"Nuper Rosarum Flores" and the Cathedral of Florence Author(S): Marvin Trachtenberg Source: Renaissance Quarterly, Vol

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Architecture and Music Reunited: A New Reading of Dufay's "Nuper Rosarum Flores" and the Cathedral of Florence Author(s): Marvin Trachtenberg Source: Renaissance Quarterly, Vol. 54, No. 3 (Autumn, 2001), pp. 740-775 Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Renaissance Society of America Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1261923 . Accessed: 03/11/2014 00:42

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This content downloaded from 192.147.172.89 on Mon, 3 Nov 2014 00:42:52 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Architectureand Alusic Reunited: .V A lVewReadi 0 u S uperRosarum Floresand theCathedral ofFlorence.

byMARVIN TRACHTENBERG

Theproportions of the voices are harmoniesforthe ears; those of the measure- mentsare harmoniesforthe eyes. Such harmoniesusuallyplease very much, withoutanyone knowing why, excepting the student of the causality of things. -Palladio O 567)

Thechiasmatic themes ofarchitecture asfrozen mu-sic and mu-sicas singingthe architecture ofthe worldrun as leitmotifithrough the histories ofphilosophy, music, and architecture.Rarely, however,can historical intersections ofthese practices be identified. This study proposes a transient nexusofarchitecture, sacred music, and theologyin earlymodern Florence.

uper rosarumAres has long been known to musicologists and historians of Florence as the brilliantisorhythmic motet commissioned from Guillaume Dufay for the dedication of the new Cathedral of S. Maria del 1 Fiore on March 2 5, 1436 (fig. 1). But only in 1973 did the piece acquire its currentrenown, as the resultof the seeming discoveryby Charles Warren of a strong connection between its musical structureand the dimensions and proportions of the new Cathedral (92-105). The composition now became an icon of music history,a work that seemed deeply embedded in an architectural context framed by ascendant Renaissance humanism, and its reinterpretationwas regarded among many musicologists as a model of in- terdisciplinaryscholarly practice. Recently, however, Warren's reading has been sharplyundermined, in particularby Craig Wright,who in 1993-1994 showed that while Warren's analysis of the musical structurewas essentially 2 correct,his reading of the architecturewas so deeply flawed as to be invalid.

'Not to be confusedwith the separate dedication of the Cupola, which was not com- pleteduntil August (Saalman, 1980, 133-34).This article is a revisedversion of a paperfor theconference "Music and Art in theRenaissance," held 1 March1996 at theInstitute for AdvancedStudy in Princeton;for a reporton theconference, see Clark. Alexander Blachly, whoparticipated in theconference, has subsequently issued an exceptionalrecording of the motetby his group, Pomerium (Deutsche Grammaphon Archiv 447 773-2,1997). I thank CraigWright, who also waspresent, for his generous support of my thesis and hiscritical readingof this paper. For the Palladio quote, see Wittkower, 113. 'Wrightfirst presented his thesis in 1993at themeeting of the American Musicological Societyin Montreal.Although Wright took his cue directlyfrom a passagein VonSimson, concerningthe proportions of the Temple (37-38), Warren's article had been previously chal-

RenaissanceQuarterly 54 (2001): 740-75 [ 741 1

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......

FIGURE 1. Florence Cathedral (Bonsignori plan of city, 1584).

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In Wright'sview, Dufays scorewas informednot by the designof S. Maria del Fiorebut insteadby a numerologicaland symbolicnexus sited in biblical and exegeticaldescriptions of Solomon'sTemple and in Marian lore. The referentialityof the musicwas not to the realarchitecture of the Cathedral, with which it had nothingto do specifically,but to the imaginarySol- omonic architecture(and relatednumerological sets) thatwas the universal model forall churchconstruction. This is wherematters currently stand. It is difficultto findfault with Wright's critique, whether regarding his refinementof Warren's musical reading, his own presentationof thetextual, Solomonic-Mariansyndrome, or his refutationof Warren'sarchitectural analysis.Nevertheless, it is possiblethat Wright made one importanttactical error,a faultnot of commissionbut omission:having invalidated Warren's readingof S. Maria del Fiore,he walked away fromthe buildingwithout looking back, and this may have been a mistake(albeit one virtuallyun- avoidable foranyone not a specialistin Italian architectureof the period). Wrighttacitly excludes the followingintriguing possibility: Warren's architectural analysis may have been wrong, but a differentreading of the architecture- differentfrom both Warrenand Wright(and also all other publishedreadings) - mightyield grounds for reestablishing Warren's idea of a connectionbetween music and the builtCathedral. It is thispossibility that I wantto explore.'In doingso myintent is notto undermineWright's reading but to overlayerit withanother, quite compati- ble interpretation,in which Nuper rosarumflares references not only the imaginarySolomonic Temple but also the realS. Maria del Fiore.Indeed, I proposeto go further,by arguingthat what we maybe dealingwith here is - nottwo independent binary relationships musicto building,and musicto - biblical/exegeticaltext but a triadicnexus in whichall threefactors are denselyinterrelated: the Cathedraldirectly related, in its morphogenesis,to Wright'stextual model, as wellas retroactivelyto the motet, which itself refers to bothtext and (realand biblical)image. Rather than seeing building and/or lenged (as noted by Wright,401 n. 18, 404 n.24) by Charles Brewerin "DefrostedArchitec- ture:The Incommensurabilityof Dufay's'Nuper Rosarum Flores' and Brunelleschi'sWork forSanta Maria del Fiore,"a paper read at theAnnual Meetingof theAmerican Musicologi- cal Society,Austin, 1989; by Smith, 94; and by Arjan R. de Koomen, "Dufay's Nuper Rosarum Flores and Santa Maria del Fiore: A Case of Misinterpretation"(unpublished). Wrightalso notes that his Solomonic reading(see textbelow) was made independentlyby Ryschawyand Stoll,47 (400 n. 14). 'At the Princetonconference, Blachly suggested that the symmetryof proportional- symbolicstructure of the motetmay reflectthe cathedraldome. See Clark, 166 nA who also reportsthat Vivian Ramalingamdelivered two papers in 1996 evidentlyasserting a connection betweenthe cathedraland the motet.

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99 text as causal" models for the music in the manner of Wright and Warren, I suggest instead that a more complex, bidirectional circulation of referentiality may have been at work, producing a complex cultural entity that we might call "word/image/music." It would comprehend the ubiquitous "word/image" modality of art and architecture, the "music/word" combination of vocal and choral music, and more. I shall proceed by firstbriefly reviewing Warren's and Wright's arguments, and then offer my own analysis.

WARREN AND WRIGHT

Charles Warren's "Brunelleschi's Dome and Dufay's Motet," published in the Musical Quarterly in 1973, was the first attempt to establish a meaningful connection between the music and the building. In the article the author identifies the underlying mathematical structure of the score, which involves two sets of numbers: a primary proportional series 6:4:2:3 (the overall isometric scheme), which is virtually unique in music of the period; and secondarily, an exceptional emphasis on the number seven in both score and text, in conjunction with the factors two and four. Warren directly relates this singular musical structure to an elaborate dimensional analysis of the building involving several sets of planning modules, rotational figuration, and other features, down to correspondences with the form, measurements, and even structural details of the Cupola. The fact that Warren gives the entire cathedral to Brunelleschi, who entered its construction more than a century after it was begun and was only involved with the Cupola, or the way his modular systems invert and contradict the design history of the Cathedral, should perhaps have alerted attentive readers to the questionable methods of his dimensional analysis. But the enthusiasm for the article was great, for (to the architecturally uncritical and misinformed reader) Warren seemed to have imaginatively linked the frozen music of Brunelleschi, the father of Renaissance architecture, with the sonic, liquid architecture of the prestigious Dufay, considered the greatest early Renaissance composer, in a way that seemed to illuminate both figures and to vindicate modern critical methodologies. - Craig Wright's reappraisal which appeared in the 1994 Journal ofthe American Musicological Society as "Dufay's Nuper rosarum flores, Solomon's - Temple, and the Veneration of the Virgin" although not the firstcritique of Warren, was the most radical and complete. 4Wright begins by calling War- - ren)s piece a "classic in the field" and then proceeds to demolish it. Wright's quarrel is not with Warren's numerological analysis of the motet, which he ba-

4See n.2.

