Série sobre a Cidade do Vaticano - Series about the Vatican's City - 09-01-2009 - IMG_20090109_9999_554
An Internal view of the St. Peter's Basilica dome.
Following, a text, in english, from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
The dome of St. Peter's rises to a total height of 136.57 m (448.06 ft) from the floor of the basilica to the top of the external cross. It is the tallest dome in the world. Its internal diameter is 41.47 metres (136.06 ft), being just slightly smaller than two of the three other huge domes that preceded it, those of the Pantheon of Ancient Rome and Florence Cathedral of the Early Renaissance. It has a greater diameter by approximately 30 feet (9.1 m) than that of the third great dome, Constantinople's Hagia Sophia church, completed in 537. It was to the domes of the Pantheon and Florence duomo that the architects of St. Peter's looked for solutions as to how to go about building what was conceived, from the outset, as the greatest dome of Christendom.
redesigned the dome in 1547, taking into account all that had gone before. His dome, like that of Florence, is constructed of two shells of brick, the outer one having 16 stone ribs, twice the number at Florence but far fewer than in Sangallo's design. As with the designs of Bramante and Sangallo, the dome is raised from the piers on a drum. The encircling peristyle of Bramante and the arcade of Sangallo are reduced to 16 pairs of Corinthian columns, each of 15 metres (50 ft) high which stand proud of the building, connected by an arch. Visually they appear to buttress each of the ribs, but structurally they are probably quite redundant. The reason for this is that the dome is ovoid in shape, rising steeply as does the dome of Florence Cathedral, and therefore exerting less outward thrust than does a hemispherical dome, such as that of the Pantheon, which, although it is not buttressed, is countered by the downward thrust of heavy masonry which extends above the circling wall.
The ovoid profile of the dome has been the subject of much speculation and scholarship over the past century. Michelangelo died in 1564, leaving the drum of the dome complete, and Bramante's piers much bulkier than originally designed, each 18 metres (59 ft) across. On his death the work continued under his assistant Vignola with Giorgio Vasari appointed by Pope Pius V as a watchdog to make sure that Michelangelo's plans were carried out exactly. Despite Vignola's knowledge of Michelangelo's intentions, little happened in this period. In 1585 the energetic Pope Sixtus appointed Giacomo della Porta who was to be assisted by Domenico Fontana. The five year reign of Sixtus was to see the building advance at a great rate.
The engraving by Stefan du Pérac was published in 1569, five years after the death of Michelangelo.
Michelangelo left a few drawings, including an early drawing of the dome, and some drawings of details. There were also detailed engravings published in 1569 by Stefan du Pérac who claimed that they were the master's final solution. Michelangelo, like Sangallo before him, also left a large wooden model. Giacomo della Porta subsequently altered this model in several ways, in keeping with changes that he made to the design. Most of these changes were of a cosmetic nature, such as the adding of lion's masks over the swags on the drum in honour of Pope Sixtus and adding a circlet of finials around the spire at the top of the lantern, as proposed by Sangallo. The major change that was made to the model, either by della Porta, or Michelangelo himself before his death, was to raise the outer dome higher above the inner one.
A drawing by Michelangelo indicates that his early intentions were towards an ovoid dome, rather than a hemispherical one. Stefan du Pérac's engraving shows a hemispherical dome, but this was perhaps an inaccuracy of the engraver. The profile of the wooden model is more ovoid than that of the engraving, but less so than the finished product. It has been suggested that Michelangelo on his death bed reverted to the more pointed shape. However Lees-Milne cites Giacomo della Porta as taking full responsibility for the change and as indicating to Pope Sixtus that Michelangelo was lacking in the scientific understanding of which he himself was capable.
Helen Gardner suggests that Michelangelo made the change to the hemispherical dome of lower profile in order to establish a balance between the dynamic vertical elements of the encircling giant order of pilasters and a more static and reposeful dome. Gardner also comments "The sculpturing of architecture [by Michelangelo]... here extends itself up from the ground through the attic stories and moves on into the drum and dome, the whole building being pulled together into a unity from base to summit."
