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[split] Taccola spillover thread
- [split] Taccola spillover thread
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RE: Rosettes as a ... magic altar
Jorge_Stolfi > Yesterday, 12:28 PM
(07-10-2026, 11:20 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
(06-10-2026, 10:09 PM)Rafal Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I disagree. They are failed copies.
the MS that contains book III and IV of De ingeneis is Pal 766. This is an autograph by Taccola, made 1432–1433 and intended as a dedication to the Emperor upon his visit to Siena. It is unclear whether a separate copy was given to the Emperor.
Pal 766 looks to neat to be the original notebook. It must be a "clean copy" of it. Could be the one made for the Emperor, or a second copy for the Siena honchos.
By Wikipedia, Taccola was born 1382 and died c. 1453, aged 71. So Pal 766 was inked when he was about 50. His real notebooks must have been created over a long period of time, probaby starting around 1400.
Thus there must have been other copies of the original notebooks, made anywhere between 1400 and 1432. Once a copy was made, thousands more could be made from it. Indeed, Taccola's international fame could only have been due to the circulation of copies of those notebooks.
Maybe that Keyser(?) manuscript that others have mentioned is such an early (copy of)^n copy of (some of) Taccola's original notebooks?
Anyway , it seems quite possible that the VMS Author, somewhere in Switzerland or Germany, even as early as 1420, would have owned a copy of one of his notebboks . Specifically, the one with the illustration of the simple arch siphon bridge (labeled B by Koen) -- which just must have been the "Inspiration" for the "rainbow" on f75r.
And don't forget that the C14 date is only a lower bound for the date of the inking of the Voynich manuscript.
(07-10-2026, 11:20 AM)Koen G Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.I don't want to go through every Taccola MS to find the source of the drawbridge image, but it is clear that [Rafal's image at lower right is about] a separate engineering problem. In the text under the drawing, you can see that it says "castellum cum ponte levatorio", "castle with a drawbridge".
Sorry, I am confused about the relation of those images. Let C and D be the two images below your A and B, respectively.
Your image A and the image C below are "identical" in the sense that they are photos of the same page from the same manuscript, correct? Not just "identical" in the sense of a good copy.
Note that the mountains in the background of image D (Rafal's) are way too similar those of your image A. And the wavy cliff in the background of D looks like a manged version of the river flowing horizontally across the background of A (the source of potable water). And then the incongruous leafy branch growing out of the river's margin in D must be a mangled version of the creek in A that leads from the sluice gate at left to the siphon's feed pool.
So I would say that D is a copy of Taccola's "drawbridge" figure, which must have been made by an artist who "borrowed" the background details from B or some other copy of Taccola's "siphon bridge" figure, without understanding them. Would you agree?
All the best, --stolfi -
RE: Rosettes as a ... magic altar
Koen G > 10 hours ago
(Yesterday, 12:28 PM)Jorge_Stolfi Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Sorry, I am confused about the relation of those images. Let C and D be the two images below your A and B, respectively
No problem, I was also confused. If I understand correctly, one of the images in Rafal's composition was mislabelled. (This happens before you realize with these similar books).
To make everything clear:
A. Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek MS Lat. Monacensis 197 II. Taccola autograph of De Ingeneis I-II,
B. Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale MS Palatino 766, De Ingeneis III-IV, the book dedicated to the Emperor. This particular MS remained in Siena. As a dedication MS, it was a clean-copy of various notes and ideas Taccola worked on over the preceding years.
C. Rafal gave this as Palatino 767, a later copy, but it looks to me like this may simply be from the Taccola autograph of De Ingeneis I-II (Munich MS, see A). Although the several copy manuscripts were often very precise, I see some damage on the page that seems identical, as well as the verso shining through.
D. Is from BNF Lat. 7239. If I understand correctly, it is based on Taccola's other work, De Machinis. To find the source of the drawbridge image, I would start by looking there.
About the similar castles ect., he's just reusing background assets.
There are many later books that include good copies of drawings by Taccola and other engineers. But these are mostly from De Ingeneis I-II and De Machinis. I am not aware of any other version of the syphon bridge drawing from De Ingeneis III-IV, the book made for the emperor.
It is correct that the presentation copy is relatively fancy, and sketches and drafts must have existed. But we have no way to tell how early this particular one with the bridge and vertical river was made, and who may have seen/copied any of those earlier sources. Nor do we know who may have seen/copied the presentation book. -
RE: [split] Taccola spillover thread
Rafal > 9 hours ago
You are right, I mixed up manuscripts.
This example:
comes from Codex Latinus 197 (Clm 197) from Munich library:
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
(this link has black and white scan, I got somewhere colourful scan).
