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The Perimeter of the Jovian Mausoleum in Split
Radoslav Bužančić
Sažetak
On March 20, 2023, under the direction of conservator Radovan Bužančić,
Ana Doljanin and staff members of Art Core d.o.o. of Split investigated the northern
side of the roof pyramid of the cathedral, one-time temple and mausoleum.
The result was surprising, the probe showing that the Andrić drawing hypothesizing
the external appearance of the museum was both well-founded and precise; at
the bottom of the extrados there were four masonry steps made of brick and stone,
in places constructed in the technique of opus spicatum. This made it clear that
assumptions about the mausoleum having been tiled are unfounded, and that the
roof of today, which is covered in this way, stems from the Romanesque treatment
of the cathedral.
What was the purpose of the step rings found at the base of the dome from outside,
alongside the stone cornice, as seen in the Hadrianic Pantheon in Rome? We
know that the construction of the Pantheon dome did not proceed without problems.
Even during the construction process, meridional cracks appeared at the
base because of the exceptionally great loading, and the building of the step rings
was related to the ongoing repairs to the structure during the construction. Their
experience prompted the builders to resort to the production of hoops around the
dome in order to brace it in the region of the operation of tensile forces. This masonry
construction was probably there to secure the huge metal hoops or annular
ties placed there to prevent them slipping on the extrados of the dome. Contemporary
computer research into the forces under the dome of the Pantheon have
shown that the Roman builders did not have the analytical tools for this kind of
calculation, and that a configuration without this ring would have been more reliable
than with it, although other studies about the pre-scientific development of
constructions tend to suggest that the designer of the Pantheon might nevertheless
have had good engineering reasons for the making of the step rings. In the Split
case, they were the outcome of tradition and of the application of a model formed
several centuries earlier.
If we continue to look for an answer to the question of the original appearance
of the peripter, in view of the appearance of the dome over the cella it too could
not have been roofed with tiles before the 13th century, for the appearance of the
temple was integral in its expression. The metal dome over the extrados entailed
for the builder a similar approach in the handling of the roof of the ambulatory on
the peripter. The central temple, of octagonal ground plan, had an ambulatory carried
on the high crepidoma of the peripter, with a prostyle staircase that was covered
by the stone lacunaria. The peripter of the mausoleum has today 19 columns,
in their original shapes and positions, as against the former 24, for five of them
were removed to make way for the building of the choir, the Chapel of St Matthew and the bell tower. The columns of red and grey and Egyptian grey granite,
Proconnesian marble, two kinds of breccia and limestone carried stone beams on
which there are still sporadic remnants of the cornice and lacunaria of the coffered
stone ceiling. The capitals of the peripter columns are Corinthian, with sharply cut
acanthus leaves. The peripter, ambulatory or portico was also covered with a roof
appropriate to the overall design of the temple.
The twenty-four columns with their Corinthian capitals carried a stone ceiling
of coffered panels resting on one side on the architrave and on the other on an
externally moulded projection from the wall of the octagonal cella. On the architrave
beams and the wall projections were placed stone slabs decorated with
coffers the outer edges of which concealed the cushion stone frieze placed on
the architrave and of about the same height as the thickness of the panel. Upon
the stone elements combined in this way, which visually increased the height of
the load-bearing beams of the ambulatory, carrying on from the architrave, were
placed cornices decorated with small corbels and lavish mouldings with motifs of
Lesbian cymatium that with their widths lay partially on the frieze and partially on
the coffered slab, their weight stabilising both of these elements.
Ključne riječi
Jovius; Mausoleum; Diocletian; peripter; anastylosis; lacunaria
Hrčak ID:
330832
URI
Datum izdavanja:
15.5.2025.
Posjeta: 54 *