It is this sense of the building being sculptured, unified and "pulled together" by the encircling band of the deep cornice that led Eneide Mignacca to conclude that the ovoid profile, seen now in the end product, was an essential part of Michelangelo's first (and last) concept. The sculptor/architect has, figuratively speaking, taken all the previous designs in hand and compressed their contours as if the building were a lump of clay. The dome must appear to thrust upwards because of the apparent pressure created by flattening the building's angles and restraining its projections.[21] If this explanation is the correct one, then the profile of the dome is not merely a structural solution, as perceived by Giacomo della Porta; it is part of the integrated design solution that is about visual tension and compression. In one sense, Michelangelo's dome may appear to look backward to the Gothic profile of Florence Cathedral and ignore the Classicism of the Renaissance, but on the other hand, perhaps more than any other building of the 1500s, it prefigures the architecture of the Baroque.
Giacomo della Porta and Fontana brought the dome to completion in 1590, the last year of the reign of Sixtus V. His successor, Gregory XIV, saw Fontana complete the lantern and had an inscription to the honour of Sixtus V placed around its inner opening. The next pope, Clement VIII, had the cross raised into place, an event which took all day, and was accompanied by the ringing of the bells of all the city's churches. In the arms of the cross are set two lead caskets, one containing a fragment of the True Cross and a relic of St. Andrew and the other containing medallions of the Holy Lamb.
In the mid-18th century, cracks appeared in the dome, so four iron chains were installed between the two shells to bind it, like the rings that keep a barrel from bursting. As many as ten chains have been installed at various times, the earliest possibly planned by Michelangelo himself as a precaution, as Brunelleschi did at Florence Cathedral.
Around the inside of the dome is written, in letters 2 metres (6.5 ft) high:
Tv es Petrvs et svper hanc petram aedificabo ecclesiam meam. Tibi dabo claves regni caelorvm
("...you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church. ... I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven..." Vulgate, Matthew 16:18-19.)
Beneath the lantern is the inscription:
S. Petri gloriae sixtvs pp. v. a. m. d. xc. pontif. V.
(To the glory of St Peter; Sixtus V, pope, in the year 1590 and the fifth year of his pontificate.)
On December 7, 2007, a fragment of a red chalk drawing of a section of the dome of Saint Peter's, almost certainly by the hand of Michelangelo was discovered in the Vatican archives. The drawing shows a small precisely drafted section of the plan of the entabulature above two of the radial columns of the cupola drum. Michelangelo is known to have destroyed thousands of his drawings before his death. The rare survival of this example is probably due to its fragmentary state and the fact that detailed mathematical calculations had been made over the top of the drawing.
A seguir, um texto, em português, do site "Eco da Notícia", que pode ser visto no endereço ecodanoticia.net/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=18683
No pontificado de Júlio II (1503 a 1513) decidiu-se afinal derrubar a igreja velha e em 18 de Abril de 1506 Bramante recebeu o encargo de desenhar a nova. Seus planos eram de um edifício centralmente planificado, com um domo colocado sobre o centro de uma cruz grega (com braços de idêntico tamanho), forma que correspondia aos ideais da Renascença, por copiar a de um mausoléu da antiguidade.
Um século mais tarde, o edifício ainda não estava completado. A Bramante sucederam, como arquitetos, Rafael, Fra Giocondo, Giuliano da Sangallo, Baldassare Peruzzi, Antonio da Sangallo.
O Papa Paulo III (pontificado de 1534-1549) em 1546 entregou a direção dos trabalhos a Michelangelo. Este, aos 72 anos, deixou-se fascinar pela cúpula, concentrando nela os seus esforços, mas não conseguiu completá-la antes de sua morte em 1564. O zimbório é visível de toda a cidade de Roma, dominando seus céus. Tem diâmetro de 42 m, ligeiramente menor do do domo do Panteão, mas é mais imponente por ser muito mais alto, com 132,5 m.
Graças aos seus planos e a um modelo em madeira do seu sucessor, Giacomo della Porta, foi capaz de terminá-la com ligeiras modificações, apenas. O modelo segue o da famosa cúpula que Brunelleschi ergueu na catedral de Florença e cria impressão de grande imponência. A diferença é que, ao contrário do que Michelangelo planejou, não se trata de uma cúpula semicircular mas afunilada, criando um movimento de impulso para cima, até culminar na lanterna cujas janelas, inseridas em fendas entre duas colunas, deixam a luz inundar o interior. Terminada em 1590, ainda é uma das maravilhas da arquitetura ocidental.
Vignola, Pirro Ligorio, Giacomo della Porta continuaram os trabalhos na basílica.
