Battle of the Nudes

Battle of the Nudes 

POLLAIUOLO'S RENAISSANCE MASTERPIECE 

Shelley R. Langdale 

THE CLEVELAND MUSEUM OF ART 2002

Battle of the Nudes: Pollaiuolo's Renaissance Masterpiece 

NTONIO DEL POLLAIUOLO (Italian, 1431-1498) was a renowned 

Florentine painter, sculptor, draftsman, and goldsmith who was particularly 

admired for his dynamic and expressive portrayal of the human 

figure. He carried out a wide range of projects including a series 

of Hercules paintings (now lost) for the powerful Medici family in Florence, designs 

for embroidered vestments, monumental tombs for Popes Sixtus IV and Innocent 

VIII in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, small bronze sculptures, and reliefs. 1 Today, 

however, a relatively small number of his works survive, and he is perhaps most 

widely known for his magnificent engraving, Battle of the Nudes [1]. Its arresting image, 

unusually grand scale, 2 and superior execution make this print—the first engraving 

to bear an artist's full signature—a landmark in Italian Renaissance art. 

The sixteenth-century artist and biographer Giorgio Vasari described the print, and 

Pollaiuolo's skill: "He engraved on copper a battle of nude figures all girt round 

with a chain; and after this one he made other engravings, with much better workmanship 

than had been shown by the other masters who had lived before him." 3 

His print is also considered among the first major artistic achievements in the history 

of Italian engraving. Pollaiuolo developed an unusually refined technique that 

simulates the V-shaped zigzag or "return stroke" found in pen and ink drawings: 

when drawing a series of parallel lines, sometimes the pen drags lightly across the 

paper as the hand returns to the starting position, leaving a fine ink line at a slightly 

acute angle between the parallel lines. 4 A 

This continuous back and forth line is effortless 

with a drawing tool such as a quill pen. To emulate such a stroke in engraving, 

Pollaiuolo carefully cut two discrete rows of parallel lines—one at a slight angle to 

the other—seamlessly integrating the two, which form elongated Vs where they 

converge at either end (fig. 1). He used this technique to great effect in the modeling 

of the muscular bodies; he also changed the direction of his parallel shading lines to 

articulate the anatomy of his figures. This was a considerable advancement over the 

more rudimentary parallel shading and crosshatching found in earlier prints. 

25

Pollaiuolo's print is also something of a conundrum, however. Scholars have 

searched in vain to identify the specific subject of the image and continue to debate 

its dating (suggestions have ranged from 1465 to around 1489), seeking stylistic and 

technical evidence in a period for which printmaking documentation is severely 

lacking. Remarkably, the Battle appears to be Pollaiuolo's only existing print. De- 

spite Vasari's suggestion that there were other examples (which may have been de- 

stroyed over time), there are no known prints executed by the same hand preceding 

or following the Battle that could suggest the development of his engraving style or 

technique. 5 The Cleveland Museum of Art's unique first state of the Battle of the 

Nudes has long been regarded as the exemplary early impression, printed before the 

plate began to wear and was supposedly re-engraved by another hand. All other 

known impressions (approximately forty-eight in number) are second states, pulled 

from the reworked plate. The silvery, harmonious, drawing-like character of 

Cleveland's first-state impression appears to give way to an image of stronger black 

and white contrasts in second-state impressions. In fact, the tonalities of some early 

second-state impressions, such as that in the Fogg Museum of Art [2], resemble the 

black and silver niello plaques produced in Pollaiuolo's and other quattrocento 

goldsmith workshops [22]. 

Aside from their compelling aesthetic qualities, part of the fascination of old 

master prints, especially works such as the Battle that were created during the early 

history of the medium, is the intrigue of their peculiarities and the close looking 

they inspire. By bringing together multiple impressions of the second state to com- 

pare with Cleveland's first state, this exhibition offers the opportunity for close 

comparative study that reveals a new understanding of the changes between the 

first and second states and what agents might have contributed to the apparent dif- 

ferences. The use of variant inks and the possibility of Pollaiuolo's own modifica- 

tions of the image in the second state—rather than the re-engraving of weakened 

lines by someone else-—suggest aesthetic choices and accepted differences between 

impressions that must alter our previous methods of evaluating Pollaiuolo's en- 

graving, and possibly of other early Italian engravings as well. 6 These observations 

expand our conception of what constitutes a "good" impression of an early Italian 

engraving, beyond the superb qualities of the Cleveland impression, and may sug- 

gest a motivation for the changes in the second state. New information about plate 

wear and watermarks helps us begin to propose a rough chronology for extant im- 

pressions. These and other issues will be explored using evidence gathered from 

existing impressions of Pollaiuolo's engraving and in the context of his broader 

artistic concerns, as represented by his work in a variety of media. 

26

Louise Richards, Cleveland's curator of prints and drawings from 1967 to 1986, was 

the first to note the existence of a first state when the museum acquired its Battle of 

the Nudes in 1967. Based on her close examination of several second-state impres- 

sions, and photographs and surveys of others, Richards concluded that "all other 

known impressions of the engraving were printed after the plate had begun to 

show wear—after the shallow thin shading lines that model the bodies had become 

weaker and a number of areas of the plate were reworked (with an engraving tool) 

by another hand." 7 The most easily recognizable difference between the first and 

second states is the addition of shading on the inner thigh of the man wielding an 

ax at far right (fig. 2). Richards also noted the less immediately obvious, more 

"destructive" alteration in the significant darkening of the background, achieved 

through the re-engraving of areas between plant stalks and added shading in some 

foliage. She observed that, while the figures appear weaker in the second state as 

the modeling lines began to wear, the background becomes distracting through in- 

creased contrasts and heightened detail. Although the plant forms in the relatively 

monochromatic gray background of the first state are carefully articulated, the foli- 

age is generally subordinated, through a predominance of methodical diagonal 

shading, to the fluid outline of the active foreground figures. Richards concluded 

that Cleveland's first-state impression is the sole unadulterated version of 

Pollaiuolo's engraving, in which the harmony of natural and formal design is pre- 

served in a subtle equilibrium. In her view, the reworking of the plate destroyed the 

quality of Pollaiuolo's line and his intentional play of the sinuous outline of the 

warriors' bodies against the linear pattern that defines the background. 

As Richards was aware, the study of Pollaiuolo's engraving is further compli- 

cated by the considerable wear and tear of impressions, partly because of their age 

and partly because of their large size. Areas that did not print well, or suffered abra- 

sion or damage over the years, were often redrawn in pen and ink at some point. 

Also, nearly all impressions show evidence of folding (a number have multiple fold 

lines, both horizontal and vertical). Many were trimmed; the edges of the sheets 

became creased, abraded, soiled, or torn, and tattered edges were cut off. Impres- 

sions were cut to fit into albums, or in a few cases appear to have been cut down in 

an effort to even out the otherwise asymmetrically shaped image. Thus comparison 

of impressions must take into account a greater than usual consideration of restora- 

tion and condition issues. 

Richards's observations were remarkable considering her limited resources at 

the time: she did not have the opportunity to compare multiple impressions side by 

side and consequently relied on photographs that can distort tonal values; further, 

she did not have access to beta radiography (a process that uses radioactive "beta" 

plates to obtain clear images of watermarks), sophisticated microscopes, or other 

technical equipment. It has become clear—through close scrutiny of the Cleveland 

engraving and more than thirty second-state impressions, with the advantage of 

direct comparisons, magnified slide details, and to-scale digital photographs—that 

while some of Richards's observations were correct, others need modification. 

27

5). There also appear to be some reinforced engraved lines and possibly some addi- 

tional fine lines cut closely along the diagonal shading on the left side of the tree 

trunk at the far right, to the right of the forearm of the figure holding the chain (fig. 

6). The plant stalk that rises above the right shoulder of the right figure holding the 

chain, which stops abruptly at a leaf in the first state, is extended in the second 

state, behind the leaf and the vine, above the sword blade, and behind the vine 

looped around the tree branches (fig. 7). Besides the careful addition of lines be- 

tween the shading patches on the ax man's inner thigh at the far right (see fig. 2), 

touches of additional line work are evident elsewhere: above and below some of the 

vines wrapped around the tree trunks at left and right (fig. 8); between parallel 

shading lines in some plant stalks and leaves in the area above the figure at the far 

right stabbing the man on the ground; in some of the foliage to the right of the ar- 

cher at far left; above and below the name plaque; and in the shading on the quiver 

above and below the left ax man's proper left thigh (fig. 9). A rib was added to a leaf 

29

Fig. 9. Details showing additional 

line work in the second state. 

Cleveland (left), Boston (right). 

to the left of the head and proper right shoulder of the figure at the far right stab- 

bing the man on the ground; and a few section lines were inserted on some plant 

stalks at right, to the left of the right ax man's stomach, for example. It should be 

noted that much of the added shading is executed in a manner in keeping with 

some of the fine zigzag-type lines already found in background areas in the first 

state (fig. 10). However, aside from the alteration of the thigh shadow and what ap- 

pear to be a few tiny strokes on the navel of the figure in the lower right stabbing 

the man on the ground (fig. 11), the shading and contours of the figures appear to 

be untouched. 

Overall, the reworking of the plate seems limited, even nuanced in some 

places, with most changes focused on adjusting shading here and there to increase 

the sense of space around or between adjacent objects. Admittedly, there is some 

variation of refinement in the changes. The tiny adjustments to the shading on the 

quiver and in some of the foliage, and the lines in the patch of shading on the far 

right ax man's thigh appear more delicately executed than some of the quick short 

strokes added above and below the name plaque and vines, or in the re-engraving 

of some of the interstices of the background. However, the intention or motivation 

appears to be the same. The explanation for these alterations may be revealed by the 

most obvious one—the shading of the ax man's thigh. This is clearly not re-engrav- 

ing of worn lines but a conscious decision to sacrifice the specificity of muscular 

definition in order to clarify the placement of the leg behind another figure by shad- 

ing the thigh. Thus the evident changes to the plate and the fact that the figures, 

where the finest shading lines occur and which are thus most vulnerable to wear, 

were largely unaltered suggests that the reworking was aesthetically motivated 

rather than an attempt to strengthen a worn plate. 

Aside from state changes, the type of printing ink can also dramatically affect 

an impression's appearance. One reason that Richards may have been deceived 

about the extent of rework in the second state is the extreme difference between the 

inks used in the Cleveland and Fogg impressions, the two examples she cited for 

comparison. Cleveland's ink is thin and sparsely pigmented. Therefore, in many 

fine lines, pigment particles appear as if individually suspended along the em- 

bossed line instead of as a continuous solid black (fig. 12a). The effect is similar to 

knots spaced along a piece of thread. As a result, white paper shows through the 

spaces between the black particles, the lines have a blurred edge, and from a dis- 

30

tance the image appears silvery gray. In sharp contrast, the Fogg ink appears 

densely pigmented and thick with a more viscous binder so the lines appear blacker 

(fig. 12b). In some areas of shading, the lines are so close together it looks as if lines 

were added or widened (fig. 13). Determining whether an area has been reworked 

requires careful scrutiny and counting lines. Sometimes, because of condition or 

printing flaws, comparison of the first state with multiple second-state impressions 

was necessary. During the course of research, it quickly became clear that the inks 

used in second-state impressions also varied and that the character of the ink was a 

key factor in the appearance of the print. 

31

The light, grayish quality of the Cleveland impression has long been praised as 

"typical" and "representative" of good impressions of early Italian engravings, re- 

flecting a preference for softer tonal effects, more akin to drawings and unlike the 

strong black and white contrasts found in contemporary Northern prints. 8 Thus the 

Cleveland print has been viewed as a closer representation of Pollaiuolo's original 

intention. 9 It would seem, however, given the range of inks used, that a greater vari- 

ety of impressions may have been acceptable than previously thought. "Relatively 

early" second-state impressions are characterized by little sign of plate wear overall, 

so that fine modeling lines still printed fairly well, and there is evidence of good 

line embossment—that is, the lines in the plate were deep enough to create a notice- 

ably raised line when the dampened paper was pressed into the inked groove dur- 

ing printing. At least three such impressions, those in the Fogg, the Rijksmuseum, 

Amsterdam, and the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, seem to have fairly dense, vis- 

cous black inks that result in high-contrast images where some interstices between 

background forms print nearly solid black. Other relatively early impressions, such 

as those at the Yale University Art Gallery and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 

have somewhat softer inks with a less viscous binder, which produces a less defined 

line that appears lighter, more sunk into the paper, and less densely black. The ink 

variation in the relatively early impressions is interesting because nearly all (Yale, 

Boston, Rijksmuseum, and Bibliotheque Nationale among them) share the same 

bird watermark—suggesting that they could have been printed around the same 

time. So even within a group printed close in time, ink type, and hence appearance, 

could vary. The ink in some late impressions from the clearly worn and apparently 

corroded plate, such as those in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art [4] 

and the Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin, also appears densely pigmented, but somewhat 

dry and thin though not "soft." Such ink may have been used to maximize the ex- 

tent to which the remaining lines would print from the worn plate. Yet, other late 

examples such as that in the Kupferstichkabinett, Dresden, have a less dense ink, 

resulting in a somewhat grayer image, so again there is variety in the inks used 

even later on. 

