Archaeological misconception and the invention of form: the trefoil metope denticule Contresens archéologique et invention formelle: le denticule à métope trilobée En Fr

Résumé En

During the Renaissance the French and the Italians responded to archaeological models in different ways: the former catalogued patterns without always copying them, while the latter, less systematic in their descriptions, were more imaginative when it came to reproducing them. The case of the trefoil metope denticule is an ideal illustration of this difference of approach. The Italians recorded this highly unusual form - in reality the mutilated version of another shape - among their drawings of archaeological fragments without reproducing either the original pattern or its subsequent variants in contemporary sculpture. The French, on the other hand, made a new form from it by combining the mutilated outline of the metope with the trefoil with witch they were already familiar and playing freely and with considerable imagination on its lines and design.