Cardinal Cesi and his garden: Antiquities, landscape and social identity in early modern Rome

My dissertation investigates the ways in which gardens and the antiquities collections they exhibited reflected their owner's self-perception and defined social distinction in early modern Rome. My case study is the Cesi Garden, established by Cardinal Paolo Emilio Cesi in the 1520s at his palace (no longer extant) near Saint Peter's Basilica. The garden was redesigned, enlarged and further embellished by his younger brother Cardinal Federico Cesi, ca. 1545-1565. At its peak, the garden enjoyed international fame as the site of one of the preeminent collections of ancient sculpture in the city.;The Cesi were a "new family," members of a provincial Umbrian elite who joined the ranks of the Roman nobility as their fame and fortune grew with Federico's curial career. More than just a show of Cardinal Federico's taste and wealth, however, I argue that the garden was saturated with messages communicating Cesi's virtu and romanitas---messages that helped to establish his position as a member of the nobility. In this sense, the garden and its collection functioned as a monumental "self-portrait" exhibited for public consumption. As such, it responded to an established code of expectations for cardinals' palaces and social conduct. The Cesi Garden therefore operated as a dynamic field in which the patron's identity was formed both through his own ambitions and by the requirements of a viewing audience. Since the audience played such a critical role in shaping Federico's identity, I consider the reception of the garden: how the landscaped setting of the garden conditioned the experience of the visitor and how this helped to bolster Cardinal Cesi's reputation in Rome and abroad.;Drawing on a wealth of archival documentation, I trace the history of the Cesi family and offer a new reconstruction of the Cesi Palace, Garden and collection. I give special consideration to the practice of collecting and inheritance law for constructing and perpetuating noble identity in this period, as well as to a detailed analysis of images representing the garden such as Cardinal Cesi's Garden in Rome, painted in 1584 by Flemish artist Hendrick van Cleve III.