If the reworking of the plate in the second state was based on an aesthetic deci- 

sion to alter the image, and given that the ink makes a substantial contribution to an 

impression's appearance, the question arises: what was the motivation behind these 

choices? First, one must address the time span between the states. Let us begin by 

considering the implications of the existence of a single example of the first state out 

of forty-eight known impressions, which might initially suggest that the first state is 

a proof, a trial run before the plate was completed. However, there are two signed 

woodcuts, copies created around 1490-1500 that are the same scale as Pollaiuolo's 

image and clearly reproduce the first state: one by Johanes de Francfordia [5] and 

the other by Lucantonio degli Uberti [6]. 10 The remarkably faithful version by 

Francfordia even follows the direction of shading on both foliage and figures, as 

well as other small details that are extremely difficult to emulate in woodcut. 

Francfordia copied the modeling of the ax man's thigh in the first state (fig. 14), and 

the scale of the figures is so close—within millimeters—that one could imagine an 

impression of the engraving was used to trace the image onto his woodblocks. 

Aside from the absence of crosshatching and zigzag lines, which would have been 

32

difficult and time consuming to recreate in such a large woodcut, the most notice- 

able departure is the delineation of white perpendicular lines and dots dispersed 

over the dark ground, a convention typical of Florentine woodcut style in the late 

fifteenth century, rather than following the pattern of scattered rocks and wavy 

shaded strips in Pollaiuolo's engraving. 11 Uberti's more stylized interpretation 

leaves out the background detail, but also retains the unshadowed thigh of the first 

state. 12 It seems highly unlikely that Francfordia and Uberti would have had access 

to the only impression of the first state, particularly if the woodcut postdates the 

33

engraving by several decades. It is more probable that there were multiple impres- 

sions of the first state in circulation before the plate was reworked and that 

Cleveland's impression is not a proof. 

The probable existence of multiple first-state impressions could be taken as 

evidence that someone else got hold of the plate after Pollaiuolo's initial printing 

and made the changes. However, the Fogg impression shows little wear, has good 

embossment of line, and is the only known impression of the second state without a 

printed scratch on the back of the right chain man's thigh (fig. 15). Thus it must 

have been printed early on, before the plate was scratched. In addition, the water- 

marks on the Cleveland and Fogg impressions nearly match: the shape and size of 

the Three Mounts correspond exactly, but the staff in the Fogg watermark has a 

crossbar (see Appendix: Watermarks). The close correspondence of the Cleveland 

and Fogg watermarks suggests that the papers were produced on the same mold (if 

the crossbar fell off or was added), by the same mill, at around the same time. Al- 

though there does not appear to be an exact known match for either version of the 

watermark, which would secure a dating of the paper, similar watermarks date 

from the 1420s to the 1490s. The congruence of watermarks combined with the lack 

of plate wear in the Fogg impression further suggests that the Fogg and Cleveland 

impressions are not separated by a wide span of years and could have been printed 

around the same time. Despite Richards's awareness of the similar watermarks and 

the apparently early printing of the Fogg impression, she suggested that the exist- 

ence of the woodcut copies, possibly made after Pollaiuolo's death in 1498, imply 

that the first state of the engraving was the form in which Pollaiuolo's print was 

recognized and admired, and that the plate wore quickly and was re-engraved by 

another hand. 13 She believed that if there were second-state impressions circulating 

when the woodcuts were made, they would have been perceived as unrepresenta- 

tive of the artist's work. This reasoning, however, does not take into account other 

variables involved in the appearance of different impressions of this engraving. It 

would seem more likely that Francfordia happened to copy a first-state impression 

because that was what was available to him. The nature of the woodcut medium 

automatically altered Pollaiuolo's image, increasing the black and white contrast 

34

and eliminating the subtlety of modeling in the figures. Had Francfordia used a sec- 

ond state for his model, the differences would probably not be immediately discern- 

ible (aside from the thigh shading). So Richards's suggestion that selecting a first- 

state impression to copy was based on aesthetic preference seems moot since the 

subtleties would not carry over in the woodcut version. In addition, there is no rea- 

son to assume that when other impressions of the first state were printed the ink 

would have been consistent; they might have looked considerably different from 

the Cleveland impression, perhaps even close to some second-state impressions if a 

much denser ink was used. 

The reworking of the plate, given its aesthetic intent, fussy adjustments, and 

execution (generally in keeping with line work in the first state), could have been 

done by Pollaiuolo himself, or perhaps by an assistant in his shop (which might ex- 

plain the occasional variation in the finesse of the changes), under his direction. It is 

possible that the alterations to the plate relate directly to Pollaiuolo's creative inten- 

tions for producing this image as an engraving. 

Numerous proposals have been put forth to explain the elusive subject matter, 

but, significantly, no one has offered a convincing literary source for this particular 

image. 14 The lack of differentiation between heroes and villains amplifies the 

ambiguity of the subject, suggesting that Pollaiuolo did not intend to describe a 

specific historical or mythological battle scene. Alison Wright has suggested that 

Pollaiuolo's imagery may serve as an imaginative allegory aligned with poetic 

rather than historical ideas. 15 In a similar vein, Patricia Emison and more recently 

Joseph Manca have explored the bestial/barbaric character of the figures, perceiv- 

ing a viciousness rather than heroic effort in their animated poses, grimacing ex- 

pressions, and bold nakedness that Pollaiuolo may have used to allude to man's 

unbridled passion or moral corruption manifest in the human body. 16 This concept 

may be reinforced by a sixteenth-century German drawing based on the Pollaiuolo 

engraving. The German artist Jorg Breu (c. 1480-1537) used the Battle of the Nudes as 

the basis for his 1516 design for a wall fresco [18]. Interestingly, his alterations of 

Pollaiuolo's composition (the addition of figures, substitution of clubs for swords, 

and adornment of the central figure with a leafy loincloth symbolic of the Germanic 

"wild man") resonate with the "barbaric" associations suggested by Emison and 

Manca. 17 A broader explanation—some kind of imaginative coded moral or didactic 

allegory rather than a precise reference, perhaps not fully decipherable to us but 

obvious to an educated contemporary viewer—seems most plausible. 

SOURCES, CLASSICAL AND CONTEMPORARY 

The impact of the engraving on other artists' work, evident in references to the 

dynamic poses, anatomical explicitness, and expressive character of Pollaiuolo's 

figures, has left little doubt that a considerable part of the artist's intention was to 

demonstrate his capacities as a master draftsman of the figure in motion, while ex- 

ploring the potential of a new reproductive medium well-suited to his skills as a 

goldsmith. This assumption is further reinforced by the remarkably large scale of 

the print and the prominent display of his name on the plaque at left. The allusion 

in the Latin inscription to his Florentine origins further suggests his plan to broad- 

35

cast his talent to a wide audience. Pollaiuolo may also have created this ambitious 

print in response to or in competition with engravings associated with Andrea 

Mantegna (1431-1506). A particularly fine impression of Bacchanal with a Wine Vat 

[12] emphasizes the drawing-like character of the engraved line, which utilizes a 

zigzag technique, similar to Pollaiuolo's, in some areas of shading. This stroke and 

the plaque hanging from the tree encircled by a vine (which may have derived from 

the Battle of the Nudes) have raised questions about the degree of each artist's knowl- 

edge of the other's work, and possible influence on one another. The plaque may 

have been left blank in Mantegna's image as an egotistical display suggesting that 

the artist's style was so recognizable that a signature was unnecessary. Two docu- 

ments now confirm Mantegna's involvement in printmaking in 1475, although spe- 

cific prints are not named and both texts indicate that Mantegna hired others to en- 

grave his designs. The first is a letter of September 1475 from the engraver Simone 

di Ardizzone to Ludovico Gonzaga about Mantegna's apparent desire to hire 

Simone as an engraver. The second, a contract between Mantegna and the gold- 

smith and engraver Zohanne (Gian Marco) Cavalli, dated April 1475, was recently 

uncovered in the Mantuan archives.' 8 Yet the ongoing debate over dating and au- 

thorship of specific Mantegna examples (whether Mantegna hired engravers to 

make all of his engravings, or in fact executed some himself) and the uncertain dat- 

ing of Pollaiuolo's engraving leaves the direction of influence open to speculation. 

Pollaiuolo's composition may be approached from several angles in an attempt 

to formulate a possible line of development for the specifics of his conception. There 

is no indication that this engraving was commissioned; it appears to be an indepen- 

dent artistic effort instead. If his goal was to demonstrate his command of the male 

nude, both his understanding of its anatomy and his ability to render that knowl- 

edge artistically and in a manner that would appeal to both artists and intellectual 

patron/admirers, he would undoubtedly seek to create an image that would allude 

to popular visual and literary sources and yet address contemporary artistic chal- 

lenges. Battle of the Nudes belongs to the very inception of the Renaissance portrayal 

of the blatantly nude adult male, a motif inspired by classical art sources. Though 

not scientifically accurate, it is one of the earliest works of Renaissance art to depict 

the figure in motion convincingly, suggesting how muscles behave under the strain 

of vigorous activity. 

During the fifteenth century, art executed in an all'antica style, which portrayed 

classical subjects or otherwise alluded to antiquity, was increasingly admired, for 

both aesthetic reasons and the implied connections to a prestigious cultural past. 

The Renaissance fascination with classical models was manifest not only in the- 

matic and stylistic references, but in the revival of specific types of antique objects 

as well. Pollaiuolo was among the artists whose work most obviously addressed 

these concerns. In addition to works such as his influential painting series of the 

Labors of Hercules for the Medici palace (the mythical hero Hercules had been used 

as a symbol of victory over tyranny since the early years of the Florentine commu- 

nal government), 19 Polliauolo made new contributions to the development of the 

bronze statuette, a revival of an antique sculpture type initiated by Donatello 

(13867-1466) that, like medals, became new collector's items, along with their an- 

cient counterparts. Pliny remarked that the ancient Roman owners of "figurines" 

36

were so enamored of them that they often carried the small sculptures about with 

them. 20 Renaissance patrons could thus replicate this fervent interest. A small 

bronze in the Galleria Estense in Modena [20], often attributed to Pollaiuolo or his 

workshop, is one of a number of statuettes that are thought to be copies after an 

ancient Etruscan or Roman prototype of a Marsyas figure playing a flute. 21 Notably, 

the copies show the figure with arms poised to hold a flute, but the actual instru- 

ment is absent and most likely was missing from the antique original. Yet because 

the primary interest for the Renaissance artist was in rendering the human figure 

and the active pose rather than in the accuracy of subject matter, the missing ele- 

ment would not have been a great concern. In fact, interestingly, a bronze Marsyas 

of this type was recorded in the inventory of Lorenzo de' Medici in 1492, listing the 

sculpture as "gnudo della paura" (frightened nude), 22 obviously misreading the arm 

gesture as a defensive reaction suggesting fear. There may not be a direct link, but 

because similar examples appear in other antique objects, it is worth noting that the 

semi-lunge position of the Marsyas figure and the placement of the feet are very 

close to those of the archer in Pollaiuolo's engraving (see note 44). Furthermore, the 

fact that such a figure would be identified by an emotional state as a "frightened 

nude" and thus presumably admired for its expressive attitude, based on pose and 

gesticulation rather than close scrutiny of its intended context, suggests an interest- 

ing connection between Renaissance patrons' (and artists') interests in antique 

sources and their admiration for Pollaiuolo's vivid, expressive portrayals of the 

human form. 

Pollaiuolo's famous bronze Hercules and Antaeus, c. 1470s (fig. 16), is not de- 

rived from a specific antique image, but rather draws on ancient ideas to create a 

highly inventive new work. 23 Though small in scale, his approach to such sculptures 

was consistently monumental and innovative, and it was precisely this quality that 

had been admired in the bronze statuettes of antiquity. 24 As Alison Wright has 

noted, Pollaiuolo breaks new ground exploring the formal and spatial complexities 

of this two-figure group. Using a triangular base, he constructed the group so that 

the tensed limbs of the struggling figures fall into geometric arrangements that 

draw attention to both the two- and three-dimensional qualities of the work, rather 

than presenting definite front and back views. 25 He offers clear profile views of both 

figures, but with Hercules' head buried in the chest of Antaeus, Antaeus's head 

thrown back in fury, and the twisting arrangement of the bodies, the viewer is 

forced to continually move around the figures in search of the singular viewpoint, 

thereby experiencing more fully the physical engagement and sense of movement 

of the struggling figures. Clearly, it was a connoisseur's object (probably the 

Hercules sculpture listed in the Medici palace inventory of 1492) to be appreciated 

for the mythological subject matter, reference to an important antique type, and the 

formal pleasure experienced by the owner, who could manually turn the figures on 

their base to appreciate the virtuosity of the artist's achievement. The Battle of the 

Nudes engraving may be seen as a comparable object designed to engage this kind 

of intellectual appreciation because the "pivotal representation" of the nude war- 

riors (so close in physiognomy and physical type that they appear to be based on 

one model shown from multiple viewpoints) may allude to the function of a small 

bronze that could be picked up and rotated in the viewer's hands. 

37

The layout of the Battle of the Nudes composition, the frieze-like arrangement 

and lunging poses of combatants, recalls the sculpted reliefs of ancient sarcophagi 

that Pollaiuolo could have seen in Rome or Tuscany (fig. 17). 26 However, while 

Pollaiuolo may have been inspired by such sources, borrowing poses, figural types, 

or other details and forming a general illusion of an antique image, he actually 

creates more space between the rows of figures, spreading them out in a careful 

arrangement to reveal more of their individual contours, while retaining enough 

overlap to suggest the frieze-like structure of antique reliefs. 

