Chorégraphies Statistiques A La Renaissance

Dance and the Garden: Moving and Static Choreography in Renaissance Europe
Author(s): Jennifer Nevile

Source: Renaissance Quarterly , Autumn, 1999, Vol. 52, No. 3 (Autumn, 1999), pp. 805-
836
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Renaissance Society of
America
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/2901919
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Dance and the Garden:
Aloving and Static Choreography

in Renaissance Europe*
by JENNIFER NEVILE
In the Renaissance there were close similarities between the static choreography of thefor
gardens ofthe nobility andthe movingchoreographiesperformedby the members ofthe c
Theprinciples of order andproportion, the expression ofsplendour, the geometricalforms,
allfundamentalprinciples of both Renaissance court dance and theformalgarden.
patterns in both these art-forms were meant to be viewedfrom above. This close similarit
design principles between the horticultural and kinetic arts existed right through the fifte
and sixteenth centuries and continued into the seventeenth century.
n his book, The Renaissance Garden in England, Roy Strong describe

those gardens as a "profound expression of the Renaissance min
He argues that "not only are these gardens important in the history of
and architecture but they also provide abundant material in relatio
the history of literature, theatre, science and ideas."2 Roy Strong, alon
with scholars such as David Coffin, John Dixon Hunt, and Claudia
zaro (to name just a few), have added immeasurably to our knowledge o
the grand gardens of Renaissance Europe, through their detailed studie
of the design, plantings, architectural features, iconographical sche
and the philosophical and political significance of these gardens. 3
This article draws on the work of scholars of garden history and i
would not have been possible without the detailed studies of indivi
gardens which these scholars have produced. However, this article draw
parallels between the design of gardens in Renaissance Europe and
contemporary choreographic designs of Italian, English, and Fren
dancing masters: a linking of the choreographic and horticultural expr
sions of the "Renaissance mind" which has not hitherto been explo
Through an analysis of the choreographic patterns of Renaissance danc
* Earlier versions of this article were presented at the Sydney Society of Literature
Aesthetics Colloquium, Sydney, June 1994 and the Annual Conference of the Socie
Dance History Scholars, Toronto, May 1995. 1 would like to express my thanks to my
league Graham Pont, who first inspired me to look at the formal gardens in Europe.
'Strong, 223.
2Ibid.
3The number of scholarly works on fifteenth to seventeenth-century gardens is too

great to fully list here. For the main works see Coffin, 1972, Coffin, 1991, MacDougall and
Hazlehurst, Lazzaro, Hunt, 1992, and Hunt and Willis.
Renaissance Quarterly 52 (I 999): 805-36 [ 805 1

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806 RENAISSANCE QUARTERLY
practices, I argue that the principles which underl

gardens in Europe also underlaid the construction o
thermore, that changes in the design principles of t
a similar time to corresponding changes in the cho
My contention that the principles which gov
the art of dance in the Renaissance were the same as those which deter-
mined other creative endeavours, including that of the planting and
design of gardens,4 was also recognized at the time is supported by Sir
Hugh Plat, who published several gardening books in the early seven-
teenth century. In his book, The Garden ofEden, Plat says: I shall not
trouble the Reader with any curious rules for shaping and fashioning of a
Garden or Orchard - . - Every Drawer or Embroider, nay, (almost) each
Dancin&Master, (my emphasis) may pretend to such niceties."' As far as
Plat was concerned both choreographers and garden designers created
artefacts which were constructed according to the same design principles.
Both garden design and choreography are concerned with manipu-
lating, controlling, and ordering space. Dance can be seen as the creation
of patterns in space: patterns which form and reform, and trace out
shapes in the air and on the ground. Formal gardens can also be viewed as
the creation of patterns on the ground: their shapes are static, but they
still present changing images as viewers stroll from section to section, and
new shapes open up before them.
An important element in the creation of patterns in both the choreo-
graphic practice and in garden design of Renaissance Europe is that in
order to be fully appreciated patterns were meant to be viewed from
above. Order and measure, symmetry, geometrical forms, straight lines,
the construction of the whole out of small compartments, the expression
of splendour and power, and the creation of enclosed spaces with clear
boundaries, these were all fundamental principles of both court dance
and the grand gardens.
These fundamental principles are clearly seen in the Italian gardens
and in the contemporary collections of choreographles. The earliest ex-
tant garden design of the sixteenth century is a sketch for a small garden
by Baldessare Peruzzi from the 1520s.6 The designs in the compartments
are geometric, segments of squares and circles. The now famous Italian
'The common intellectual framework shared by poets, musicians, choreographers,

and artists during the Renaissance is discussed with respect to sixteenth-century France by
McGowan, 1985.
'Plat, 31-32.
'Lazzaro, 3 8.

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DANCE AND THE GARDEN 807
gardens of the Medici family and other nob

were built from the 1530s onwards. The Medici villa at Castello was
7
started in 1537, the villa at Poggio was begun in the fifteenth century by
Lorenzo de' Medici, but Duke Cosimo I made additions from 1545.'
The Villa Lante at Bagnaia was laid out from 1568, the Villa d'Este at
Tivoli begun in 1560, and the Villa Farnese at Caprarola was begun in
the 1570s.9 UAmbrogiana was begun after 1587,'O while Petraia was ren-
ovated by Ferdinando de' Medici from 1591 to 1597."
The two main Italian dance treatises of the sixteenth century were
printed in 158 1 '12 and 1602. 1 3From information in the treatises, how-
ever, it is clear that both these works were published nearer to the end of
the authors' careers than the beginning, and that they represent the dance
practice of the second half of the sixteenth century, exactly the period
when the grand gardens were being constructed.
Information on the princely gardens of the fifteenth century is less
abundant. But from the work of scholars such as David Coffin on the gar-
dens in Rome' 4 and from the architectural treatises of the fifteenth
century, such as that of Leon Battista Alberti, it seems clear that the essen-
tial characteristics of strongly geometric shapes, compartments enclosed
within a finite space and arranged in four quarters were present."
The fundamental design principles found in both the Italian horti-
cultural and choreographic arts were applied more widely than just in
Italy. Throughout the sixteenth century in France there was great enthu-
siasm for Imperial Rome and its ceremonies as a symbol of princely power
in all fields of artistic endeavour: from architecture to the triumphal entry,
from hat jewels and coat buttons to statutes and trophies, from painting
to poetry. 16 This enthusiasm extended to include the same geometrical
'Ibid., 326.
'Ibid., 43.
'Ibid., 34.
'01bid., 70.
"Ibid., 84.
1 2Caroso, 1581 and a second, revised, version in 1600.
"Negri, 1602.
"Coffin, 199 1.
"For a discussion on the problems of dating the fifteenth-century Italian dance trea-
tises, see below in note 39.
16 See McGowan, 1985, 121-207, for an extensive discussion of the French response
to the ideas developed in Italy during the fifteenth century by Leon Battista Alberti and
others and the Italians' resurrection of their imperial heritage.

