DOCUMENTATION | Exhibitions: 1648 - War and Peace in Europe
Essay Volumes > Tome II: Art and culture
DAMIAN DOMBROWSKI
"Il Genio Bellicoso di Napoli": The warrior ethos of the Neapolitan aristocracy as mirrored in contemporary portraits
"Questo è il secolo de' soldati, e Dio voglia che non siamo vicini all'occasione de valercene." (Fulvio Testi, 1641)
In 1632, the French traveller Jean-Jacques Bouchard visited Naples, where he devoted many pages of his journal to a brilliant portrayal of the Neapolitan aristocracy and its customs. All in all, the commentaries of this well-educated Frenchman remained remarkably objective, but when he turned his attention to the nobility's reading habits he could hardly disguise his condescension toward such a high degree of provinciality. "Les plus doctes", he complained, "lisent Tasso et il cavalier Marino,qui etaient du pays." [1] Whereas the Neapolitans' interest in the work of Marino B who had died seven years earlier B corresponds to that author's reception throughout Europe, their lasting and one-sided preference for the much younger Tasso was not a matter of fashion. It seems rather to have satisfied a specifically Neapolitan passion.
The reading of Tasso meant above all the reading of the Gerusalemme Liberata. The last truly European chivalric epic, it associated the realities of war more with personal heroism than with the nameless terror which B in the wake of decades of fighting, pillage and devastation in large areas of the Continent B had permanently changed the depiction of war in literature and art. Yet the Regno di Napoli had not experienced war on its own territory and accordingly underwent no such aesthetic revolution. The Gerusalemme Liberata inspired various sets of illustrations, all typologically attributable to a genre conspicuously popular in the Naples of the 1630s and 1640s: battle-scene painting.
The singularity of works by painters such as Aniello Falcone or Andrea di Lione has already been recognised by Saxl in his work Schlachtenszene ohne Held. [2] The depiction of the pure battle scene, detached from any concrete historical framework, had become the sole intent; the focus was on war for war's sake. The causes of this phenomenon B and particularly of its remarkably frequent occurrence B are, however, not sufficiently explained by Saxl, who saw Naples' continuing social conflicts reflected in its citizens' predilection for the battle genre. The pictorial evaluation of war was a form of political iconography: with it the Neapolitan nobility was reacting to threats presented to its status by competing social classes B namely the bourgeoisie and the Spanish administration. Surprisingly, however, it is not battle-scene painting but rather another artistic genre which provides the most convincing evidence B in both quantity and quality B of the nobility's effort to maintain its social position: portrait sculpture. Neapolitan portrait art of the Thirty Years' War period represents a historical source of the first order, powerful enough to prove that the war was the aristocracy's raison d'être and explain why that same aristocracy was plunged into its deepest crisis by the Peace of Westphalia.
Jacob Burckhardt summarised the most obvious difference between the tomb art of Rome and that of Naples simply by remarking that, "the military aristocracy is immortalised in the Neapolitan tombstones just as the high priesthood is in Roman sepulchral art". [3] The preponderance of warrior portraits, not limited merely to the sepulchral context, is no coincidence. The discussion below will attempt to illustrate how, in early seventeenth-century Naples B a time and place strongly characterised by the collision of various claims to power B portraits functioned as the political instruments of the persons who commissioned them.
Visitors to the Neapolitan church of Saint Giovanni a Carbonara entering the Cappella Caracciolo di Vico, are confronted by a portrait statue, slightly larger than life size, generally considered to represent Carlo Maria Caracciolo (fig. 1). [4] This man had died in 1641 at the battle of Barcelona; two years later the marble figure was completed, a joint work by the Lombard Ercole Ferrata and Giuliano Finelli of Carrara. The latter, during his stay in Naples from 1635 to 1650, was the city's most popular portrait sculptor. The statue represented the further development of a type which looked back on a long tradition in Naples. In the sixteenth century, standing, armour-clad funerary figures had come to inhabit the city's churches. Typologically speaking, however, the statue of Carlo Maria Caracciolo does not echo the iconography popular at the time of its making, but resorts to older models. On the other hand, the standing-warrior type, helmet at its feet, has now been modified to conform to a new intellectual and religious state of mind. The portrait statue of Marcello Caracciolo B a work from the year 1573 by Girolamo d'Auria (fig. 2) B stands on one side of the altar, that of Carlo Maria on the other; framing the two figures are two tombstones commissioned by the donors of the early sixteenth-century chapel. The two statues correspond to one another superficially, but in these related works a confrontation takes place between the spirits of two eras: the devotion and self-sacrifice of the Counter-Reformational religious soldier concerned with moral self-justification as opposed to the pompous, purely mundane martial cult of the mercenaries involved in the Thirty Years' War.