The inclusion of gladiatorial references (the chain, shield, and dagger) in the 

engraving could have been derived from descriptions of gladiators' weapons in 

well-known literary sources such as Pliny. The emphasis on contour and the ani- 

mated battling figures also recalls descriptions of the work of the ancient painter 

Parrhasius, whom the Florentine sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti (1378-1455), like Pliny, 

had admired for his highly naturalistic paintings of running foot soldiers. It is 

worthy of note that Pliny also cited Parrhasius's work as "instructive to artists." 27 

The strong figure contours in Pollaiuolo's composition are executed with line 

that varies in thickness, seemingly in response to the swelling of the internal forms. 

Finer lines emulating zigzag pen strokes are used to describe the modeling of light 

and shade within the figures, in a manner that reflects drawing in pen and ink or 

wash, but notably with more extensive interior modeling than he usually employs. 

A fragment of a drawing in the Fogg of three nude warriors engaged in battle [13] 

and the drawing Prisoner Led before a Judge (fig. 18) show a similar emphasis on fig- 

ure contour as a primary means of conveying movement, which is further under- 

scored by the dark wash background that acts as a foil for the figures, while the in- 

dication of interior modeling to describe anatomical detail is minimal. 28 The wiry 

vigor of Pollaiuolo's pen line is clearly seen in drawings of individual figures, such 

as Study of a Nude—Man Taking Aim with a Bow [16], Study of a Nude Man, Standing 

with Arms Crossed (fig. 19), and Hercules and the Hydra [15]. The first two works are 

focused studies of the exact pose and attitude of an individual figure, precisely the 

type of image to which Pollaiuolo could refer when orchestrating his Battle compo- 

sition. The third drawing is a more freely executed sketch, most probably relating to 

his large Hercules paintings for the Medici, capturing the dynamic pose of the fig- 

ure in motion, with hand reaching out to grasp the neck of the barely defined form 

of the Hydra. The multiple broken contour lines and short strokes describing mus- 

culature and bone structure in the last drawing suggest the rapidness of execution 

and heighten the sense of movement that is the focus of the study. This figure is in 

fact referenced in the pose of the engraved archer, and although the manner of exe- 

38

cution differs in the engraving, the desire to convey the mobility of the figure re- 

mains his primary focus. The dominance of the linear pen contours of Pollaiuolo's 

figure drawings appears to surpass that found in the drawings of his senior gold- 

smith colleague Maso Finiguerra (1426-1464), with whom he shares close stylistic 

affinities. 29 With such drawings, Pollaiuolo invites the viewer to admire his virtuos- 

ity in portraying the muscles tensed for action and in showing the way in which 

they wrap around limbs, as articulated entirely through the bend and curve of the 

contour without actually describing the specific interior details. This approach to 

drawing may be seen in light of his goldsmith training, emphasizing legibility of 

outline and clarity of movement and gesture necessary for detailed work in metal. 

Alison Wright has also pointed out that the use of contour as a primary means of 

representing the figure in Pollaiuolo's drawings recalls both Leon Battista Alberti's 

emphasis on the importance of "circumscription" in defining figures within a com- 

position and Pliny's praise for Parrhasius's subtle depiction of contour "to give 

assurance of the parts behind, thus clearly suggesting even what it conceals." 30 

The viewer's comprehension of the complete movement of the figure contributes 

to a sense of volume that may account, in part, for the careful construction of 

Pollaiuolo's composition in which the figures are spaced somewhat farther apart to 

reveal as much of their entire form as possible, with less overlapping than that 

found in the ancient reliefs that undoubtedly inspired it. 

In addition to the similarities with Pollaiuolo's approach to drawing, there also 

appears to be a perceptible tension in the engraved figures. The strong, two-dimen- 

sional characteristic of the contours vies with the implied three-dimensional quali- 

ties of the modulated tonalities created by the extensive interior modeling. This ten- 

sion brings to mind additional Albertian concepts regarding artist models, two- and 

three-dimensional media, and composition that Pollaiuolo may have used as the 

starting point for this unprecedented engraving project. In book 3, section 58 of his 

De Pictura, Alberti notes the benefit of copying from sculptural rather than painted 

models, teaching the copyist to represent both the likeness of the object and the cor- 

rect incidence of light, and how working in sculpture can bring greater advantages 

39

than painting alone because the artist becomes more intimately familiar with the 

relief of an object and thus will paint it more accurately. 31 In book 2, section 40, 

under a discussion of "historia" and the tendency of overambitious artists to show 

off by packing too many figures into their compositions, Alberti seems to prescribe 

Pollaiuolo's composition when he states, "In my opinion, there will be no historia 

so rich in variety of things that nine or ten men cannot worthily perform it." 32 He 

continues, "Though variety is pleasing in any 'historia' a picture in which the atti- 

tudes and movements of the bodies differ very much among themselves is most 

pleasing of all. So let there be some visible full-face, with their hands turned up- 

wards and fingers raised, and resting on one foot; others should have their faces 

turned away, their arms by their sides and feet together, and each one of them 

should have his own particular flexions and movements." Alberti even goes so far 

as to suggest, "If suitable, let some be naked," though admittedly he recommends 

modesty, and Pollaiuolo clearly takes liberties with his brazenly nude combatants. 

The degree to which these ideas appear to describe Pollaiuolo's engraving is most 

compelling. The issue of how one might render the idea of a sculptural figure—pro- 

viding as much information as possible about the modeling, relief, and anatomic 

specificity or "likeness" of the figure in a two-dimensional medium—is addressed 

by adapting Alberti's historia discussion. Pollaiuolo portrays ten men, in a variety 

of active poses including paired opposites, to provide the viewer with multiple 

viewpoints of the human form in action, as if rotating a statuette or moving around 

a sculptural form—the striking similarity of the faces suggesting one model. Great 

attention is given to the surface modeling of the figures (the play of light across 

form), and as Laurie Fusco noted, some areas of musculature are even unnaturally 

twisted around a limb toward the viewer to reveal more than one would actually 

see from that angle, in an attempt to provide as much information about the struc- 

ture of the body as possible for the viewer's reference. 33 The pairing of oppositely 

posed figures has a tradition in medieval copybooks as well. 34 The problem of con- 

veying three-dimensional ideas in a two-dimensional format, and seeking a means 

of resolving the tension between them, must have provided a particularly appealing 

challenge for an artist like Pollaiuolo, who worked as a goldsmith, sculptor, and 

painter. 

POLLAIUOLO'S ULTIMATE LEGACY 

Further insight into these Albertian connections may be found in a broader exami- 

nation of Pollaiuolo's approach to drawing and his role as a maestro di disegno. 

Among the works central to this discussion is a drawing, Nude Man Seen from Three 

Angles [14], now generally accepted as by Pollaiuolo's hand. 35 Whether the model 

for this image was a small, malleable wax figure with movable limbs or a live model 

(as has been debated), 36 the purpose of this exercise appears to be the translation of 

a three-dimensional object into two dimensions by depicting multiple viewpoints 

(front, back, and side; heads shown in three-quarter, profile, and lost profile), and 

establishing the anatomical structure of the figure. The two-dimensional aspect of 

the drawing is subtly accentuated in the limb arrangements of the front and back 

views: the contours of the arms and legs are strikingly similar and it is primarily the 

40

interior modeling that suggests a single figure is shown, pivoted 180 degrees. 37 A 

similar approach is found in Pollaiuolo's monumental painting The Martyrdom of 

Saint Sebastian, c. 1475 (fig. 20), in which not only do the foreground figures appear 

as pivoted pairs, but again the contours of the bent legs of the crossbowmen facing 

front and back are remarkably close, with interior modeling again used to suggest 

the alternate viewpoint. 38 While the correspondences between the contours are not 

exact, and in the drawing the figures differ slightly in size, disposition of the 

clenched hand, and other minor aspects, the correlation is sufficient to underscore 

the two-dimensional character of the image. As with his other drawings, the pen 

line varies to define the swell of the muscles as they fold around the figure. How- 

ever, minimizing his use of wash, Pollaiuolo employs parallel and some slight V- 

stroke/zigzag shading to articulate the placement and interrelation of the muscular 

structure within the contour, in a manner similar to the Battle engraving, though not 

as extensively. See, for instance, the use of thin light "sketch" lines combined with 

shaped patches of shading to describe the musculature of the figure's back at right. 

Vasari claimed that Pollaiuolo's knowledge of anatomy was derived from experi- 

ence with dissection of human cadavers. 39 Yet Pollaiuolo's occasional misunder- 

standings (evident in the lack of inclusion of certain muscles and tendons) 40 and the 

tendency to show all visible muscles flexed simultaneously (and thus inaccurately) 

when describing a particular movement or pose suggest that his knowledge came 

from the close scrutiny of a live nude model with a distinctive muscular develop- 

ment (perhaps an athlete or some kind of professional fighter) 41 and that he com- 

bined the flexing of muscles for different actions within one figure. 

41

The use of more extensive interior modeling in the Battle engraving may have 

had two purposes: first, as a means to demonstrate the artist's considerable (if less 

than perfect) understanding of human anatomy by articulating the figures' muscu- 

lar structure in considerable detail (one can even discern the suggestion of bulging 

veins in the raised arm of the left chain man); and second, to convey a greater sense 

of surface modeling through a detailed description of the fall of light across form, 

suggesting a sculpted three-dimensional surface, or at least the relief of a highly 

modeled surface—just as Alberti prescribes. 

Pollaiuolo used drawing to expand his understanding of the human figure and 

to develop a repertoire of reusable motifs, frequently based on antique sources, 

which appear throughout his work. The forward-facing striding figure of the Lou- 

vre drawing [14] could easily be seen as a warrior type if a weapon was inserted 

into his clenched hand. His pose, one foot in profile (or near profile), one pointing 

forward, is seen time and again, including the Berlin archer [16], the foreground 

archer in the right and left corners of the St. Sebastian altarpiece and (slightly modi- 

fied) in the left man holding the chain in the Battle engraving. The other key recur- 

ring motif is that of the lunging figure with arms raised, often positioned to shoot 

an arrow from a bow or wield some other weapon. This pose is found in the archer 

at left in the Battle engraving, in the British Museum Hercules sketch [15], the small 

oil painting Hercules and the Hydra in the Uffizi (fig. 21)—and thus most likely in the 

large Hercules and the Hydra painting made for the Medici family that is now lost, 

but which is generally believed to be represented in the small Uffizi oil—and (re- 

versed) in the figure of Hercules in the painting Hercules, Nessus, and Deianeira [19] 

at the Yale University Art Gallery. 

The high esteem in which Pollaiuolo's abilities were held and his motifs 

admired is evident in the inscription that appears in the upper left of the Louvre 

drawing [14]: "This is the work of the excellent and famous Florentine painter and 

outstanding sculptor Antonio di Jacopo. When he depicts man look how marvel- 

42

ously he renders the limbs." 42 A close, unfortunately cropped, anonymous copy of 

the Louvre drawing (which includes the changes in the arm position of the right 

figure as well as the latter portion of the inscription in handwriting emulating the 

original), now in the British Museum (fig. 22), testifies to the veracity of the inscrip- 

tion through the homage paid to Pollaiuolo's skills by replication, albeit in a less 

accomplished, less nuanced hand. The choice of parchment as the support for the 

British Museum version is noteworthy for its durability, suggesting the desire to 

preserve this detailed copy as a model for future reference. 43 Numerous copies and 

adaptations of the figures in the Louvre drawing, used for specific projects or as a 

means of developing drawing skills, further substantiate the recognition of 

Pollaiuolo's portrayal of anatomy in the active nude male as exemplary. 44 

In the first book of his Commentarii, Ghiberti extols the importance of drawing 

as fundamental to all branches of art, with the implication that the mastery of 

"disegno" (under the broader meaning of "design") liberated the artist from an at- 

tachment to a single manual skill and allowed him, as a generator of ideas, to ap- 

proach a greater intellectual standing. Ghiberti used himself as an example of the 

significance of the artist's role as a maestro di disegno when he stated: "Also for 

many painters, sculptors and stone-carvers I provided the greatest honors in their 

works [for] I have made very many models in wax and clay and for the painters I 

have designed very many things." In fact, Ghiberti was specifically paid for his skill 

as well as his labor in producing cartoons for a stained-glass window of the Flo- 

rence Cathedral in 1438. 45 Pollaiuolo's ultimate legacy as a maestro di disegno was 

noted in his mid career by the Florentine patron Giovanni Ruccellai, who applied 

the term to both Pollaiuolo and his goldsmith colleague Maso Finiguerra as part of 

a list of the illustrious artists represented in his collection (c. 1471), 46 although the 

work he owned by Pollaiuolo was not specified. A key function of the maestro di 

disegno was to create images that could be reproduced and/or used by other artists 

working in a variety of media. Finiguerra worked primarily as a goldsmith. He de- 