By the way, is there any thread which lists all manuscripts by Taccola and says which are originally by Taccola and which are copies? -
RE: [split] Taccola spillover thread
DG97EEB > 5 hours ago
(9 hours ago)Rafal Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.You are right, I mixed up manuscripts.
TACCOLA — AUTOGRAPHS
This example:
comes from Codex Latinus 197 (Clm 197) from Munich library:
You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
(this link has black and white scan, I got somewhere colourful scan).
By the way, is there any thread which lists all manuscripts by Taccola and says which are originally by Taccola and which are copies?
- Munich, BSB Clm 197,II — De ingeneis I–II + "Notebook" (c.1419–c.1450; KdiH gives 1441) — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
- Florence, BNCF Palatino 766 — De ingeneis III–IV, dedicated to Sigismund (c.1431–1433) — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
- Munich, BSB Clm 28800 — De machinis (completed 1449) — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
COPIES OF DE MACHINIS
- Paris, BnF lat. 7239 — Paolo Santini copy (1459?, Venice; before 1475) — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
- New York Public Library, Spencer Coll. MS 136 ("Codex Wilczek II") — 15th-c. copy, exact date not established — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
- Venice, Marciana Lat. VIII, 40 (=2941) — later excerpts, date not established — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
DERIVATIVE COMPILATIONS
- London, BL Add MS 34113 — excerpts from De ingeneis, De machinis and Francesco di Giorgio's Codicetto (2nd half 15th c.; additions dated 1612) — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
- Dresden, SLUB — military-technical miscellany with drawings after Taccola, Valturio, Francesco di Giorgio (c.1440–1460, per Handschriftenportal) — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
RELATED
- Vatican, BAV Urb. lat. 1757 — Francesco di Giorgio, Codicetto, free copies after Taccola (c.1465–1470/76) — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
- Florence, BNCF Palatino 767 — later excerpts (date not established) — You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. 1467-75
Edit: added link from Marco -
RE: [split] Taccola spillover thread
Rafal > 5 hours ago
Thanks a lot! I promise to systematise my knowledge of Taccola
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RE: [split] Taccola spillover thread
DG97EEB > 5 hours ago
(5 hours ago)Rafal Wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.Thanks a lot! I promise to systematise my knowledge of Taccola
I built really only for myself a manuscript collection.. You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.
It's not complete but it's pretty extensive....and more or less includes every manuscript ever mentioned on this forum, plus a pretty detailed trawl of the main library collections -
RE: [split] Taccola spillover thread
Rafal > 5 hours ago
Quote:I built really only for myself a manuscript collection...
Holy cow! Pox leber! 7637 manuscripts
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RE: [split] Taccola spillover thread
Koen G > 4 hours ago
Thanks, Ed, that's very handy.
On the various copy books, I recommend You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. by Elizabeth Merrill. On Francesco's Codicetto, she writes:
Quote:The signature authorship displayed in the Codicetto comes with a notable caveat
in that, as has long been recognised, Francesco relied extensively on Taccola.
Almost all of the drawings packed into the first half of the tiny manuscript are
clearly copies after Taccola, taken primarily from books i and ii of his De Ingeneis. [KG: we are interested in any spread of book III-IV instead]
Compiled between 1427 and 1441, De Ingeneis was initiated as a formal treatise on
technical design and infrastructure, but over time and with the sporadic addition
of notes and drawings, it evolved into a more jumbled book of ideas. Although
it is not entirely certain how or where Francesco gained access to these fecund
manu scripts, it is likely that they were held within the Sapienza of the Studio of
Siena, where Taccola had served as camerarius. The close links that existed among
the Commune of Siena, the Studio and the Spedale assured the continual flow of
information between these institutions, so it is quite plausible that an individual
employed by the Spedale or the Commune would have been able to reference an
authoritative work like De Ingeneis. Drawings added to a final folio of Taccola’s
manuscript offer evidence of the book’s study by other practitioners and have, in
fact, been attributed to Francesco. Still, that few images in the Codicetto are strict
Taccola reproductions warrants emphasis. Francesco emulated Taccola’s graphic
models, but also notably improved on them, rendering them in a more lucid, concise
manner.
What's interesting here is that they confirm, for books I and II, the kind of access pattern we are also hypothesizing for books III-IV: availability to the university's visitors. It is possible that the prettier MS with books III-IV had already been removed from the library by the time people like Francesco got to them.
Reading a bit further, I notice that Merill only mentions the 766 MS twice, both in the descriptions of images:
Does this mean the dedication MS with books III-IV was available for copying? I just went through the Dresden copy again and it certainly does not include the bridge (mostly machines, really). Maybe the fountain drawing was also found elsewhere. -
RE: [split] Taccola spillover thread
MarcoP > 3 hours ago