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dance patterns for the French court ballets as was

dance, and in the descriptions of the English court
Thus geometric patterns lay at the heart of sixt
court dancing, and the French in turn were strong
Italian practice. Two of the dancers named by Cesa
the most famous ballarini of his age, Ludovico P
bono, worked at the French court from 1554 on
Le Ballet Come de la royne, Balthazar de Beaujo
Baltazarini di Belgioioso, who arrived in Paris in th
ric patterns were also part of the French court's s
fkes, Le ballet des Polonais (1 5 73) " and Le ba
(158 1 ).20 The climax of the latter occasion was a d
metrical figures. Geometric dance figures c
seventeenth century as seen in such works as the B
(16 10),2 ' and the notebook of a French dancin
tween 1614 and 1619, which included diagrams
22
dancers arranged in geometrical figures. Italian choreographic practice
also reached England as well as France. Elsewhere I have argued that Eng-
lish dance practice exhibited strong links with Italian practice as early as
1 500,23 while evidence for the knowledge of French da'nce practice in En-
24
gland is found throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
In this article my argument as to the similarity in design principles be-
tween dance and the grand gardens in Italy, France, and England from the
fifteenth to the seventeenth century, is presented through a discussion of
"For a detailed discussion of how Ronsard (in particular) described sixteenth-cen-

tury French court dancing, the impact the noble dancer made on those present, and the
figures of the dance itself: "circular, now long and then narrow, now pointed, as a trian-
gle" (ibid., 224). See ibid., 209-41.
"Negri, 2-3.
19For a brief resume of the 1573 festivities, see McGowan, 1994, 196-97.
"McGowan has also edited a facsimile edition of the 1581 production, 'Le Balet
Comique' by Balthazar de Beaujoyeulx. (McGowan, 1982) For more information on the
French court ballets from 1581 to 1643, see McGowan, 1963.
21 See McGowan, 1963, 69-84 for a discussion of the 1610 ballet.
22 Walls, 123. For more information on the dance master's notebook, see Ward,
115-16.
23 Nevile, 1998a. See also Fallows, 1-7.
24 For additional information on the extent of French and Italian influence on Eng-
lish dance practice in the early seventeenth century, see Walls, 110-12 and 221-24. For
information on the presence of the dance treatises of Caroso and Negri in England during
the seventeenth century see, Smith and Gatiss.

ff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff on Thu, 01 Jan 1976 12:34:56 UTC
the fundamental design principles as they

ordered and measured nature of gardens an
shapes or figures created by both arts; thir
structed to be viewed from above, and four
princely gardens functioned as an expression
a ruler or noble. The second half of the arti
which took place in the seventeenth cent
dance practice. In particular, it focuses on
cc " French style of garden design arrive in
teenth century, and what the answer to
type of dances performed by courtiers in th
ORDER, MEASURE, AND GEOMETRICAL FIGURES
Above all, the Renaissance garden was ordered and measured. Throug
was expressed the interaction of the artificial culture created by hum
beings with the natural "culture" created by God. Nature as a reflect
of the cosmic order was seen as inherently ordered, and so in the ga
the art of mankind had to " imitate not only nature's outward appea
but also its underlying order."" This underlying order was understoo
be rendered more perfect by the cultivation of the trees and plants
garden, and in the addition of sculpture, ornaments, water feat
mounds, and grottoes. In the topiary work, labyrinths, as seen
Villa d'Este (fig. 1) and in trellis constructions, natural materia
plants, vines, and trees - were cultivated into geometric figur
spheres or pyramids, or into shapes reminiscent of sculpture like sh
human figures, or into natural shapes like animals. One fifteenth-ce
garden is described as having topiary in the form of "ships, temples,
giants, men, women, dragons, centaurs, putti, various animals and b
jousters, philosophers, a pope [and] cardinals."16 In Giusto Utens's de
tion of the Medici villa at Castello, 27 the steps leading up to the gar
are ornamented with topiary in the shape of vases. Behind these step
hedge topped with a topiary parapet, while at the top of the second,
rower flight of stairs are topiary obelisks. Although the materials u
construct the topiary work, or edifices like pavilions were natural, t
appearance was not.
The overwhelming importance of order in fifteenth- and six-
teenth-century gardens was the characteristic which distinguished them
25 Lazzaro, 8.
21 Ibid., 49.
27 The garden was begun in 1537, though Utens's painting is from 1599.

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Vd.
----------
J- 4 4 4
01
T.
FIGURE 1. 9tien e Dup6rac, Vil a d'Este, 1573. (By permis ion of the British
Library, Vil a d'Este, Tivoli, Maps 15.D.28.)
from the gardens of earlier centuries. It is also the characteristic which

binds them to other artistic endeavours of the Renais ance, such as paint-
ing, architecture, and poetry, as wel as cartography and theatre design.
For example, the influence of symmetry on Renais ance thought can be
se n in the cartographers' strong conviction that the unknown landmas
of the southern hemisphere would have to equal that of the northern
hemisphere. Similarly, in the maps of Gerard Mercator (I 595) and Abra-
ham Ortelius (I 570) there is a vertical symmetry betwe n the landmas
of the Old World and that of the New.21
One of the most influential humanists on the development of the

Renaissance garden was Leon Battista Alberti. Around 1450 he presented
his treatise on architecture, De Re Aedificatoria, which included com-
ments on gardens, 29 to Pope Nicholas Wo After it was finished it
circulated in manuscript copies, and Rykwert feels that it could have even
been translated into Italian before it was printed in 1486." Lorenzo de'
"See Gillies, 34-35 and 166-67. For more details on the interrelationships between
gardens and the theatre, see Adams, 63-73.
29Alberti, 1988, 300.
30 Rylcwert, xvi.
31 Ibid., xviii-xix.