43

veloped a very consistent and lucid drawing style, predominantly figural and often 

based on live models; the resulting clear contours gently modeled in light wash 

reflect the legibility required of goldsmith work. Two of his rarer grand narrative 

compositions (the Deluge and Moses on Mount Sinai) were later reproduced as en- 

gravings by Francesco Rosselli (1448-1508/25?) in the 1490s after Maso's death, and 

certainly Finiguerra's drawing style has been recognized as influential in much of 

early Florentine printmaking. 47 Pollaiuolo's similarly goldsmith-like approach to 

drawing, in the emphasis on clear contour, revealed a more flexible approach in a 

dynamic pen line than that found in the more resolutely consistent pen over metal 

point approach in the Finiguerra workshop. Pollaiuolo was influenced, as described 

above, by his more diverse experience as a painter and sculptor, which in turn may 

have also helped him win more ambitious commissions than Finiguerra as a de- 

signer. 48 However, despite the significance of such commissions as the Hercules 

paintings, or the St. Sebastian altarpiece for his workshop, Pollaiuolo's reputation 

rested on his impact as a maestro di disegno, as evidenced by the enormous extent 

to which his figural works were copied and imitated; it was in this role that he 

made his most significant contribution to Italian Renaissance art. The sixteenth- 

century goldsmith and sculptor Benvenuto Cellini confirmed Pollaiuolo's influence 

as "a goldsmith and a draughtsman of such skill that all the goldsmiths made use of 

his beautiful designs, which were of such excellence that many of the best sculptors 

and painters also use them .. . [he] did little else but admirable drawing and always 

kept faith with that great disegno." 49 

The broader relationship of the maestro di disegno to Florentine artistic prac- 

tice in general is widely acknowledged. The importance is specifically emphasized 

as a requirement for master goldsmiths—significantly, Pollaiuolo retained his mem- 

bership in the goldsmith guild and identified himself with the profession through- 

out his life, despite his endeavors in other media—in Biringuccio's treatise on 

metallurgy of 1540: 

Those who work in gold and silver must outdistance all other craftsmen in 

learning and achievement to the same degree that their materials outdistance 

all others in nobility. Therefore, it is necessary first of all to be a good designer, 

because design is the key that opens the doors not only to the goldsmith's craft 

but to all others. . . . There are, in short, three things . . . that are greatly es- 

teemed in this art: first, engraving and making figures or foliage in full or bas- 

relief; next, drawing out a vessel in silver or gold . . . and third, setting a gem 

accurately and gracefully. 50 

It is in this light that scholars such as Leopold D. Ettlinger and Francis Ames-Lewis 

have been inclined to view Pollaiuolo's Battle engraving as a "demonstration" piece 

specifically created as a way to disseminate and lay claim to artistic ideas (specifi- 

cally the anatomy of the male nude figure in action), despite the unprecedented na- 

ture of this kind of self-advertisement by an artist. 51 The extent of Pollaiuolo's role 

as a maestro di disegno is revealed in the range of copies and adaptations of his 

work, many through exchanges in graphic forms, but interwoven with associations 

with other media appropriate to Pollaiuolo's diverse talents—as indicated in his 

44

own inscription on the tomb of Sixtus IV: "The work of the Florentine Antonio 

Pollaiuolo, famous in silver, gold, painting, bronze, 1493." 52 

An examination of some of the copies and adaptations of Pollaiuolo's imagery 

in works by other artists may offer some further insight into the motivation behind 

the Battle of the Nudes engraving. A fairly large (approximately 40 x 59 cm) less so- 

phisticated engraving, mistitled Battle of Hercules and the Giants [7, 8], appears to be 

based on a Pollaiuolo drawing that may be partially represented in the Fogg frag- 

ment Three Fighting Men [13], which corresponds to the figures at the far right of the 

composition. Oddly, the engraved composition, like the drawing fragment, appears 

cropped at the right where a seemingly disembodied hand holds a dagger in the 

upper corner. The hand should belong to the cut-off warrior, but the spatial rela- 

tionship does not work. The entire design is apparently preserved in a small copy 

drawing at the Biblioteca Reale, Turin, attributed to school of Pollaiuolo (fig. 23), 

which shows a group of twelve battling nudes in the left half of the composition 

and a nude man with arms tied behind his back running away from this group to- 

ward four nude or semi-draped men and women near a tree. The extended compo- 

sition is also represented, in a reverse copy, omitting the woman seated by the tree 

and the soldier at far left, in a sixteenth-century engraving by the Netherlandish 

artist Allaert Claesz (fig. 24). 53 The engraved inscription that appears in the com- 

pleted second state of the anonymous engraving mistitled Battle of Hercules and the 

Giants [8] identifies the scene as the hero and twelve giants, despite the fact that 

there are only nine figures in addition to "Hercules," whose name appears on the 

sheath of his sword. 54 The cropping of figures at the right could allude to other 

"giants" outside the picture. Yet none of the figures are characterized as overly large 

in stature and the supposed protagonist/victor is not distinguished in any way, 

45

aside from his "label." The inscription thus suggests a misguided attempt to assign 

a known subject to a generalized battle scene that, like the Battle of the Nudes, has no 

clear protagonist but appears to draw on imagery from Roman sarcophagi such as 

the half-fallen warrior seen from the front or the lunging figure with the curved 

sword, and like the Battle serves as an all'antica invention rather than an illustration 

of a specific narrative event. (The misnomer is perpetuated, however, because it ap- 

pears on the second state of the print and serves as a means of differentiating be- 

tween Pollaiuolo's engraving and the anonymous engraver's similar subject by 

title.) The engraver's addition of extensive interior modeling (albeit exaggerated 

and crude, resulting in a schematic and inaccurate anatomical description) and the 

background vegetation of vines and stalks, which are not indicated in either the 

Fogg fragment or the expanded copy drawing, were not independently invented, 

but rather appear to derive from some awareness of the Battle engraving. Although 

closely spaced parallel shading lines predominate, the contours are weaker, the 

tonal subtleties Pollaiuolo achieved with his nuanced zigzag strokes are lacking, 

and the figures appear stiff and awkward. In light of the similarities in scale and 

nude secular subjects, various scholars have tried to devise a logical narrative con- 

nection between the two engravings and the drawing Prisoner Led before a Judge (see 

fig. 18), but to no satisfactory conclusion. 55 Stylistically, the Battle of Hercules and the 

Giants engraving is typically identified as North Italian (possibly Paduan), based on 

the consistent, narrowly spaced parallel hatching used for shading and the angular 

treatment of the broken rocky foreground ledge that is similar to that found in some 

Mantegna School prints. Thus it does seem probable that the original Pollaiuolo 

drawing (of which the Fogg fragment may be a part, or which may show the same 

composition) may have been the cartonum (cartoon) of nude figures that is docu- 

mented as being among the drawings used as models by students in the art school 

of Paduan painter Francesco Squarcione (c. 1395-c. 1468) in the 1460s. 56 Whether or 

not Pollaiuolo ever intended that this composition be engraved remains specula- 

tion, but it is worthy of note that the Battle of the Nudes presents a more carefully 

orchestrated composition in which the figures appear more balanced, less crowded 

together, and overlapped—and thus provides a more complete view of their entire 

bodies than those found in the Hercules battle image, which are more in keeping 

with classical battle reliefs. The cropped edge of the Hercules print also suggests the 

reuse of another image for another purpose. It is also possible that the intention was 

to reproduce the original drawing on two paired engraving plates, like Mantegna's 

Battle of the Sea Gods, but for some reason the second plate was never realized. Lilian 

Armstrong Anderson objected to dating the Hercules print to c. 1500, as Arthur 

Hind and John Goldsmith Phillips had suggested, 57 observing that some of the fig- 

ures in the composition correspond to images of putti portrayed in combat in illu- 

minations for several Venetian incunabula printed around 1470; she thus asserts 

that the print must have been in circulation by the late 1460s. 58 However, one must 

consider the possibility that the miniaturists who created the illuminations might 

have known the drawing, particularly during the time it was "stolen" from the 

Squarcione school. 59 So the print could have been made at any time during the last 

quarter of the fifteenth century. Another possible factor that affects the dating of the 

print is the suggestion that Pollaiuolo may have created his Battle engraving in re- 

46

sponse to the crude interpretation of his drawing as represented by the Hercules and 

the Giants engraving. 

Among the many examples by other artists that appear to borrow figures from 

the Hercules battle image is the bizarre and spatially inconsistent composition, 

Fighting Beasts Regarded by Soldiers [9]. Here the anonymous Florentine engraver 

created a pastiche: lifting the ax-wielding warrior, complete with ferocious attitude 

and gaping mouth, from the Hercules image, turning him into a centaur-type beast, 

changing his ax to a ball and chain weapon on a pole, and setting him to battle with 

a half-man/half-lion counterpart while elegantly dressed soldiers in classical styled 

armor calmly look on. Interestingly, the subject has been interpreted as a moralizing 

contrast between the bestial and rational aspects of man's nature, 60 a theme perhaps 

not unrelated to issues addressed in the Battle of the Nudes discussed earlier. The 

pair of soldiers at left are copied from an embroidered design, The Beheading of St. 

John the Baptist (fig. 25), one of twenty-seven surviving panels from a monumental 

series of narrative designs portraying the life of John the Baptist commissioned 

from Pollaiuolo for a set of liturgical vestments to be used for services on major 

feast days in the Florentine Baptistery. Made over a long period (c. 1466-80S), these 

embroideries were the largest and most detailed series showing the life of St. John 

in the history of Florentine art. The extensive cycle tested Pollaiuolo's practice of 

inventive reuse of figures and poses, but his success is evident in the existence of 

copy drawings, 61 and engravings such as Fighting Beasts Regarded by Soldiers that 

replicate certain motifs, thus putting into circulation images that would seldom be 

accessible to the public, except for high holy days at the church. The stylized ren- 

dering of hair and fur in the engraving, and the fine patterned shading strokes and 

hatching, suggest a familiarity with goldsmith work and the so-called fine manner 

style of engraving practiced by Florentine engravers such as the so-called Baccio 

Baldini (supposedly active 1460s-80s), 62 very different from the longer diagonal 

shading and delicate engraving strokes used by Pollaiuolo to suggest subtleties in 

47

tonal values and modeling of forms in the Battle of the Nudes. The less schematized 

rendering of anatomy in the Florentine engraving suggests that it was based on 

Pollaiuolo's drawing rather than the Hercules engraving, since the North Italian 

copyist seems to have less of an understanding of musculature. 

Several Northern European examples testify to the spread and adaptation of 

Pollaiuolo's imagery outside Italy. Possibly as early as the 1480s and certainly no 

later than 1496, the Netherlandish engraver Master IAM van Zwolle, who is not 

known to have traveled to Italy, apparently had access to the Hercules battle en- 

gravings as he adapted the ax-wielding figure from that image, showing the figure 

with upraised arms framing an open-mouthed grimace in his own print Battle of 

Two Men with a Centaur. The streaming headbands, lithe figures, and pointedly con- 

trasting poses (shown in side and back views) further underscore a connection to 

Pollaiuolo's figural ideas as indicated in both battle engravings. 63 Albrecht Durer 

(1471-1528), known for his fascination with Italian art, also copied and borrowed 

imagery from Italian engravings. 64 In his drawing study Abduction of a Woman (Rape 

of the Sabine Women) of 1495 (fig. 26), Durer adapts the lunging pose and figure type 

of the archer in Pollaiuolo's Battle of the Nudes engraving (within millimeters of the 

same scale) to portray one of the young Roman men carrying off a Sabine woman. 

In keeping with Pollaiuolo's composition, Durer's two male figures are also por- 

trayed so that one faces forward; the other, in mirrored pose, has his back to the 

viewer. 65 Jorg Breu's creative adaptation of Pollaiuolo's Battle of the Nudes [18] for 

his 1516 wall fresco design has already been addressed. In contrast, a school of 

Nuremberg drawing of c. 1500-10 (fig. 27), too weak to be Durer but possibly an 

artist in his circle, produces a straightforward copy of the figures at the right of the 

second state of the Hercules battle engraving in pen on pink prepared paper. 66 

Pollaiuolo's Italian followers also made use of his figure types as represented 

in the Battle engravings. One example is A Battle of Naked Men, c. 1500-10 [17] by an 

artist in the circle of Pietro Perugino (c. 1450-1523). This drawing has recently been 

48

attributed to Perugino's most famous student, Raphael (1483-1520), noting the 

modification of Pollaiuolo's vigorous approach (evident not only in the pose, but 

also in the grimaces and open-mouthed expressions of some figures) through the 

more delicate sensibilities of the Perugino workshop. 67 Francis Ames-Lewis and 

Elizabeth Clegg have suggested that incised lines present in the contours of some of 

the figures, such as the helmeted lunging man at right, indicate that they were 

transferred from a Pollaiuolesque source, while other figures, such as those behind 

the archers at left, were added to fill out the composition. 68 The fallen front-facing 

warrior at center, and his counterpart seen from the back, as well as the lunging fig- 

ure at right recall figures in Pollaiuolo's Hercules and the Giants battle [7, 8] as well as 

antique prototypes. The sharply bent back of the man with the shield at far right 

and, behind him, the open-mouthed man with pike raised over his head loosely 

relate to the poses of the right man holding the chain and the man fending off the ax 

behind him in the Battle of the Nudes. Because neither engraving presents a precise 

match, the hypothesis of Ames-Lewis and Clegg of another Pollaiuolesque source 

seems probable, or like Durer and Breu, the artist freely adapted forms based on 

Pollaiuolo's figural ideas. Pollaiuolo's inventions are also reflected in two prints by 

Cristofano Robetta (1462-1535 or after): Hercules and the Hydra [10] shows 

Pollaiuolo's favored lunging figure motif (in reverse); 69 Hercules and Antaeus [11] 

recalls the exaggerated bend of Hercules' back, the front-to-front arrangement of the 

figures, and the gaping mouth, thrown-back head, and balletic extension of the leg 

of Antaeus of Pollaiuolo's small bronze. Both Robetta compositions are generally 

associated with Pollaiuolo's famous lost Hercules paintings. 70 

Since Pollaiuolo repeated favorite motifs in the other media in which he 

worked, his conceptions also circulated through works produced in a variety of me- 

dia. It has recently been suggested that a terracotta relief, Battle of Nude Men [21], in 

the Victoria and Albert Museum, possibly late fifteenth or early sixteenth century, 

may represent a copy of a "metal" (presumably bronze) relief of battling figures by 