This content downloaded from 192.147.172.89 on Mon, 3 Nov 2014 00:42:52 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 744 RENAISSANCE QUARTERLY sicallyaccepts and indeedfurther refines.' Rather he demonstratesthat the architecturalanalysis is cooked,attempting to force proportional and modu- larschemes on a buildingthat they do notfit without blatant fudging. For example,in orderto gethis primary dimensional module to fitthe actual naveof the building, Warren must extend it about 30 feetinto the crossing, farbeyond the tolerances allowed such proportional analysis. Wright's blister- ingcritique leads him inexorably tothe statement, "The unique ratio 6:4:2:3, whichgoverns Dufays motet, is in no wayimmanent, or evensuperficially apparent,in thedesign of the cathedral of Florence" (404). Havingbroken, as he putsit, the "causal link between related media of artisticexpression," Wright is leftwith the problem of explaining the evi- dentlyunique musical structure of the motet, of somehow finding a way to

5Wright,396-400, providesthe followingtechnical analysis: "As is knownto everystu- dentof thehistory of music,Nuper rosarumflores possesses a systematic,indeed, architectonic design.It comprisesfour sections of music and a shortconcluding 'Arnen.' Section one com- menceswith a duet forthe two highervoices (superiusand contratenoraltus) lastingtwenty- eightbreves (transcribed as twenty-eightmeasures in themodern standard edition); the lower two voices (tenorI and tenorII) thenenter and supportthe uppervoices fora periodof time equal to the opening duet (twenty-eightmeasures). Sections two, three,and fourunfold in preciselythe same way: an openingduet is followedby four-voicepolyphony of the same duration.Each time the lowervoices enter,they present the same notes in approximatelythe same rhythmas in the previoussection - hence the designation'isorhythmic' motet. The uppertwo voices proceedmore or less freely,ungoverned by strictmelodic or rhythmicrep- etition.What createsthe distinctiveform of Nuper rosarumfloresis the use of mensuration signsapplied to the two lowervoices; the meterof each of the foursections is determinedby itsown sign(0, , C, 4) respectively).These signschange the relativelength of the notesand rests,and thusa differentoverall duration results for each section,according to whetherthe breveis perfector imperfect,and whetherit is measuredin termsof integervalor or diminutio ... [Thus] the structureof the motet,as reducedto itsmost basic expression,is governedby a proportionalrelationship with the values 6:4:2:3. The proportion6:4:2:3 is not foundelse- where in Dufay's isorhythmicmotets nor does it appear in those of any othercomposer. Nuperrosarumflores is also noteworthyfor the factthat a second setof numbersis prominent here:4 x 7 and 2 x 7.... There arefour sections to thework, each consistingof twicetwenty- eight (4 x 7) breves.Moreover, the composer has chosen as a cantus firmusthe firstfour wordsand the firstfourteen notes of the Introitof the Mass of the Dedication of a Church, Terribilisest locus iste, which he disposesin quasi-canonicfashion in the two lowervoices in two groupsof sevennotes. "While the lowervoices proclaimthis ancient chant, the two upper partssing a newly createdLatin poem, likelypenned by Dufayhimself. It is arrangedin fourstanzas, each with seven (normally)seven-syllable lines .... Unbrokenruns of seven-syllablelines are exceed- inglyrare in classicalLatin poetryand equallyscarce in late medievalLatin verse.The poet . . . has strivento produce successionsof seven-syllablelines, even if an unconventionalverse formis the finalproduct. Thus the prominencegiven the numbersfour and sevenhere is not the resultof merehappenstance, but of carefulcogitation, likely with the aim of expressinga symbolicmeaning."

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tieit in with the dedication of the cathedral for which it was composed. Per- haps because Warren'sanalysis of the Duomo turnedout to be so embarrassinglyinept, Wright turns away from the real architecture of the Duomo and exploresmodels in anotherdirection - thetextual realm of imaginary,legendary buildings and traditionsof biblical exegesis and numerologicalsymbolism, which certainly were important in thereligious and artisticdiscourse of the period. Wrightexplains that the motet is essentiallya "spiritual vehicle with a symbolicmessage," and that the main theme of this message, plainly evident in theverbal text, is thedivine unity of the legendary Temple of Solomon andthe Virgin Mary, to whom, of course, Florence Cathedral - as S. Maria delFiore - wasdedicated (406fo. The exegeticalidentity of the Virgin and theTemple is denselyframed. just as Solomonprefigured Christ, so his Templewas the precursor and symbolof the Universal Church, and every sanctuarydrew spiritual authority from it. Similarly,Mary and herwomb werethe maternal temple, the templum maternale in whichChrist was nur- tured:Mary is theTemple of Christ,Mary is Solomon'sTemple, which converselysignifies Mary, who is theSeat of Wisdom, and so on. It is inthis syncretistic, circular identity of the Virgin and the Solomonic Templethat Wright finds the key to themotet's proportions. If virtually uniquein musicalhistory, these proportions are ubiquitous, in certainre- spectsfundamental, in the Solomonic and Marian realm. The proportional sequence6:4:2:3 that underlies the motet corresponds tothe proportional set organizingthe primary biblical description of the Temple, whose principal dimensionsare all multiples (by ten) of 6, 4, 3, and2. Overall,the plan of the mainbody of the Temple (Wright excludes the vestibule) measures 60 by20 cubits;it is subdivided into a nave40 cubitslong and 30 cubitshigh and a cu- bicsanctuary of 20 by20 by20 cubits.Although not presented in quitethe sameorder as themotet sequence, the four numbers - 6, 4, 3, 2 - areall 6 there,and only those four. As to the secondary number set 2 x 7 and4 x 7, or 2, 4, and7 ofthe motet (densely shaping text as wellas music),the Temple 6I Kings 6:1-20. In concentratingon the two main areas of the Temple,Wright disre- gardsits secondary spaces: the 10 cubitdeep vestibuleand the side chambersaround the nave and sanctuary(406). Althoughit mightbe arguedthat the omissionof thevestibule is poten- tiallya singularweakness of his interpretation(although the biblicaltext does treatthis porch as supplementaryto the 60 by 20 main body of the Temple), it would not affectmy reading in whichthe numbers6.4.3.2 are employedas multiplicationfactors, with a productthat ob- viouslywould not be affectedby the additional factorof I (see textbelow). Moreover,in Krautheimer'sunderstanding of numericalarchitectural modelling in the period (1-33), both the selectiveuse of the prototype'sdimensions and the reshufflingof theirorder are standard practice(see n-31); extendingKrautheimerian theory from the visual to themusical represen- tationof architecturewould ftdlylegitimize Wright's omission of the I O-cubitSolomonic ves-

This content downloaded from 192.147.172.89 on Mon, 3 Nov 2014 00:42:52 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 746 RENAISSANCE QUARTERLY withits four cornerstones and sevenPillars of Wisdom was begunin the fourthyear of Solomon's reign; it took seven years to completeand was ded- icatedin the seventh month with a serviceof dedication that lasted 2 x 7 days. The 2.4.7 setis alsoMarian, especially the seven - theseven sorrows of the Virgin,her seven joys, her seven acts of mercy, virginal companions, years of exilein Egypt,feasts, and so on,as Wrightexplains at length.The upshotof hisanalysis is thatthe proportional structure of the motet reproduces a nu- merologicalset that signifies the union of theVirgin and theSolomonic Temple.This biblical/exegetical numerological structure would have served as Dufay'smodel for the musically unique proportions ofhis motet. Insofaras itgoes, Wright's interpretation, which is nuancedfar beyond mysummary, is in everyrespect exemplary. But is itreally as comprehensive as he makesit seem? Wright's emphasis is on theuniversalism ofthe Motet. "DufaYsintent," he writes,"was to honornot merely the cathedral of Flo- rence,but all Christian sanctuaries.... the Virgin and the Universal Church areworthy of honor, not merely Santa Maria del Fiore and the Cathedral of Florence"(439). Effectively,in Wright's reading the motet could have been usedwith equal significance for the dedication of just about any church, at leastany Marian church - whichwould include most of the major cathe- dralsof Tuscany, not to mentionmany in otherregions in andbeyond Italy. To mymind, the question - to invertWright's summation - is whether Dufay'sintent was to honornot merely all Christiansanctuaries, but also specificallythe Cathedral of Florence.

RECONSTRUCTING THE PROPORTIONS OF THE Duomo S. Mariadel Fiore, of course, was not just any church, nor was Florence just anothercity. It was,as we know,one of the largest, most dynamic, self-con- fident,and creative urban centers in Europe.In thecourse of the fourteenth centuryFlorence had created an extraordinarysetof huge civic monuments to itsambition, pride, and power- amongthem the Palazzo Vecchio, the Campanile,and Orsanmichele.The dedicationof the Duomo, begunin 1296,was theculmination of nearly a centuryand a halfof planning and buildingon a scaleunprecedented in medieval Italy. No citywas more self- assertiveabout its identity, honor, and civicmythology as realized in public 7 buildings.1find it difficultnot to speculatethat the Florentine regime

tibule,as wellas hisreordering ofthe number sequence, not to mentionmy own analogous interpretationsbelow. For extensive analyses of the several biblical descriptions ofthe Temple, seethe references in Wright, 406 nn.29, 31. 'Trachtenberg,1993.

