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Egidio Di Velo

Writer's picture: Palladian RoutesPalladian Routes

Egidio Di Velo in the Vicenza culture of the nineteenth century Count Girolamo Egidio di Velo was born in Vicenza in 1792 from a noble family with vast possessions; he had in the city the Di Velo palace in Carpagnon, so comfortable that it could house the King of Denmark in 1709; in 1808 he also inherited the Montanari palace. After his studies, from 1812 he went on an educational tour in Europe: Paris, Holland, Denmark. He returned to Italy and in 1816 he was in Rome, Naples and Sicily; in the south he began to study art and became a friend of Count Cicognara (president of the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice).

In 1819 he spent a year in London where he attended Ugo Foscolo and carefully studied the original drawings by Palladio (in London through the English architect I. Jones, who had obtained them from Scamozzi in Vicenza). Back in Vicenza he enriched Palazzo Montanari with Greek vases collected in the South and had a room decorated with Pompeian-style paintings. In 1824, after studies and talks with his learned friends, he began a campaign of archaeological excavations in Rome; he chose the ruins of the Baths of Caracalla, using Palladian drawings as a guide (very accurate, even if in 1550 Palladio measured only on the surface). He adopted a new excavation technique: he divided the entire archaeological area into a lattice and on each square he carried out shallow excavations, 30/50 cm; only in the most promising squares did he go on, always digging in layers. Until then he had proceeded with deep holes of small diameter in different places. His technique allowed him to discover the vast floor of the central hall, decorated with the splendid mosaic of 28 athletes; and he confirmed the precision of Palladian drawings. Di Velo had made a preliminary contract with the Papal State for which he would have as compensation a part of the statues found; but he only found a large, splendid mosaic and a legal controversy arose; an agreement was found and Di Velo obtained 22 statues already in the Vatican Museums. These statues, together with those of the Berga theater, are the origin of our archaeological museum. Before dying, in 1831 he inserted in his will (his sister Isabella the only heir) a legacy of 100,000 Venetian lire for a monument to Palladio; but that's another story. Fabio Gasparini





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