49

Pollaiuolo that, according to Vasari, was sent to Spain, but of which "every crafts- 

man in Florence has a plaster cast." 71 The composition shares affinities with the 

Battle of the Nudes engraving in the two-tiered layout of mostly paired-off figures in 

a relatively shallow stage-like space; the inclusion of two fighting figures with a 

chain shown in the same pose pivoted 180 degrees with feet slightly overlapped; 

the range of activity and pose revealing a generalized portrayal of violent action in 

the service of anatomical display; and the articulation of musculature and classiciz- 

ing robust type. Yet the three-dimensional qualities of the medium, even in rela- 

tively shallow relief, allow for more subtle modeling than that portrayed in the en- 

graving, and the more archaic facial type (deep-set eyes, stylized mask-like profile) 

is less expressive. The lunging figure with the dagger facing right and the figure 

with dagger raised about to strike a seated man with a shield near the center back- 

ground also recall the turbaned lunging figure with the sword at right and the man 

with the dagger in the central background of the Hercules battle engraving. The 

figure being tied to a tree may relate to antique examples of Marsyas prepared for 

punishment with his hands tied above his head. 72 

Examples such as these would seem to confirm the supposition that 

Pollaiuolo's Battle of the Nudes engraving was intended as a means of disseminating 

artistic ideas. It has been suggested that both Pollaiuolo and Mantegna, the two ear- 

liest Italian artists to conceive of prints on a large pictorial scale, used prints to dem- 

onstrate to a wide audience that they understood the Albertian principle of what 

constitutes a good historia, while further addressing popular intellectual tastes for 

all'antica designs. 73 The visual manifestation of the two artists' endeavors, however, 

reveals ultimately different artistic concerns. Pollaiuolo's success in conveying the 

vitality of the active male figure is achieved at times at the expense of anatomical 

accuracy and three-dimensionality. His circumscription of the figure with a lively 

contour line, use of flickering patches of highlight, and varied engraving technique 

infuse the bodies with energy, suggesting the behavior of muscles under the strain 

of vigorous activity in a highly convincing, if not precisely naturalistic manner. 

While Mantegna's heavier, static figures, though portrayed perhaps more convinc- 

ingly as weighty three-dimensional forms, recall more literally their antique 

sources, the lines that surround modeled sections within a figure, defining planes or 

pockets of flesh and the crisp curls of hair, give the appearance of a form carved 

from marble or stone (see [12], for example). The line in the Mantegna engravings 

has long been lauded for its marvelous variety and drawing-like character. 74 

Pollaiuolo's creative use of line, evident not only in his unusual delicate zigzag 

technique manipulated at different angles to articulate the musculature of his fig- 

ures, but also in tiny nuanced shading strokes in background foliage, combined 

with broad parallel shading and selective crosshatching, has been underappreciated 

in comparison to Mantegna both in its contribution to the overall energy of his com- 

position and in its departure from similar techniques used by engravers of lesser 

skill. 

Given Pollaiuolo's sensibility for sculptural media, the allusion to classical im- 

agery in the composition, and the connections to Alberti's theories about two- and 

three-dimensional media, it would seem perfectly plausible that Pollaiuolo himself, 

or an assistant under his direction, could have been responsible for the reworking of 

50

the plate in an attempt to alter the largely monochromatic tapestry-like background 

(seen in Cleveland's first state) by increasing the sense of space between forms. This 

interest in spatial relationships and adjacencies is evident in the ground shading in 

the first state, which shows some effort to describe the areas around the figures' 

contours in order to allude to cast shadows and set forms off from the background 

rather than serving as generalized background fill: see particularly the shading 

around the figures in the lower right quadrant. Highlighted passages of leaves just 

below the right ax man's blade at the upper left and above the sword blade of the 

man fending off the ax at center as well as the tree branches at upper left and right 

also hint at an attempt to describe light penetrating the otherwise undifferentiated 

background in the first state. However, the halo effect of much of the ground shad- 

ing seems to heighten tension between the two-dimensional surface of the sheet and 

the three-dimensional forms described, rather than increasing spatial depth. The 

subtle highlights become somewhat lost in the background, overshadowed by the 

rippling muscular bodies. The attempts to modify the image in the second state 

were not entirely successful either. In fact, the shaded thigh looks flattened and, 

given the character of different inks and printing difficulties (double printing, 

smudging, etc.), it is not altogether clear that the reworking had a major impact on 

the appearance of the print, and the engraver may have decided to leave well 

enough alone. 

Variant ink types and the possibility of the artist's own changes to the plate, 

consisting of modifications of the image and not merely the re-engraving of weak- 

ened lines, suggest aesthetic choices and accepted differences that must alter our 

previous methods of evaluation of Pollaiuolo's engraving, and possibly of other 

early Italian engravings as well. 75 These observations do not detract from the superb 

qualities of the Cleveland impression, but rather expand our conception of what 

constitutes a "good" impression of an early Italian engraving. 

DATING THE ENGRAVING 

One of the most difficult aspects of addressing the small body of work that remains 

by Pollaiuolo is the lack of secure dates of execution. Aside from the papal tombs 

(1493 and 1498), the bronze relief for the baptistery altar (1477-83), and the St. 

Sebastian altarpiece (1474-75), documents suggest that the embroideries were cre- 

ated over a period of fifteen years (c. 1466-80s), record his commission for the lower 

portion of the reliquary cross for the baptistery (1457), and refer to works in a vari- 

ety of media (some now lost). Yet they fail to establish a clear chronology for his 

extant oeuvre. Dates suggested for the engraving have ranged from 1465 to about 

1489, with c. 1470-75 often given as a compromise. Arguments have been made for 

both earlier and later dates, but the lack of specific documentation and the com- 

plexities of the evidence put forth for each make it difficult to resolve the matter 

absolutely. For these reasons, I have elected to review the issue separately, rather 

than attempting to include the arguments in the analysis of the engraving. 

As another possible source for motifs in Pollaiuolo's engraving, Fusco cites 

Apollonio di Giovanni's Death of Panthus in the Virgil Codex manuscript (c. 1453-64), 

51

possibly made for the Medici, which includes a lunging archer running in from the 

left and two central figures in approximately pivoted positions raising their swords 

to strike while a figure with arms raised strikes a blow with a long spear at right. 76 

Such a source would suggest 1453-64 as the earliest period when the print could 

have been made. Some scholars have argued that the figure style relates to the now- 

lost Hercules paintings of c. 1460 (though the 1460 date is dependent on Pollaiuolo's 

recollection years later, when in a letter from 1494 he referred to the paintings he 

created with his brother for the Medici "thirty four years ago"), 77 which becomes 

more advanced in the c. 1474-75 St. Sebastian altarpiece. Affinities between the en- 

graving and the Five Dancers frescoes at Villa la Gallina in Arcetri (fig. 28), recently 

redated to the early 1470s, have also been put forth as evidence: the carefully or- 

chestrated placement of active figures of a similar type, strongly contoured with 

articulated musculature, sometimes twisted unnaturally into view (fig. 29) and 

shown from varying viewpoints (though this is difficult to discern in photographs 

because of the deteriorated condition of the frescoes). 78 Armstrong's recognition of 

motifs associated with the Battle of Hercules and the Giants [7, 8] in early manuscript 

illuminations for Venetian incunabula dated to 1469-72 has frequently been used in 

support of an early date for both engravings (since the background of Hercules 

appears to be based on that of the Battle of the Nudes). 79 Yet, as stated earlier, these 

Venetian examples (which conform more to the Hercules and the Giants than to the 

Battle of the Nudes) could have been based on the drawing in Squarcione's workshop 

and do not necessarily presuppose knowledge of the Hercules engraving. Ruccellai's 

identification of Pollaiuolo as a maestro di disegno around 1471, seen as a possible 

impetus for the artist to have created such a self-promoting piece, has also been 

suggested as reason for furthering the argument for an early dating. The possibility 

that the unspecified work Ruccellai owned was an impression of the engraving, 

though, must also remain speculation. 80 An early date has also been supported by 

the tenuous connection between the pose of the right figure holding the chain in the 

engraving and the drawing of a nude male figure seen from the back (Mercurius 

Trismegistus, plate 51 of the book of drawings known as the Florentine Picture 

Chronicle, in the British Museum) recently attributed to the workshop of the so- 

called Baccio Baldini and dated to the 1470s). 81 

Advocating a later date, while also intriguing, can be equally speculative. 

Fusco's discovery of a specific classical model for the reclining figure in the lower 

left corner of the Battle of the Nudes engraving postulates a much later dating of 

1489, based on the excavation in that year of an antique work (as noted in a letter to 

Lorenzo de' Medici by his agent), now in a private collection in Graz. 82 Although 

there is some doubt, as is often the case when dealing with antique sources, about 

whether the marble group at Graz is in fact the precise example cited in the Medici 

letter, there is a striking correspondence between Pollaiuolo's figure and the marble, 

not only in position of the torso but in facial expression as well. Pollaiuolo's connec- 

tions to the Medici and his presence in Rome during the late 1480s into the 1490s 

also lend credence to this proposal. Another letter, also from 1489, written by 

Lorenzo de' Medici to Giovanni Lanfredini, Florentine ambassador to Rome (the 

same family that commissioned the Arcetri frescoes), urgently requests that 

Pollaiuolo execute some "task" that they had recently discussed when the artist 

52

visited Florence. And although wildly speculative (as the "task" need not be art 

related) one cannot rule out the possibility that it could refer to the engraving. 

Madeline Cirillo Archer's redating of Francesco Rosselli's Life of the Virgin and Christ 

engravings to the mid 1480s or later 83 has also been identified as evidence that 

Pollaiuolo's Battle of the Nudes was made after the 1470s because in one of several 

dramatic changes in the third state of Rosselli's Flagellation scene, the figure on the 

right has been completely transformed to correspond with the pose of the nude 

warrior with the chain seen from the back in the Battle engraving, suggesting a re- 

sponse to an idea from a new source unavailable when he made the first state of the 

Flagellation. 84 Although it might seem unlikely that Rosselli could have been un- 

aware of Pollaiuolo's engraving when he first executed his series, given Pollaiuolo's 

reputation and the apparent speed and extent to which his ideas seemed to circu- 

late, the possibility must be suggested, so again this evidence is not absolute. Simi- 

larly, the woodcut copies of the first state by Francfordia and Uberti, c. 1490-1500, 

might be taken as evidence for a later dating of the Battle engraving, if one surmised 

that the woodcuts were created soon after the appearance of the engraving in Flo- 

rence in response to demand for the image. The fact that the woodcuts copy the first 

state, of which there were presumably far fewer examples, might suggest that they 

were produced close to the same time as the engraving. Yet, as seen with engravers 

such as Robetta (in his Hercules prints after Pollaiuolo, c. 1500) and Rosselli (in his 

prints after Maso Finiguerra, c. 1490s), images could be appropriated for use several 

decades after they were created. 

Wright has posited that some outside influence may have spurred Pollaiuolo 

to produce the Battle of the Nudes in the 1460s or 1470s. 85 Although she suggests a 

possible competition with Mantegna's Passion engravings, which itself opens a 

thorny issue regarding the recent debate over different datings for his work, an- 

other mechanism may have triggered Pollaiuolo's interest in creating the Battle: to 

53

assert his knowledge of the human figure. Bernard Schultz discusses the publica- 

tion of a small but important number of printed medical texts, beginning in 1472, 

that made information about anatomy more available throughout the 1470s, specifi- 

cally citing the publication in 1478 of De medicina of Celsus in Florence, which had 

concise chapters on human anatomy that attracted such attention the volume was 

quickly reprinted in many editions. 86 Schultz outlines the publication and market- 

ing of such books through a branch of the Medici e Speziali guild during this pe- 

riod—they were sold in the same apothecary shops where artists purchased some of 

their supplies. A papal bull in 1482 allowed certain hospitals to practice dissection 

with ecclesiastical permission, and Schultz notes that Pollaiuolo could have been 

acquainted with the anatomist Gabriele Zerbi, the attending physician at the papal 

court in Rome during 1483-94 when Pollaiuolo was working on the tomb for Sixtus 

IV. 87 This is not to imply that Pollaiuolo ever actually participated in dissection (the 

consensus based on the visual analysis of his figures points instead to an in-depth 

study of surface anatomy for his own purposes in rendering the figure, rather than . 

the scientific interest advocated by Leonardo), but it seems equally valid to consider 

the increasing awareness and discussion of anatomical knowledge surrounding 

Pollaiuolo in the late 1470s into the 1480s as a possible factor in his decision to pro- 

duce the engraving. However, Schultz also cites the greater accuracy in anatomical 

description of the Louvre drawing (undated but often assigned to the 1470s) and 

the correct portrayal of muscular opposition in the arms of the bent-over archers in 

the St. Sebastian altarpiece (as does Wright) while finding the engraving less accu- 

rate, thereby suggesting that the engraving might precede the other works (and 

thus fall into the early 1470s), presuming that Pollaiuolo's anatomical accuracy 

would have increased. While Schultz's account does not offer a clear resolution to 

the dating issue, he raises important historical factors that provide additional in- 

sight into Pollaiuolo's working environment. The arguments for a later date (1470s- 

80s) are compelling in many respects, not least of which is the extraordinary size 

and scale of the print. Bernardo Prevedari's engraving of an architectural subject 

after Bramante of 1481 is the only other print executed on a larger single plate in the 

quattrocento. 88 The later dating for the Battle would seem more plausible, from a 

purely logistical point of view, for one might presume an advancement in printing 

equipment and ability as the demand for printing increased in the last quarter of 

the fifteenth century. Finally, the dated Durer copy after the engraving suggests a 

terminus ante quern of 1495, just three years before Pollaiuolo's death. 