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wouldhave expected that the dedication motet be in someway more site- specificthan in Wright'sinterpretation. Surely it is notunreasonable to hy- pothesizethat the Florentines (the "devoted populace of Florence"in the motetstext) might have wanted that their city and itsproud, shining new cathedral(the motet's "most enormous Temple . . . theTemple of the grand- eststructure dedicated to ... [the]Virgin") be somehowidentifiably and significantlypresent not only in thetext but in themusic of its dedication motet.'At the very least it may be contemplatedthat Dufay might have in- tuitedthat such referentiality would be well-receivedby his audience,in particularthe "intellectual and spiritualelite" that Wright sees as theaudi- torsof the "number allegory. q He wellmay also simply have been intrigued bythe challenge to hisvirtuosity ofcreating such a musical"Portrait" of the greatbuilding, a notionthat would have found stimulus and support in the Florentinecultural atmosphere of exceptional inter-media fluidity (of which Brunelleschihimself, never far from the Duomo, was an extremeparticipant as goldsmith,sculptor, painter, geometer, architect, and urbanplanner).'o Wright'sreading, as alreadyexplained, is basicallya binaryconstruct themotet on oneside, biblical exegesis and numerology on theother - by- passingthe cathedral, leaving it virtuallyexcluded, at bestonly nominally present.My hypothesis of a triadic,or rathertriangular structure of meaning,is one thatretains Wright's two components but reintroduces Warren's ideathat the motet's musical structure is directly and specificallyrelated to theactual physical cathedral - onlyin a differentway than Warren himself proposed.In thistriangular structure all threecomponents - motet,building,and biblical text - wouldparticipate in a commonnumerological and ideologicalstructure, albeit in differentways and degrees. The musicwould reflectnot onlythe distant biblical Temple, but moreimmediately the buildingbeing dedicated, although as I emphasize,the interrelationship is oneof mutual triangulation. Thishypothesis involves a reinterpretationofthe dimensional and pro- portionalbasis of S. Maria del Fiore (and also othercritical factors, regardingarchitectural iconography, discussed later). To followmy reading ofthe Duomo, however, one mustfirst gain a moreaccurate notion than is usuallyheld of how the proportioning ofmonumental buildings worked in 'For Dufays completescore and forthe textin originaland translation,see Wright,399. 9Wright,439. This extraordinaryelite probably would have includedBrunelleschi, Ghi- berti,Donatello, and otherartists; Alberti (in Florenceat thetime in thePapal court),Leonardo Bruni,Poggio Bracciolini, Niccolb Niccoli, and otherhumanists; the Pope and his entourageof Cardinalsand highprelates; and, of course,Cosimo de' Medici, family,and adherents. "Trachtenberg,1997, 185-223; thisholds forthe earlyfifteenth century as well as the Trecento.

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late medievalFlorence." Although the Renaissancebias towardthis period has taught us to overlook, undervalue, or otherwisemisconstrue pre- Renaissancedesign, it was in factat once strategicallyrather simple, yet highlynuanced and effectivein practice.Buildings were structured by net- like chains of proportionallyrelated dimensions, whose generationvari- - ously employed both geometricand arithmetictechniques that is, dimensionsproduced by geometricfigures (principally squares and trian- 12 gles) as well as simple"musical" ratios (1: 1, 1:2, 2:3, etc.). These chains, whichinterlinked all importantelements of plan and elevation,were often combinedwithout methodological consistency, just as it was also possible to combine measurementstaken between pier/wallcenters with others made betweeninternal and/or external surfaces of elements.In thisproce- dure,which combined proportionalidealism with a canny,opportunistic pragmatism,what countedmost was not any absoluteconsistency of technique (all concerned seem to have understood the resistance of monumentalbuildings to any such consistency)but simplicity,exactitude, and lucidityof the finalnumerical relationships - thatis, accountability and readability- togetherwith the continuityand comprehensivenessof 13 the proportionalchain. Such chains,moreover, rather than arising from a single design moment,were oftenproduced over time in an openended, transgenerationalprocess, a processthat might comprehend more than one buildingat a singlesite, as well as manydesign moments, and whose pri- marygoal was to maintainproportional norms even as the projectevolved, as was usuallythe case in thetypically large and slow-movingprojects of the 14 time. It is in studyingthis dynamic, volatile process (as opposed to simply thefinal product, as is usuallyattempted) that we generallycan bestobserve the proportionalthinking of the planners(who practicallynever tell us ex- plicitlyin wordswhat that thinking was). This meansthat we shouldstudy thebuilding, not as a timelessabstraction, but ratherin itslong forwardde- velopmentthrough time. One of Warren'smost egregiouserrors was to read the Duomo back- ward,as if it had been designedand builtfrom the huge octagonalbase of theCupola westwardinto the nave, an errorthat led to a hopelessmuddle of

"Althoughfar from exhaustive or definitive,the considerable literature on FlorentineTre- centoarchitectural proportions includes Gori-Montanelli, Friedman, and Trachtenberg,1997. "Although framedin somewhatnegative term .s, the most insightfulaccount of this method (whichdoes not touch directlyon Florence,however) is Ackerman. "The dialogicalprocess combining idealism with pragmatism is also seen in the urban planningof TrecentoFlorence (Trachtenberg, 1997, 21-22 and passim). "In a forthcomingbook I deal systematicallywith this dynamic design process, which was fundamentalto the age.

This content downloaded from 192.147.172.89 on Mon, 3 Nov 2014 00:42:52 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions ARCHITECTURE AND MUSIC REUNITED 749 proportionalmisreadings. Reading the building "forward" - i.e.,eastward - means,of course, starting at thebeginning, which in thiscase takes us backto theperiod before the commencement ofthe new cathedral, back to thepreexisting site conditions, which were a powerfulfactor in determining thedimensions and proportionsof the new project. Among these determi- nants,the most important was not the old cathedralof S. Reparatathat was replacedby S. Mariadel Fiore beginning in 1296,but what must be consid- eredthe "root" building of the Cathedral group, the Romanesque Baptistery 15 (fig. 1). It is theBaptistery's dimensions from which those of both the new Duomoand "Giotto's" Campanile, begun in 1334,derive. That is, the Bap- tisterywas the first link in a singleproportional chain that eventually came to structureall threebuildings of the cathedral group.'6 The Baptisteryembodies two discrete sets of major proportions, inboth cases1:1. Likeits model the Pantheon, its diameter (56 bracciaexternally) correspondsto itsheight (to thevault extrados). Of directconsequence for the"chain," however, is theother set. Here it is notthe building's actual di- ameterthat is used,but what might be calledits virtual, circumferential diameter:this dimension is derivedfrom a basicmodule of the building, the facetsof the octagonal plan, each of which measures externally circa 24 braccia. Threeof these facets - whichcircuitously "span" the 56 braccia"real" diameter- measuretogether 72 braccia,which corresponds to thefull heightof thebuilding through the lantern (including the cross and orb, shownin Trecentoviews of the building). Whatis tellingin thepresent context is howthese two dimensions were )) 1-7 takenup in theTrecento as "small"(24 braccia)and "large k/2braccia) modulesin the development ofthe cathedral group. The Campanileadopted thesmall module as thesides of its square plan, while its final height came to 144 braccia,that is, thelarge module doubled. The developmentof the Duomo,while far more complex, remained equally "chained" to theBaptis- terysystem, as wellas adherentto itsproportional idealism. Although, as we shallsee, this chain was finallyextended through the entire building only withsome difficulty, itbegan unproblematically, The dimensions of Arnolfo di Cambio'snew facade represented a direct projection of the three-dimen- sionalBaptistery (using its "virtual" diameter) onto a planemeasuring 72 17 bracciain bothwidth and height (fig. 2). Behindthe facade, Arnolfo's side

1 5On thehistory of the buildings of the cathedral group, see Paatz and Paatz,entries "S. Giovanni"and "S. Mariadel Fiore"; Saalman; Toker, 1978, 1983; Trachtenberg, 1971, 1979. "On theevolution of this proportional chain, see Trachtenberg, 1997, 43-55, 118-21, 160-63. 17 Trachtenberg,1997, 55-59.

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24 72

FIGURE 2. Projection/unfoldingof Baptisterywalls to form Duomo facade.

1) 102 164

66 8 7 1357 1296

FIGURE 3. Reconstruction of 1296 Duomo project of Arnolfo di Cambio and Francesco Talenti's 1357 revision (after Franklin Toker). " walls of his new nave correspondingly spanned 72 braccia. externally. )&%en, after a long lapse in construction, the Duomo project was taken up again in the 1350s under the leadership of the architect Francesco Talenti, Arnolfo's facade and side walls were retained, but most everything else of the project was radically changed. The definitive project did not emerge immediately, " The navewidth is 71 braccia,measured to theexterior faces of the side walls; together withthe buttresses the dimension comes to circa 72 braccia.The 66 7/8braccia, internal mea- surementrecorded 19 June 1357 (Guasti, 94) hasconsistently misled scholars about the nave proportions.This dimension served only for the internal subdivision of the space into main