The older Caracciolo lays his arm across his breast in a gesture of pious emotion; a statue such as this one was intended to demonstrate the faith of its donor, prepare him for death and guarantee his salvation. It was to symbolise the soldierly ideal inspired by contempt for everything mundane and the mission to uphold the Catholic faith. [5] While Marcello's gaze is directed upward, his descendant has eyes only for the world around him. There is no telling whether this gallant figure is about to enter the battlefield or the dance floor. But one thing is certain: he does not conceive of his life as being consecrated to God.
Whereas the aristocracy of the late sixteenth century had identified strongly with heroic devoutness B clearly reflected in its pictorial commemorations B the portrait now took on the considerable task of increasing the significance of a social class. As defined by Giovan Battista Manso in 1628, the portrait's function was not only to preserve the memory of one's ancestors but also to serve the pompa del presente. [6] At a time when the Neapolitan aristocracy was being surpassed economically by a new class of bourgeois climbers, it increasingly put its stakes on "ideological profitability" guided by the motto: "earning money is good, high social standing is better". [7] Such repute could only be attained by success in battle: according to the aristocracy's concept of itself, a military career was "la condizione di Nobile, che ne' Cavalieri Napolitani si univoca con la profession di Soldato". [8] Furthermore the military profession was still the exclusive right of the aristocracy, and for reasons of self-preservation the old feudal class placed utmost emphasis on its one last domain. A veritable war cult spread through Naples; its genius loci was to be found in the Genio bellicoso di Napoli B as the title of the most significant family historiography of the seventeenth century implies. Warrior portraits and battle-scene paintings are the visual counterparts to the decidedly martial literature of the time.
The military enthusiasm of the Neapolitan nobility was surpassed only by its boundless conceit and love for ornament. In 1632, the above-quoted Jean-Jacques Bouchard observed a "culte de l'apparence et de l'exterieur". [9] In his view, exaggerated vanity was the Neapolitans' chief characteristic trait: "Et d'abord il n'y a point de race au monde plus vaine que cette noblesse, estant toute dans l'apparence et l'exterieur". [10] The Spanish model of modesty and reserve was mostly ignored; with regard to clothing, jewellery and fabrics, the aristocracy abandoned itself to uninhibited luxury. In the statue of the Caracciolo chapel we find ourselves face to face with the "uomo che s'ammira / e va in punta di piedi / si pavoneggia e vanta", the target of a satire by Giambattista Basile published in the folk-tale collection Pentamerone in 1634. [11] Young Caracciolo is dressed entirely à la mode, great descriptive exactitude infusing the reproduction of his French hairdo, his French cravate, the justeaucorps, a kind of short soutane, the lace ribbon peering out from under his armour, the high riding boots sporting spat-like surpieds across the feet and revealing on one side the crinkled overstocking known as the bas de botte. [12]
In the first two decades of the seventeenth century, the portrait figures of Neapolitan tombs were still dressed according to Spanish custom. In the early 1630s, we learn from Bouchard, the clothing of the nobility was a combination of Spanish and French elements. [13] Another ten years later Caracciolo's wardrobe is a pure homage to French fashion, whose daintiness was a scandal in the eyes of the Spanish. Yet apparently the prohibition of Francophile taste by the government of the viceroys contributed substantially to its spreading popularity. [14] With their penchant for everything French B their "libertà francesi" as it was described by the chronicler Fuidoro [15] B the aristocrats of Naples demonstrated their refusal to take orders from the central authorities. The provocation, chiselled here into stone for all eternity, was a form of rebellion, a proud demonstration of inherited freedom.