Série sobre a Cidade do Vaticano - Series about the Vatican's City - 09-01-2009 - IMG_20090109_9999_554
An Internal view of the St. Peter's Basilica dome.
Following, a text, in english, from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
The dome of St. Peter's rises to a total height of 136.57 m (448.06 ft) from the floor of the basilica to the top of the external cross. It is the tallest dome in the world. Its internal diameter is 41.47 metres (136.06 ft), being just slightly smaller than two of the three other huge domes that preceded it, those of the Pantheon of Ancient Rome and Florence Cathedral of the Early Renaissance. It has a greater diameter by approximately 30 feet (9.1 m) than that of the third great dome, Constantinople's Hagia Sophia church, completed in 537. It was to the domes of the Pantheon and Florence duomo that the architects of St. Peter's looked for solutions as to how to go about building what was conceived, from the outset, as the greatest dome of Christendom.
redesigned the dome in 1547, taking into account all that had gone before. His dome, like that of Florence, is constructed of two shells of brick, the outer one having 16 stone ribs, twice the number at Florence but far fewer than in Sangallo's design. As with the designs of Bramante and Sangallo, the dome is raised from the piers on a drum. The encircling peristyle of Bramante and the arcade of Sangallo are reduced to 16 pairs of Corinthian columns, each of 15 metres (50 ft) high which stand proud of the building, connected by an arch. Visually they appear to buttress each of the ribs, but structurally they are probably quite redundant. The reason for this is that the dome is ovoid in shape, rising steeply as does the dome of Florence Cathedral, and therefore exerting less outward thrust than does a hemispherical dome, such as that of the Pantheon, which, although it is not buttressed, is countered by the downward thrust of heavy masonry which extends above the circling wall.
The ovoid profile of the dome has been the subject of much speculation and scholarship over the past century. Michelangelo died in 1564, leaving the drum of the dome complete, and Bramante's piers much bulkier than originally designed, each 18 metres (59 ft) across. On his death the work continued under his assistant Vignola with Giorgio Vasari appointed by Pope Pius V as a watchdog to make sure that Michelangelo's plans were carried out exactly. Despite Vignola's knowledge of Michelangelo's intentions, little happened in this period. In 1585 the energetic Pope Sixtus appointed Giacomo della Porta who was to be assisted by Domenico Fontana. The five year reign of Sixtus was to see the building advance at a great rate.
The engraving by Stefan du Pérac was published in 1569, five years after the death of Michelangelo.
Michelangelo left a few drawings, including an early drawing of the dome, and some drawings of details. There were also detailed engravings published in 1569 by Stefan du Pérac who claimed that they were the master's final solution. Michelangelo, like Sangallo before him, also left a large wooden model. Giacomo della Porta subsequently altered this model in several ways, in keeping with changes that he made to the design. Most of these changes were of a cosmetic nature, such as the adding of lion's masks over the swags on the drum in honour of Pope Sixtus and adding a circlet of finials around the spire at the top of the lantern, as proposed by Sangallo. The major change that was made to the model, either by della Porta, or Michelangelo himself before his death, was to raise the outer dome higher above the inner one.
A drawing by Michelangelo indicates that his early intentions were towards an ovoid dome, rather than a hemispherical one. Stefan du Pérac's engraving shows a hemispherical dome, but this was perhaps an inaccuracy of the engraver. The profile of the wooden model is more ovoid than that of the engraving, but less so than the finished product. It has been suggested that Michelangelo on his death bed reverted to the more pointed shape. However Lees-Milne cites Giacomo della Porta as taking full responsibility for the change and as indicating to Pope Sixtus that Michelangelo was lacking in the scientific understanding of which he himself was capable.
Helen Gardner suggests that Michelangelo made the change to the hemispherical dome of lower profile in order to establish a balance between the dynamic vertical elements of the encircling giant order of pilasters and a more static and reposeful dome. Gardner also comments "The sculpturing of architecture [by Michelangelo]... here extends itself up from the ground through the attic stories and moves on into the drum and dome, the whole building being pulled together into a unity from base to summit."
