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Borromini’s Ovals in the Dome of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane in Rome

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All Sides to an Oval

Abstract

We have always been surprised, fascinated and intrigued by Borromini’s architecture, especially if we consider how carefully his drawings were made, whether they were perspective sketches made with a pen or orthogonal projections made with a pencil, where shapes, dimensions and proportions were displayed. Graphite, “which had been used since the last thirty years of the sixteenth century” (Joseph Connors) is what enabled Borromini to make clear, precise and detailed representations, increasing his control over the project. That is why it makes sense to ask which drawing was the basis for the building of the dome, or at least which elements or data he needed for the purpose. His precision and his obsessive control of the project and of its realisation, as well as his marginal notes on the drawings where he illustrates his lines of reasoning, allow, justify and legitimate this study of ours. Aware that we cannot be totally sure of our results, we can suggest a method which can be the basis for further investigations and new hypotheses.

(Written with Margherita Caputo—Freelance architect. Roma, Lecce, Carpignano Salentino (Italy). margherita.caputo@gmail.com)

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Notes

  1. 1.

    This is a collection of the researches made in connection of the exhibition "Il giovane Borromini. Dagli esordi a San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane" organised at the Museo Cantonale d'Arte in Lugano from Sept. 5th to Nov. 14th 1999.

  2. 2.

    For references on San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane see [10, 12].

  3. 3.

    As pointed out by Paola Degni, who has directed the restoration site of the entire complex of the Trinitarians, in different times between 1986 and 2000, it is more precise to call it a vault and not a dome ([9], p. 378); we will carry on calling it a dome as indicated by Borromini himself in his drawings.

  4. 4.

    It is important to stress that we were not looking for an abstract rule; instead we wanted to simulate the process made by Borromini when trying to control the form by means of the properties of the chosen geometrical shapes.

  5. 5.

    In the cited paper Mazzotti deduces a value of 1.4461 for the ratio of the impost axes from a preliminary drawing by Caputo. Calculations presented in Subsection 7.2.1 yield the more reliable value of 1.4636.

  6. 6.

    Notable examples are: McCrossan’s dissertation [14], where he examines Borromini’s drawings for the church using Sartor’s survey, concentrating on the ground plan constructions, and Hill’s paper [11], where San Carlino’s ground plan is analysed to discover Borromini’s ideas for the construction.

  7. 7.

    Drawings AZRom168, 169, 170r, 173, 175, 176, 177. See J. Connors, in [7], p. 478.

  8. 8.

    Comparison of these drawings with the survey has revealed that a church built according to them would have been larger than the present one.

  9. 9.

    Bellini’s opinion on the subject can be read in [2] p. 28: "Borromini uses geometry as an instrument, his only goal being the visual effect [...] Whenever a conflict arises between architecture and geometry Borromini and his contemporaries always give priority to the former"(our transl).

  10. 10.

    Comparison between the survey and the project drawings has also been carried out by Margherita Caputo for another of Borromini’s works: Palazzo Carpegna in Rome, location today of the Accademia Nazionale di San Luca; the corresponding results have been published in [6].

  11. 11.

    Among the drawings of the Albertina collection, AZRom192 is said to correspond to the lantern of San Carlino. This is not the case, in our opinion, since the shape of the oval is somewhat rounder, the displayed spiral staircase could not be built in the actual wall, the double columns between the niches are missing and most of all, the axis of the oval is much longer.

  12. 12.

    On this sheet one can read: "no(n) si metera vetriata/nel campo della croce/p(er)che la polvere lo im(bratta?)” (“no glass window shall be put inside the cross, because dust would soil it” our translation); this indicates that scenographic details were important to Borromini, but he was ready to give them up if they might cause unwanted effects.

  13. 13.

    These models have been published in [18] pp. 385–386.

  14. 14.

    A more rigorous examination of the survey revealed that the longitudinal section has a profile made of two circle arcs, forming (part of) an ogival arch, as Bellini (in [1] p. 393) had acutely conjectured.

  15. 15.

    To keep it simple we imagine domes where the longitudinal section is obtained by rotation of half the drum shape.

  16. 16.

    The value we are using here for the Roman palm is 0.2234 m.

  17. 17.

    In the drawing AZRom203, ascribed to Borrominni’s nephew Bernardo, the indicated measurements in palms of the axes of the “ovato” of the dome are 52 and 1/2 and 35 and 3/4. Both these values differ about 1/4 of a palm (6 cm) from the measured ones. The axes as surveyed by Canciani in [5] are again different. This may have to do with the fact that the height that he uses for the impost (the height of the level containing the centre of the curvature of the vertical section) is 16.38 m from the floor of the church. We maintain that the impost level is about 2 palms under the level where the coffer decoration starts. Canciani chooses some specific sections of the dome and draws the ovals and their most likely constructions, but he does not relate them with one another, not attempting to explain Borromini’s choices. Our attempt is to suggest a logical sequence describing the project development. Dimensions of the geometric shapes are thus secondary to the constructions determining them.

  18. 18.

    We believe that symbolic references, even when obvious, are nonetheless secondary with respect to constructive or formal choices.

  19. 19.

    About the statics of Borromini’s domes see [1] (p. 391) or the more detailed [2] (p. 136).

  20. 20.

    The construction is actually derived from the one appearing in [3], it is Construction 3a in Chap. 3.

  21. 21.

    First conjectured by Ragazzo in [16], see also Fig. 2.6.

  22. 22.

    We maintain that the cross section, as well as the other vertical sections through the axes of the wedges, are a consequence of the construction of the ovals framing the coffer rings.

  23. 23.

    The same pattern of crosses, octagons and hexagons cam be found as part of the mosaic decoration of the barrel vault covering the ambulatory of the Santa Costanza mausoleum in Rome.

  24. 24.

    It was common, in hemispherical domes, to start the first coffer ring slightly over the equator level, as recorded nearly two hundred years afterwards by Rondelet in his treaty on the art of building [17].

  25. 25.

    Borromini wanted to use four octagons as windows, but the one on the side of the entrance has always been shut by the façade.

  26. 26.

    Document cited by Tabarrini in [20] (p. 115). Virgilio Spada (Brisighella 1596—Roma 1662), non-professional architect, from 1622 in the Oratorio romano of S. Filippo Neri, played a decisive role in its construction, along with P. Marucelli and, after 1637, with F. Borromini.

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  1. Istituto di Istruzione Superiore, “I.T.C. Di Vittorio – I.T.I. Lattanzio”, Roma, Italy

    Angelo Alessandro Mazzotti

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Mazzotti, A.A. (2017). Borromini’s Ovals in the Dome of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane in Rome. In: All Sides to an Oval. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39375-9_7

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