1444-10-18, Zadar: ipsi ecclesie facere cuuam quadram longam pedibus octo, et campanille ab una canpana

1452-11-04, Rab: Item prefatus magister Georgius promisit et obligavit se facere unam sacristiam ad cuvam ecclesie Sancti Bernardini fiende per dictum magistrum Georgium anexam ad dictam cuvam et ad murum factum per magistrum Bertolam

Cylindrus

Bartul Đurđević / Bartholomaeus Georgievits (1506–1566), De afflictione, tam captivorum quam etiam sub Turcae tributo viventium Christianorum (1545) describes Ottoman architecture

De aedificiis domorum. In aedibus non multa magnificentia, pleraeque latericio opere constant, duplici ex materia; sunt enim lateres alij fornacibus, alij sole excocti. Tecta cuneatim coeunt, quemadmodum hîc et hoc in tota Europa, sed in Natolio tecta plana sunt in modum tabulati, sine ullo fastigio; sciphones et canales aquae pluuiam demittunt, quae ad illos per cylindrum deuoluitur.

How their houses are built. There is not much magnificence in buildings, most of them are made of brick, from two kinds of material; some bricks are baked in kilns, other by the sun. The roofs come together in the form of a wedge, as can be seen here and there in whole Europe; but in Anatolia the roofs are flat, like a platform, without a gable; pipes and conduits drain away the rainwater, which is squeezed towards them by a roller.

https://archives.saltresearch.org/handle/123456789/195660: Mud roofs required constant maintenance: excessive water would have to be squeezed out with a large manually operated stone roller, called loğ.

Elazığ'da toprak damlı evlerde loğlama zamanı

Forcellini, s. v. cylindrus

Totius Latinitatis lexicon (1771): (...) Hinc cylindrum appellavere lapidem hujus figurae, quo utebantur rustici ad areas aequandas, huc et illuc saepius volutando. Cato R. R. 129. Aream cylindro, aut pavicula coaequato. Virg. 1. G. 178. Area cum primis ingenti aequanda cylindro. Vitruv. 10. 2. 12. Schneid. In palaestris cylindri exaequant ambulationes. Adde Colum. 10. R. R. 319. et 11. ibid. 3. 34. Plin. 19. Hist. nat. 8. 46. (158). Calcare aliquid cylindro.

Epistylia: Vitruvius

CroALa: epistylia epistyllia epistiliis epistilium

Andreis

Fran Trankvil Andreis / Franciscus Tranquillus Andronicus (1490–1571) makes Julius Caesar describe to Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix a typical visit of a tyrant to a city (Dialogus Sylla, 1527)

Quum semel toto triennio te uniuersę ciuitati ostensurus plateas obequitabis, quamuis more Persarum uelata facie, tamen uulgum, quasi aliquid augustius humana specie uisurum, dum credit numen quodpiam sub hominis forma latere, uidebis undique certatim concurrere, alios ex fenestris prospectare, multos fornices, epistyllia, tectaque domorum conscendisse repletis omnibus plateis: atque ibidem studio e proximo conspiciendi alios inter se trudere aliis pressura proculcatis, nonnullis etiam suffocatis interemptisque. Tum ędium uestibula tapetis et auleis ornari, uicos spargi floribus, extrui temperarios (!) arcus, imagines tuarum uictoriarum in ferculis uectari.

(Caesar speaks:) To show yourself to the whole state once in the three-year period, you will ride through the streets, although with your face covered, as is the Persian custom; nevertheless, you will see the people gather eagerly from all around, expecting to see something more wonderful than human beauty, believing that a deity is hiding in a form of a man; some will be looking from the windows, many will climb the arches, architravs, roofs of houses, as all the streets will be full; and there, trying to see you from close up, they will be jostling, some of them trodden down by the throng, some of them even suffocated and killed. Then you will see the entrances of houses ornamented by carpets and curtains, rows of buildings strewn with flowers, temporary arches erected, images of your victories carried around in litters.

Grapaldi, De partibus aedium

Grapaldi, De partibus aedium, Verborum explicatio quae in libro de partibus aedium continentur

Epistylium supra columnas capitulum dici posse quibusdam placuit: At Festo trabem quae columnis imponitur, Et supra ipsa capitula epistylium additur. Vitruuio cum alibi tum libro III membra inquit omnia quae supra capitula columnarum sunt futura id est epistylia, Zophori, coronae, Tympana fastigia, Acroteria, inclinanda sunt in frontis suae cuiusque altitudinis parte duodecima et supra epistylia collocandos triglyphos cum suis metopis docet libro IIII. Sunt autem ad decorem capitulis columnarum non tamen omnibus Abacus, flores, cauliculi, helicesue folia et uolutae; habent aliqua etiam Cymatium plinthum echinum cum anulis et hipottachelium, cum apophygi: quod uero sit hipotrachelium in columnis et capitulis, quid Zophorus Triglyphi metopae, Tympana acroteria in fronte domorum alibiue ostendit ipse Vitruuius, quae tamen nisi oculis subiiciantur deformata, non facile sola lectione possunt intellegi nisi a peritioribus.