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Medici (also a choreographer) had a copy

was not eager to lend it to Borso d'Este
1484. When the book was printed two ye
edition were delivered to Lorenzo as soon
other manuscript copy was finished in
Federico da Montefeltro.3' Translation
published in 1553 and 1546 respective ly,
den design were still being repeated at the
One of Alberti's central points was tha
the architect just as much as the house w
35
figures should be employed in gardens as in buildings. The same terms
were used in gardening and architecture, and it was not an accident that
the great garden designers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries were
also the famous architects of the day; for example, Francesco di Giorgio
Martini, Giuliano da Sangallo, and Bramante. In the designs of
Francesco di Giorgio, for example, the compartments of the gardens are
36
very similar to the rooms of the houses. The ordered and compartmen
talized gardens in sixteenth-century Italy often resembled the plans for
31
ideal cities which appeared at the same time.
While there were strong links between architecture and garden de-
sign, Alberti's other writings suggest connections with the art of dance.
His treatise on painting, Della Pittura, appeared in an Italian version in
1436,3' and is very similar in philosophical outlook to the fifteenth-cen-
tury dance treatises, the earliest of which is believed to have been written
circa 1430 to 145 0.39
It is not surprising, therefore, that the principles which Alberti delin-
eated in regard to the creation of a garden also applied to the creation of
"Ibid., xviii.
"Ibid., xix.
14 For example, in the gardening treatises by Giovanvettorio Soderini, written in the
1580s and 1590s, the author repeats Alberti's words "almost verbatim." Lazzaro, 45.
15 Alberti, 1988, 300.
3'Lazzaro, 44.
3'As Lazzaro has observed the Boboli garden in Florence (begun 1550) resembles the
city plan in Pietro Cattaneo's treatise published in 1554. Ibid., 44.
3'Alberti, 1956.
39It is difficult to date precisely the fifteenth-century dance treatises, as they all exist
only in manuscript form and only one is dated and signed by the scribe. For a summary of
the various theories as to the dates of the dance treatises see Nevile, 1992, 61-67, and
Clough, 241-269. For more detail on the similarities between Alberti's treatise on paint-
ing and the fifteenth-century dance treatises, see Nevile, 1991, 3-12.

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choreographies. In the prologue to his treatise,40 o

tury dance masters, Guglielmo da Ebreo, spen
explaining how the art of dancing proceeds from t
the essential nature of music was the study of pro
the educated of the fifteenth century (as for thos
perfect art was one in which rational form and p
simultaneously in sound and movement; that is
and danced. Thus the art of dance in the Renaissa
principles of order and proportion: a proportionin
proportioning of the movements of the body, an
music. The resultant choreographies reflected t
geometric shapes (squares, straight lines), and in t
In gardens the order was not only expressed thr
of the ornaments, but also through the use of bila
tral paths which bisected each other at right ang
straight lines, and the geometry of the compartm
a strong rectilinear character. Utens's view of the
ana (begun after 1587) clearly shows the wide
symmetrical units on either side of it. (See fig. 2.)
partment have its own geometrical space, but each
four quarters. Even the large trees in the beds at t
planted in straight lines. The four quarters and b
clearly shown in the 1573 engraving of the Villa
There are many other gardens from Renaissanc
have been chosen to illustrate the ordered and geom
design. One of the most famous is the botanical g
was designed as a square within two concentric circ
vided into four smaller squares by two perpendicu
smaller squares were themselves divided into trian
beds, while the triangular shape was also formed b
tween the arc of the inner circle and each side of th
early description of this garden written by the V
1546 emphasizes the use of these three principal ge
"Ebreo, 1463. For a translation of this treatise, the only

1993.
"For more details on the Italians' preference for squar

see Coffin, 1991, 174-75.
4'For more information on the garden at Padua see Az
sius, and Minelli.
43
For a modern edition of Guazzo's description of the garden at Padua, see Azzi
Visentini, 250-53.

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FIGURE 2. Giusto Utcns, Villa UAmbrogiana, 159

Topografico Fircnzc com'cra.
FIGURE 3. Dctail of UAmbrogiana. Florcncc, M

Fircnzc coacra.
In the grand gardens the concern for straight lines and regular gco-
metric shapes extended from the largest design units down to the smallest
components, as can be seen in the detail of the garden at UArnbrogiana.
(See fig. 3.) The beds, which were filled with flowering plants of different
colors and shapes, were divided again into squares, circles, triangles, all
delineated by paths. These paths not only helped to reveal the design

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan Thu, 01 Jan 1976 12:34:56 UTC
through the contrast between their level ground and

bed of plants, but they also allowed the compartment
The similarity between the patterns of the compar
of the choreographies can be illustrated by comp
UAmbrogiana with the sixteenth-century balletto, Do
this dance for three couples the men stand in a line d
room, the ladies facing them down the other side. Th
dance emphasizes the straight lines with all the mo
the original axes or an axis perpendicular to it, create
change places. (This is illustrated by fig. 5.) The secon
is a hay which creates patterns that are those of the
middle couple start the hay and change places on the
They then move diagonally to change places with
first man. They then move along the original axis to
the remaining two dancers. (The path created is sh
path is very similar to those in the top left compartme
six steps all the dancers are in a straight line across t
The hay continues in a straight line, with each change
circular figure found in the top right compartment.
left hands alternately, each couple traces a 90 deg
straight line along the length of the hall. During the
another 90 degree arc to complete their half of the ci
straight line across the width of the hall. (See fig. 7.)
One of the major contributing factors to the order
ture of the formal gardens was the use of the square.
while often having circular forms within them we
This shape was further emphasized by the planting of
corner of the compartment, as in the Villa Petraia
(See fig. 4 and fig. 2.) This characteristic of the Re
found expression in the patterns created by the dancer
through the fi ures of a dance. For exa' ple, the figure of a square delin-
9 m
eated by a d
dance, either
dance. For ex
ples which
hays in whi
square, then
one. (See fig
CC squared c
44 Lazzaro, 37.