The Caracciolo statue is not an isolated case; the funerary figure of Paolo de Sangro was made at about the same time B probably also on the basis of a Finelli model B for the Capella Sansevero (fig. 3). Like the portrait of Carlo Maria Caracciolo, its rendition of the clothing is precise to the last detail; it also resembles its contemporary in that its "seat in life" was the Thirty Years' War. Around de Sangro's shoulders a wide collet vidé has been laid, decorated with lace lambrequins; along with the cravate, this collar form supplanted the Spanish roll and stand-up collars throughout Europe. The collet vidé had been launched under Louis XIII in France and quickly adopted by the Dutch. [16] In view of the fact that Naples came to know and love French fashion primarily through the merchants of Holland, the polemic intentions associated with it take on even more distinct contours. The influence worked both ways: the Neapolitan warrior model soon struck the fancy of the Dutch, and the Caracciolo figure became the stylistic godfather to François Dieussart's four statues of the princes of Orange-Nassau. [17] To return to the figure of De Sangro, it further complied with the laws of Franco-Dutch fashion as the subject was shown in funnel-shaped boots equipped with high heels and large facings.
The Neapolitan aristocracy responded to the Spanish regimen with cheeky self-confidence; after all, in battle the former led the armies of the latter. The behaviour of the nobility is certain to have been just as exhibitionist and arrogant in real life as its portraits would imply. We see Paolo de Sangro as he might have looked when surveying the battlefield; his statue thus serves to represent an epoch in which war had become a mania, blood an intoxication, the glory of battle the only gratification. De Sangro's coquetry and causticity, although certain to have been intended by the donor in dead seriousness, now seem almost to deride the belligerence of the nobilità di Napoli. It comes as no surprise that the behaviour revealed to us by this statue was subject to ridicule by satirically talented contemporaries: "with his hand on his hip / he furiously stamps the floor", Basile gibed at the warrior nobility of his hometown in 1634, "a mere blade of grass vexes him / and he would even go to battle against the mosquitoes." [18]
Facing the statue of Carlo Maria Caracciolo in the same chapel is the portrait bust of his father Carlo Andrea Caracciolo, the Marchese di Torrecuso (fig. 4). Not only does it exemplify the most mature phase of Finelli's portrait oeuvre, it is also the most representative as well as most original portrayal of the Neapolitan seicento. The subject's biography consists mainly of dates in military history. [19] Between expeditions he rarely had time to come home to Naples: his last visit there took place in 1643, when at the age of sixty he had himself immortalised by Finelli. In order to understand a bust such as this one, we must concern ourselves less with the artist's genius than with the donor's intentions. Through the politicisation of the portrait, aspects such as clothing, gesture and facial expression were given a distinct function. An interpretation of the Neapolitan aristocratic portrait on the basis of its ideological motivation, however, requires knowledge of the political and social circumstances from which it emerged.
The incorporation of the Regno di Napoli into the Spanish empire should by no means be confused with assimilation into a unitarian political organism; despite the presence of the viceroys, Naples was never relegated to the status of a Spanish province. [20] The aristocracy maintained its social and political importance; at no time was the Spanish perspective an absolutist one. [21] Ever since the Spanish had taken control, the history of Naples was characterised by antagonism between the viceroys and the city's nobility. The latter was determined to defend its autonomy and traditional privileges against the Spanish sovereign's claim to power. All the viceroys' efforts to transform the nobilità into a royal suite were doomed to failure, [22] although some steps had been taken in this direction under the regency of Don Pedro de Toledo (1532-52). As the decline of the Spanish royalty became obvious at the end of the sixteenth century, however, a phenomenon referred to by historians as "re-feudalisation" got underway. In the early years of the seventeenth century, the baroni insisted on their prerogatives more tenaciously than ever. The Spanish had more or less managed to keep the feudal class at bay for about a century, but in view of the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War, the noblemen reverted to a practice of out-and-out blackmail. Although the Neapolitan baroni undermined its governmental authority, Spain was dependent on them to finance the war. They could now afford to demand the guarantee of their privileges and immunities in return for financial tribute. A document of 1642 patronisingly confirms that with the will of the Neapolitan aristocracy, His Majesty could have anything he desired from the kingdom of Naples, for the aristocracy was lord over most of the cities of the Regno and guaranteed the payment of tributes and taxes; furthermore it applied all of its competence to the preservation of the monarchy. [23]