It is this sense of the building being sculptured, unified and "pulled together" by the encircling band of the deep cornice that led Eneide Mignacca to conclude that the ovoid profile, seen now in the end product, was an essential part of Michelangelo's first (and last) concept. The sculptor/architect has, figuratively speaking, taken all the previous designs in hand and compressed their contours as if the building were a lump of clay. The dome must appear to thrust upwards because of the apparent pressure created by flattening the building's angles and restraining its projections.[21] If this explanation is the correct one, then the profile of the dome is not merely a structural solution, as perceived by Giacomo della Porta; it is part of the integrated design solution that is about visual tension and compression. In one sense, Michelangelo's dome may appear to look backward to the Gothic profile of Florence Cathedral and ignore the Classicism of the Renaissance, but on the other hand, perhaps more than any other building of the 1500s, it prefigures the architecture of the Baroque.
Giacomo della Porta and Fontana brought the dome to completion in 1590, the last year of the reign of Sixtus V. His successor, Gregory XIV, saw Fontana complete the lantern and had an inscription to the honour of Sixtus V placed around its inner opening. The next pope, Clement VIII, had the cross raised into place, an event which took all day, and was accompanied by the ringing of the bells of all the city's churches. In the arms of the cross are set two lead caskets, one containing a fragment of the True Cross and a relic of St. Andrew and the other containing medallions of the Holy Lamb.
In the mid-18th century, cracks appeared in the dome, so four iron chains were installed between the two shells to bind it, like the rings that keep a barrel from bursting. As many as ten chains have been installed at various times, the earliest possibly planned by Michelangelo himself as a precaution, as Brunelleschi did at Florence Cathedral.
Around the inside of the dome is written, in letters 2 metres (6.5 ft) high:
Tv es Petrvs et svper hanc petram aedificabo ecclesiam meam. Tibi dabo claves regni caelorvm
("...you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church. ... I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven..." Vulgate, Matthew 16:18-19.)
Beneath the lantern is the inscription:
S. Petri gloriae sixtvs pp. v. a. m. d. xc. pontif. V.
(To the glory of St Peter; Sixtus V, pope, in the year 1590 and the fifth year of his pontificate.)
On December 7, 2007, a fragment of a red chalk drawing of a section of the dome of Saint Peter's, almost certainly by the hand of Michelangelo was discovered in the Vatican archives. The drawing shows a small precisely drafted section of the plan of the entabulature above two of the radial columns of the cupola drum. Michelangelo is known to have destroyed thousands of his drawings before his death. The rare survival of this example is probably due to its fragmentary state and the fact that detailed mathematical calculations had been made over the top of the drawing.
A seguir, um texto, em português, do site "Eco da Notícia", que pode ser visto no endereço ecodanoticia.net/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=18683
No pontificado de Júlio II (1503 a 1513) decidiu-se afinal derrubar a igreja velha e em 18 de Abril de 1506 Bramante recebeu o encargo de desenhar a nova. Seus planos eram de um edifício centralmente planificado, com um domo colocado sobre o centro de uma cruz grega (com braços de idêntico tamanho), forma que correspondia aos ideais da Renascença, por copiar a de um mausoléu da antiguidade.
Um século mais tarde, o edifício ainda não estava completado. A Bramante sucederam, como arquitetos, Rafael, Fra Giocondo, Giuliano da Sangallo, Baldassare Peruzzi, Antonio da Sangallo.
O Papa Paulo III (pontificado de 1534-1549) em 1546 entregou a direção dos trabalhos a Michelangelo. Este, aos 72 anos, deixou-se fascinar pela cúpula, concentrando nela os seus esforços, mas não conseguiu completá-la antes de sua morte em 1564. O zimbório é visível de toda a cidade de Roma, dominando seus céus. Tem diâmetro de 42 m, ligeiramente menor do do domo do Panteão, mas é mais imponente por ser muito mais alto, com 132,5 m.
Graças aos seus planos e a um modelo em madeira do seu sucessor, Giacomo della Porta, foi capaz de terminá-la com ligeiras modificações, apenas. O modelo segue o da famosa cúpula que Brunelleschi ergueu na catedral de Florença e cria impressão de grande imponência. A diferença é que, ao contrário do que Michelangelo planejou, não se trata de uma cúpula semicircular mas afunilada, criando um movimento de impulso para cima, até culminar na lanterna cujas janelas, inseridas em fendas entre duas colunas, deixam a luz inundar o interior. Terminada em 1590, ainda é uma das maravilhas da arquitetura ocidental.
Vignola, Pirro Ligorio, Giacomo della Porta continuaram os trabalhos na basílica.