Cees de Bondt’s Power Point Presentation: TWO VENETIAN TENNIS COURT BUILDINGS THAT HAVE SURVIVED
Text:
Two Surviving Tennis Courts of c. 1600 in Venice
Sopra le fondamente dietro al monasterio di Santa Caterina’(1661): n.5, ‘racchetta di ragion del n.h. homo ser Francesco Grimani’, n. 6, ‘una portion della medesima racchetta di ragion, della signora Zanetta relicta quondam Zuanne Redolfi’, n. 7, ‘casa e racchetta di ragion delle revedente madre di Santa Caterina.
[tr. At the top of the Fondamente Nove, behind the S. Caterina convent (1661): no. 5, a tennis court, the possession of Francesco Grimani; no. 6, a part of the same tennis court, the possession of Mrs Zanetta, for the late Zuanne Redolfi; no. 7, house and tennis court of the venerable ‘Mother’ of the S. Caterina convent]
We owe a first glimpse of tennis in Venice to a diary compiled by an Englishman, who visited the city in 1596. During his travels in Italy, Fynes Moryson observed the carnival disguises in Padua and Venice he saw that year with obvious disapproval, particularly of women on their way to the tennis court in masculine dress. Fynes Moryson also relates the tale of how the Venetian courtesans complained about the planned construction of tennis courts in their city, fearing that “strangers” might take their exercise on the tennis court rather than in their boudoirs. One may be surprised to learn that research into what courts were constructed in Early Modern Venice and what role tennis played, is unexplored territory. So far only fragmentary references to the ‘racchetta’ game have cropped up, mainly inspired by the mystery about the origin of Venice’s Calle de la Racheta street.
My research was triggered by the discovery of an archival document of 1661 relating to taxation of properties on land that was reclaimed from the sea, located in Venice’s late sixteenth-century urban development Fondamente Nove. Two entries mentioned a ‘racchetta’, one of which was owned by the ‘madre di Santa Caterina’, the nuns of the S. Caterina convent (see no. 7 of archival record above). Besides the document showed that the two buildings were virtually adjacent, only separated from each other by houses that belonged to the ‘racchettieri’ the tennis professionals who were responsible for running the court. Were there indeed two tennis courts in the seventeenth century, one, surprisingly, owned by the S. Caterina nuns? And could one of the two ‘racchetta’ courts perhaps be identified as the tennis court Gabriel Bella immortalized in his Giocco della Racchetta painting of c. 1760, preserved in Venice’s Museo Querini Stampalia? Recent inspection of the site in Venice’s Fondamente Nove, established that the two tennis court buildings recorded in the 1661 archival document have survived (photo).
The exterior structures of the two buildings in Venice’s Fondamente Nove have retained all the tennis court’s architectural characteristics, regarding measurements, their typical rectangular shape and high windows (photos). The present interior of one of the two Racchetta courts in Fondamente Nove in particular, is very much reminiscent of what a late Renaissance tennis court looked like. Towards the end of the 1630s it was used as a makeshift theatre, run by the Grimani family (see no. 5 of record above), one of the leading theatre impresarios active in Venice at the time. It was in 1639 that its spectator galleries and other wooden structures were transported a few hundred metres further along Fondamente Nove, to the new Grimani theatre that became known as Teatro SS. Giovanni e Paolo.
We are fortunate to possess a tennis-related document, which contains a description of ‘gioco della racchetta’ in Venice. The manuscript recalls how the tennis game was introduced in Venice in 1595, at a ‘bellissimo campo” at the end of the Fondamente Nove, which is the S. Caterina tennis court for the nuns. The text sheds light on the approximate location of the courts, and how the game was embraced by both the ‘popolari’ and the nobility. The former tennis court theatre run by the Grimani family was in the eighteenth century run by members of the Cicogna family. It became the venue where numerous nobles met to play the game, at a court which was run by the ‘racchettiero”, or tennis professional, Pasquale Cicogna during a particular vibrant period the lagoon city experienced in the early eighteenth century. Frequent visitors to Pasquale’s Racchetta were two future emperors, Charles VI and Charles VII. As to Charles VI, in 1715, this Habsburg Emperor (1711–1740) entered into an alliance with Venice and declared war on the Ottomans. His successor Charles VII, a member of the Wittelsbach dynasty, became Prince Elector of Bavaria in 1726, and Holy Roman Emperor from 1742-1745. Other illustrious figures to play at the Cicogna tennis court were the King of Denmark, a number of ambassadors and a large group of distinguished Venetian patricians of noble descent. The manuscript picks out ‘Kurfürst’ Frederick August of Saxony (1670-1733), from 1697 King of Poland, as the favourite visitor of all, as he was the most generous towards the tennis professional Pasquale Cicogna presenting him with a substantial tip of 4 ‘ducati’ every time he visited the court, which was almost daily. It must have been this royal setting that inspired the Venetian painter Gabriel Bella to create his idealized version of the Cicogna tennis court (photo).
Both original tennis court buildings were used as ‘magazzini’ (warehouses) in the nineteenth and twentieth century. Between 2003 -2016 the original Grimani-Cicogna tennis court became a theatre again, Teatro Fondamenta Nuove, used mainly for contemporary performances. Current measurements: 27 x 9, height 8.5 metres. The other tennis court, which belonged to the S. Caterina nuns, was in 2015 transformed into an exhibition hall (photos). This court is slightly smaller, 25 x 8,3 metres, height 8 metres, dimensions which reflect the general rule of thumb for Early Modern tennis courts, the length being three timers its width.
The Grimani-Cicogna tennis court was probably the venue where the idea for one of the most stunning tennis paintings ever made was conceived. On this ‘racchetta’court Count Schaumburg Lippe of Bückeburg (near Hanover) regularly played with (his lover) a Spanish musician in 1747-1748. The musician died in 1751, and we may take it for granted that it was because of this tragic event that the count commissioned Giam Battista Tiepolo (who may have been a frequent visitor of the Cicogna ‘racchetta’ court), with the production of his La Morte di Giacinto (Death of Hyacinth, 1752-1753, Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid, see photo). Castle Bückeburg possessed a tennis court (Ballhaus), which is at present used as a riding school (photo).