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FIGURE 4. Giusto Utcris, Villa Petraia, 1599. Fl

Topografico Firenze corn'era.
with the two couples facing one another in a

consists of the four performers changing places
outside of the other couple to create circles.
Furthermore, in the choreographies the harm
the straight walks of espaliered fruit trees or ye
the long, forward-moving floor tracks of the fi
bassedanze, and the common circular figure whic
with the rectilinear patterns. (I am referring he
created when a couple takes left or right hand
each other tracing out a circle as they go.) On
,floor pattern is the bassadanza Lauro (which
Lorenzo de' Medici). (See fig. 9.) Many of the
this type of floor pattern. Figure 9 shows the st
performers and the path they traverse during t
this particular dance the couple only move for
middle of the choreography to describe a circl
similar to the gardens with their long, straight,
terspersed with a circle around which the
arranged; for example, the Medici villa Petraia (f
Poggio a Caiano.

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ml
Starting position of
M2 W2 the dance
M3 W3
Mi -- ----- Wi
Changing
M2 W2
M3 W3
FIGURE 5. D
MI N WI
2
W3
FIGURE 6. Dolce Amoroso Foco: First three changes in the hay.

x
3
2
FIGURE 7. Pattern created by the hay in a straight line along the width of the
hall in DolceAmoroso- Foco.

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A Dt M Ct
C
FIGURE 8. La Battaglia: Pattern created by a hay for 4 in a square.
VVoman
FIGURE 9. Floor Track of the b-assadanza Lauro.

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In other dances the performers move forward

the starting position, but usually still in straigh
remarks:
throughout the Renaissance, a central avenue traversed the garden, often

covered with a pergola. . . . Movement from one end of the garden to the
other, but not excursions to either side was encouraged by such an axis. 45
In the bassadanza Lauro, the two performers move from one end of the
dance space to the other, with only a few small "excursions to either side"
with the riprese. One should note that two of the four groups of sideways
steps occur in the central circular space, created by the couple taking hands
and walking around each other. Thus half of the sideways movements are
used to reinforce the circle in the middle of the long, straight path.
LOOKING DOWN AND LOOKING OUT
Another important design principle of both Renaissance

court dance is that both were meant to be viewed from above.
Texts from the fifteenth century and particularly in the sixteenth

stress that the order in a garden must be visible, primarily from a
as the patterns in the gardens of simples were best viewed from
windows. . . . But even from its highest point, the ordering
through the repetition of compartments, geometric figures, ova
podromes could not be whollyperceivedftom within [my emphas
and engraved views of gardens ... present what is not visible from
46
nature ordered through regular units.
The patterns of the dances were also designed to be seen from above. At a
ball the dancing took place on the floor of the hall, and often the ladies of
the court were seated on raised platforms along one wall. In the late fif-
teenth and sixteenth centuries when dancing became a common feature
of theatrical performances, the dancing often took place on the floor of
the hall with the king or prince seated on a raised platform to view the
spectacle. When the dances took place out of doors many spectators
watched from the upper-level windows of the buildings around the city
squares. Thus, as in the gardens, the patterns would not be entirely visible
to those on the dance space, especially not to the performers themselves.
The order of the whole would only be visible from above. This was cer-
tainly the case for the Jacobean masque dances as they were performed
not on the raised stage but on the floor of the hall, surrounded on three
"Ibid., 80.
'61bid., 70.

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si'des by the audience. Not only would ther

on the front of a prospective stage to ade
eight, nine, twelve, or sixteen participants,
ence seated along the sides of the hall at
facing in towards the central space, the dan
geometric figures would have been difficul
In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries
signed to be viewed from all sides. Th
performers, watched the dance from close
ace), or from within the dance space itself
Thus their attention was focused on a finit
The performers' attention was also focused
they would not have ignored their fellow
around them, their attention was still wi
cused on a distant vista.
The gardens of the Renaissance most of
focal point. The boundaries of the garden
hedges or walls. The space they occupied
seventeenth- and eighteenth-century garde
and finite. `8 One's attention was focused w
ing down on the compartments, or within
or along a trellised avenue to a grotto or fou
Gardens increased in size in the seventeen
their design changed. No longer were the g
lection of small compartments enclosed w
two to three foot hedges of the sixteenth c
the seventeenth century so that their wall-
view within the garden far more and work
the order and organization of the garden as
point of the first floor of the house, or a r
the visitors came to be focused less on the
"Based on fifteen years )experience of performin

would estimate that the average space needed to perf
six performers would be twenty-one feet by fifty feet
"Ibid., 70.
"While the majority of Renaissance gardens were constructed with this internal fo-
cal point, there were exceptions. Gardens such as the Villa Madama at Rome were
constructed so that their focus was towards a distant object such as a mountain. I would
like to thank Professor Coffin for drawing my attention to the existence of these more un-
usual Renaissance gardens in which the focus was outside the garden itself.
5OLazzaro, 276.