This wording is indicative of both the self-confidence and the dilemma of the Neapolitan nobility. The nobles were not seriously opposed to the Spanish; Cesare Firrao, for example, personally designed the decoration for the facade of his palace in a demonstration of loyalty to the Spanish sovereign. [24] In his Genio bellicoso de Napoli, Raffaele Filamondo reports on war heroes who fought "per la fede, per lo re', per la patria", as expressed in the book's subtitle. But he also makes a point of mentioning that, both financially and militarily, the valorosa milizia napoletana played an essential role in all the Spanish crown was capable of achieving. [25] The epitome of Filamondo's argumentation is reached when he agrees with a historian of the first half of the century according to whom the kingdom of Naples was solely responsible for the continued existence of the Spanish monarchy. [26] The extent to which the nobility's sense of its own value changed with regard to the Spanish is confirmed by a backward glance at Scipione Ammirato's Delle Famiglie napoletane of 1580. In the prośmium, the author acknowledged that his history revolved largely around the Spanish kings because the rise and fall of the various Neapolitan families so strongly depended on them. [27] During the first half of the sixteenth century, however, protest against the claims of the Spanish crown emerged from a growing consciousness of the Spaniards' dependency on the nobility. [28]
If we now B following this brief excursion into history B view the bust of Torrecuso in the context of the cultural and political processes of the 1640s, we find an expressive document of the self-image of the nobilità di Napoli. The metallic clanking and squeaking of the cuirass is virtually audible in the geometric bust form; the severe cut lends itself well to a self-definition of the portrait subject in military terms. The huge horizontal collar severs the heraldic-lifeless shoulder section from a highly animated head consisting solely of curves. The armour is just as rigid and dead as the head is full of the momentary experience of life. Carlo Andrea turns his head slightly to one side and raises his gaze. Particularly when viewed from a slightly lower position, as originally intended, [29] this pull toward the upper right produces a grandezza serving to characterise the portrait subject for what he was: a battle general in the consummation of his heroic acts.
Only at first sight does Carlo Andrea's appearance strike one as being particularly individual. In reality it corresponds so precisely to the self-stylisation of an entire social class that it supplies the perfect visual counterpart to Basile's La Cappella, a satiric poem on the military megalomania of the Neapolitan aristocracy contained in the Pentamerone. Nowhere else do we find such an exact description of type embodied by Torrecuso:
"Then there's the type that glorifies war / praises it as highly as the stars / and, when the hour has come, / the battle standard has been planted / and the drums beat, / he races to enlistY / When a friend asks, >Where are we going?' / he answers joyfully, / nearly lifting off the ground as he shouts it, >To war! To war!" [30]
Basile's satire expresses the spirit and appearance of the Torrecuso bust more precisely than any of the numerous seventeenth-century apologias composed in defence of Neapolitan bellicosity. "He imagines, presumes himself to be / a terror to others / able to hurl someone into a state of dismay / by a mere roll of the eyesY / his nose upward-stretching / the tips of his moustache as well / his eyes turned in their sockets." [31]
The portrait embodies the Neapolitan aristocratic type not only by means of its armour but even in the details of its facial expression. The bushy eyebrows, the thick loops of moustache and hair are displays of the habitual wildness referred to by Basile. And the portraitee certainly looks as though he might collapse under all that pride at any moment B "l'orgoglio lo tormenta". [32] To consult the principles of physiognomics which had become extremely popular in Naples since their reestablishment by Giambattista della Porta, Torrecuso's presumptuousness can be read in his very eyebrows: "le ciglia lunghe verso le tempie significa l'huomo arrogante" expounded on by Giuseppe Ingegneri. [33] Examining the portrait in his Osservationi della Scoltura antica of circa 1650, the sculptor and art essayist Orfeo Boselli proposed a theory of affect according to which there are three possible emotional states: irascibile (hot-tempered), concupiscibile (greedy) or ragionevole (rational). Finelli had become acquainted with Boselli in Rome long before the recording of the Osservationi, and seems to adhere to the tenet in having l'irascibile predominate in Torrecuso: "quella parte guerriera, la quale pugna e castiga chi vuole apporsi alla raggionevole, questa arma il volto di sdegno, rigore, e gravità severa". [34] The Spanish customs, the protocolary stiffness and self-control, are met with conscious flamboyancies. In contrast to the formulaic character of the armour, the head has been conceived wholly in the attitude of arrogance and theatricality. By exaggerating the features, Finelli accentuated the exceptionality of his subject's nature which, according to Torrecuso's biography, constantly strove for greatness and grandeur. Filamondo compared Carlo Andrea with the sea, its waves rising higher and higher the harder they are beaten by the wind. [35]
The express snobbishness was aimed at the climbing social classes; the turn of the head can also be understood as a gesture of aversion from the lower strata. The concept of physical presence here apparent is entirely different from that of the Baroque portrait of Rome. The dominating principle of the latter is the aspiration towards response, the visible desire for communication. This outflow and inflow of mental energies can also be sensed in Finelli's Roman works, while Carlo Andrea's features overflow with distrust of every form of sociality.