Pollaiuolo's artistic personality and the limited examples of his work that re- 

main further confound the attempt to come to a consensus about the dating of the 

print. His reuse of motifs throughout his career and in different media somewhat 

weakens the arguments about stylistic affinities with early works, and, without 

other engravings, establishing a chronological development of his technique is im- 

practical. His diverse approach to drawing, with both minimal interior modeling 

using few lines and light wash such as the Bayonne and Berlin examples and more 

extensive shading in the Louvre and other drawings, adds a further element of un- 

certainty. Information provided by watermarks on various impressions of the Battle 

of the Nudes has likewise proved to be inadequate in pinpointing an execution date. 

However, it is interesting to note, although it has no bearing on the date when the 

54

plate was cut, that while the sheer number of extant impressions (approximately 

forty-eight) indicates the extent to which the print was prized over the years, the 

fact that the majority are late, most likely posthumous impressions, may suggest 

that more impressions were made as the popularity of the image increased after the 

artist's death. The large number of late, worn impressions also suggests that the 

plate seems to have deteriorated (with corrosion as well as wear) fairly quickly and 

may not have been printed very long after the sixteenth century. None of the water- 

marks indicate an absolute date, early or late, for any of the impressions (see Ap- 

pendix: Watermarks). 

The possibility that the changes in the plate could have been executed or aided 

by an assistant encourages further examination of the quattrocento Italian print- 

making process: who was printing the plates, and where (in the artist's workshop or 

at the printer's)? The relationship between the designer of the image and the execu- 

tion of the engraved plate has been raised most recently in the heated debate over 

the authorship of the Mantegna engravings. 89 But one cannot rule out the possibility, 

though much less likely since he possessed sophisticated metalworking skills, that 

Pollaiuolo provided a drawing (as a maestro di disegno) for another engraver to 

execute as a print. Since Bramante's name appears on the engraving executed by 

Prevedari, it would not be out of the question for Pollaiuolo's name to appear on an 

engraving he did not actually cut, as the one responsible for the image. Inscribed 

references such as "inv." to indicate the inventor of the image, "fecit" to indicate the 

engraver of the plate, and "excudit" to indicate the publisher (and sometimes 

engraver) had not yet entered printmaking practices. These and other unresolved 

issues will come into sharper focus as new sources and documents (such as the 

contract between Mantegna and an engraver he hired to make prints that was dis- 

covered in 2000) are unearthed, and current research projects, such as the fifteenth- 

century Italian watermark project at the Istituto Centrale per la Patologia del Libro 

in Rome, come to fruition. 90 New research, combined with the opportunity to 

compare works side by side, in different contexts, through the periodic organization 

of exhibitions such as the present one, will ultimately lead to new revelations 

and expand our appreciation of the remarkable achievement of works such as the 

Battle of the Nudes. Clearly, the rich field of early Italian engraving has yet to be fully 

cultivated. 

55

Notes 

1. The lost paintings are believed 

to have depicted three subjects 

from the Labors of Hercules: 

Hercules killing the Nemean lion, 

Hercules and the Hydra, and 

Hercules and Antaeus (the com- 

positions of the last two are pre- 

sumed to be represented by the 

much smaller versions of these 

subjects painted on panel, also by 

Pollaiuolo, now in the collection 

of the Uffizi in Florence; loss of 

paint around the edges of the 

panels suggests a previous frame 

or perhaps insertion in some type 

of furnishing); the designs for 

embroidered vestments were 

commissioned by the merchants' 

guild for the celebrant to wear 

during special services at the 

Florence Baptistery and are now 

housed in the Museo dell'Opera 

del Duomo; the Tomb of Pope 

Sixtus IV, 1493, and Tomb of Pope 

Innocent VIII, 1498, both in 

bronze, remain at St. Peter's Ba- 

silica, the Vatican; the most fa- 

mous of his small bronze sculp- 

tures, Hercules and Antaeus (see 

fig. 16), once owned by the 

Medici family, is now in the 

Museo Nazionale del Bargello, 

Florence; and the bronze relief 

panel Birth of John the Baptist, 

made for the large silver altar for 

the Florence Baptistery, is now 

also in the Museo dell'Opera del 

Duomo. See Leopold D. Ettlinger, 

Antonio and Piero Pollaiuolo: Com- 

plete Edition with a Critical Cata- 

logue (London, 1978): nos. 18, 20, 

21, 25, 26, and 44 (all illustrated 

except no. 44). 

2. The engraving plate measured 

approximately 41.2 x 61 cm, 

which is unusually large, for most 

engravings produced in the 15th 

century were half that size or 

smaller. There are a few excep- 

tions: Bernardo Prevedari's Inte- 

rior of a Church after Bramante, 

1481, 70.5 x 51.3 cm; attributed to 

Baccio Baldini, Judgment Hall of 

Pilate, 43.5 x 58.1 cm; and 

Francesco Rosselli, Assumption of 

the Virgin, 1490s, 82.6 x 56 cm 

overall, but printed from two 

plates, each approximately 41.3 x 

56 cm. Even the largest plates 

used for the Mantegna engrav- 

ings do not appear to have ex- 

ceeded 37 x 48 cm; see Jane 

56 

Martineau, ed., Andrea Mantegna, 

exh. cat., Royal Academy/Metro- 

politan Museum of Art (London/ 

New York, 1992), 469. Yet the 

large scale of Pollaiuolo's figures, 

which measure approximately 

25.5 cm tall, is also exceptional, 

even when compared with the 

above examples. 

3. Giorgio Vasari, Lives of the 

Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, 

trans. Gaston du C. de Vere (New 

York/Toronto, 1996), 1: 533. 

4. The continued debate over 

whether the engraved zigzag 

shading technique was developed 

in the Mantegna engravings or 

Pollaiuolo's Battle is complicated 

by the lack of documented evi- 

dence and the disagreement 

among scholars about the relative 

chronologies of these prints. Most 

recently, Shelley Fletcher has 

suggested that the two artists 

may have developed the tech- 

nique independently of one an- 

other; she views Mantegna's use 

of the zigzag or simulated return 

stroke as a natural development 

in the evolution of his engraving 

style, as she has outlined in "A 

Closer Look at Mantegna's 

Prints," Print Quarterly 18 (2001), 

19-22. She also suggests that 

Pollaiuolo's influence may have 

been in the increased elegance of 

line and streamlining of pattern 

evident in Mantegna's Bacchanal 

with a Wine Vat [12], the first of 

his engravings where this specific 

zigzag technique appears, as well 

as in the more widely spaced 

modeling lines found in its pen- 

dant engraving, Bacchanal with 

Silenus. Basically, the concept is 

the same for both artists but the 

manner of execution differs— 

more refined and delicate in 

Pollaiuolo, more idiosyncratic 

and varied in the Mantegna ex- 

amples. Given the fame of the 

two artists, however, it seems 

more likely tha t one might have 

adopted and modified the other's 

idea. Some argue that the tech- 

nique was the outcome of 

Pollaiuolo's prowess as a gold- 

smith and knowledge of working 

in metal, and his renown as a 

master draftsman and designer 

would have further contributed 

to his ability to devise such a 

technique. Others suggest that 

the drawing-like character of the 

resulting effect points more to- 

ward Mantegna's approach to 

drawing and the particularly 

flexible and diverse drawing-like 

qualities of his engravings. 

Alison Wright has suggested that 

the expanded use of interior 

modeling in Pollaiuolo's engrav- 

ing, in a manner less typical of his 

drawing technique, may indicate 

adaptation of the long parallel 

and zigzag strokes used in the 

Mantegna examples; see Alison 

Wright, "Mantegna and 

Pollaiuolo: Artistic Personality 

and the Marketing of Invention," 

in Stuart Currie, ed., Drawing 

1400-1600: Invention and Innova- 

tion (Aldershot, U.K., 1998). How- 

ever, Pollaiuolo may have created 

this method of shading to de- 

scribe the modeling of his figures 

more explicitly, and it may have 

been the only means available to 

him to achieve the effects of tonal 

modeling that he produced with 

wash in his drawings. Yet without 

other examples of Pollaiuolo's 

engraved works (if they existed) 

for comparison, one can only 

speculate about which artist to 

credit with originating the tech- 

niques, and perhaps it is most 

reasonable to surmise that they 

were aware of each other's work 

and that each may have re- 

sponded by adjusting his ap- 

proach to some degree. 

5. Various prints have been attrib- 

uted to Pollaiuolo over the years, 

but most of them are now recog- 

nized as the work of other 

printmakers, sometimes based on 

Pollaiuolo's designs but clearly 

not engraved by his hand. The 

first systematic catalogue of 

prints listed by artist was com- 

piled by Adam Bartsch in his 

volume on early Italian engravers 

(Le peintre-graveur [Vienna, 1811], 

13: 202-4). He lists three prints by 

Pollaiuolo: Battle of the Nudes 

(erroneously entitled "The Gladi- 

ators"); Hercules and Antaeus (now 

attributed to the Master of 1515, 

based on a design by Andrea 

Mantegna); and the so-called 

Hercules and the Giants (now at- 

tributed to an anonymous North

Italian printmaker, possibly 

Paduan) [7, 8]. Arthur M. Hind 

(Early Italian Engraving [London, 

1938-48], 1: 189-92, hereafter 

Hind) lists six prints under 

Pollaiuolo, but suggests that all 

but the Battle are copies based on 

Pollaiuolo designs: Battle of the 

Nudes (as "Battle of Naked 

Men"), Hercules and the Giants, 

Hercules and the Hydra (a different 

version than that described by 

Bartsch), Profile Portrait of a Lady, 

The Grand Turk (El Gran Turco), 

and Two Centaurs Fighting. 

6. Inspired by Shelley Fletcher's 

study of Mantegna and the pre- 

liminary research for the present 

catalogue, the Center for Ad- 

vanced Studies in the Visual Arts 

(CASVA) held a colloquy, gathering 

ten impressions of Pollaiuolo's 

Battle of the Nudes from eight 

institutions in the paper conser- 

vation lab at the National Gallery 

of Art in Washington for exami- 

nation and comparison by a 

group of scholars, curators, and 

conservators (Curatorial/Conser- 

vation Colloquy 9: Antonio 

Pollaiuolo's Battle of the Nudes, 

19-21 June 2000). Cleveland's 

unique impression of the first 

state was examined next to three 

second-state impressions from the 

National Gallery (Russell Allen, 

Rosenwald Collection, and 

"Gott" impression) and second- 

state impressions from the Balti- 

more Museum of Art, Fogg Art 

Museum at Harvard University, 

Metropolitan Museum of Art, 

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 

Philadelphia Museum of Art, and 

Yale University Art Gallery. This 

event allowed the comparison of 

many impressions at once, un- 

mounted and unframed, with 

high-caliber microscopes (particu- 

larly important for discerning ink 

variation, plate wear, and state 

changes) and the input of inter- 

ested and knowledgeable profes- 

sionals in the field, which pro- 

vided essential groundwork for 

the course of research for the 

Cleveland project (see Acknowl- 

edgments for a list of partici- 

pants). 

7. Louise S. Richards, "Battle of 

Naked Men," The Bulletin of the 

Cleveland Museum of Art (hereafter 

CMA Bulletin) 55 (1968), 66. 

8. Jay A. Levenson, "Mantegna 

and the Emergence of Engraving 

in Italy," in Cesare Mozzarelli et 

al., Le Corte di Mantove nell'eta di 

57 

would have made up this stalk on 

a whim. The extended stalk in the 

woodcut also fills in the other- 

wise empty area in the upper 

right corner of the engraving, and 

seems better matched with the 

opposite corner where tree 

branches and foliage extend right 

up to the edge. Since the woodcut 

has a printed border around the 

image, it is unlikely that the stalk 

was added by Francfordia to 

make a firmer printing edge. 

12. One must also allow for the 

possibility that Uberti could have 

copied Francfordia's woodcut 

rather than Pollaiuolo's engrav- 

ing, which might explain the 

slightly cruder style, once- 

removed from the original ex- 

ample. It is also worthy of note 

that despite their appropriated 

image, both Francfordia and 

Uberti saw fit to promote their 

own names in prominent 

plaques; Uberti's is ironically 

elaborate considering the decid- 

edly weaker effort displayed in 

his version. 

13. Richards, "Battle of Naked 

Men," 69-70. 

14. Erwin Panofsky (Albrecht 

Diirer [Princeton, 1943], 2: 95-96) 

identified the scene as the story 

of the Roman consul Titus 

Manlius who slew a Gaul and 

took his necklace, thus gaining 

the nickname "Torquatus" or 

"chain." John Goldsmith Phillips 

(Early Florentine Designers and 

Engravers [Cambridge, 1955], 48- 

49) suggested that the print repre- 

sents a scene from the Legend of 

the Golden Fleece, the battling 

warriors that sprang to life when 

Jason sowed the dragon's teeth. 

But the figure of Jason, the central 

character, is neither present nor 

alluded to, and it was a helmet, 

not a chain, that Jason threw into 

the warriors' midst that caused 

them to turn on one another. 

