Abstract
The buildings of Francesco Borromini (1599–1667) rarely follow the accepted design standards of the time and their meaning eludes traditional readings. His eclecticism result from both the unique personality of the man himself, and the fact that many of his sources of inspiration were far from traditional. One such source is the astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571–1603) best known for his three planetary laws of motion. Kepler’s methodology and interpretation of the universe appealed to Borromini on many levels, the most important being Kepler’s belief in the divine geometry ruling the structure of the universe and his manner of interpreting it. Borromini’s churches of S. Carlo alle Quattro Fontane and S. Ivo della Sapienza involve rather novel and complex geometric designs that are both the starting and endpoint in understanding these buildings. The debt to Kepler is further confirmed by Borromini’s adoption of the astronomer’s rather unique Trinitarian interpretation of the cosmos.
First published as: John G. Hatch , “The Science Behind Francesco Borromini ’s Divine Geometry”. Pp. 127–139 in Nexus IV: Architecture and Mathematics, Kim Williams and Jose Francisco Rodrigues, eds. Fucecchio (Florence): Kim Williams Books, 2002.
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
This idea of the dome or vault of heaven may have been inspired by Byzantine architecture since we known that Borromini was collecting information on the Hagia Sophia and San Vitale in the early 1640s; see Connors (1996: 50–51).
- 3.
Wittkower argues that Borromini ’s use of geometry represents a move away from “the classical principle of planning in terms of modules” (Wittkower 1973: 132).
- 4.
It should be noted that Borromini does not sever completely his ties with the anthropomorphic in architecture. One does still find occasional references to parallels between the human body and architecture in Borromini’s notes and letters. In turn, when Borromini does reference the human body, he adopts the more organic relationship between the body and architecture defined by Michelangelo ; see Ackerman (1966).
- 5.
It will, obviously, be pointed out that the dome at S. Carlo is oval rather than elliptical. I suspect that Borromini may have decided that designing an elliptical dome was far too difficult; an oval is much simpler to handle geometrically and does have architectural precedents. It should be noted, however, that Kepler himself had toyed with the idea of planetary motion describing an oval around the sun, but the observational data Kepler inherited from Tycho Brahe simply did not support this; see Martens (2000: 87–90).
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Acknowledgments
I must thank Ann Marie Carroll, J. Gerard Curtis, Karen Hatch (and the boys), Laurier Lacroix, Jody McNabb, and Irene Mordas, for their invaluable assistance and encouragement during the various stages of research and writing.
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Hatch, J.G. (2015). The Science Behind Francesco Borromini’s Divine Geometry. In: Williams, K., Ostwald, M. (eds) Architecture and Mathematics from Antiquity to the Future. Birkhäuser, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-00143-2_14
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