The chronicles of the 1640s depict Naples in a state of constantly smouldering unrest. It is as though Finelli's portraits received their life spark from the explosive atmosphere of the time. This can be felt in both his images of the aristocracy and those he realised for his Spanish clientele. The bust of the Viceroy Medina de las Torres (fig. 5) was executed in 1643; [36] it was under this Spaniard's rule that the conflicts with the nobilità di Napoli escalated. The head gives the impression of being blown up, its effect emphasised by the bushes of hair framing it. On the left temple a swollen artery stands out plastically; indeed, the entire face seems on the verge of bursting with inner pressure. It speaks of an excitable, sanguine temperament, of pride, brutality and pretentiousness. And it reveals something of the constant tension, but also of the haughtiness brought to bear in dealings with the Neapolitan aristocracy B a trait Bouchard had already labelled as "le plus grand vice des Espagnols". [37]
Finelli invariably apprehended the personalities of those he portrayed by basing formal design on criteria of status consciousness and concrete historical-social position. One might argue that the tension crackling in these stone faces is more likely to be a stylistic trait of Finelli's work or of Neapolitan sculpture in general than a reflection of social circumstances. Yet Finelli's workshop was quite capable of producing "relaxed" portraits as well, just as specifically related to social class as the others: here we are referring to portrayals of the bourgeoisie, particularly as represented by its strongest group B that of the lawyers. One of Naples's most outstanding lawyers was Giovanni Camillo Cacace, who commissioned his funeral bust from Finelli shortly before the artist's departure from the city in 1650 (fig. 6). In 1653, Bernini's long-time assistant Andrea Bolgi took over the commission and, on the basis of drawings and probably a clay model, translated Finelli's preliminary impressions into stone with marvellous technical virtuosity. [38] Giovanni Camillo's face has been captured in an instant of jovial loquaciousness, the moustache perching atop a shrewd, cryptic smile. The portrait radiates ironic self-assurance and wiliness of tactic. And the sculptor's focus once again encompassed more than the individual personality: the portrait of the bourgeois Giovanni Camillo Cacace became the emblem of a new social and economic status. The economic decline of the aristocracy had already set in long before, but was bridged by its military significance until the middle of the century. A satirist like Basile had promptly rubbed salt into this wound. Once again, his words might easily be a commentary on the Torrecuso bust when he writes, "gonfie ha le guancie, ma la bocca vuota / teso il collare, ma la borsa floscia; / aria contenta, ma senza un contante". [39] Yet it was not until the end of the Thirty Years' War that the crisis became evident. The disproportion between its claims to power and its financial impotence led to the aristocracy's no longer being accepted by the bourgeoisie as the dominant political class. [40]
The new judicial and financial nobility sought assimilation into the old-established nobility, as documented not least in the adoption of iconographic formulae. Giovanni Camillo Cacace commissioned Cosimo Fanzago to design the interior of his family chapel in S. Lorenzo Maggiore and then intervened in the planning himself B with the express intention of adapting it to resemble the Capella Firrao in the neighbouring church of S. Paolo Maggiore. [41] And all of the same formal means were in fact summoned up B and even intensified B in order to outdo the noble precursor. According to one source writing at the time, the Firraos were among the most outstanding families of the empire in terms of age, feudal estate, aristocratic kinship and the number of war heroes they produced [42] B all qualities which the bourgeois gentil-homme must have perceived with a certain sense of inferiority. The portrait sculpture provided an opportunity to even out differences in social standing B at least pictorially B by means of iconography.