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butin two phases: Talenti's (re)design of 1353-1358, and the modification of thatdesign by a committeeof architects, painters, and sculptorsin 1366- 1367.1'What is mostsignificant for us aboutthis complicated, often re- counted,yet incompletely understood mid-Trecento story is thatthe second (final)phase was prompted not by structural problems or any known changes intaste, financing, orpersonnel but essentially by a seriousproportional flaw: Talenti'srevised project of 1353-1358had interrupted and discontinued the proportionalchain, and it needed to be restored. Talentihad inheritedfrom Arnolfo, in additionto theincomplete facade and side walls,quite possiblyalso the partialfoundations of an ambitiouseast end comprising a large cupola and some manner of attending chapels.Talenti's major task evidently was one of fitting, as besthe could, his newdesign into the confines of this uncompleted fabric (or at leastinto the sitelimitations determined by it)." In placeof the timber-roofed nave with fiveor moreshort bays, planned by Arnolfo, Talenti set out, in 1357, a vaultedstructure of three huge bays (fig. 3)." In plan,each central unit mea- sured34 bracciain lengthand 33 7/16 bracciain width(between pier centers),or halfthe 66 7/8braccia internal width of thenave; while the vaultswere to riseto 72 braccia,corresponding to the external width of the 22 building. This 102 braccia-long nave project was to be combinedwith a cupolascheme of indeterminateauthorship - Arnolfoand/or Talenti butof a specifieddiameter of 62 braccia. The interruptionofthe proportional chain of the cathedral group by Talenti'srevision involved not the individualbays - whoseplan and heightwere proportionally directly scaled respectively to the internal and and sideaisles, whereas the external 72 bracciadimension played a dominantrole in thedi- mensioning/proportioningofthe nave as a whole,as well as ofthe east end, as observedbelow. "For thishistory, see n. 1 5. 2'Thequestion of what possible "Arnolfian" model and completed fabric Talenti inher- itedremains controversial, in particular regarding the east end or cupolaarea of the project. AlthoughWaldman has recently demonstrated that the often cited 1334 document referring to a completed"choir" does not refer to the cathedral at all, Toker's archaeological findings do possiblyindicate considerable construction ofthe foundations of the Arnolfian choir O 978), whichwould seem to have imposed tight limits on Talenti'sredesign. In the1366-1367 phase, thelimitations ofArnolfo's fabric were overridden as the project was expanded eastward. 2'Guasti, 94; Saalman'sis thebest published reading of this key document (38-41). Mostof the following dimensions are recorded in thedocument, although a feware taken fromthe building directly. Serving as illustrationshere are Franklin Toker's reconstructions (withmy measurements added) of the Arnolfo and Talenti projects, which are more plausible thanmost such attempts (Toker, 1978, 214-3 0. 22 See n.18.

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externalwidth of the nave - but the largestunits of the project:the 102 braccia-longnave as a whole and the62 bracciacupola diameter.These figures clearlywere in absolute proportional discord with the width and heightof the nave and wereincompatible with the chain as a whole. Thus itwas thesefigures that came underthe common criticism of theseveral re- 23 view and (replanning committeesof 1366-1367. Most tellingly,it was thesedimensions that were altered and "corrected"in the finalproject of 1367 (figs.4, 5). Proportionally,the overall basis of thisrevised project was self-evidentlythe 72 bracciamodule thathad determinedthe overall width and heightof the nave (of which two bays had been completedin 1366). On thisbasis, the cupola was broughtinto fullconformity by simplyex- panding its projected (internal) diameter from62 to 72 braccia, and settingits (internal)height at 144 braccia.(The internalheight of thevault was made 55 bracciafrom base to intrados,identical to the internalheight )24 of the Baptistery. This leftthe problem of the navelength. From the outset of the 1366- 1367 replanning,the proportionalnecessity of adding a fourthbay to Ta- 25 lenti'sthree had been openlystated. This was now done, bringingthe total navelength (as Wrightnoticed)26 to 136 braccia(4 x 34) - stilleight braccia shyof a normative144. These missingbraccia, however, were provided in a decisionof 1367 to makethe inner face of thehuge piers supporting the Cupola on the nave side - wherethey could be seen as "extensions"of the - fourthpair of nave piers,hence conceptuallypart of the nave exactly "On thisphase of replanningsee Saalman,45. The criticalreport of the reviewcommittee of goldsmithsand artistsof 13 July1366 is quite specificabout the inadequatenumber of bayswith respect to the proportionalproblem (see n.25); otheraspects of the critiquecan be directlyinferred from the changesmade to the Talentiproject in the 1366-1367 process. 24 Braunfels,31-32, arguesthat the height of the Cupola was determinedby the so-called Fibonacciseries, in whicheach numberis the sum of the previoustwo numbers(1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, i44, etc.); i.e., the Cupola itselfis 55 bracciahigh, its substructure 89, the totalbeing 144. However,as we have seen,its diameter and totalheight of 72 and 144 braccia is directlyderived from the nave dimensions;the 55 bracciavault height is produceddirectly by its stated"quinto acuto" curvature(a methodusing a radiusof 4/5 the diameter),leaving the 89 bracciadifference. The appearancehere of the Fibonacci numbersmay well be a simple coincidence;or thismay be one of those "redundant"convergences of diverseplanning methodsseen elsewherein Florentineplanning (Trachtenberg, 1997, 62; 1980). In thiscase the "quinto acuto" curvature,the interiorBaptistery height, and the Fibonacciseries all produce the identical 55 braccia Cupola dimension,as well as the 144 dimension. Friedman mentionsthe Fibonacciseries among the standardplanning techniques of the period (I 2 1). 25 The 1366 reviewcommittee recommends: "E che inanzi che la cominci,si facciano quatro valichi,e ponghasila croce non uscendo la chiesa di sua ragionedi lungheczane di largheczane d'altecza" (Guasti, 167 doc. 141). 26 Wright,402.

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FIGURE 4. Maindimensions of Cathedral plan.

FIGURE 5. Maindimensions of Cathedral in lengthand height.

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17 eightbraccia deep. Therebyat exactly144 bracciafrom the facade, the navecame to theedge of the 72 bracciaoctagonal spatial base of the Cupola. All was nowwell in theplanners' eyes - architecturaldissonance having beenfully resolved into consonance - andremained so: theproject of 1367 wasfollowed without formal or dimensional change down to thededication ofthe Cupola in 1436 (forwhich Brunelleschi provided only the structure, notthe shape or dimensions) - bringingus backto thequestion of Dufays 21 motetand its numerological referential ity .

NUMERICAL CORRESPONDENCES BETWEEN MOTET AND CATHEDRAL Havingnow reconstitutedaccurately the basic dimensional and propor- tionalstructure of the cathedral as historicallycomposed, let us explorethe possiblereferentiality ofthe motet to it. 29Firstwe findthe basic musical numberset - 6.4.2.3- presentin theDuomo in a ratherstraightforward way.In thispotential relationship, however, I allow one modification,that

27 On 9 August1367 it is specifiedthat the Cupola measure72 bracciain diameter, andthat the last pier measure (in length) 12 bracciaon oneside and 8 bracciaon theother; thelatter is clearlythe primary, inner face, part of the center aisle of the nave (Guasti, 178). This is anotherdetail of the planningwhose significance appears to have eluded all commentators. "In additionto thisarithmetic proportioning ofthe building, the forms and dimensionsof the entire east end - cupolaand surrounding tribunes and chapels - wereprecisely generatedby the systematic and inspireddeployment of the geometric rotational technique of"quadrature" (Trachtenberg, 1997, 118-22).This also produced the 42 bracciadepth of thetribunes, in itselfan insignificantnumber that falls outside the arithmetical proportional chain(24, 72, 144),yet ultimately linked to itthrough the way the 72 bracciaoctagon is the pointof deparature of the east-end quadrature series. Because of its arithmetical non-presence,the 42-braccia dimension, i.e., thedepth of the tribunes, does not itselfenter the numerologicalsymbolism of the Duomo, although the form of the triconch is importantfor theDuomo iconography,as explained below. Warren!s attempt to readthe building in terms ofthe quadrature method is evenmore flawed than in thecritique of Wright. "Smithrefuses Warren's argument on thegrounds that Renaissance descriptions of the Duomo byManetti, Goro Dati, and Albertini see itsdimensions in simple(and somewhat inaccurate)measurements oftotal length, width, and height - forexample in Manetti's case, respectively266, 66, and70 "Paces"- thathave nothing in commonwith Dufays proportions. It is not true,however, that such numbersindicate fully how the cathedral's ((measurementswere perceived in the quattrocento" - butonly how certain Florentines who wereneither architects nor polyphonic composers saw them. Assuredly, Brunelleschi would haveunderstood them in authenticTrecento terms; and Dufay, given the extraordinary intri- cacyof numerological relationships in his music, not only would have been capable of such comprehension,but most likely would have been intrigued by the Duomo scheme, especially ifit was explainedto himby the architect (and also consideringhis figuration of the So- lomonic-Marianproportional nexus in hismusic). It is alsopossible that Brunelleschi played somefurther role in thegenesis of the motet.

