Aldrovandi, Ulysse

Persons known by name

Aldrovandi, Ulysse

Ulysse Aldrovandi

1522–1605
"nephew" of Ugo Boncompagni, the later Pope Gregory XIII. (Ugo was a cousin of Aldrovandi's mother, not her brother.)
was born in Bologna, so he may have had connections to Achille Bocchi and his circle and/or other antiquarians and artists from Bologna.
Author of the book on ancient statues in the Roman collections, written (according to the author) in Rome in 1550.
He must have had access to these collections, usually owned by rich antiquarians and cardinals or bishops, during his stay in Rome.
His book lacks any illustrations, which makes it possible that a separate edition with images was planed but never executed. Preparations for such a volume on statues may survive in the collection of drawings by Jacopo Strada and his workshop (Vienna, ÖNB, Codex Miniatus 21,2) or in the drawings by (Giovanni) Battista Franco.
entry in the Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani
Lucio Mauro's book including Aldrovandi's Delle Statue was dedicated by the printer Ziletti to Giulio Martinengo della Pallada from the same Martinengo family to which the mother of Rodolfo Pio da Carpi belonged; therefore, a book on the statues of which many were found in Pio's garden, would be justified to be dedicated to Giulio Martinengo.
Aldrovandis Buch(beitrag) was accompanied by his editor Ziletti with indices to easily find the descriptions of the statues and to help with their interpretation. (Maybe a result of a systematic influence from the Accademia?
[Daly Davis / Aldrovandi 2009: 10] The praise of Pio's garden is unusual in Aldrovandi's book (pp. 309-310): "Benche sia stato questo luogo delitioso e bello, assai lodato da molti dotti scrittori, non si puo nondimeno della sua gran vaghezza credere, se non da quelli, che visto l'hanno perche, come si dice et è in effetto cosi: questo bel giardino è un'unico essemplar, dal quale hanno à torre il modello tutti quelli, che vogliono, ò pensano di far in contado villa, che habbia à piacere".
Aldrovandi met Paolo Giovio in 1549 (or slightly later) and was inspired by him to start is collections of natural objects.
Aldrovandi knew also Ippolito Salviani and (presumably) Guillaume Rondelet and Pierre Belon, both also naturalists.
On February 5, 1582, Aldrovandi wrote a letter regarding the interpretation of Plautus to Sigonio.
[Gudger 1934: 38] "ALDROVANDI was probably not so able a man as some of the other naturalists studied, but he had health, means, academic position, enthusiasm, assiduity, long life, and the will to devote his whole life and fortune to the completion and publication of his great work. Furthermore, outside of his own fortune freely spent, he had the help of the authorities and of the treasury of his native city. Judged by the outcome, he well deserves the appellation " the modern Pliny".
[Gudger 1934: 36] "This great encyclopedist was born at Bologna of a family said to be noble. He inherited a fortune, which along with the emoluments of his life work, he employed in assembling a museum in his native city and in gathering other materials for a natural history even greater than GESNER'S. His education was carried on partly in Bologna, partly in Padua, and he was graduated Doctor of Physic by the university of his native city in 1553, and in the following year was appointed professor of philosophy and logic, and lecturer in botany. Eventually all these positions seem to have been combined and he was for the remainder of his life professor of natural history in the University of Bologna.

On a visit to Rome in 1550 he met RONDELET, also a visitor there, and SALVIANI-of whom he became a lifelong friend. There is reason to believe that he also knew BELON and GESNER. These contemporaries, especially RONDELET and SALVIANI, may have had some influence in turning his mind toward the fishes.

ALDROVANDI, himself, states that early in his career as a student he kept before his mind the ancient Greek saying that " Nothing is sweeter than to know all things." This led later to his formulating a plan for a gigantic encyclopedic natural history that would include his own first-hand data supplemented by all recorded knowledge of such subjects. For illustrations for this work he states that he employed one painter for thirty years and various other draftsmen and engravers who worked under his own eye. Along with these he speaks (also by name) of various able assistants who helped prepare, describe and care for the contents of his museum."
[Gudger 1934: 37] "As to the fate of his materials, it is stated on good authority that there are found in Bologna today 20 volumes of figures of animals in' color, the originals from which the woodcut figures in ALDROVANDI'S books were made. These were carried away to Paris in the Napoleonic wars but were returned in 1814. Preserved with them is a great mass of the manuscripts of the texts of the great folios of our author's encyclopedic work.

That one of the separate volumes now to claim our attention is

DE PISCIBUS LIBRI V
ET DE CETIS LIB. UNUS
BONONIAE, I6I3.

This was brought out after ALDROVANDI 's death by JOANNES CORNELIUS UTERVERIUS and HIERONYMUS TAMBURINUS. The part dealing with fishes comprises 668 folio pages illustrated by hundreds of woodcuts, which are in the main cruder than those in BELON'S work. A certain number of figures and descriptions are of new Mediterranean fishes, but the greater part of the book is a compilation-even more than is found in GESNER. This work is, however, an improvement on GESNER's book because it contains nothing but fishes; all other " water-animals " are relegated elsewhere."