The Class that Never Ends: Medieval Funerary Monuments of Professors of the University of Bologna
- circe927 chezcirce@gmail.com
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Bologna is a magnificent city, with an overwhelming number of sites to see, and you could easily miss the small Museo Civico Medievale, off the main street from the Basilica of San Pietro. But if you go there, you'll find a rare, perhaps unique, collection of funerary monuments, and if you're a special kind of geek, you'll appreciate how very different they are from the ones you'll typically find in large and famous museums in Europe. Famous sarcophagi and funeral monuments are usually religious, royal, or military. Key exceptions to this are very old burials, such as Etruscan tombs, or prehistoric findings, where little remains except the, er, remains, such as mummified people from high elevations or bog bodies. Almost all monuments and sarcophagi in museums are products of the wealthy, because the wealthy build from durable materials: they want their memories to last for a very long time, and in the case of what you find in museums, they do.
The Museo Civico Medievale houses something very niche: gothic funerary monuments of judges and professors of law from Bologna's renowned university. These develop into their own very particular art form, quite unlike the many other monuments in the city, because they are neither religious, nor noble, nor military. It's a secular art form, showing the men at their work, with their students, and, as the form evolved, poking gentle fun at the professors through their students' varying degrees of (in)attention.
Tomb of Matteo Gandoni, died 1330
The earliest monument fragment in the museum is that of Matteo Gandoni, who was a law professor. The museum card describes the carving as important because it comes from the workshop of Agostino di Giovanni and Agnolo Ventura, who had a prestigious sculpting and architecture workshop in Siena. Their design is considered the origin of the genre for these scholarly monuments. However, I found evidence of an outdoor tomb in Bologna from 1203 of Rolandino de' Passegeri which carries the same motif.
The figures are drawn with individual faces, but they do not have the look of portraiture, not even the professor. The professor is larger in scale, and has a cap and cape with fur banding. We see him in a three-quarters profile. Each of the students is dressed somewhat differently. The one in the first seat appears to be taking down every word the professor says with his stylus. The second student appears attentive, but thoughtful. The third student is gazing backward, maybe hoping the figure entering the room is bringing him a book he needs, or is a welcome distraction. The last student gazes outward, toward the viewer, either day-dreaming or otherwise lost in thought. These different types of students become stock figures on academic monuments.
On the far left of the lecture scene is a standing figure who is not a student. He is what the museum calls a "bidello," roughly translated as a "beadle" in university terminology, or "porter." He is carrying a book, perhaps bringing it for the student who turns to notice him in the scene.
Detail of the "Bidello" from the Matteo Gandoni Monument, 1330
The bidello was an important position in the university. He was the curator of the library, and chiefly handled and distributed the books. Nonetheless, the carver has depicted him here in smaller scale and in a worker's clothing.
Tomb of Bonandrea de' Bonandrei 1333
The next tomb fragment in chronological order in the museum is that of Bonandrea de' Bonandrei, who died in 1331. His epitaph reads: "In the year one thousand three hundred and thirty-three, On the tenth of August, he was joined with Christ. Chosen by heaven, but here covered in body, Serene in morals, a delightful Doctor of the Decretals, Bonandrea was born, and Bonandrea is now a haven from everywhere. Pray for him, reader, with a totally devoted mind."
In this version of the lecturing professor, the man is front and center, directly facing the viewer. He is completely framed and separated from his students, akin to a nimbus that a saint would have in a fresco. The stock-character students flank him: the furious note-takers, those thoughtfully considering his lecture, those turned away in distraction. Also flanking Bonandrei in the scene are his family crest and some lovely turned pillars, making the classroom seem almost like a chapel.
Tomb of Pietro Cerniti, died 1338
The inscription on this sarcophagus describes Pietro Cerniti as a Doctor of Laws and states the day of his death; nothing more. The museum notes that the tomb was carved by a different workshop than the Sienese one; that of Roso da Parma, and that it is an example of the mature gothic style in scholars' monuments. Yet, it is essentially the same form as Bonandrei's: the professor is at the center, seated ("in cathedra," like a bishop) and his students listen (some more, some less) to his lecture. In fact, in this instance, the monastic origins of the medieval university seem to come through quite clearly. The raised seat of the authority, and, the nearly uniform dress of these students look very much like a meeting in a cathedral's chapter house.
Tomb of Bonifacio di Galluzzi 1346
Bonifacio de Galluzzi was from a prominent noble family of Bologna. The family tower is still standing in the city. Not only was he a professor, he was an ambassador to popes and royals. His epitaph refers to him only as a "doctor of decretals," meaning canon law, not mentioning his other accomplishments, nor his pedigree. He wrote papal decrees and taught others how to do so. Given his family's enormous real estate holdings, noble titles, and political power, he could have had a princely monument among his family, but elected instead to have this one located in the cloister of the convent of San Domenico, among the other elite law professors of the university.
