Renaissance Architectural Drawings of Diocletian's Palace at Split and Palladio

Abstract

The article analyses the drawings of Diocletian’s Palace at Split which had belonged to the Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio and which represent the only surviving Renaissance drawings of the most important late antique architectural structure on the east Adriatic coast. Today, they are housed at the Royal Institute of British Architects in London and in the Devonshire collection, Chatsworth. A detailed analysis of the drawing technique, the paper, the handwriting and the style of the drawings, have confirmed the opinion of the scholars who argued that the ground-plan of the emperor’s mausoleum was drawn by an unknown artistand that Palladio added his sketches at a later point; the drawing of the mausoleum’s portal was also made by the same artist. Both drawings were most probably produced in Vicenza during the last quarter of the sixteenthcentury. The ground-plan of the palace itself was drawn by Palladio on the basis of an earlier source. It is likely that a version of the palace ground-plan whichhad served as a model to Palladio remained at Split and that the drawings published by Daniele Farlati in the eighteenth century relied on it rather than on those produced by Johann Fischer von Erlach, as it was argued until now.