ANTIQUE NUMISMATICS IN RAPHAEL''S CREATIVITY: MARRIAGE OF THE VIRGIN
This paper considers the role of antique numismatics for the Renaissance art history and the history of comissions of Raphael's and Perugino's “Marriage of the Virgin”. The hypothesis that had been put forward by the author is that there is an influence of antique Roman coins on both these early altarpieces and Rafael's drawing “Meeting of Frederick III and Eleanor of Portugal”. The hypothesis is based on compositional and semantic allusions to the reverse image of Julia Domna's coins dedicated to her restoration of the temple of Vesta in Roma after the fire of 191 AD, as well as the similarity of the temple antefixes decoration motif both in Rafael's image of the “ideal” temple and Nero's coins dedicated to the restoration of the temple of Vesta in Roma after the fire of 64 AD. The author discusses the Raphael's familiarity with humanistic iconographic programme including antique Roman coin images in case of frescoes by Perugino and his pupils at Collegio del Cambio.