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foreground and more on a distant vista, which, whi

den, was situated at the end of the wide central
the entire garden.
In the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centu
ingly moved onto a stage, which meant that one si
and that the focus of the performers' attention
from the dance space into the body of the hall.
"looking out" from the stage into the distance, a
surrounded, or in close proximity to their fellow c
were also further removed from the dancing. They
far distant vista to see the dance, as perspective ch
wards a certain point.
The effect that changing the nature of the d
choreographic patterns can be seen by compari
ballo, 0 che nuovo miracolo, for the final intermed
celebrations of the Grand Duke Ferdinando de' Medici and Christine of
Lorraine, with the social dances of late sixteenth-century Italy. The floor
patterns in Cavalieri's balls are very similar to those found in the contem-
porary courtly social dances. Cavalieri used common patterns such as una
treccia or una intrecciata (a hay), two seguiti in volta (in which each dancer
creates a small individual circle by turning around one shoulder or the
other), two dancers coming together to meet and take hands and then to
change places, and a "figure of 8" pattern in which dancers first circle
around the dancer next to them, and then around the dancer on the other
side of them. 51
The main difference between the floor patterns in 0 che nuovo mira-
colo and the majority of the social dances is that in the former the action
ha's to take place on a flat plane in front of the arc of seven dancers, with
the focus being outwards in one direction; that is, towards the audience.
The square, or rectangular, patterns in which the focus and interaction
between the performers are inward looking 52 are not present in this ballo.
Many of the social dances for one couple are built around a pattern
of the two dancers facing one anther, one at the foot and one at the head
of the hall. The dancers then parade in front of each other, come together
"For an extended discussion of Cavalieri's ballo, see Nevile, 1998b and 1999.
"One example of a social dance which is entirely built around.these patterns is the
balletto, La Battaglia. (Negri, 257-63) As the name suggests, this dance is a mock battle
for two couples with the women pitted against the men. The floor patterns concentrate
the attention within the square formed by the four dancers, with the movements being
mainly around the perimeter of the square or moving across the interior of the square, ei-
ther diagonally or on one or other of the two axes.

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
and change places, often several times,

more than two (like Dolce Amoroso Foco)
face each other on either side of the hall
lines, of dancers is not possible, or at lea
transposed to a proscenium stage. Rath
along a perpendicular axis the dancers in
facing the same direction. They then hav
the arc formation, meet, change places, a
all face the front of the stage again at t
SPLENDOUR, POWER, AND" DIVINE EFFECTS"
The court dances and the grand gardens of the Renaissance were both
used by princes, popes, and cardinals as expressions of their splendour
and power." The expense and the labor of designing, building, planting
and maintaining these gardens was enor .mous, and thus they were only
available to a few. 51 While small private gardens abounded in Rome as ex
tensions of the indoor living space, 55 it was only "the lavish garden
created for the popes, the cardinals, and the noble families ... that ex
pressled] the intellectual concepts necessary for the consideration of the
garden as a work of art."56
Contemporary descriptions of the princely gardens recognized their
function as a display of the power of its owner. For these visitors the orde
and control exerted over the plant life and over the forces of water in the
fountains and grottoes, and exhibited in the garden were exemplars of th
prince's dominion in other aspects of life. It was as if the "streams respond
"In today's common usage the words "magnificence" and "splendour" are often used
interchangeably. In the sixteenth century, however, there was a distinction made between
them. In the 1490s the Neapolitan humanist Giovanni Pontano wrote two treatises, on
on "Magnificence" and one on "Splendour." In these two treatises Pontano says tha
((magnificence" applies to large, substantial and permanent projects such as houses an
buildings. "Splendour" refers to more transient objects, private collections, furnishings,
clothes, and gardens. For more information on this distinction see Coffin, 1982, espe
cially 213-14. I would like to thank Professor Coffin for pointing out this distinction to
me.
54 For a description of how the Elector Palatine, Frederick V, expre

dominion in his garden at Heidelburg Castle (created between July
1619) see Zimmerman, 97-118.
55 See Coffin, 1991, 3: "The medieval documents of the sale or l
Rome, after briefly defining the building, follow the statement almost
notarial formula'with the garden behind it."'
56 Ibid., 6.

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
to the call of their lord, plants spring up at his bi

ple is given by Lionello Puppi, who comments:
Is] urviving descriptions of the gardens begun in 1487
at Poggio Reale, near Naples, make it very clear ... t
specifically to celebrate the wealth and privileges of t
spectacular way possible, and that that entailed the us
and ingenious technical devices of every conceivable
Dance also functioned as an expression of the au

prince." The rules and postural codes of courtly
mechanisms by which the court made itself appear
to the rest of society. The courtiers believed that
be demonstrated to the rest of society by the diffe
moved, walked, danced, and even stood in repose. T
meanour when on the dance floor did not change o
dancing: it remained with them as it was their nor
Because of its "magnetism and powerful effect,
gral part of the spectacles organized for the im
visits by foreign princes or ambassadors, wedding
cal feasts, and entries by the ruler." At many
performers were the courtiers themselves. For e
tions held in Naples in May 1473 to honour Eleo
she left on her wedding journey to Ferrara, stands
around twenty thousand people were erected along
dell'Incoronata. In the center of the square a stage
King of Naples, the court, and his guests. It wa
professional dancers, who began the dances on the
assembled populace. 6' As Graham Pont has remark
Mance was not only an essential part of aristocratic

behaviour; it also provided a code of social emblems
mic metaphors which were part of the Renaissan
Renaissance mind, nurtured on Plato, a well-conducte
noble dance. 62
"Comito, 42.
58 Puppi, 50.
5'For one example of how dance functioned in this way in one specific city, see the
study by Teofilo F. Ruiz on the Castilian city of jae"n.
6OMcGowan, 1985, 219.
6Talletti, 272-73.
62 Pont, 1 18. Pont adds in a footnote that one of Plato's words for "uneducated" is
CC achorentos " that is, "danceless" (Ibid., 124).

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A "noble dance" was more than entertain

passing the time at a social function. As
CC movements and the geometric patterns"
dance "both graceful and more significant t
patterns inscribed on the floor of the ballr
ard; they had divine effects."13 These were
which were present in the formal garden
having a moral effect on those who walked
giorgi Tomasi comments: "the geometric fo
in these designs for plant-beds - shapes suc
a symbol of earth and its elements), the cir
vinity), the regular polygons, and the trian
sustain complex astrological and magical-
example, in 1623 John Taylor visited the ga
scribed as:
circular, triangular, quadrangular, orbicular,

and chargeably conceited: there he hat
arbours ... planting them and placing them in
ions, resembling both divine and moral rememb
arbours standing in a triangle, having each a r
the midst, resemble three in one and one in th
THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY
The changes which occurred in gardening design in the seventee

happened slowly, and at different times in different places. Just
the impetus and innovation shifted during this century from Ital
though in both arts the French practitioners learnt from the si
tury Italian practices. As mentioned above one of the major
garden design during the seventeenth century was the increase i
house and garden were regarded as one unit, with the garden laid
it was seen at best advantage from a single viewpoint. 67 The geo
partments of flowers changed into parterres of box, and the patt
beds also underwent a radical alteration. Gone were the squares,
hexagons, and the rectilinear character of the compartment de
61 McGowan, 1985, 224.

