Introduction

The stage is set to examine the conditions under which prints from the Balli di Sfessania di Jacopo Callot have been marketed and sold, sourced and re-sourced, excavated and dismembered, copied and misread as visual records over 400 years. This section introduces a methodology of synthesis and capriccio to explore how the Balli di Sfessania di Jacomo Callot prints have taken on a life of their own in transmedial diffusions as marketable paper objects and illustrations. Ultimately, the prints have become emblems of the commedia dell’arte itself, thanks to the nineteenth-century Romantic takeover of its historiography. By juxtaposing the dissimilar interpretive modes that relate to encounters with Callot's Balli di Sfessania suite, we will turn corners to explore a grotesque display of Callot's legacy on theatrical, literary, and visual culture, as well as its visual resilience.