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(2) Ottavio Strada (a Rosberg)
(b ?Nuremberg, 1550; d Prague, 1606). Emblematician and antiquary, son of (1) Jacopo Strada. As a young man he assisted his father in his work as an antiquary, travelling with him in France and Italy and to Constantinople. In 1567 he was entrusted by Jacopo with the supervision of the copying of frescoes in the Palazzo del Te, Mantua, and in that year or the next had his portrait (Amsterdam, Rijksmus.) painted in Venice by Jacopo Tintoretto. On 1 February 1577 he was engaged by Emperor Rudolf II as a court retainer (Hofdiener), and in November 1581 began to receive a salary for his services. In 1583 he married and moved with the court to Prague. His collaboration with his father ended bitterly in 1584, when he was disinherited. Up to this point he had only copied manuscripts, but now he began to make and sell his own compilations, sometimes based on his father’s ideas, as in the case of his numismatic works (Continuata series; De vitis imperatorum et caesarum), books with gold- and silversmiths’ designs, genealogies of the House of Austria and the ‘Book of Mills’ (Künstliche Abriss allerhand ...Mühlen). More important were his compilations of imprese (see IMPRESA), the Symbola ...imperatorum, the contents of which varied with the political identity of the buyers, among whom were Rudolf II, Philip II of Spain, the Venetian senate, the Medici, the German electors and the Fugger family. There are 32 known versions of the Symbola, none of which includes the explanatory texts provided by Jacobus Typotius (1540–1601) and Anselmus de Boodt (?1550–1632) for the edition of 1601–2. In the 17th century the work was repeatedly reprinted and served as a source of inspiration for emblematicians, numismaticians and authors, such as Andreas Gryphius (1616–64) and Johannes Luckius (c. 1574–1653). By the end of his life Strada, whose daughter Anna Maria was Emperor Rudolf’s mistress, held a powerful position at the Habsburg court.
Part of the Strada family
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