Giuseppe Arcimboldo és Jacopo Strada jelmeztervei és az 1572. évi pozsonyi koronázás lovagi tornája = Costume Designs by Giuseppe Arcimboldo and Jacopo Strada, and the Coronation Tournament in Pozsony (Bratislava) in 1572

Gulyás, Borbála (2023) Giuseppe Arcimboldo és Jacopo Strada jelmeztervei és az 1572. évi pozsonyi koronázás lovagi tornája = Costume Designs by Giuseppe Arcimboldo and Jacopo Strada, and the Coronation Tournament in Pozsony (Bratislava) in 1572. ARS HUNGARICA : A BÖLCSÉSZETTUDOMÁNYI KUTATÓKÖZPONT MŰVÉSZETTÖRTÉNETI INTÉZET FOLYÓIRATA, 49 (4). pp. 363-388. ISSN 0133-1531

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Abstract

This study examines the costumed tournament held in 1572 in Pozsony (in German: Preßburg, today Bratislava, Slovakia) to celebrate the coronation as King of Hungary of Archduke Rudolf of Habsburg (the future Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor, 1576–1612, King of Bohemia, 1576–1608/1611, King Rudolf I of Hungary, 1572–1608). The event was modelled on the dramatic tournaments (cavallerie) that were held between 1561 and 1570 in the court of Alfonso II d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, who had dynastic relations with the Habsburgs (figs 1–2). Among the other costumed tournaments preceding the chivalric spectacle in Pozsony in 1572 were the one held in the Bavarian ducal court in Munich in 1568, and those of the Habsburg court in Prague in 1570 and in Vienna and Graz in 1571 (fig. 3), at which prizes were awarded for the most beautiful “inventions”. Within the tournament in Pozsony in 1572, held on three separate days, two allegorical costumed all’antica jousts were organised: the central character of the running at the ring, held on 27 September, was Minerva, Goddess of Wisdom, while the foot tournament (joust over a barrier) on 28 September centred around the struggle between an elderly male mage (Negromante) and his female counterpart (Maga). The participants were not dressed in costumes on the final day, 30 September, when a siege was held of a large wooden fortress (probably a Feuerwerksschloß, firework fortress, cf. the 1563 coronation’s similar structure, fig. 4), involving several thousand soldiers on horseback and on foot. All the ephemeral wooden structures and the wooden fortress for the 1572 tournament were designed by Pietro Ferrabosco, the Italian court architect of Ferdinand I (previously, in 1563, also in Pozsony, Ferrabosco had constructed two ephemeral all’antica triumphal arches for the coronation of Archduke Maximilian of Habsburg as King of Hungary, fig. 5). Among his structures in 1572 were a palazzo, referred to as the Gymnasium of Minerva, two castelli for the Mantenitori, with two templi (Temple of Bellona and Temple of Venus) and stucco statues of the goddesses, as well as triumphal arches with sculptures. It was around this time that princely collections North of the Alps were beginning to evolve into encyclopaedic Kunstkammern, which included countless manuscripts by court artists; among the special books and manuscripts held in these collections, a separate group comprised illustrated accounts of court festivals. It is thanks to this practice that albums have also survived containing drawings by Giuseppe Arcimboldo and by Jacopo Strada and his workshop, including loose bundles of costume designs for several dramatic Habsburg tournaments held in the 1570s (e.g. 1570, Prague; 1571, Vienna and Graz; 1572, Pozsony). Connecting the drawings by Arcimboldo and Strada with the 1572 tournament in Pozsony is problematic in several respects: the costume designs are mostly undated, they are rarely accompanied by explanatory inscriptions, and moreover, they can also be associated with rather similar tournaments at several Habsburg court festivals held close to the same time, at which certain motifs and characters of the allegorical events may have been repeated. Furthermore, the functions of the drawings range widely from preparatory sketches to idealised all’antica designs. In my opinion, it is possible that Arcimboldo participated in designing the costumes for the 1572 tournament. Among the surviving drawings, it is more likely that the mage costume (Abito de negromante, fig. 6) was designed for the 1570 tournament in Prague. At the same time, a few figures found in the album are shown wearing costumes reminiscent of Hungarian attire adorned with soutaches (figs 7–8); I consider it possible that these costumes were worn by attendants of Rudolf, the new King of Hungary, and his brother, Archduke Ernest, on the first day of the 1572 tournament in Pozsony, when Rudolf and Ernest, dressed emphatically in Hungarian attire, entered the arena accompanied by hussars and surrounded by Hungarian aristocrats (e.g. Ferenc II Nádasdy) and their riders. Jacopo Strada’s participation in designing the costumes for the 1572 tournament was recorded by the ambassador from Mantua (as first published by Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann in his fundamental study of 2010). Strada’s costume designs have survived as parts of some all’antica albums (Vienna, Dresden, Stockholm), and as a standalone drawing (Budapest), as well as in woodcut copies. I regard it as highly likely that several of these designs record costumes made for the 1572 tournament in Pozsony (figs 12–17, and in addition to these, possibly also figs 18–20).

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