GIOCONDO, FRA GIOVANNI, an Italian architect of Verona, was born about the middle of the 15th century. He was celebrated for his almost universal acquit ements, was a Greek and Latin scholar, a theologian, philosopher, and engineer, and was skilled iu perspective and in decoration, especially in in-laid wood-work. He is mentioned in the highest terms by many contemporary writers, and particularly by his countryman Julius Caesar Scaliger, who was his pupil in the Greek and Latin languages. Giocondo served the Emperor Maxi milian in Germany, Louis XII. in France, and Leo X. at Rome : he built the Ponte della Pietra at Verona, that of Notre-Demo at Paris, and succeeded Bramante as architect of St. Peter's, the foundations of which be much Improved. Vasari mentions other of his archi tectural works; he also says that he built two bridges over the Seine. He turned a great portion of the waters of the Brenta from the Venetian lagoons, directing them to Brontolo, many miles to the south of Venice, by which means the Venetian waters were kept perfectly free from the vast quantities of mud brought down from tho Alps by the Brenta ; this Vasari terms Gioconda'a greatest work, and a signal service for Venice : the same or a similar channel still exists, and is called the Brenta Nuovia,ima. Amongst Giocondo'a literary services Vasari mentions a great collection of ancient inscriptions which he copied in Rome and presented to Lorenzo de' Medici: he also first discovered several of the letters of the younger Pliny in an old library at Pada ; and he published an illustrated edition of Vitruvius' at Venice in 1511.
In the continuation of St. Peter's, Giocondo was appointed con jointly with Giuliano da San Gallo and Raffaelle, and the latter speaks of Giocondo in the followiog terms in a letter (published by Richard son, and inserted in recent Lives of Raffaelle) to his uncle, dated July 1, 1519 :—" He (the pope) has given me a companion, a very learned old friar, who is upwards of eighty years of age; and as the pope sees that he cannot live long, and as he has the reputation of great knowledge, his holiness has given him to me as an assistant, that I may learn of him, and discover any great secret he may have in architecture, and thus perfect myself in the art. He is called Fra Giocondo." According to this, if Randle was a correct judge of sge, or had ascertained the fact of Giocondo's age, he must have been born about 1430, twenty years earlier than the date given by Vasari. Singularly enough, though not with unusual inconsistency, Vasari, in mentioning Giocondo incidentally in the ' Life of Raffaelle,' says that he died in 1537, aged eighty-seven, yet in Giocondo's own life, which follows soon afterwards, he says, " He died at length very old ; but it is not known exactly when or where.' It is not known with certainty to what religious order he belonged, but ho Is supposed to have been a Franciscan. He was living in 1521.
(Versed, Vise de' Pitiori, .1:c.; Dal I'ozzo, Vile de' Pillori, flroneri ; Milizia, Opere ; Quatremere do Quincy, Dictionnaire d'Architeelure, ,Pe.)