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is, I switch2 and 3, much in theway Wright himself legitimately rearranges theorder in whichthe dimensions of theTemple appear (sometimes repeat- edly) in biblical descriptions I also introducea second operationthat is entirelyin keepingwith the spiritand methodsof medievalnumerological practice.31In theTemple and themusic, 6.4.3.2 arepresent directly as struc- turalproportions, whereas in the Cathedralthey serve instead as factorsin multiplicationswhose productscorrespond to the majordimensions of the building (much as divisionanalogously attends Wright's Temple connection,with its dimensions60, 40, 30, and 20 all requiringthe divisor10 to directlyconnect with the musical series). In thismanner we arriveat thefol- simple arithmetic.First, we have 6 x 4 = 24, yielding the basic lowing(( small"module of the cathedralgroup (the Baptisterysides, the Campanile breadth,also the facetsof the Cathedraltribunes). Next appearsthe opera- tion 6 x 4 x 3 = 72, producingthe "intermediate" module of the navewidth and height,and the Cupola diameter.Finally we providemultiplication of the fullset, 6 x 4 x 3 x 2 = 144, or the lengthof the entirenave and the heightof theCupola. The numericalset 6.4.3.2, in otherwords, contains in themost condensed form possible the entire cathedral (indeed, the entire cathedralgroup of buildings,including the 144 bracciaCampanile), whose virtualcompletion was markedby the 1436 consecration. Althoughin a muchless clear-cut and comprehensiveway, it is possible also to see the secondarylevel of numericalstructure of the motet- 2 x 7 and 4 x 7 - in thebuilding. This possibilityrequires that again we takeour cue fromWright's reading, which uses thesenumbers for the mostpart not as multiplicationfactors but simplyas the integers2, 4, and 7. Four is presentthroughout the cathedral in two powerfulmodes: as thefour gigan- tic nave bays, and as the fourtremendous piers supportingthe Cupola

30 Comparethe biblical text as quotedby Wright, 406 n.31. On thereshuffling, seemy discussionof Krautheimerian theory in n.6. 31 On medievalnumerology, see Hopperand Meyer.That moderninterpretations of medievalnumerological practices can be farmore speculative than my reading is apparent in thesuggestion by one of theanonymous readers of mymanuscript that I relatethe Duomo numbersto Christiancabalistic methodologies (which began in thethirteenth century),according to whichthe total length of thecathedral, 144 + 72 + 42 (thetribune depth,see n.28) = 258, wouldbe thenumber of Hiram in Hebrew(Cheth 8, Yod 10, Resh 200, Mem 40 = 258). KingHiram of Tyre provided the materials for the Temple, while Hiramthe bronzemonger was responsiblefor its iconographic program; all of this(and much,much more in theway of such cabalistic cipher combinations) serves as evidenceof theFlorentine New Jerusalem Duomo program.On theother hand, the proportional sys- temsof Renaissancearchitecture seem at timesnot unrelated to themultiplication chains proposedhere; an exampleis theway Alberti split up compoundproportions into the smallestharmonic ratios, e.g., 1:2 = 2:3 + 3:4 = 2:3:4, and so forth;cf Wittkower, II 5.

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(analogousto thefour cornerstones ofthe Temple). Although I would not insiston thefollowing conjunction, seven and two easily become 72, which multipliedby two becomes - again- 144.

FROM NUMEROLOGY TO ICONOGRAPHY: THE DuomO AS nMPLE, AND OTHER ANCIENT AND IDEAL MODELS It wouldseem possible, then, that despite his own flawed analysis, Warren's ideaof a numerologicallinkage of music and cathedral may indeed have had a certainvalidity. The questionis, although the numerical interrelationships discussedin thepreceding paragraphs are seemingly quite positive for the mostpart, what might be theirsignificance? Does theparallelism entail referentiality,and ifindeed the music does allude to thebuilding, is this buildingtargeted simply as a proportionalabstraction, or as something more,perhaps itself Solomonic or embodyingother meaningful traits, whichwould reinforce the numerical allusion? Medieval-Renaissancenumerology, as we know,tends hermeneutically to be notoriouslydifficult given the highly polyvalent character of individ- ual numbers,as, for example, the way "seven" could refer to thedeadly sins or thecircles of Hell, as wellas theVirgin's Joys, Sorrows, Acts of Mercy, etc.In andof themselves, numbers - symbols- werehighly unstable sig- nifiers,whose signifieds generally took on definitiononly as partsof a particularsemantic field produced by a specificcombination of numbers and/orby the context in whichthe numbers appeared (and eventhen the numberstypically produced multiple meanings). While it is possibleto see sucha semanticfield in theintricate numerical set of the cathedral dimen- sionsalone, the numerological cross-referencing of music and cathedral wouldacquire more positivity and resonanceif a symboliccontext were present,that is, if it could be establishedthat the building itself, apart from proportions,participated independently in the Solomonic-Marian realm of meaningsbeyond its rather commonplace dedication to theVirgin. Thispossibility requires that the Duomo be understoodnot merely in termsof formal abstraction but as a representationalentity, in otherwords, thatwe see the building much in the way that Richard Krautheimer showed medievalarchitecture to behavein general,in his fundamentalarticle of 12 1942 on architecturaliconography. Like many buildings of themiddle ages- andespecially those of Florence - theDuomo invitescomprehen- sionas morethan the abstract architectural composition that it is generally takenfor in modernscholarship, which often finds a satisfactionin formal- ismalien to themedieval period itself As I haverecently argued, S. Maria

"Krautheimer;see also Crossley.

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del Fioreappears to comprisea complex,overlapping collage of forms, that is, of architecturalimages referential to realand imaginaryarchitectural models."Whereas most of Krautheimer'siconographic allusions (which arefor the most part early medieval) tend to be ratherminimalist and abstract(as well as, to themodern eye, often somewhat arcane and even surreal),Trecento Florence tends to be morevisually explicit in itsreferenc- ing. It movestoward the "realistic"mode thatKrautheimer attributed mainlyto thepost-medieval period (raising again the issue of the true posi- tionof the Trecento in architecturalhistory). But eventuallywe willalso findthat the Duomo quitepossibly participated as wellin Krautheimer's ((minimalist"numerological mode (in which,for example, a buildingwith morethan four sides was considered "round"). To comprehendthe iconographic modeling of the Duomo, however, we needfirst to understandsomething of the ideological foundation of the architecturaliconography of Trecento Florence. The iconographyof its principalmonuments centered in various ways on theprotean concept now knownas the"Myth of Florence," whereby the city, in itsprimary ideological metaphorof civic status and identity, saw itself as botha newRome and 14 a newJerusalem. Rooted in thefactual ancient origins of Florence,the "Roman"notion - whichwas already immanent in theextreme classicism of thePantheon-like Baptistery - firstappears explicitly in chronicles around1200, and it continues strongly inexpanded form in thefourteenth- century"new" histories of the Villani. Yet Florence identified itself not only withpagan Rome but also with the early Church Fathers' concept of a New ChristianRome. It wasthis latter entity, according to theFlorentine chronicles,that provided the model forthe rebuildingof Florenceafter its destructionby the barbarians, in theway the dedications and locationsof Florentinechurches were made parallel to thosein Rome.This visionary ur- banisticreading tied the Roman myth with the myth of Jerusalem, which cameto mostintensely embody the moral and spiritualaspirations of the city.In thismyth, Florence is explicitlydestined to be botha rebornChris- tianRome and a veritableNew Jerusalem of Christian virtue.'5 This multilayeredcivic mythology, and especiallythe New Jerusalem component- an ideaclosely associated with the Temple in Jerusalem, that is,ultimately with the Solomonic Temple as wellas withthe Heavenly Jerus- alem- appearsto underliethe complex architectural iconography of the

33 Trachtenberg,1993. 31 Ibid.,with further literature. 3'Davis.

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Cathedral."In itsanalysis of pictorial representations ofthe Duomo, schol- arshiphas in onecase come close to recognizingthis referential nexus. It has oftenbeen noted that in the 1430s panel in the Philadelphia Museum depict- ing"Christ Healing the Demoniac" - an eventthat occurred in theTemple (Matthew17: 14-18,Mark 9: 17-27)- the"biblical Temple in Jerusalem," inWright's words, "is transmogrified into the cathedral of Florence" with its fourbays and dome (416, 429). Butwhereas Wright and others see the paint- ingonly as an ex postfacto reinterpretation of the Duomo, in which,in Wright'swords, it "ismade to representthe Temple of Solomon and, by ex- tension,to symbolizethe ideal of theUniversal Church" (417), 1 find evidenceindicating that the Florentines instead saw their new Cathedral in suchsymbolic or biblical terms from the beginning. A striking example is the wayin which the 1366-1367 Duomo project serves to represent the universal Churchin thecontemporary Spanish Chapel frescoes at S. MariaNovella by 37 Andreada Firenze,himself a member of the planning committee. yet theis- sueis not one merely of the Florentines' always having "Seen" their Duomo in suchterms regardless of itsactual form, in theway so manymedieval build- ingswere willfully "seen" as theTemple, etc., important as thatprojected perceptualdesire was to therepresentational process; rather, the Florentines appearto haveshaped its forms to specificallymirror the Solomonic-Jerusa- lemicset of models. 38 To followmy iconographic analysis of the Duomo, however, another digressionis needed,in thiscase to graspcertain further peculiarities of the representationalprocess in questionand theproblematics of our access to it.Models such as "TheTemple," "Jerusalem," and "The HeavenlyJerusa- lem,"far from being fixed images, tended to be extremelyfluid, unstable, 39 and evenmutual or self-contradictorypresences in theimaginary. Al- thoughthis volatility and irrationalitycomplicates our interpretation,it augmentedthe freedom of thearchitect in theprocess of transmogrifica- tion,that is, in designingvisible referentiality into the form of an actual building,with all ofits historical and physicalcontingencies of typology, structure,function, and localtaste and tradition.Architectural representation,like representation in general,was nevera passivemirroring but a complexprocess involving the transformation ofone or morereal or imag-

"On these associations, see Sauer, 109; Sedlmayr; von Simson, 8ff,38-39, 95ff,- Stookey,35-41. "Meiss, 97-100. 3'For this modelingprocess, in addition to Krautheimersee Krinsky;Sinding-Larsen, 203ff,220ff. 39Thisinstability is apparentin KrinsWs discussion.