According to Fusco, Colin Eisler, 

following Bartsch (Le peintre- 

graveur, 13: 202, no. 2) and Paul 

Oskar Kristeller (Kupferstich und 

Holzschnittt in vier Jahrhunderten 

[Berlin, 1905], 171), put forth the 

idea that the figures are gladia- 

tors who are engaged in an an- 

cient funerary ritual fight to the 

death, thus offering a blood sacri- 

fice signifying regeneration in 

commemoration of the deceased. 

The remains of the fallen gladia- 

tors would nurture the soil from 

which their own sustenance came 

(grain, wine from the vines, 

from olive trees). Eisler even 

suggested that the print may 

have been commissioned to 

memorate the death of a pow 

ful Florentine such as Cosim 

(1464), Piero (1469), or Giul 

de' Medici (1478). This prop 

at least accounts for the lack 

differentiation among the fig 

figures and the seeming aiml 

ness of the battle. For a summ 

tion of these and other sugge 

tions, see Hind, 1: 189-92; L 

Smith Fusco, "Battle of the 

Nudes," in Jay A. Levenson 

Early Italian Engravings fro 

National Gallery of Art (Wa 

ton, 1973), 66-80; and Wend 

Stedman Sheard, Antiquity in 

Renaissance, exh. cat., Smith 

lege Museum of Art (Northampton, 

1979), no. 44. 

15. Alison Wright, in Patrici 

Rubin and Alison Wright, Re 

sance Florence: The Art of th 

exh. cat., National Gallery (L 

don, 1999), 259. 

16. Patricia Emison, "The W 

Made Naked in Pollaiuolo's B 

of the Nudes," Art History 13 

(1990), 261-75; Joseph Manc 

"Passion and Primitivism in 

Antonio Pollaiuolo's Battle of 

Naked Men," Source: Notes i 

History 20 (2001), 28-36. Em 

perceives a more generalized 

concept for Pollaiuolo's imag 

that offers a complex allusion 

philosophical and theologica 

beliefs rather than a specific 

or historical event. She reads 

grain and vines as referring t 

Eucharist while the ensuing b 

of nude figures points to the 

subject of universal death an 

resurrection of the soul when 

separated from the mortal bo 

Manca (p. 34) dismisses the 

"subjectless" interpretation o 

engraving and describes the w 

riors as representative of the 

passions of a base and barbar 

society. He regards the engra 

as a statement about the impo 

tance of moderating desire, " 

central tenet that unites vario 

moral philosophies that flour 

ished in antiquity, a point we 

known in humanistic circles 

quattrocento Florence." 

17. For a discussion of the as 

ciation of the wild man with 

German tribal origins and fur 

analysis of the iconography r 

ing to an ancient battle betwe 

the Romans and the Germani

the Pollaiuolo workshop, based 

on the slightly faceted articula- 

tion of the anatomy, notably the 

V-shape of the sternocleidomas- 

toid muscles near the neck, al- 

though the large hands with large 

and distinct knuckles and highly 

articulated feet appear somewhat 

closer to Verrochio's style. How- 

ever, these Renaissance copies 

after antique examples are notori- 

ously difficult to attribute with 

certainty to specific artists be- 

cause of the complexity in dis- 

cerning the Renaissance artist's 

individual stylistic approaches 

from elements belonging to the 

original antique sculpture. John 

Pope-Hennessy considers the 

bronze Marsyas in the Frick 

Collection to be in the style of 

Pollaiuolo (The Study and Criticism 

of Italian Sculpture [Princeton, 

1980], 129-32). The less finished 

surface of the Modena example, 

as compared with the Frick 

bronze, is more in keeping with 

the Florentine practice of leaving 

bronze statuettes relatively in the 

rough (since they would have 

been shown alongside excavated 

examples), and typical of 

Pollaiuolo's other known works 

such as the Hercules, also in the 

Frick Collection, and the Hercules 

and Antaeus in the Museo 

Nazionale del Bargello. For a 

description of the antique source, 

see Phyllis Pray Bober and Ruth 

Rubinstein, Renaissance Artists and 

Antique Sculpture: A Handbook of 

Sources (London, 1986), 73-74, no. 

30. 

22. For a discussion of a group of 

Marsyas bronzes affiliated with 

the Medici collections, see Anna 

Maria Massinelli, Bronzetti e 

Anticaglie dalla Guardaroba di 

Cosimo I, exh. cat., Museo 

Nazionale del Bargello (Florence, 

1991), 31-39. 

23. For instance, the use of the 

lion skin as a supporting strut for 

the Hercules figure is unneces- 

sary given the tensile strength of 

the bronze, but it may have been 

an intended allusion to the use of 

such struts to support marble 

Roman copies of Greek bronze 

statuary. For further discussion of 

possible antique sources and 

motives that influenced 

Pollaiuolo's Hercules and Antaeus 

sculpture, see Edward J. 

Olszewski, "Framing the Moral 

Lesson in Pollaiuolo's Hercules 

and Antaeus," in Luba Freedman 

and Gerlinde Huber-Rebenich, 

58 

eds., Wege zum Mythos (Berlin, 

2001), 71-87; and Massinelli, 

Bronzetti e Anticaglie, 26-30. 

24. See Joy Kenseth, "The Virtue 

of Littleness: Small-Scale Sculp- 

tures of the Italian Renaissance," 

in Sarah Blake McHam, ed., Look- 

ing at Italian Renaissance Sculpture 

(Cambridge, 1998), 128-48. 

25. Alison Wright, "Dimensional 

Tension in the Work of Antonio 

Pollaiuolo," in Stuart Currie and 

Peta Motture, eds., The Sculpted 

Object 1400-1700 (Aldershot, 

U.K., 1997), 65-86. For further 

discussion of Pollaiuolo's incor- 

poration of two- and three- 

dimensional formal concerns and 

use of antique sources, see Laurie 

Fusco, "Antonio Pollaiuolo's Use 

of the Antique," Journal of the 

Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 

42 (1979): 257-63. 

26. Before entering the Uffizi 

collection in 1788, the Rape of the 

Daughters of Leucippus (fig. 17) 

was housed in the Medici villa in 

Rome. It was acquired by the 

Medici family in 1584 when 

Ferdinand de' Medici bought 

most of the antique sculptures 

from the della Valle collection. It 

is not known when this sarcopha- 

gus entered the collection of Car- 

dinal Andrea della Valle (1463- 

1534), which was well established 

in the quattrocento by the della 

Valle family of learned jurists, 

physicians, and classical scholars 

and developed by the cardinal 

into one of the most important 

collections of the 16th century. A 

variant example, also known in 

the Renaissance, is now in the 

Vatican collection. See Bober and 

Rubinstein, Renaissance Artists and 

Antique Sculpture, 161-62, 479-80, 

nos. 126 and 126a. 

27. Lorenzo Ghiberti, I Commen- 

tarii, ed. Julius von Schlosser 

(Berlin 1912), 1: 22; Pliny, Natural 

History, 35.67-72. 

28. It should be noted that both 

the Fogg and British Museum 

drawings have suffered damage 

over the years. Some of the lim- 

ited interior modeling lines (de- 

scribing ribs and muscles in the 

areas of the stomach and neck) 

have faded and thus are difficult 

to see in an illustration; the dis- 

coloration and restoration of the 

surface of the drawings make it 

impossible to ascertain if any pale 

wash was applied, as is often 

found in Pollaiuolo's drawings 

this type. The execution of the 

two drawings with their unusu 

solid dark backgrounds have 

been compared to the dancing 

nude figures of Pollaiuolo's Vi 

Gallina frescoes at Arcetri, wh 

in turn have been discussed in 

relation to painted imagery on 

ancient Greek vases that were 

being rediscovered as collector 

items in Italy in the 1460s. In 

attempts to link the elusive sub 

ject matter of the British Muse 

drawing and the Fogg fragmen 

(and the so-called Hercules an 

Giants engraving to which it re 

lates) with the Battle of the Nu 

engraving, Cruttwell, Popham 

and Pouncey, and others have 

suggested that all these works 

may have been conceived as 

preparatory to some decorative 

scheme that did not necessarily 

have a complicated iconograph 

beyond staging inventive displ 

of the nude figure in action, w 

generalized references to class 

sources. See Maud Cruttwell, 

Antonio Pollaiuolo (London, 1 

124; A. E. Popham and Philip 

Pouncey, Italian Drawings in 

Department of Prints and Dra 

at the British Museum: The Fo 

teenth and Fifteenth Centuries 

don, 1950), 136-38, no. 224; F 

Shapley, "A Student of Ancien 

Ceramics, Antonio Pollajuolo, 

Art Bulletin 2 (1919), 78-86; A 

H. Barr, "A Drawing by Anton 

Pollaiuolo," in Art Studies: Me 

eval Renaissance and Modern 

bridge, 1926), 73-78; Michael 

Vickers, "A Greek Source for 

Antonio Pollaiuolo's Battle of 

Nudes and Hercules and the Tw 

Giants," Art Bulletin 59 (1977 

182-87; Ettlinger, Antonio and 

Piero Pollaiuolo, 161, nos. 35 

and Ann Driscoll, "The Pig 

Painter: Parties, Poets, and 

Pollaiuolo," CMA Bulletin 80 (1 

83-111. Alison Wright (Rubin 

Wright, Renaissance Florence 

has also noted the affinity of th 

Fogg and British Museum draw 

ings with the small-scale relief 

silhouetted against dark groun 

found in the ancient cameos th 

were avidly collected by 

Pollaiuolo's patrons, the Medic 

in the 1470s. 

29. For a discussion of 

Finiguerra's stylistic relationsh 

to Pollaiuolo, and their possibl 

collaboration in the same gold 

smith shop in the early years o 

Pollaiuolo's career, see Alison 

Wright, "Studies in the Paintin

of the Pollaiuolo" (Ph.D. diss., 

Courtauld Institute, University of 

London, 1992), 23-30, and Alison 

Wright, "Antonio Pollaiuolo 

Maestro di disegno," in Elizabeth 

Cropper, ed., Florentine Drawing 

at the Time of Lorenzo the Magnifi- 

cent (Bologna/Baltimore, 1994), 

131-46. 

30. Wright, in Rubin and Wright, 

Renaissance Florence, 264; Pliny 

35.67-68. See also Wright, "Di- 

mensional Tension," 69-70. 

31. Leon Battista Alberti, On 

Painting and On Sculpture: The 

Latin Texts of De Pictura and De 

Statua, ed. and trans. Cecil 

Grayson (London, 1972), 101. 

32. Ibid., 79. 

33. Laurie Fusco, "The Use of 

Sculptural Models by Painters in 

15th-century Italy," Art Bulletin 

64 (1982), 175-94. 

34. See examples from the Villard 

de Honnecourt Sketchbook, Fig- 

ures based on Geometric Shapes, c. 

1235, Bibilotheque Nationale, 

Paris; Children Playing from a 

Neopolitan sketchbook, late 14th 

century, Pierpont Morgan Li- 

brary, New York; and Horsemen, 

from the workshop of Bartolo di 

Fredi, c. 1370, Musee Bonnat, 

Bayonne; reproduced in Ettlinger, 

Antonio and Piero Pollaiuolo, figs. 

12, 13, and 14. 

35. As noted by Ettlinger (Antonio 

and Piero Pollaiuolo, 159), 

Pollaiuolo's drawings present a 

special problem in that a rela- 

tively small number of sheets 

have survived; because his style 

quickly became popular, there are 

workshop replicas, copies (some- 

times of a later date), and many 

other works executed in his man- 

ner. Some drawings attributed to 

Pollaiuolo that share affinities 

with the style of Maso Finiguerra 

have also complicated attribu- 

tions at times. For the purposes 

of this study, I have chosen to 

discuss drawings that have been 

generally accepted by current 

scholarship as attributable to 

Pollaiuolo. Bernard Berenson, 

Maud Cruttwell, and Sergio 

Ortolani did not believe this 

drawing was by Pollaiuolo's 

hand: Berenson (The Drawings of 

the Florentine Painters [Chicago, 

1938], 2: 271) gives the work to 

the school of Pollaiuolo, as does 

Cruttwell (Antonio Pollaiuolo, 

59 

battle of nude figures" (Vasari, 

Lives, 1: 533). 

40. For detailed discussion of 

Pollaiuolo's correct anatomical 

observations, slight exaggera- 

tions, and inaccuracies, as re- 

vealed in his nude figures, and 

the unlikelihood that he practiced 

dissection, see Laurie Fusco, "The 

Nude as Protagonist: Pollaiuolo's 

Figural Style Explicated by 

Leonardo's Study of Static 

Anatomy, Movement and Func- 

tional Anatomy" (Ph.D. diss., 

New York University, 1978), 16- 

25. Bernard Schultz (Art and 

Anatomy in Renaissance Italy [Ann 

Arbor, 1985], 51-66) concludes 

that Pollaiuolo may have "per- 

formed limited dissections in the 

service of his art" in light of a 

1482 papal brief, by Sixtus IV, 

approving the practice of dissec- 

tion by ecclesiastical permission 

and the possible contact between 

noted anatomist Gabriele Zerbi 

and Pollaiuolo at the papal court 

between 1482/83 and 1494. 

41. Wright, in Rubin and Wright, 

Renaissance Florence, 245. 

42. "[A]ntonii Jaco[b]i excelentis- 

simi ac eximii florentini pictoris 

scultorisque prestantissimi hoc 

opus est./Umquam hominum 

imaginem fecit/Vide quam 

mirum in membra redigit." This 

inscription appears to be written 

in an ink that is contemporary to 

the drawing. Ettlinger (Antonio 

and Piero Pollaiuolo, 161) has sug- 

gested that the drawing was 

inscribed by a 15th-century 

owner or collector. 

