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A fine example of a late impression, the sheet untrimmed. Light marginal soiling. Early fold visible on verso but no crease visible on the recto. Watermark "fleur-de-lis in a circle" A view of the cortile of Palazzo Farnese. Construction of the palazzo, designed by Antonio da Sangallo the Younger (1484-1536), with modifications and additions by Michelangelo, began in 1517. By the time of its completion in 1589, Jacopo Vignola and Giacomo Della Porta had also worked on the project. The courtyard is partly the work of Sangallo, who designed the ground floor and first floor, while the second floor was built according to the designs of Michelangelo, who took over the project upon Sangallo s death in 1546. Of the two ancient statues of Hercules shown in the cortile, the one on the right is the famed Farnese Hercules, now in Naples, which caused a sensation upon its discover in 1546. The inscription reads: "Palatij Farnesij Romae non procul a reliquiis Theatri Pompei olim e solidissimo Tiburtino lapide non minore architecturae commendatione ab Antonio Sa[n]gallo inchoati, quam stupendo artificio per Michaelem Angelum omnibus numeris consumati, quantum artificio diligentia assequi potuit, interioris partis expressio, atq[ue] in intimo eius ambulacro duarum Herculis statuar[um] icones." Translation: "An image of the interior part, with two statues of Hercules in its lower portico, of Palazzo Farnese in Rome, located not far from the remains of what was in the past the theater of Pompey; begun -in very solid travertine stone- by Antonio Sangallo with no less architectural art than when finished, with astonishing craft and all possible diligence, by Michelangelo." The publisher, Nicolas van Aelst, emigrated to Rome from his native Brussels in the mid 1580s. He "established his home and workshop in a house situated between the now vanished church of San Biagio della Fossa and the church of Santa Maria della Pace, near Piazza Navona. The building was the property of the church of Santa Maria dell Anima, to whom the printed paid an annual rent of 30 scudi." Van Aelst died at Rome on 19 July 1613. For more, see Lorizzo, "Nicolas van Aelst's Will and a List of his Plates", Print Quarterly , March 2014, Vol. 31, No. 1 (March 2014), pp. 3-20. In 1585, Claudio Duchetti produced a copy of this plate. That version was subsequently printed by Orlandi (1602) and Van Schoel. THIRD STATE, of FOUR. The first state had no explanatory text. The second, with the text and "Formis Antoni Lafrerij Sequani MDLX". In this third state, the Lafréry address has been erased, though the date "MDLX" has been preserved, and Nicolas van Aeslt s publishing information has been engraved at the lower left. A fourth state, described by Rubach (n. 376), has Gio. Battista de Rossi s address (in place of van Aelst s).
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