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inarymodels into a newform, an act of reinterpretationof the historical andthe imaginary into the present and the real, and nowhere was this truer thanin TrecentoFlorence. There the architectural representation of the fluidcomplex of "models" in question,which I earliercharacterized simply as comparatively"realistic" (in termsof Krautheimer'sspectrum) was on closerexamination actually highly variable in modality,ranging from the ratherdirect and concreteto thevaguely suggestive, speculative, and freely interpretative,all complicated by the contingent factors just alludedto. Unlikemuch of Renaissance architecture, where we easilyrecognize a rep- resentationof the Corinthianorder, triumphal arch, temple front, or tholos,and in contrastto certainTuscan Romanesque buildings such as the Baptisteriesof Florenceand Pisa,respectively modeled directly on thePan- theonand HolySepulchre, the Florentine Trecento developed in itsmajor buildingsan extremelysophisticated and poeticart of allusion, collaging, andconcatenation of representational forms. Difficult as itsometimes is to decipherthe iconographies involved, the effort is necessaryand justified, unlesswe arewilling to acceptthe huge, extravagant, expensive, and struc- turallychallenging works simply as oversizedand overcomplicated abstract forms.What finally makes possible here a potentiallyvalid iconographic readingis thevery factor that, in myview, made these forms representa- tionallyeffective in thefirst place: each building, rather than repeating or developingestablished typologies or assemblagesof features, instead com- prisesa uniqueand highlyindividuated formal entity, a singulardesign inexplicablein termsof utilitarianfunction, structural exigency, stylistic evolution,or criteriaof sensuous "beauty" - ofwhat was seductiveand pleasingto theeye. Indeed, regarding the last mentioned factor, much of Trecentoarchitecture - and mostparticularly the visually disjunctive, overcomplicated,ponderous, sometimes even coarse Duomo - refrains fromsignificant participation in sucha discourseof the "beautiful" (not- withstandingits incorporation of ideal proportionalschemes). I would arguethat any valid understanding of theDuomo and othermajor Tre- centomonuments must be predicatedon thepremise that the key to their designresides in theiriconography; that is, we mustseek to understand themin sernioticterms, as architectureparlante,as complex three-dimen- sionalsignifiers that participated in thelarger semantic field centered on 40 Florentinecivic mythology. Whenwe enterthe nave of the Duomo, what we behold,for all itspro- portionalcoherence, iscertainly not sensuously "beautiful" inany normative

40 Thisprocess is moreextensively studied in Trachtenberg,1993; see also Trachtenberg, 1991,for the eclectic design modality of the practice and alsoits sociological basis.

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FIGURE 6. Cathedral nave. sense (fig. 6). That Trecento Florentines were fully capable of producing ele- gant and serene church interiors when they so desired is quite clear, for example, in the nave of S. Maria Novella. At the Duomo, other criteria seem to be at work, and, as I have indicated above, those criteria appear to center on the iconographic. In part, the interior may be understood as a collage of the major local church interiors of the period: the nave incorporates the pier type of Orsanmichele (whose ground story loggia was then being trans- formed into a closed oratory), the clerestory oculus and vaulted format of S. Maria Novella, and the ballatoio of S. Croce. 4' Thereby the interior becomes identifiably "Florentine," something uniquely and broadly referential to the city itself Yet our eyes tell us there is more to the nave than this easily identifiable syncretism of contemporary monuments; in its immense scale, weight, and detailing, the nave seems inhabited by an alien presence. Compared to virtually all church interiors of the period, in Florence and elsewhere, the Duomo nave, in its extraordinary massiveness and overt classicism of form and space, is infused with the presence of antiquity. Its piers, faced with classicizing pi- lasters on all sides, form towering, double-storied masses that, at this level of perception, obliterate the reference to the small Orsanmichele models. The double-consoled ballatoio, unlike the spartan version of S. Croce, is as mas- sively and lavishly classicizing as the trabeation of many an ancient triumphal arch or basilica. The huge spatial units (some 20 meters square, over 40 meters high), like the piers, dwarf those of any contemporary building. Per- ceived against the architectural horizon of expectations of its day, the nave

"The cathedralpilasters possibly also alludedto theold naveof S. Reparata,whose principaltectonic features were piers of rectangular plan with a singlepilaster articulation.

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,aide f Ir C7

FIGURE 7. ReconstructionofBasilica of Maxentius ("Pacis"), Rome. seems less allied to "medieval,"that is, contemporaryinteriors than to the vastspatial and massivephysical forms of ancientRoman architecture. It is possibleto carrythis reading a stepfurther. I suggest that the refer- entialitymay have been morespecific, that, in otherwords, the Florentines mayhave had a particularancient building in mind as model. Especiallyin theoriginal plan of the 1350s of onlythree bays, the nave mayhave specifi- callyreferred to the huge three-bayed"Templum Pacis," as the Basilica of Maxentiusin the ForumRomanum was knownat the time (fig.7). What mighthave made such an allusionresonant and givenit motivationbeyond the desiremerely to make the nave "Roman," was thatthe TemplumPacis iconographycontained a meaningrelevant to the main themeof thispaper, forit was believedto have been the repositoryof thespoils taken by the Ro- mans fromthe destroyedTemple in Jerusalem(which, of course, had actuallybeen displayedin the realTemplum Pacis in the Forumof Vespa- sian).4' Through the agency of metonymy,the nave might have thus acquired an ideological "resemblance"to the Temple in the Florentine mind,thereby speaking simultaneously to bothsides of Florentinecivic mythology,to Florence as both a New Rome and a New Jerusalem.This readingwould be strengthenedby the way in which, first,the Duomo scheme is virtuallycopied by the Loggia dei Lanzi, the huge three-bayed

"On theway the Basilica of Maxentius acquired the identity of the Templum Pacis, see Whitehead,2-3; Scherer,78. It is,however, not known exactly at whatpoint between the thirteenthand the mid-fifteenth century the building acquired this mistaken identity (having earlierbeen known as the"templum urbis Romae" and theTemple of Romulus).

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civicloggia in thePiazza della Signoriabuilt 1374-1382; and second,later in theSassetti Chapel frescoesGhirlandaio pairs the Loggia with the Templum 43 Pacis itself,completing the circle of reference. In the cathedralnave such Temple/Romemodelling as may have ob- tained was limitedand diluted by the dependence of the interioron the standardthree-aisled, rib-vaulted, basilican church typology, which the ref- erencesin questionwould have overlaid.Few such compromisesappear to haveaffected the immense east end of theDuomo, whichconstituted a radically freeand virtuallycomprehensive departure from contemporary typologies(sharing with Tuscan prototypesonly the basilica-cum-cupola idea), presentinginstead a complex collaging of multiple referencesto "Rome" and "Jerusalem,"the Temple and theVirgin. As the beholdermoves from the nave into thevast eastern interior (fig. 8), she or he is struckby theway its lower parts resemble no buildingof the age, seeminginstead to transposeinto Tuscan architecturallanguage the huge massesand voids of some greatRoman ruinssuch as the bathsor the 44 imperialpalace. In any case, the Cupola thatthese "antique"-like masses supportunquestionably was intendedto rivalthe Pantheon, whose diameter it almostprecisely equals and whose medievaldedication to the Virginas "Sancta Maria Rotunda"it parallels.Indeed, so intentwere the Florentines on again "copying"the Pantheon-this timein scale ratherthan more for- mally as at the Baptistery(which the Cupola also "copies") - that the Cupola was plannedat a momentwhen no architectseems to have known how a Pantheon-scaledvault might actually be built.Again, the symbolism is complex,alluding to Florenceas theNew Rome, but throughthe Marian traitsalso indirectlyto theJerusalem/Solomonic nexus. Althoughthe Cupola tendsto dominateour attentionat the Duomo becauseof itssheer scale and Brunelleschianglamour, the fantasticmassing of whichthe Cupola was but the dominantpart -that is, the prodigious, polymorphouseast end as a whole- was compositionallyand iconographi- callystill more complex,indeed superchargedwith referentiality(fig. 9). The evidencesuggests that, considered as a whole,and particularlyin itsex- ternalform, the east end was notsimply a "domedtriconch" or othergeneric 45 medievaltype, as is usuallyimagined. Ratherit appearsto have been ex plicitlymodeled afterthe Trecento Florentinenotion of the Temple in "Borsook, 46-47. 44Paatz,1937, 102-03, comparesit withthe "Massenbau" of Roman imperialarchitec- ture(seen herefor the firsttime since antiquity),specifically with the Palace of Augustuson the Palatine. 4'For example,by Wittkower,I 1, as a "Compositetype" of nave plus cupola, as in Siena, Pisa, etc.

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FIGURE8. Cathedraleast end, interior......

FIGURE9. Cathedraleast end, exterior.

