Content provided in partnership with
The lost wheel map of Ambrogio Lorenzetti
Art Bulletin, The, June, 1996 by Marcia Kupfer
75. With the acquisition in 1303 of the coastal town of Talamone, Siena hoped to win access to the sea. On efforts to make Talamone into a genuine port, derided by Dante (Purg. 13.151-53), see W. Bowsky, A Medieval Italian Commune: Siena under the Nine, 1287-1355, Berkeley, 1981, esp. 175-76, 194, 216-17. A plan of Talamone harbor exists from 1306; see Harvey, in The History of Cartography, 464-501, esp. 488, 491, fig. 20.27.
76. Surveyed in Southard, 213-70.
77. Martindale, 1988, 14-15.
78. Ibid., 15, 204-9.
79. To the extent that I propose the inscription on the Christ Child's scroll as one of the connecting links between the Mappamondo and the Maesta, I am greatly indebted to Chiara Frugoni's discussion of the Wisdom text in the Sala della Pace frescoes: "The Book of Wisdom and Lorenzetti's Fresco in the Palazzo Pubblico at Siena," Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, XXXV, 1972, 145-62; and eadem, A Distant City, trans. W. McCuaig, Princeton, N.J., 1991, 118-88.
80. I develop this point somewhat more fully in Kupfer, 275-76.
81. Sterling (as in n. 1), 72-76 with ills. Peter Barber suggests that a little-known, Higden-type mappamundi produced ca. 1392 at Evesham Abbey (London, College of Arms, Muniment Room 18/19) incorporates the theme of the world's submission to divine judgment by representing an elaborately carved throne at the apex of the east-oriented oval; the throne frames a scene of the Fall. See "Die Evesham Weltkarte yon 1392: Eine mittelalterliche Weltkarte im College of Arms in London: Von der Universalitat zum Anglozentrismus," Cartographica Helvetica, IX, 1994, 17-22; and idem, "The Evesham World Map: A Late Medieval English View of God and the World," Imago Mundi, XLVII, 1995, 13-33. The map is reproduced in color in Whitfield (as in n. 64), 25.
82. I have treated both monuments (with bibliography) at greater length in Kupfer, 277-79.
83. A. Perrig, "Formen der politischen propaganda der Kommune von Siena in der ersten trecento-halfte," in Bauwerk und Bildwerk im Hochmittelalter: Anschauliche Beitrage zur Kultur-und Sozialgeschichte, ed. K. Clausberg et al., Giessen, 1981, 213-34, esp. 222-27.
84. Martindale, 1988, 14, 209-10: Polzer, 1987, 28; and Seidel, 19, 25-33.
85. Seidel; L. Bellosi," 'Castrum pingatur in palatio': 2. Duccio e Simone Martini pittori di castelli senesi 'a l'esemplo come erano,' "Prospettiva, XXVIII, 1982, 41-65; Polzer, 1987, 32-69; and Maginnis, 144.
86. Mallory and Moran, 1986 (as in n. 4), 251-59; Martindale, 1986, 265; Martindale, 1988, 40, 209-10; and O. Redon, "Sur la perception des espaces politiques dans l'Italie du XIIIe siecle," in Le Italie del tardo medioevo, S. Miniato, Centro di studi sulla civilta del tardo medioevo, Collana di Studi e Ricerche III, S. Miniato, 1990, 51-70, esp. 69.
87. Martindale, 1988, 209.
88. Southard, 215-16.
89. On the semantic range of the word carta, meaning both map and document (charter), see Harvey, 1980 (as in n. 58), 10.
90. On the nature of these town portraits as Bilddokument, see H. Belting, "Das Bild als Text: Wandmalerei und Literatur im Zeitalter Dantes," in Belting and Blume, 23-64, esp. 38.
