1556 / 1565 Giovanni Battista Ramusio Woodcut of the Great Temple of Tenochtitlan (Mexico)

Contemporaneous View of Tenochtitlan's Great Temple.

This scarce 1565 woodcut, appearing in Giovanni Battista Ramusio's description of Mexico-Tenochtitlan, is among the earliest depictions of the main temple at the center of the capital of the Aztec empire. It is drawn from the report of an anonymous conquistador who accompanied Hernan Cortéz, whose account detailed the European view of the city for the first time.

A Closer Look

The woodcut - probably the work of Matteo Pagano - was not a firsthand drawing, but is based on a written description of the temple. This appears in the Italian text:

They build an edifice of a tower in a square, two hundred and fifty paces or a little more in length, and one hundred and fifteen or one hundred and twenty in width, and the whole structure begins solid; and after it rises to the height of two stories of a man, on the three sides around they leave a roadway eight paces wide; and on the long side they begin to build steps, and afterward they rise again another two stories of a man in height. And the material is all solid, made of lime and stone. And here again, on three sides, they leave the roadway eight paces wide, and on the other side they make steps, and they rise in this manner until they reach one hundred and thirty degrees, and above they leave a small square, well proportioned; and in the middle of it they begin two other towers within, which rise ten or twelve stories of a man in height, and at the summit are the windows. In these tall towers they keep their idols, very well arranged and adorned; and the façade is also well finished and ordered...

By the time this description reached Europe, the conquistadors had destroyed the temple.

Publication History and Census

This woodcut was first cut by Matteo Pagano for inclusion in the 1556 third volume of Ramusio's Navigationi et Viaggi. The woodblocks for this, and indeed all the maps of the 1556 edition, burned in a 1557 warehouse fire. It appears in only one known state. The blocks were all re-engraved, probably again by Pagano, for the 1565 edition of the Navigationi et Viaggi. The second block (the present example) is near-identical to the first; the two blocks are most easily distinguished by the sharp differences in the fence posts in the bottom-right corner of the woodcut. This second block was used again in 1606. That edition is easily identifiable by the small worm-shaped blank areas (woodworm appears to have similarly infested all blocks of the 1606 edition.) The 1556 edition of the third volume of Navigationi et Viaggi is rare. Seven examples of the 1565 are listed in OCLC, while perhaps twenty of the 1606 edition appear in institutional collections. No confirmed examples of this separate woodcut are cataloged in OCLC, although its lack of a title may have stymied its cataloging.

Cartographers

Giovanni Battista Ramusio (July 20, 1485 - July 10, 1557) was an Italian civil servant, humanist, scholar, historian, and geographer active in the middle part of the 16th century. Ramusio spent most of his life in the service of the Republic of Venice, first as part of that state's embassy to France, and later as a reporter on voyages and discoveries. He was born to an illustrious family in Treviso and moved to Vencie as a young man, where his father was a magistrate. He studied at the University of Padua but may not have received a full degree. He entered the civil service shortly after leaving the university and was immediately assigned to diplomatic service for his facility with languages, particularly French. His most significant contribution to cartography is his publication of Navigationi et Viaggi a collection of travel narratives he collected in his service to the state. The narratives include those of Marco Polo, Niccolò Da Conti, Magellan, Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, Giosafat Barbaro, and Tomé Pires, among others. Some of the voyages appearing in the Navigationi et Viaggi are otherwise unknown, marking it as an exceptionally important volume. Ramusio died in Venice in 1557.   Further Details...

Matteo Pagano (1515-1588) was a Venetian woodcut artist and illustrator. While nothing is known about his early training, he was prolific and apparently successful. Among his more famous works is a 1556 eight-sheet woodcut of the procession of the Doge, in Venice. He produced a number of maps for various works, most notably the visually distinctive area maps appearing in Ramusio's Navigazioni et Viaggi. He is particularly noted for having published books of lace, needlework and embroidery designs, promoting needlework as an acceptable activity for virtuous women.   Further Details...

Source

Ramusio, G. B., Delle Navigationi et Viaggi Raccolte da M. Gio. Battista Ramusio, (Venice: Appresso i Giunti) 1565.    

Condition

Excellent. Minor marginal stain, else fine.