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Jerusalem,in conjunctionwith certain medieval images of theHeavenly Jerusalem,the two concepts overlapping inthe medieval mind. The shapeof theTemple in Jerusalem,insofar as it existedin theFlorentine imaginary, appearsto have had little to do eitherwith the biblical description or the ac- 46 tualpost-Solomonic Temple. Its imaginedform, which partly derives from theIslamic Dome ofthe Rock with which the Temple was often confused (notwithstandingthe fact that the Herodian Temple was, of course,de- stroyed),is revealedin contemporaryFlorentine painting in a seriesof depictionsof the Temple rising behind the walls of Jerusalem, all takingthe formof a largedomed octagon, often though not always surrounded by tri- bunesor smaller domes. While numerous examples postdate the Florentine Cathedralpro)ect, several predate it, including one ofspecial importance (fig.10). TaddeoGaddi's Temple, painted in theBaroncelli chapel in S. Crocein the1330s, I believereflected the current Florentine notion of the Templein Jerusalem on whichthe Cathedral itself was eventually modeled. ThatTaddeo Gaddi became a prominentmember of the definitive Cathe- 41 dralplanning committees of the 1360s reinforces this line of argument. The probableassociation of the Duomo east end with the related image ofthe Heavenly Jerusalem is suggestedby another work: the famous reli- quaryof the Holy Blood in S. Marcoin Venice, which is themost elaborate preservedexample of a widespreadmedieval type of representation ofthe HeavenlyCity (fig. I 1)." To understandthis connection one mustfirst re- conceptualizethe Duomo eastend accordingto theway it was originally plannedand partly built. Although its three tribunes are usually seen as huge apsidialconstructions, this is trueonly of their plan. Their high vaults were conceivedas asymmetrical,pseudo-domical forms, and as canbe seenin the SpanishChapel fresco, each vault was meant to receivea lantern.4' The ef- fecton the exteriorthus was to have been of a greatlanterned dome surroundedon threesides by secondary lanterned pseudo-domes (the fourth sidebeing, of course, occupied by the nave), much as in theTaddeo Gaddi Temple,as wellas in thereliquary, as is suggestedby my sketch in fig.12. To thisrestoration should probably be addedanother detail (seen in thesketch): Brunelleschi's highly classicizing semicircular exhedrae would havereplaced an originalproject for presumably more "Gothic" corner ac- cents,for such prominent corners resulting from the setting of an octagonal

46 Following Krinsky'sanalysis, such deviation would have been characteristicof the Temple in the late medievalimaginary. 41 CE Trachtenberg,1993, 16-19. 48 Gaborit-Chopin. 49Trachtenberg,1983a.

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FIGURE IO. Taddeo Gaddi, Meeting at the Golden Gate, detail of Temple in Jerusa- lem, Baroncelli Chapel, S. Croce, 1332-1338.

FIGURE I 1. Reliquary of the Holy Blood, S. Marco, Venice.

This content downloaded from 192.147.172.89 on Mon, 3 Nov 2014 00:42:52 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 766 RENAISSANCE QUARTERLY structureover a largersquare base were rarely left bare in theGothic period.5' Giotto's Campanile projectforesaw a huge centraloctagon surroundedby high pinnacles at thecorners, an arrangementparalleled in thesuperstructure of Orcagna's Orsanmichele tabernacle, whose central ribbedcupola has in factbeen seen to reflector foreshadowthe Duomo project(fig. 13). Ifin additionto theminor cupolas-cum-lanterns onethus restoresto theTrecento Cathedral project a setof corner pinnacles (fig. 12), itsresemblance to theS. Marcoreliquary, with its subsidiary domes, lanterns,and pointedcorner elements, is schematicallycomplete.

ICONOGRAPHY AND NUMEROLOGY AT THE DUOMO Farfrom having been iconographically innocent or facile,the Duomo thus appearsto haveincorporated two collage-like layers of deeply meaningful multipleimages in itsdesign. One layerreferred to thecontemporary physi- calcity of Florence itselfi its three major "modern" church interiors, S. Maria Novella,S. Croce,and Orsanmichele,were collaged into the nave; and the Baptistery,the architectural epicenter of Florentine civic identity, appeared in enlargedform as theCupola and also was multiplied in theexternal forms of thethree tribunes, which repeat the Baptistery dimensions, its triple-arched arcading,and (as originallyprojected) its lantern. At thislevel, the Duomo appearsas a flamboyant,explosive, polymorphous celebration of the city as representedin its major preexisting ecclesiastical monuments. Bycontrast, in thesecond - butby no meanssecondary - icono- graphiclayer, the referential thrust is insteadto extra-Florentine,real and imaginaryarchitecture bound up withcivic mythology, indeed, with virtu- allythe entire semantic field associated with the Myth of Florence. Allusions to Rome,both pagan and Christian,and toJerusalem, both historical (the Temple)and Heavenly,permeate the nave, the Cupola, and thedominant eastend as a wholeof the church dedicated to andsymbolizing the Floren- tineVirgin, S. Mariadel Fiore.If the model for the nave (at thislevel) was theTemplum Pacis, the huge interior was allusive to bothRoman antiquity andthe Temple, whose treasures the Templum Pacis had contained. Analo- gously,the Cupola, modelledin itshuge dimensions on thePantheon dedicatedto S. MariaRotonda, formed an iconographicallyMarian crown forthe cathedral dedicated to S. Mariadel Fiore.The colossaleast end as a wholeiconographically conflated the period's imaginary of the Temple in Jerusalemand theHeavenly Jerusalem, themselves closely associated con- ceptsin themedieval mind, to producethe most stupendous of Solomonic references,capped by the Mariological Cupola. 50 Cf. Trachtenberg,1993, 29 n-30.

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FIGURE 12. Reconstructionsketch of definitive 1367 projectfor Duorno.

FIGURE13. Andrea Orcagna, Tabernacle, Orsanmichele, detail of superstructure.

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As we contemplatethese multiple, overlapping allusions, the Duomo is transformedinto a powerful,rich semantic field in which signifierscon- stantlyshift and oscillatein theirsignifieds between iconographic nodes and layers,as, forexample, in theway (in thenave) S. Croce and S. Maria Novella also becomeemblems of Florenceas New Jerusalemin theirembodiment of spiritualreform, or in the transmogrificationof the Baptistery,originally a RomanTemple of Mars (as TrecentoFlorentines erroneously believed) in the formof theChristianized Pantheon, into the Duomo eastend. To use Krau- theirner'sterm for the highly-valuedmedieval cognitiveexperience of a simultaneityof numerologicaland iconographicsymbolism, the Cathedral of Florencein its manyparts and as a whole "vibrated"syncretistically with Marian,Solomonic, Jerusalemic, and associatedreferences (not to mention Roman and contemporaryFlorentine allusion)." That the Duomo was inhabitedby this"reverberatory" biblical-exegetical nexusof architecturaliconography and allusionenables us now to read withgreater fluency the numerologicalcharacter of the Duomo, wherewe findadditional meaning in its dimensions.Given the richiconography of the Duomo-as-Temple, we may legitimatelyspeculate that the Temple model mayalso be embeddedin itsproportional structure - herethe biblical descriptionrather than the centralizedformat of Taddeo Gaddi's representation.If we reducethe Duomo plan, in its mostbasic aspect,to a schematicconstruct, it may be said to parallelthe biblicalTemple format and proportions(fig. 14). That is, in both cases the main partof the building is bipartite,comprising a nave and separatesanctuary; in plan, both navesare proportioned 2:1 in lengthand width,respectively 40 by20 cubits and 144 by 72 braccia;and in both buildingsthe sanctuariesrise over cen- tralizedplans with diameters equal to thenave width, in one case a 20 cubit square,the othera 72 bracciaoctagon (leaving aside herethe peripheral tribunes). At the fundamental Krautheimerian level of architectural representation,minimalist abstraction, the Duomo thusmay be said to have proportionally"resembled" the biblical Temple (that also was theVirgin) so richlyalluded to in morepalpably visual terms. Similarly,the CelestialJerusalem - withwhich the Temple was also identified- mayalso be seen as numerologicallypresent in the Duomo, in a basic and lucid way.The largestmeaningful dimension of the Duomo is the 144 bracciaof the navelength and Cupola height;that is, 144 bracciais the dimensionof the major axis (respectivelylongitudinal and vertical)of the two basic unitsof the Duomo. Quite simply,the numberin question correspondsto the descriptionin Revelationof the New Jerusalem,whose

5'Krautheimer,122.

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11.1 72

2:1 2:1 0

20 L 72 TEMPLE SMDF

FIGURE14. Schematic identity of Temple and Cathedral. walls (ofjasper) measure144 cubitsin height(21:17) - a cityto be popu- lated with the 144,000 worthymembers of the twelvetribes of Israelwho alone "Wereredeemed from the earth" (14:3). That 144 bracciawas also the heightof theadjacent Campanile, as well as the"ideal" height of thePalazzo Vecchiodesign (stretched in executionto 160 braccia),would haveextended this apocalyptic symbolismtoward the cityof Florence itself;that is, it would have returnedthe ideological chain of associationto theMyth of Flo- rence whereby the city is destined to be a New Jerusalem on earth, completingthe iconographic-myth/textcircle interlinking the civic and re- ligiousthemes and iconographythat we have been attemptingto follow.