Alberti, Intercenales (c. 1440)

Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472), Intercenales (c. 1440), Picture (ed. Garin, 1965): Apud gymnosophistas philosophos vetustissimos, cultu virtutis et sapientie laudibus celeberrimos, templum fuisse ferunt bone maleque Fortune, quod quidem omni ornamentorum copia, opumque varietate esset refertissimum. Nam illic intercolumnia, capitula, epistolia, fastigia, lavacra, et numero et amplitudine manuque artificum mirifica ex pario marmore et ab ipsis ultimis Indorum Arabumque montibus excisa, vasaque et candelabra et tripodes cortineque et eiusmodi reliqua omnia, que ad sacrificium exponerentur quamplurima illic et pulcherrima, auro gemmisque ornatissima...

Epistylia: the Bible

Marko Marulić / Marcus Marulus (1450–1524) interprets columns of the Temple in Jerusalem in De institutione bene vivendi per exempla sanctorum (1507)

Liber V, Caput VIII / De perseverantia bene agendi (...) Hęc est ergo columna Iachin et columna Booz, id est, firmitatis et fortitudinis, quę epistylia liliorum malogranatorumque sustentant. Quia firmi ac fortis est summam conseruare uirtutum quam semel amplexus fuerit.

So this is the column Iachin and the column Booz, that is, the column of strength and of courage, which support the architrave of lilies and of pomegranates. Because it is the nature of the strong and the courageous to keep the heights of virtue once he has embraced it.

II Paralipomenon 3, 15–17; 4, 11–13 (Solomon builds the temple)

Biblia utriusque testamenti, Rob. Stephani 1557: Capitella inquam illa quae erant super duas columnas, etiam desuper eregione uentris capitelli, qui erat ultra reticulum, habebant malogranata: nam malogranata ducenta erant in ordinibus duobus per circuitum super capitellum secundum. Statuit deinde columnas illas in porticu templi: et statuit columnam dexteram, uocauitque nomen eius Iachin: statuit et columnam sinistram, uocauitque nomen eius Boyaz. Et super caput columnarum opus lilii: absolutum est itaque opus columnarum.

Vulgata: Ante fores etiam templi duas columnas, quae triginta et quinque cubitos habebant altitudinis: porro capita earum, quinque cubitorum. Necnon et quasi catenulas in oraculo, et superposuit eas capitibus columnarum: malogranata etiam centum, quae catenulis interposuit. Ipsas quoque columnas posuit in vestibulo templi, unam a dextris, et alteram a sinistris: eam quae a dextris erat, vocavit Jachin: et quae ad laevam, Booz. (...) Fecit autem Hiram lebetes, et creagras, et phialas: et complevit omne opus regis in domo Dei: hoc est, columnas duas, et epistylia, et capita, et quasi quaedam retiacula, quae capita tegerent super epistylia. Malogranata quoque quadringenta, et retiacula duo ita ut bini ordines malogranatorum singulis retiaculis jungerentur, quae protegerent epistylia, et capita columnarum.

Sabellico Enneades (1498): a synthesis

Marco Antonio Coccio Sabellico (1436–1506), Opera M. Antonii Coccii Sabellici in duos digesta tomos... Rapsodiae historicae Enneadum XI... D. Casparis Hedionis historica synopsi... Accesserunt libri decem Exemplorum..., ex officina Hervagiana, 1538.

Enneadis I. liber IX, 142: (Salomonis monumenta) (Templi aedificatio) Statuit et columnas duas aeneas ante uestibulum duodeuicenum cubitum celsitudine, ambitumque duodenum. Epistylia fusilia inque liliorum speciem figurata.

Flacius, Clavis Scripturae sacrae

Matthias Flacius Illyricus (1520–1575) explains Biblical terms in Clavis Scripturae sacrae, 1567; Appendix, De expositione diversarum rerum, III.

Epistylia, in Reg. quae super capitella columnarum ponuntur: Graecum est.

(Cf. Isidorus, Etymologiae, Liber 15, 8: Epistolia sunt quae super capitella columnarum ponuntur; et est Graecum)

Conclusions