Looking for a Fight: The Outer Limits of Coincidence

Abstract

The sixth installment counts coincidences. Raphael's battle scene descends from Leonardo's design; beneath it lie the same two materials the Battle of Anghiari purchase records carry; and in the winter of 1518 to 1519 Raphael prepared for his cavalry battle exactly as Leonardo had prepared for his, months of perspective study that a duke's agent complained about in the same terms a marchioness's agent had used of Leonardo eighteen years earlier. Three matches, in three kinds of record that cannot contaminate each other, a drawing, a ledger, a letter. Eight itemized observations follow, and a choice: independent invention must explain away all eight, while transmission requires only that two artists were in the same place at the same time. That one thing is documented.