Homo Platonis

Author(s): Edgar Wind

Source: Journal of the Warburg Institute, Vol. 1, No. 3 (Jan., 1938), p. 261
Published by: Warburg Institute
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/750019
Accessed: 29-01-2016 05:25 UTC

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 MISCELLANEOUS NOTES
Critics, without suspecting any such con-
notation have often been astonished by the
extreme classicism of the style of the bust,
and were inclined to explain the use of the
cameo as a result of a formal interest in
the antique. Actually, the antique form
is dictated by an antique content. The
Grecian appearance and dress of the boy
correspond to the Platonic ideal which he is
meant to embody and which the emblem of
the cameo indicates.
A mediseval craftsman who introduced
ancient jewels and stones into his own work
meant to heighten the decorum of the work,
but the addition did not alter the artistic
structure (see P1. 3oa, b). Donatello, by in-
serting a cameo which expressed a Grecian
idea, felt compelled to shape the work as a
whole in accordance with this initial con-
ception.
R.W.
representation of the triumphant AmoreDivino (Bartsch
XVI, No. Io6). Quite logically, he adds to the horses
the single horn of the unicorn and thus converts them
into the symbol of Chastity (P1.34c). He makes Cupid
shoot his arrows from the heavenly realm to the
Olympic gods on earth, who give themselves up to
the luxurious Amoreprofano.
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261
HOMO PLATONIS
The ancient doxographers relate that
when Plato defined man as a 'feather-
less biped', Diogenes ridiculed him by pro-
ducing a plucked rooster and exclaiming:
"This is the Platonic man !"'
In the Renaissance, the delight in this
sound piece of buffoonery was not confined
to the antiquarians. The painter Ugo da
Carpi introduced into the background of his
woodcut of 'Diogenes' an actual portrait of
the miserable bird (P1. 34a).s The woodcut
was copied by Bonasone for a book of
symbols devised by Achille Bocchi,8 and in
order to leave no doubt as to the meaning of
the plumeless creature, the engraver added
the words: "Hic est Homo Platonis".
(P1. 34b).
E. W.
1 Diogenes Laertius, VI, 2, 40.
2 The inscription says that the woodcut was made
after a design by Parmigianino. A drawing for the
woodcut, attributed to Ugo himself, is in the Pinacoteca
at Bologna.
s Symbolicarum quaestionumde UniverseGenerequas serio
ludebatLibri Quinque,1555.
 Ia
L F

lte tr "am c
LATOMIS

b-Homo Platonis
from Bocchi, 1555
(p. 261)
4-?i
low I

-;-;-??

"'

iR~

~--~- a i

a-Ugo da Carpi, Diogenes (p. 261) c-Bonasone, Celestial Love. Detail d-Donatello. B
(p. 261) (p. 260)

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