The bonhomie radiated by the Cacace portrait completely fails to correspond with what we know about this man's character from sources of the day. For there we find him described as a morally rigorous, bigoted boor, a dismally reserved, overbearing zealot and a brute. [43] These descriptions loudly repudiate the image presented by the statue in S. Lorenzo Maggiore. The busts of Cacace and the Marchese di Torrecuso could hardly be more contradictory, although the personalities of the two were apparently not so very dissimilar. The one significant difference between them is that, in view of his social standing and the ethos attached to it, Carlo Andrea Caaracciolo had no interest in having his portrait recommend him as an integral element of orderly social coexistence. The lawyer, on the other hand, presents himself as a harmless, loyal, good-natured citizen within the Spanish-dominated system. Whereas the aristocrats had themselves portrayed as they really were B presumptuous, arrogant, bellicose, passionately faithful to the point of superstition B the bourgeois climbers were concerned with erecting monuments to their integrity, guilelessness and social acceptability: what a contrast to the grandiose poses of the aristocracy!
The degree to which circumstances were different after the Peace of Westphalia is already evident in the quantitative relationship between the numerous bourgeois portraits and the few scattered noblemen's portraits executed. Finelli himself justified his departure from Naples with the observation that there was no longer much to be expected from what had been his primary clientele for fifteen years: "giàche in questa città non ritrova opere, con le quali si possa mantenere". [44] What is more, a qualitative turnabout took place after the war with regard to portrait and tomb sculpture, also serving to indicate the broken self-image of the nobility. While shortly after 1640 direct copies were made of the figures of adoration in the Cappella Firrao for the wealthiest merchant family of Naples (Cappella d'Aquino, Saint Maria la Nuova), now the nobili were conforming to the togati. With its mood of aloofness, the half-length figure of Flaminio Antinoris in Saints Apostoli [45] is more reminiscent of a lawyer's portrait than of the haughty Marchese di Torrecuso. Although a veteran of the Flemish wars, Antinori is not wearing the armour that had previously been the indispensable symbol of class superiority. But even in the armour-clad portraits of the second half of the century, the mental condition of the portraitees can no longer be distinguished from that of their bourgeois counterparts. In his sculptured likeness, the nobleman is no longer impetuously commanding but soberly introverted, as in the half-length figure of a knight in the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, which I would like to refer to as a work of Andrea Falcone (fig. 7). [46] In view of all that has been said here, it would seem that this unknown soldier for a lost cause is gazing back to a lustre of glory only recently but forever past.
2. Saxl 1939-40, pp. 70-87. The Italian battle-painting genre, including its Neapolitan exponents, is the subject of Marco Chiarini's article contained in this catalogue.
3. Burckhardt 1884, p. 156.
4. For a more detailed discussion of the problem of identifying the subject and maker of the statue, see Dombrowski 1997, pp. 371-73.
5. In Ripa 1603, p. 107 the armour-clad dispregio del mondo is the only warrior among a number of feminine virtues. According to Ripa, the fede cattolica is represented as a "donna vestita in bianco, che si tenga la destra mano sopra il petto" (ibid., p. 149). Marcello Caracciolo thus introduces the model of the miles christianus.
6. Manso 1628, p. 632.
7. See Labrot 1977, n. 523, p. 51.
8. Filamondo 1694, dedication to the nobilità (unpaginated).
9. Marchieux 1928, p. 78.
10. Ibid., p. 72.
11. Basile 1982, p. 119. Basile's contemporary Giulio Cesare Capaccio spoke quite highly of the aristocracy's gallant qualities: "con quanta leggiodria si veggano ne i Festini, con quanta pompa si adornino, con quante nobili maniere facciano le loro attioni. Dove vedrete un più leggiadro ballatore, di un nobile Napolitano? Un più manieroso nelle conversationi, più osservator del decoro? Volete ch'io vi dichi? Giudicate i nostri Cavallieri tanti Heroi" (Il Forastiero. Dialoghi in X giornate, Napoli 1634, p. 742).
12. See Mastrocinque 1969, pp. 145 ff.
13. Marchieux 1928, p. 77.
14. See Mastrocinque 1970, II, p. 770.
15. See Galasso 1977, p. 773.
16. See Cirillo Mastrocinque 1969, p. 142.
17. See Avery 1974, p. 84. Dieussart was probably employed in Finelli's Roman workshop around 1630 (see Dombrowski 1997, p. 75). There is documentary proof that he travelled to Naples in 1643, where he is quite likely to have seen his former master's newly completed work.
18. Basile 1982, p. 125. "Con la mano al fianco / sbuffa pestando i piedi / gli dà fastidio fino una pagliuzza / e se la prenderebbe con le mosche".