The monument is an innovation on the theme, though. The tomb is the work of Bettino da Bologna, who was a master sculptor with a workshop specializing in academic monuments. This one is distinctive for the deep relief of the carving, and the sculptor's choice to show the student from the back, in a kind of turning gesture so that we can see their faces in profile, is not unlike Giotto's figures. We're particularly lucky here in that some of the paint has survived on Galluzzi's tomb, unlike the earlier examples above.
Tomb of Giovanni d'Andrea, died 1348
Giovanni d'Andrea died of the Black Death. Bologna was a city in collapse and terror during the five months the plague as at its worst, and the university was nearly paralyzed by the number of deaths and those fleeing to the countryside in a panic. The city lost nearly half of its population. There was a desperate flurry of people seeking to make wills to secure the futures of their heirs as whole families were dying out, and that also had a huge impact on the university. In the midst of all of this chaos, the city still insisted on giving Giovanni d'Andrea full honors with the installation of this monument in San Domenico.
His epitaph (not visible in the photo) gives some clues to his high regard: "Gem of purity, unwithering tree of honor, / In this tomb I am hidden, you who were the glory of the laws: /Teacher of teachers, light, censor, and standard of morals." D'Andrea was one of the most famous canon law professors of the Middle Ages, and a beloved teacher. In the image above, you see his effigy on the top of the sarcophagus, and beneath it you see him in the classic scholarly motif.
The left side shows you a lot of variety in expressions and gestures among the students, while D'Andrea's depiction is rather generic.
On the right side, you see more of the same, all jammed in together, as though the class was standing room only, but the types of students seem to be the same stock characters, with varying degrees of commitment to listening to the teacher.
Tomb of Giovanni di Legnano, died 1383
The Giovanni da Legnano tomb exists in disjointed fragments, but is nonetheless a prized piece in the museum because it is an example of the work of Jacobello and Pierpaolo dalle Masegne, famed sculptors from Venice who were noted as masters of Late Gothic style. Comparing this piece to the ones immediately above it, you can see that the Masegnes' figures are much more lively and realistic. Their bodies appear more realistically under their robes. There's more detail to the hands and the books. Most of the faces seem individual and animated.
Monument of Roberto and Riccardo da Saliceto, erected by Carlo Saliceto 1403
Carlo Saliceto was a nobleman who wanted to immortalize his family's legal scholars, so he contracted with the dalle Masegne workshop to carve this double monument to his grandfather and great-grandfather. We have an interesting variation on the tradition. The two professors (one figure has not survived to the present time), instead of teaching from chairs with a traditional desk, seem to be sectioned off like the noblemen they were, each with his own baldachino covering him. the students are shunted to the side, and, curiously, they lean away from their instructor. The classroom(s?) themselves have security in attendance on either side in the form of armed knights. Perhaps it's because Carlo was not an academic himself, he did not commission the monument in exactly the style his ancestors would have chosen for themselves, if they had wanted to be placed with their colleagues in San Domenico. This monument was placed in the Church of San Martino, where the Saliceto family had a special chapel dedicated to their legal scholars.
The representation of the students in the images above and below have the signature dalle Masegne individualized, stock-figure students, but this group seems somehow more intense and even agitated to me.
Tomb of Pietro Canoncini, died 1502
With this last monument example, the Gothic has definitively left the building and we're rolling with the Renaissance. Actually, this monument is more interesting than that. It was carved by Vincenzo Onofri, a terracotta artist who worked on a sculpture group called "Lamentation over the Dead Christ," which occupies a niche in the nearby Basilica of San Petronio. This monument originally was placed in the Basilica. The monument reflects Onofri's active decision to use the gothic art form, but give it his own Renaissance twist. He arranges the students and the professors in what looks like a Renaissance choir stall, but gives the composition depth by using single-point perspective, centered on the professor himself, on a raised dais. Behind the students are a very Renaissance-themed candelabrum-style acanthus-leaf motif in high-contrast black and white.
Canoncini, despite his name, was a professor of Roman (secular) law, not canon law, and it's fitting that he's shown using Roman oration gestures as he lectures.
But the Renaissance chef's kiss on this monument is the cabinet beneath Canoncini's feet, which is an homage to the Studiolo of Federico da Montefeltro in Urbino, which was constructed in 1476, and envied throughout Europe as a marvel of optical illusions done in wood intarsia. Just as Montefeltro's cabinets boasted in 3D/2D of his knowledge of the humanities, Orofini has created this illusion to symbolize Canoncini's accomplishments teaching and study. The hourglass, the stylus with ink, the notebooks and books. They're all there and at his feet, open for his students to use.
Tomb of a Lecturer, Pietro Barilotto, gilded terracotta, Bologna Civic Museum, early 16th century