MOTET AND CATHEDRAL: UTARCHITECTURA MUSIC,4

Let us now summarizethe main evidence brought forward regarding the pri- marypurpose of thispaper, the revivalof Warren's idea of a linkagebetween Dufayand FlorenceCathedral: 1) Dufays textrepeatedly refers explicitly to theCathedral as theTemple, an obviousbut fundamentalpoint consideringthe absolutebonding of music (score)and textin composition(as Wrightemphasizes) and performance.

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2) As Wrightexpansively shows, the structureof Dufays motet- the pri- mary6.4.2.3 set as well as thenumbers 2, 4, and 7 - alludesdensely to the numerologyof the symbolicnexus centered on the SolomonicTemple, the Virgin,and theirunity. 3) The principaldimensions of thecathedral group of monumentsare identical with or derivedfrom the modules 24, 72, and 144, numberswhich resultfrom the progressive multiplication of the numbers 6, 4, 3, and 2. The 2.4.7 set maybe seen as presentat the Duomo in a lesscomprehensive way. 4) The complexform of the Duomo is understoodhere mainly, not as an abstraction,but in termsof iconography,allusion, and representation.It forms a complexcollage of referentialitythat includes the Temple, the Virgin, and the HeavenlyJerusalem. 5) The Duomo may also be seen as representingthe Temple numerologically,in itsschematized proportions (nave 2: 1. chancel 1: I in plan). 6) The Duomo's largestmeaningful dimensions, of its 144 braccialong nave and 144 bracciahigh Cupola (as well as its Campanile), correspondto the heightof the walls of the CelestialJerusalem, with which the Temple was closelyidentified. (144, we recall,is theproduct of 6 x 4 x 3 x 2.) 7) Pictorialevidence that the Florentines saw theircathedral as theTemple is presentin the Baroncellichapel (beforethe matureDuomo projectof the 1360s), the SpanishChapel (duringthe Duomo planning),and the Phila- delphia"Christ Healing the Demoniac" (afterwards). Given theseobservations, it would seem fairto stronglysuggest that if Wrightis indeedcorrect in his thesisthat the numerical structure of Dufays motetis referentialor representational(as Warrenfirst vainly attempted to show), the dimensionsof such allusionmay have been morecomplex than he argues.The internalcross-referentiality of text and score and the referentialityof the motetas a whole to theTemple-Marian nexus occurred in a work whose ostensible purpose was to embellish the consecration of a building,which is explicitlymentioned in the motet'stext. This building was not only numerologicallylinked to the music but, perhapsmore im- portantly,was itselfprofoundly and visiblyshaped by a referentiality, deeplyrooted in Florentineas well as churchideology, to thesame Temple- Marian knot of meaning that informsthe music. The motet, in other words,would be multiplyreferential, in both textand score, to the very ideological nexus that shaped the actual formand dimensions of the Duomo, dimensions that find parallels in the music. Although it is of courseimpossible to provethat any of the apparentallusion was conscious

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and motivated,once we acceptthe presence of such motivation in thispic- tureI findit difficult,ifnot impossible, to drawa linebetween what may be admissibleand what should be excluded.The strongestcase is Wright's cross-referencingof musical score and text- therethe 2.4.7 set is so denselyand comprehensively present as tovirtually exclude any doubt. But oncethe referentiality becomes external to themotet - a referentialitythat themotet's text and purposeunambiguously warrants - it seemsto me thata provisionalinclusivity is the preferable and more profitable interpre- tativestrategy, given the observations I have made about the Duomo and, in general,Krautheimer's theory, with its emphasis on thecomplex poly- valanceof medieval architectural symbolism and "vibration." In thepresent instance such "vibration" would have been far more com- plexthan with any of Krautheimer's examples - certainlyfar more difficult forus to tryto imagine.Whereas Krautheimer was imagining the contem- plationof a givenbuilding and itsmodel(s), here we areconsidering the simultaneousexperience of such architectural factors together with vocal music,involving both text and score. More than that, unlike a givenbuild- ingor otherwork of thevisual arts, which we can experiencedirectly or throughreproduction, unless we area musicianor musicologistwe cannot meaningfullyexperience a motet through reading a score:we needto hear it performed,in thiscase preferably in thespace that it was meantto be - onlyonce - performed.Moreover, ideally - andimpossibly - we would needto hearthe performance with the "ears" of the Quattrocento audience. Neverthelessit is possibleto speculateon theexperience of the partici- pantsof thatexalted moment in 1436, to describewhat may have been possiblefor them to hear,see, and imagine. The performanceofNuper rosarumflares briefly made the building(in myinterpretation), not just a theatricalsetting and auditorium,but an integralpart of the performing arts,integrally part of the performance. For the ideally knowledgeable and attentiveparticipant, the words, structure, and "images"of the musictext weremirrored in thepiers, walls, and vaults all around.Yet simultaneously thebuilding seemed to be echoedin themusic, and all suchsensuous expe- riencereflected and was reflected by the multilayered ideological, imagetext knotof Temple and Virgin,Temple as theVirgin, Virgin as theTemple, Templeas NewJerusalem, all convergingwith a (Selo-consciousnessofsite and meaningintricately fused with the city of Florenceand itsmythical/ mysticalidentity. In whichdirections such thoughts, perceptions, and feel- ingsactually might have run, whether, indeed, any of the auditors, even the mostknowledgeable, actually experienced much of what was theoretically possible,we shall,of course, never know (we don't even know at what point in theconsecration ceremony the motet was performed, and in any case, the

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Duomo has terribleacoustics). Perhapsonly Dufay himself,or the other membersof the papal chapelsinging under his direction,would have regis- teredmuch of the referentialsystem at all. Technicallyit would have been difficultindeed for even the informed listener to followwith the ear the long durationalsequences inherent in themotet, although clearly heard by all, lit- erallyor figurativelytrumpeted, would have been the fourwords of the cantusfirmus,"terribilus est ipse locus,"the centralwords of the famousvi- sion of Jacob'sLadder in which angels are seen going up and down from Heaven (and perhapsevoking for some listenersthis vision, even the "heavenly"space directlyaround them). But mymain point here is to suggestthat a cross-referential,multimedia experience of music,architecture, and text- based meaningas suggestedin thisparagraph may have been at leasttheo- reticallypossible, or imagined as thus by the composer,for some of the culturallyelite members of his audience. Finally,I would pointout thatthis triangulated interpretation of Dufay, the Duomo, and theirbiblical/Mariological sources, as some readerswill have realized,effectively has raisedanother intriguing possibility regarding Krautheimer'sprotean theory of medievalarchitectural iconography. In his analysis,the iconographicmodel is typicallysubject to threeoperations in theprocess of transfer:"the disintegration of theprototype into its single elements,the selectivetransfer of these parts,and theirreshuffling in the copy" (126). Krautheimerhimself notes that this reductive, recombinatory so widelyoperative in "real"architectural modeling, that is, the procedure, )) way actualbuildings "copy realor imaginaryarchitectural prototypes, also characterizesarchitectural representation in other media. As he puts it, "Representationsof buildingsin medievalsculpture and paintingappear to confirmthe peculiar relationship between copy and originalin medievalarchitecture"(126). What the presentstudy has found is not only that the variousways in which S. Maria del Fiore "copies" the Temple/Heavenly Jerusalem"prototypes" correspond to Krautheimerianrules of disintegra- - tion,selection, and reshuffling- as indeedwe mighthave expected but also thatDufay's musical representations of both the real cathedral(in my reading)and of the legendarytext-based Solomonic/Marian prototypes (in Wright'sreading) play by thesesame rules. Of coursemusic and architecturewere densely bonded in theperiod by theircommon Pythagoreanproportioning, and intimatelybonded by the 52 way thatmonumental architecture was the place of musicalperformance. 52 Wittkower,131-32, emphasizes that Renaissance architects did not try to "build"mu- sicbut rather were self-consciously using the same rules of mathematics as musicused; the proportionsof soundsand spaces were not related directly but through the universal validity ofa commonharmonic system, which was rooted in divineorder.

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Buthere we appearto havestumbled across something more. In thestory of Nuperrosarumflores we discover a singularlyclear case of the intersection of medievalmusic and medievalarchitecture in the sphere of representation, andwe findmoreover that the Krautheimerian method of architectural representation(or "copying")for the plastic-visual arts, at leastin thisone particularinstance, evidently also methodologically guided the architectural representationofthe greatest European composer of the moment. Thisconjunction will not surprise Zeitgeist-believers, butit does puzzle me as to itsground of possibility and implications.Although only a musi- cologist,if anyone, will ever be ableto work this issue out thoroughly, I offer thefollowing observation. Architecture, so functionalist and gravity-bound, is themost physical and material of all artistic media; although its spaces and massesmay be diligentlyshaped and orderedby number and proportion, music- especiallypolyphony - is itselfquintessentially proportion and number.This wouldmean that music was inherentlymore sympathetic thanarchitecture to Krautheimer's rather abstract, numerologically centered methodology:in otherwords, music was potentiallymore fitting to the Krautheimerianmode of architectural representation than architecture itself.Thus, one could almost say that at some point in the period an instance ofdense musical representation ofarchitecture was an eventfated to hap- pen.That it appears to havehappened in Florenceis notsurprising.

INSTITUTE OF FINE ARTS, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY

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