Michelangelo Book

My own reading notes: after returning from Rome (oct 1528), Clement wore a beard (Ha una barba longa canuda), a traditional sign of grief, penitential beard. Quattrocento was a beardless century, the next one encouraged beardness. In Greek culture the beard is a sign of a hermit, eremite, loner (barbatus). In western art, the beard signifies an easterner. In 1528 Hadrian VI. bans priest from having beards (they resembled soldiers too much). That's why in 1528 Clement's (colla barba longa) penitential beard seemed odd, but it wasn't a surprising gesture on its own. Wearing a beard is a sign of grief.