19. The most thorough description of Carlo Andrea's deeds is found in Filamondo 1694, pp. 145-163; shorter versions in Caracciolo 1896, II, p. 320 and Fabris 1966, Tav. XIII.
20. See Galasso 1977, pp. 165-67.
21. See Villari 1978, pp. 259-77 (esp. pp. 271 ff.).
22. See Labrot 1977, n. 523, pp. 66 ff.
23. See Villari 1978, p. 270.
24. See Labrot 1993, p. 173.
25. Filamondo 1694, unpaginated (dedication to the nobilità di Napoli).
26. Ibid. "E veramente dal solo Regno di Napoli pare, che per gran tempo habbia quella Monarchia riconosciuta in gran paprte la propria sussistenza". Filamondo is quoting a certain Brusone.
27. Ammirato 1580.
28. During his visit to Naples in 1632, Bouchard noted that the aristocracy did not express its emotions toward the Spanish as directly as the commoners: "estant meslée d'interest avec les Espagnols, faint en estre ami, et cache l'affection qu'elle peut avoir pour les François". Marchieux 1928, p. 67.
29. The bust was not placed in the chapel until 1778; actually it was one of the ritratto di galleria originally belonging to the furnishings of the Caracciolo di Vicos' family palace. A detailed discussion of the Torrecuso bust as well as relevant bibliographic references can be found in Dombrowski 1997, pp. 158-62 and 378.
30. Basile 1982, p. 117. "C'è chi loda la guerra / la solleva alle stelle / e, quando viene l'ora / che si pianta l'insegna / che si scute il tamburo / va di corsa ad iscriversi / [1/4] / Se un amico gli dice: >dove andiamo?' / risponde allegramente, / quasi non tocca terra: >Alla guerra! Alla guerra!"
31. Ibid., p. 125; "Si picca e si presume / d'atterire la gente / di farti sbigotterie / con un sol giro d'occhi. / [1/4] il puntale erto in aria, / i mustacci rialzati; e con gli occhi stravolti."
32. Ibid., p. 115. "His cheeks are puffed but his mouth is empty / his collar stiff but his purse limp; / pure satisfaction in his face / but no pure cash to back it up."
33. Ingegneri 1652, p. 50.
34. Boselli 1978, ms Corsini, fol. 23v-24r.
35. Filamondo 1694, p. 159.
36. It is regarded as certain that Finello supplied the modello for the head of the bust; see Dombrowski 1997, pp. 382-84.
37. See Marchieux 1928, p. 6.
38. See Dombrowski 1996-97.
39. Basile 1982, p. 121.
40. See Borrelli 1985, pp. 153 ff.
41. See Pacelli 1986, p. 173. In the contract Cacace concluded with Fanzago in 1646 reference is made twice to the newly completed Firrao family shrine; see Filangieri 1884, II, pp. 227-29.
42. See Campanile 1672, p. 105.
43. See the sources referred to under Mezzacane 1972.
44. Finelli, referring to himself in a letter begging the Deputati of the Cappella del Tesoro di S. Gennaro to summon an arbitration court for the purpose of appraising the value of his long-completed bronze figures (Archivo del Tesoro di S. Gennaro, 60/1588, fol. 402r).
45. Finelli B who had apparently been entrusted with the general supervision of the furnishing of the Cappella Antinori B may well have supplied a model for the half-length figure shortly before leaving Naples in the late autumn of 1650. On the basis of stylistic features, the finished sculpture can once again be attributed to Andrea Bolgi; see Dombrowski 1997-98.
46. This anonymous half-length figure C about whose provenance practically nothing is known C was exhibited for many years in London as the work of a Netherlandish sculptor (Inv. No. 263-1898). The curator of Italian sculpture in the Victoria & Albert Museum, Peta Motture, kindly responded to my queries, informing me that Philip Ward-Jackson of the Courtauld Institute has recently also recognised the typological affinity of this work with Neapolitan sepulchral sculpture, although he has expressed no opinion as to its possible maker. Nevertheless, its stylistic convergence with the funerary statues of Andrea Falcone (ca. 1630-1675), particularly the kneeling figure of Tommaso Blanch in S. Domenico Maggiore of Naples, is so apparent that it would be difficult to prove that the London work did not belong to the oeuvre of the most important Neapolitan sculptor of the third quarter of the seventeenth century. For more information on Falcone, cf. Lattuda 1985.