Focus on Medal of John VIII Palaeologus and explain the Drawings.
Some notable drawings and sketches are associated with Pisanello's medal. One is a highly finished pen drawing of a saddled and harnessed horse from the front and the back (The Louvre, Vallardi, 2468, fol. 277). The horse from the back is clearly the same horse as that of the emperor's squire on the reverse of the medal. The horse is very likely to have come from a Byzantine stable because of its slit nostrils. It was believed in some oriental countries that slitting the nostrils of horses enabled them to breathe easier under exertion. A similarly maltreated horse is depicted in the centre of the Paris sheet of sketches of John and members of his retinue.The sketches of John on sheets held in Paris and Chicago are the only drawings by Pisanello that can be securely dated and provide firm evidence of his presence in Ferrara. The figure on the horse in the recto of the Paris leaf (Louvre MI 1062) is undoubtedly the emperor because of the Italian inscription above the figure, part of which reads: "The hat of the Emperor should be white on top and red underneath, the profile black all around. The doublet of green damask, and the mantle of top crimson. A black beard on a pale face, hair and eye-brows alike." Pisanello's references to colours on this sheet suggests that the artist intended to do a painting of the emperor.Scholars differ as to the circumstances of the production of the Paris and Chicago sheets and what they depict. It has been argued that Pisanello made his drawings at the opening of  the first dogmatic session on 8 October 1438 when the emperor, in a characteristic insistence on punctilio, required that he be allowed to proceed on horseback to his throne in the council chamber. While the emperor and his retinue waited outside for this impossible demand to be accommodated, Pisanello had the opportunity to sketch the emperor and members of his delegation, including perhaps Joseph II. Contrary to this position, however, is the argument that every figure (except the standing figure in the centre of the Chicago recto) is a drawing of the emperor. This view argues that the Paris and Chicago leaves show Pisanello's early attempt to formulate the composition of the medal by sketching the emperor in diverse poses wearing different hats and robes.
Chicago Ferrara Louvre Joseph II The Louvre Paris Pisanello damask medal