6'Tomasi Tongiorgi, 212.
65 Strong, 122.
66 When Louis XIII started work on Versailles it was only a few acres in
1668 the gardens had grown to cover over one hundred acres.
6'Thacker, 135.

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. . ... .......
FIGURE I 0. Aparterre d
nage,1638. (By permissi
French parterres wer

besques, arcs, and embr
garden at Vaux-le-Micom
rie from Jacques Boyce
In his 1652 posthumou
nages, Claude Mollet cla
new parterres de bro&r
which we know this oc
Claude Mollet in the 15
plan of the palace and
that the beds were stil
another plan was made
sign all the parterres
shapes of the previous
this time-frame for th
garden designs publis
ture, in which the desig
The introduction of t
versal during the first
in France the older pa
garden designs publish
Wnivers, the parterr
'The garden at Vaux-le-V

1661. For Israel Silvestre's
house, 168.
6'Karling, 8.
70 Ibid., I 0.
71 Ibid., 8-9.

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strongly resemble the sixteenth-century geom

12
seventeenth-century French embroidery
French designs and concepts were particularl
ample, in Francesco Pona's treatise of 162
strongly recommends that if there is a choi
arranged in "four perfect squares, ))73 the sta
and sixteenth-century gardens.
The radical change in the patterns employ
seventeenth century is echoed in the change
terns created by the French choreographers
particularly in the dances created for Louis X
rectilinear floor plans vanished as the co
sweeping curves and arabesques found in the
Figure I I is the notation of the regular min
the balls at Versailles during the reign of Lo
between it and the floor plans of the sixteen
74
similarity with the parterres de broderie, are quite striking.
It is interesting to note that just as the Italians were reluctant to em-
brace the new garden designs from France, so too were they happy to
continue using the choreographic style and forms of Caroso and Negri.
In 1630, long after his death, Caroso's Nobilt, di Dame was re-issued in
Rome with the title Raccolta di varij balli. In circa 1620 G. Mancini,
born into an upper class Sienese family (1 5 5 9), art collector and critic,
and from 1623 onwards the papal physician, wrote a short treatise on
dance, Del Origine et Nobilt, del Ballo. The step descriptions which Man-
cini includes in his work resemble those of Caroso and Negri; that is, he
is still concerned with the dance practice of seventy years earlier.75 SiMi_
larly, at the same time as Mancini was writing his treatise, Ludovico
Jacobilli wrote down on a few pages descriptions of dances including a
spag-noletta, a gagliarda and a canario, dances which "he may well have
"Thacker, 145.
73 Coffin, 1991, 174.
74 Figure I I is taken from Kellom Tomlinson's work, The Art ofDancing, which was
published in 1735. The dance is written in a system of notation developed by Pierre
Beauchamp in the latter part of the seventeenth century. The system was first used in
publications by Raoul-Auger Feuillet in his work, Chorigraphie, ou lArt de De'crire la
Danse, published in Paris in 1700. Thus, as was the case with the dance treatises of Caroso
and Negri, the written records of the choreographies notate a practice which had existed
for decades previously.
75 Sparti, 1995.

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
_U
Al S revlemi eWor (;PP,,l AM,(,

Muct.
A
It
.4f
Azw,,er
i 3 I I Yi
ot 0
6 W- <* 1,
Nk WI
S finwaevAyexlqmll dn""'d
101zl -Minuet.
F.1 F
.z AVV
ell
411--,
3
4.
AI
7 -E;
FIGURE I 1. The regular mi

Dancin 1735. (By permission
81-7.)
76
learned while a student at the Roman Seminary" (1614-1615) . One
has to assume that the style was still alive in the 1620s and 1630s (at
least in Rome) otherwise there would have been no market for, or inter-
est in, these publications.7
16 Sparti, 1996, 261.

'Sparti concludes from the work of jacobilli that "Thanks to his clear accounts and
step descriptions we are able to confirm, here at least, a very definite continuing [Italian)
tradition of step, choreography, and style from the last third of the sixteenth century
through the first two decades of the seventeenth" (ibid., 262).

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
MASQUE DANCES AND GARDEN

IN JACOBEAN ENGLAND
If the new style of garden design was first
tween 1600 and 1614, when did these de
and what does the answer to this question
performed by the courtiers in the masques
During the first two decades of the seven
newed interest among the English nobility
their gardens. Publications dealing with th
and planting of smaller gardens and orchard
the publications reflected gardening pra
their emphasis on enclosed gardens laid out
into four quarters, or as a series of squa
knots." Evidence from gardens reconstruct
the seventeenth century and from newly c
this view that the design principles of the
hered to. For example, the series of desi
Robert Smythson in 1609 indicate that the
at this time were rectilinear. Smythson
shows the total area divided into separate
square compartments, with the largest gar
80
knots. Smythson also recorded the addit
"This garden [had] a quatrefoil laid onto a d
rical basis, though this was merely the
complex arrangement of knots, beds and em
1603 to 161 0 Sir William Rigdon built a ho
Dowsby in Lincolnshire. Once again the
cates that the patterns of the compartment
in the orchard were to be planted in a quin
78 Gervase Markham published books I and 2 of

and 1614, and the work was published again in 16
A New Orchard and Garden first appeared in 1618
1638, and 1648. It also appeared another eight tim
Hill published The Profitable Art ofGardening in 1 5
1608. Under the pseudonym Didymus Montaine h
Labyrinth (1577) which also appeared again in 1
four times between 1650 and 1660.
79For example, Lawson, 1983, 11-12.