43. A recent article by Lorenza 

Melli, "Sull'uso della carta lucida 

nel Quattrocento e un esempio 

per il Pollaiolo," Paragone: Arte, 

no. 316 (March 2001), 3-9, makes 

the very intriguing suggestion 

that the British Museum copy 

was actually made by tracing 

Pollaiuolo's original, following a 

pedagogical practice recom- 

mended by Cennino Cennini in 

his Libro dell'Arte (c. 1400). This 

would account for the closeness 

of the copy; the slightly smaller 

scale of the British Museum ver- 

sion could be explained by the 

possibility that the parchment 

support could have shrunk in 

reaction to environmental condi- 

tions; and the necessary prepara- 

tion of the parchment to make it 

transparent for tracing could 

account in part for the discolora-

60 

graving to a drawing of the Death 

of Pentheus by Marco Zoppo 

(1432/33-1478) in the British 

Museum, from the early 1470s. 

But this supposition seems less 

convincing given the differences 

in articulation of musculature and 

absence of modeling in the thigh, 

the slightly more frontal orienta- 

tion of the face, and the elevation 

of the body by the raised out- 

stretched leg of Zoppo's figure. 

Since there was a known antique 

prototype for this figure, Zoppo 

could have used it as a model 

instead (perhaps based on a cast 

found in the workshop of 

Squarcione, with whom Zoppo 

was affiliated from the 1450s), or 

he might have known 

Pollaiuolo's drawing and adapted 

the figure—but the connection 

does not presuppose that Zoppo 

would have to have known the 

engraving, thereby securing a 

date for the print. This also raises 

a similar question with regard to 

the incunabula illuminations: 

Could they be based on 

Pollaiuolo's drawing rather than 

the print? Especially if the draw- 

ing was out of the Squarcione 

family's hands from 1462-74; 

perhaps the drawing was in 

Venice? 

59. See note 56 above. 

60. For further discussion of 

beasts and centaurs in relation to 

early human ancestors, irrational- 

ity, and the inability to control 

violent impulses, see Wright, in 

Rubin and Wright, Renaissance 

Florence, 284. 

61. Zachariah Leaving the Temple, 

Galleria degli Uffizi (inv. 98 F) 

and St. John the Baptist Questioned, 

Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 

Kupferstichkabinett (inv. 5028). 

The latter drawing is reproduced 

in Rubin and Wright, Renaissance 

Florence, 242, no. 49. For discus- 

sion of Pollaiuolo's embroideries 

as sources for some of the draw- 

ings in The Florentine Picture 

Chronicle in the British Museum, 

see Lucy Whitaker, "Maso 

Finiguerra, Baccio Baldini and 

The Florentine Picture Chronicle," 

in Elizabeth Cropper, ed., Floren- 

tine Drawing at the Time of Lorenzo 

the Magnificent (Bologna/Balti- 

more, 1994), 183. 

62. Various early Florentine prints 

that appear to have been exe- 

cuted by the same hand, includ- 

ing one cycle of Prophets and 

Sibyls, the Planets, Judgement H 

of Pilate, and the engraved illus 

trations for Dante's Divine Com 

edy based on Botticelli's drawings, 

have long been attributed 

the largely undocumented figur 

Baccio Baldini. For recent argu 

ments regarding the historical 

basis for the attribution of the 

Divine Comedy illustrations, an 

Baldini's existence in general, s 

Peter Keller, "The Engravings i 

the 1481 Edition of the Divine 

Comedy," in Hein.-Th. Schulze 

Altcappenberg, Sandro Botticel 

The Drawings for Dante's Divin 

Comedy (London, 2001), 326-3 

and Mark Zucker, review of 

Altcappenberg, Sandro Botticel 

Print Quarterly 19 (2002), 81-8 

63. See Evans, "Pollaiuolo, Dur 

and the Master IAM van Zwolle 

114-16. 

64. Perhaps the most famous 

example is Durer's 1494 copy 

after Andrea Mantegna's Battle 

the Sea Gods; see Walter Straus 

The Complete Drawings of Albr 

Durer (New York, 1974), no. 14 

13. In her forthcoming book, 

Albrecht Durer and the Venetia 

Renaissance (Cambridge, in pre 

Katherine Luber makes the case 

that Durer may not have travele 

to Italy until 1504, and that his 

drawings showing the influence 

of Italian works of art dating to 

the 1490s are entirely based on 

engraved sources he would have 

seen in Nuremberg, brought to 

Germany via active trade routes 

possibly through the hands of on 

of Germany's most influential 

humanists and Durer's friend 

and supporter, Willibald 

Pirckheimer. I am grateful to 

Suzanne Boorsch for bringing th 

information to my attention and 

to Katherine Luber for sharing 

her thoughts with me in advance 

of the publication of her book. 

65. Although this drawing has 

been described as after a "lost" 

engraving by Pollaiuolo, I see n 

reason, given the close correspo 

dences in scale and figure type 

(including physiognomy) between 

Pollaiuolo's archer and 

Durer's lunging figure, why an 

artist of Durer's skill and knack 

for invention could not have 

adapted the figure from the Batt 

of the Nudes to his own purpose 

66. Evans, "Pollaiuolo, Durer, a 

the Master 1AM van Zwolle," 1

67. Martin Clayton, Raphael and 

His Circle: Drawings from Windsor 

Castle, exh. cat., Queen's Gallery 

(London, 1999), 50-53, no. 10. For 

additional autograph drawings 

by Raphael that have been inter- 

preted as revealing evidence of 

his interest in the expressive force 

of attitude and pose of 

Pollaiuolo's nude figures, see 

Battle Scene with Prisoners Being 

Pinioned and Nude Warriors Fight- 

ing for a Standard, both pen and 

ink over chalk, in the Ashmolean 

Museum, Oxford University. 

68. Francis Ames-Lewis and 

Elizabeth Clegg, "A Contribution 

to an Inventory of Pollaiuolo 

Figure-Group Drawings," Master 

Drawings 25 (1987), 237-41. 

69. Another print of the Hercules 

and the Hydra subject, based on 

Pollaiuolo's lunging figure motif 

but shown in a much larger scale 

and with reduced landscape 

elements, is executed in a fairly 

crude, "fine manner" type in 

which short strokes and cross- 

hatching are employed and the 

forms are stylized in the manner 

of goldsmith work. Sometimes 

attributed to the Florentine en- 

graver Baldini, but listed under 

Pollaiuolo in Hind (see Hind 

D.I.3), this print is known in only 

one impression in the collection 

of the Topkapi Palace, 

Constantinople. 

70. In both examples, Robetta 

closely follows Pollaiuolo's fig- 

ural motifs, but models the forms 

in his own graphic language 

(short engraving strokes and 

stippled dots) and places them in 

rocky landscapes of his own in- 

vention, based on Albrecht Durer 

and, in the case of the Hercules 

and Antaeus, includes a bizarrely 

out-of-place figure of a frolicking 

putto. As Levenson has sug- 

gested, it would be inaccurate to 

call Robetta's prints reproductive 

(Levenson, Early Italian Engrav- 

ings, 290). The association with 

the Medici Hercules painting 

series is perhaps reinforced by the 

similarity between the British 

Museum drawing Hercules and the 

Hydra (also believed to be related 

to the paintings) and Robetta's 

print in which Hercules wields a 

lighted torch. The smaller painted 

Uffizi panel of the same subject, 

which has also been suggested as 

a source for the print, shows 

Hercules carrying a club. 

71. Vasari, Lives, 1: 534. See 

Wright, in Rubin and Wright, 

Renaissance Florence, 260, for a 

technical analysis of the makeup 

of the terracotta version and its 

possible relationship to 

Pollaiuolo's bronze example, 

either direct or based on one of 

the plaster casts. See also Italian 

Renaissance Sculpture in the Time of 

Donatello, exh. cat., Detroit Insti- 

tute of Arts (1985), 203-4, no. 69. 

Another terracotta relief, ascribed 

to an anonymous artist working 

at the end of the 15 th century, 

Birth of St. John the Baptist (Musee 

Jacquemart Andre, Paris, inv. 

865), is a close copy of 

Pollaiuolo's silver relief made for 

the Florentine Baptistery altar 

(c. 1477-83), now in the Museo 

dcll'Opera del Duomo in 

Florence, and may be a similar 

example. 

72. Bober and Rubinstein, Renais- 

sance Artists and Antique Sculpture, 

75-76, nos. 32-34. 

73. Ames-Lewis, The Intellectual 

Life, 40-44, 254-56. 

74. Fletcher, "A Close Look at 

Mantegna's Prints," 3-41. 

75. The 1992 Mantegna exhibition 

(Royal Academy/Metropolitan 

Museum of Art) and Shelley 

Fletcher's recent investigations 

into Mantegna's prints have re- 

vealed new insight into the coarse 

granular ink used in many early 

impressions (see ibid., p. 74); it 

seems that in some instances the 

thick dark ink lifted off the sur- 

face in places, leaving a softer, 

more muted charcoal-like line 

exposed, making some impres- 

sions appear grayer and less 

black than they originally ap- 

peared. David Landau discusses 

the use of a variety of different 

color inks by early Italian engrav- 

ers, hypothesizing that certain 

choices of gray or brown might 

have been consciously selected to 

achieve effects similar to draw- 

ings in silverpoint or pen and ink, 

which may have been intentional, 

or not (depending on how good 

the artist's chemistry was in mix- 

ing inks). The range of inks used 

within the black/gray/brown 

categories, aside from the red or 

green anomalies, suggests a 

broader, more flexible approach 

to aesthetic "standards" even in 

light of a prevailing interest in 

tonal qualities. See David Landau 

and Peter Parshall, The Renais- 

6l 

sance Print (New Haven/London, 

1994), 78-80. 

76. Fusco, "Battle of the Nudes," 

79-80. 

77. Ettlinger, Antonio and Piero 

Pollaiuolo, 164, no. 44. 

78. For a thorough discussion of 

the frescoes and the post 1464 

dating, see Alison Wright, "Danc- 

ing Nudes in the Lanfredini Villa 

at Arcetri," in Eckart Marchand 

and Alison Wright, eds., With and 

Without the Medici (Aldershot, 

U.K., 1998), 47-76. 

79. See note 55 and discussion 

preceding it. 

80. Wright has expressed reserva- 

tions about the interpretation of 

this unidentified work as an en- 

graving, arguing that while 

Pollaiuolo's abilities as a designer 

would certainly include creating 

engraved works, the moniker 

"maestro di disegno" does not 

presuppose such activity; because 

Pollaiuolo does not appear to 

have pursued printmaking exten- 

sively, it seems unlikely that 

Ruccellai's reference would indi- 

cate his ownership of prints by 

Pollaiuolo and Finiguerra. See 

Wright, "Antonio Pollaiuolo," 

141. One might also add that it 

would be highly unusual for a 

print to be perceived as making 

its creator worthy of the designa- 

tion "maestro" in a document as 

early as 1471, when printmaking 

was still such a young medium 

and collecting patterns had not 

yet been established. Pollaiuolo's 

engraving would have been an 

extraordinary example, however, 

and thus might be argued as 

deserving of comment. During 

the CASVA colloquy, Evelyn Lin- 

coln, who has described the Battle 

of the Nudes as a "virtuoso origi- 

nal performance in the arts of 

design and engraving" (Invention 

of the Italian Renaissance Print- 

maker [New Haven, 2000), 31), 

advanced the possible legitimacy 

of a connection between the en- 

graving and Ruccellai's diary 

entry. 

81. While the feet and pose of the 

legs are similar, the dramatically 

shortened back, summary model- 

ing, differences in articulation of 

musculature, and variation in 

position of arms and proportions 

of the figure all seem to weaken 

this connection; now that the 

drawings are no longe 

ered to be by Finiguer 

died in 1464), the loo 

opens up the possibili 

there is a vague conne 

suggests only a time f 

Pollaiuolo print. For a 

son of figures, see Ph 

Florentine Designers 

pls. 47 a-b. For discus 

new attribution and da 

well as the Pollaiuolo 

the Chronicle drawing 

Whitaker, "Maso Fini 

Baccio Baldini and th 

Picture Chronicle," 1 

82. Laurie Fusco, "Po 

Battle of the Nudes," 

storia dell'arte in ono 

Zeri (Milan, 1984), 19 

discussion of the date 

her text is incorrect; sh 

corrected the date to 1 

cited in Mark Zucker' 

the Battle of the Nude 

in Kristin L. Spangenb 

Centuries of Master P 

sures from the Herber 

Collection (Cincinnat 

16. 

83. Madeline Cirillo A 

Dating of a Florentine 

Virgin and Christ," Pr 

terly 5 (1988), 395-40 

84. Tom Rassieur and 

Boorsch recognized th 

tion of Archer's article 

Pollaiuolo dating. See 

Blumenthal, Cosimo R 

85. Wright, "Mantegn 

Pollaiuolo," 77. 

86. Schultz, Art and A 

Renaissance Italy, 59- 

87. Ibid., 63-64. He al 

a fascinating account 

ence of medical and a 

texts on artists' direct 

when studying the hum 

88. 705 x 513 mm. Se 

101-4, Bramante/Prev 

89. See articles by Da 

and Suzanne Boorsch 

Martineau, Andrea Ma 

66. 

90. The watermark pr 

under the direction of 

Munafo, with the assi 

Rosella Graziaplena.

Battle of the Nudes

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