'OBrown, 30-3 1.
"'Ibid., 35.
12 Strong, 1 17-19.

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
engineer Salomon de Caus worked in England b

first in the employ of Queen Anne, and then for
83
Wales. During his time in England de Caus worked on the gardens at
Somerset House for Queen Anne, as well as remodelling the gardens at
Greenwich. In the Works Accounts for 1613-1614 there is mention of
84
payments for laying out knots at Greenwich, a strong indication that
the patterns were still geometric.
Wilton House, the seat of the Earl of Pembroke, provides a clue as to
when the new French style was adopted in England. From a description of
the garden in 1623 as "circular, triangular, quadrangular, orbicular [and]
oval, 1181 it seems that the garden was geometric and rectilinear. In 1630
Philip Herbert inherited Wilton on the death of his brother. From 1632
to 1635 he had part of the house and the garden rebuilt, with Isaac de
Caus in charge of the work. Ten years later Isaac de Caus published a series
of plans of Wilton, and from these plans it is very clear that the four com-
partments which lay underneath the windows of the piano nobile were
parterres de broderie M (fig. 12). From the surviving evidence the garden at
Wilton in 1635 appears to be the earliest example of an English garden
laid out according to the new design principles developed in France.
The conclusion that the transition from the strongly geometric Ren-
aissance style to the arabesques of the baroque first occurred in England
in the 1630s is confirmed by another royal garden, St James's Palace. It
was the French garden architect Andr e-' Mollet who re-designed the gar-
dens at St James's Palace from 1629 to 1633 on the invitation of Queen
Henrietta Maria. A description of the garden, written in 1637, describes
part of the garden as consisting of "parterres of different figures."87
But it is not only the activities of men such as de Caus and Mollet
which reveal the horticultural passions of this time. Formal gardens also
appear in masque stage sets, and, not surprisingly, the descriptions of
these gardens parallel the developments in the living gardens of the nobil-
ity. For the masque presented by the members of Gray's Inn in honour of
the marriage of the Earl of Somerset and Lady Francis Howard, The
"When Prince Henry died de Caus moved back to the Continent, where until 1619
he designed and supervised the building of the Hortus Palatinus for his late employer's sis-
ter, Princess Elizabeth,,and her husband the Elector of Palatine. Ibid., 74.
"Ibid., 96, 227 n. 39.
"Ibid., 122.
16 Ibid., 147-49.
87 Ibid., 188.

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
FIGURE 12. Engraving by Isaac de Caus, Wilton

of the British Library, Wilton Garden, 44 I.g. 1 9 .)
Masque ofFlowers, on 6 January 1614, the

hall was transformed into:
a garden of a glorious and strange beauty, cast

cross-walk and alleys compassing each quarter ...
den was finely hedged about with a low hedge
knots within set with artificial flowers ... In e
were great pots of gilly-flowers."
Twenty years later when the Banqueting Ho

and pleasant prospect ... showing a deliciou
had filled each quarter had vanished, replaced
89
parterres. On this occasion the masque was Thomas Carew's Coleum
Britannicum, performed before the court on 18 February 1634; that is, at
precisely the same time the garden at Wilton was being rebuilt by Isaac de
"Spencer and Wefls, 169.

'90rgel and Strong, 2.579.

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
Caus.'O Similarly, a year earlier in the court play,

(1633) the design by Inigo Jones portrays a ga
French, scroll-like parterres are clearly visible. 91
If garden styles in England began to change to
in the late 1620s and early 1630s, did the court
parallel path? From the descriptions of the ma
do exist in the masque-texts themselves it seems
que dances continued the practices of the sixte
Walls notes:
[t]hose masque descriptions which do go beyond a ra

of enthusiasm for what was seen indicate that the fo
groupings played a prominent part in set-dance chor
Samuel Daniel describes the first dance of the

masque from 1604, a dance which took place in
as "being performed with great majesty and a
strains framed into motions circular, square, tria
portions exceeding rare and full of variety."93
Masque of Queens (I 609) the dancers formed b
and alphabetic figures.9' In the text of one of t
The Vision ofDelight (1617) the dances are desc
and mazes"95 thus indicating that not only were
geometrical patterning, but that the same wor
both the dance patterns and the patterns used in
Orazio Busino, the chaplain to the Venetian Em
an entertaining account of the Twelfth Night ma
Pleasure Reconciled to Virtue. The dance for the t
started in the form of a pyramid, with the Princ
"As Peter Walls points out, Carew accompanied Sir Edwar

the latter was ambassador there from 1619 to 1624, and the
opportunity to become acquainted with the latest in Fre
(220).
9'See Strong, 182-83.
92WallS, 121.
9'Spencer and Wells, 29-30.

9"'Here, they daunced forth a most neate and curious measure, full of Subtilty and
Deuice; which was so excellently performed, ... The straines were all notably different,
some of them formed into Letters, very signifying to the name of the Bridegroome" and
cc a more numerous composition could not be seene: graphically disposd into letters, and
honoring the Name of the most sweete, and ingenious Prince, Charles, Duke of Yorke."
jonson, 8.220-21 and 315-16.
9'Walls, 106. See also ibid., 121-23 for further discussion of the masque dances.

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
apex. The twelve then changed places with ea

the ladies for the revels' dances.
They did all sorts of [ballettil and dances of e

mezzi, correnti, canaries spagnolettej and a hun
delight the fancy. Finally they danced [la spagn
ladies.'6
From Busino's account the main masque dance was based on geometric
figures, and the dances he named for the revels, the Passamezzo, corrente,
canario, and spagnoletta are all found in the Italian manuals of Caroso and
Negri.
If the revels' dances for the 1618 masque appear to have been those
current in Italy in the late sixteenth century, ten years later the fashion
seemed to have swung in the direction of France. In 1628 Bulstrode
Whitelocke was elected to the position of Master of the Revels for the
Middle Temple. In his account of the festivities for the 1628/1629 Christ-
mas season, Whitelocke lists the dances performed.
[I]n the evening the Mr entered the Hall, with about 16 revellers, proper
handsome young gentlemen ... the Mr led them in his bar gowne with a
white staffe in his hand, the musique playing before them. They began with
the old measures, after that they daunced the Branles, then the Mr took his
seat, & the Revellers daunced Galliards, Corantoes, & french daunces, then
countrey daunces till it grew very late.9'
Instead of passamezzi or spagnolette, the members of the Middle Temple

danced "the old measures . . . the Branles ... Galliards, Corantoes, &
french daunces, then countrey daunces."
From Whitelocke's description of the 1628/29 festivities, it appears
that the list of dances does bear some resemblance to the order of the no-
bles' dances performed at the French court balls in the early decades of
the seventeenth century; that is, the suite of bransles, then the ceremonial
danses,4 deux, the courante, and the gaillarde and finally dances in which
partners could be chosen at will. However, one must note here that given
this brief description it is not possible to state definitively whether
Whitelocke's "galliards" and "corantoes" were the same dances as the gail-
larde and courante described by Franois de Lauze in his treatise of 1623.
""[Flecero tutti le sorti di balletti, et danze, che si costurnano in qualsiuoglia paese,

I
a modo de passamezzi, correnti, canaries spagnolette, et cento altri gesti fatti a pizzego
molto belli. Ballarono finalmente un'alla uolta la spagnoletta con la sua Darna" (Orgel
and Strong, 1.281 and 283). Busino's account and a translation is quoted in full in ibid.,
279-84.
97 Quoted in Walls, 262.

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
The late sixteenth-century Italian dance treatises

example, give many variations for the gagliarda,
de Lauze's gaillarde." Similarly, the dance, La corre
the pantomimic coranto as described by Arbeau,10
the same manner as the courante by de Lauze.'O'
In the French court balls of the first decades o
tury, the latter part of the ball often "provid
dancing of lively new dances." 102 While it is not p
was meant by the term "french daunces" in W
seems reasonable to assume that he was referring t
ionable in France, and that these "french dau
"lively new dances" performed at the end of the F
tainly by the 1640s the English court was being r
with French fashions, including dance.103
Given the available evidence concerning the
dance and the formal gardening practices, it seem
mid 1620s the dances in the English court masque
geometric style of the late sixteenth century. From
there was an increasing French influence at court
resulted in a change to the arabesques of the seven
style and may well have had the same result as re
In this article I have argued that there were clo
the static choreography of the formal gardens
moving choreographies performed by the mem
"De Lauze, 44-46. De Lauze's work is the only French d

treatise of 1589 to Rameau's Maitre a danser of 1725, and in
social dances of the French court in the early decades of th
discussion of de Lauze's work see Garlick.
99Negri, 265-66.
"'Arbeau, 123-25.
"'De Lauze, 34.
'O'Garlick, 182.
103 For example in a play called The Varietie by William
tle, the style of dancing at court was definitely French. In
1642, gentlemen are portrayed as walking with turnout: "an
out for brave genty, you call dat a de splay foot." (Cavendis
play and the political climate in which it was performed, se
of the feet while dancing (and walking) assumed a far gre
teenth century in France than it had in the previous centur
principle of dance was the correct manner of walking, a ne
was the turnout of the feet (De Lauze, 27). For a discussion
rect manner of walking in the seventeenth century, see Garl

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
principles of order and proportion (which

the expression of splendour, the geometric
principles of both Renaissance court dance
thermore, the patterns in both these art for
from above. This close similarity in design p
cultural and kinetic arts existed right throug
centuries and continued into the seventeenth
this similarity in design principles, and the
ber of descriptions of masque dances we d
that the masque dances (as opposed to the r
masques were of the same geometric style w
France from 1550 onwards. The floor plans w
vilinear, and the patterns produced would
on squares, triangles, circles within squares,
gles or squares. From the late 1620s and ea
court dance imitated more closely the contem
which geometric shapes changed to scroll-
curves and arabesques.
UNIVERSITY OF NEW SOUTH WALES

154.59.124.210 on Wed, 25 Jan 2023 15:40:19 UTC
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Chorégraphies Statistiques A La Renaissance

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Dance and the Garden: Moving and Static Choreography in Renaissance Europe

Author(s): Jennifer Nevile

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/2901919

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Aloving and Static Choreography

n his book, The Renaissance Garden in England, Roy Strong describe

3The number of scholarly works on fifteenth to seventeenth-century gardens is too

Renaissance Quarterly 52 (I 999): 805-36 [ 805 1

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practices, I argue that the principles which underl

'The common intellectual framework shared by poets, musicians, choreographers,

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gardens of the Medici family and other nob

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dance patterns for the French court ballets as was

"For a detailed discussion of how Ronsard (in particular) described sixteenth-cen-

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the fundamental design principles as they

ORDER, MEASURE, AND GEOMETRICAL FIGURES

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from the gardens of earlier centuries. It is also the characteristic which

One of the most influential humanists on the development of the

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Medici (also a choreographer) had a copy

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choreographies. In the prologue to his treatise,40 o

"Ebreo, 1463. For a translation of this treatise, the only

"For more details on the Italians' preference for squar

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FIGURE 2. Giusto Utcns, Villa UAmbrogiana, 159

FIGURE 3. Dctail of UAmbrogiana. Florcncc, M

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through the contrast between their level ground and

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FIGURE 4. Giusto Utcris, Villa Petraia, 1599. Fl

with the two couples facing one another in a

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FIGURE 6. Dolce Amoroso Foco: First three changes in the hay.

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FIGURE 8. La Battaglia: Pattern created by a hay for 4 in a square.

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In other dances the performers move forward

throughout the Renaissance, a central avenue traversed the garden, often

LOOKING DOWN AND LOOKING OUT

Another important design principle of both Renaissance

Texts from the fifteenth century and particularly in the sixteenth

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si'des by the audience. Not only would ther

"Based on fifteen years )experience of performin

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foreground and more on a distant vista, which, whi

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and change places, often several times,

SPLENDOUR, POWER, AND" DIVINE EFFECTS"

54 For a description of how the Elector Palatine, Frederick V, expre

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to the call of their lord, plants spring up at his bi