THE

HISTORY OF PAINTING

IN

ITALY.

VOL. II.

THE

HISTORY OF PAINTING

IN

ITALY,

FROM THE PERIOD OF THE REVIVAL OF

THE FINE ARTS,

TO THE END OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY:

TRANSLATED

From the Original Italian

OF THE

ABATE LUIGI LANZI.

By THOMAS ROSCOE.

IN SIX VOLUMES.

VOL. II.

CONTAINING THE SCHOOLS OF ROME AND NAPLES.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR

W. SIMPKIN AND R. MARSHALL,

STATIONERS'-HALL COURT, LUDGATE STREET.

1828.

J. M'Creery, Tooks Court,
Chancery Lane, London.

CONTENTS

OF

THE SECOND VOLUME.

HISTORY OF PAINTING IN LOWER ITALY.
BOOK THE THIRD.

ROMAN SCHOOL.

BOOK THE FOURTH.

NEAPOLITAN SCHOOL.

HISTORY OF PAINTING

IN

LOWER ITALY.

BOOK III.

ROMAN SCHOOL.

I have frequently heard the lovers of art express a doubt whether the Roman School possesses the same inherent right to that distinctive appellation as the schools of Florence, Bologna, and Venice. Those of the latter cities were, indeed, founded by their respective citizens, and supported through a long course of ages; while the Roman School, it may be said, could boast only of Giulio Romano and Sacchi, and a few others, natives of Rome, who taught, and left scholars there. The other artists who flourished there were either natives of the cities of the Roman state, or from other parts of Italy, some of whom established themselves in Rome, and others, after the close of their labours there, returned and died in their native places. But this question is, if I mistake not, rather a dispute of words than of things, and similar to those objections advanced by the peripatetic sophists against the modern philosophy; insisting that they abuse the meaning of their words, and quoting, as an example, the vis inertiæ; as if that, which is in itself inert, could possess the quality of force. The moderns laugh at this difficulty, and coolly reply that, if the vis displeased them, they might substitute natura, or any other equivalent word; and that it was lost time to dispute about words, and neglect things. So it may be said in this case; they who disapprove of the designation of school, may substitute that of academy, or any other term denoting a place where the art of painting is professed and taught. And, as the learned universities always derive their names from the city where they are established, as the university of Padua or Pisa, although the professors may be all, or in great part, from other states, so it is with the schools of painting, to which the name of the country is always attached, in preference to that of the master. In Vasari we do not find this classification of schools, and Monsignor Agucchi was the first to divide Italian art into the schools of Lombardy, Venice, Tuscany, and Rome.[^[1]] He has employed the term of schools after the manner of the ancients, and has thus characterised one of them as the Roman School. He has, perhaps, erred in placing Michel Angiolo, as well as Raphael, at the head of this school, as posterity have assigned him his station as chief of the school of Florence; but he has judged right in classing it under a separate head, possessing, as it does, its own peculiar style; and in this he has been followed by all the modern writers of art. The characteristic feature in the Roman School has been said to consist in a strict imitation of the works of the ancients, not only in sublimity, but also in elegance and selection; and to this we shall add other peculiarities, which will be noticed in their proper place. Thus, from its propriety, or from tacit convention, the appellation of the Roman School has been generally adopted; and, as it certainly serves to distinguish one of the leading styles of Italian art, it becomes necessary to employ it, in order to make ourselves clearly understood. We cannot, indeed, allow to the Roman School so extensive a range as we have assigned to that of Florence, in the first book; nevertheless, every one that chooses may apply this appellation to it in a very enlarged sense. Nor is the fact of other artists having taught, or having given a tone to painting in the capital, any valid objection to this term; since, in a similar manner, we find Titiano, Paolo Veronese, and Bassano, in Venice, though all of them were strangers; but, as they were subjects of her government, they were all termed Venetians, as that name alike embraces those born in the city or within the dominions of the Republic. The same may be said of the subjects of the Pope. Besides the natives of Rome, there appeared masters from many of her subject cities, who, teaching in Rome, followed in the steps of their predecessors, and maintained the same principles of art. Passing over Pier della Francesca and Pietro Vannucci, we may refer to Raffaello himself as an example. Raffaello was born in Urbino, and was the subject of a duke, who held his fief under the Roman see, and who, in Rome, held the office of prefect of the city; and whose dominions, in failure of male issue, reverted to the Pope, as the heritage of the church. Thus Raffaello cannot be considered other than a Roman subject. To him succeeded Giulio Romano and his scholars; who were followed by Zuccari, and the mannerists of that time, until the art found a better style under the direction of Baroccio, Baglione, and others. After them flourished Sacchi and Maratta, whose successors have extended to our own times. Restricted within these bounds, the Roman may certainly be considered as a national school; and, if not rich in numbers, it is at least so in point of excellence, as Raffaello in himself outweighs a world of inferior artists.

The other painters who resided in Rome, and followed the principles of that school, I shall neither attempt to add to, nor to subtract from the number of its followers; adopting it as a maxim not to interfere in the decision of disputes, alike idle and irrelevant to my subject. Still less shall I ascribe to it those who there adopted a totally different style, as Michelangiolo da Caravaggio, an artist whom Lombardy may lay claim to, on account of his birth, or Venice, from his receiving his education in that city, though he lived and wrote in Rome, and influenced the taste of the national school there by his own example and that of his scholars. In the same manner many other names will occasionally occur in the history of this school: it is the duty of the historian to mention these, and it is, at the same time, an incomparable triumph to the Roman School, that she stands, in this manner, as the centre of all the others; and that so many artists could not have obtained celebrity, if they had not seen Rome, or could not have claimed that title from the world unless they had first obtained her suffrage.

I shall not identify the limits of this school with those of the dominions of the church, as in that case we should comprise in it the painters of Bologna, Ferrara, and Romagna, whom I have reserved for another volume. In my limits I shall include only the capital, and the provinces in its immediate vicinity, as Latium, the Sabine territories, the patrimony of the Church, Umbria, Picenum, and the state of Urbino, the artists of which district were, for the most part, educated in Rome, or under the eyes of Roman masters. My historical notices of them will be principally derived from Vasari, Baglione, Passeri, and Leone Pascoli. From these writers we have the lives of many artists who painted in Rome, and the last named author has included in his account his fellow countrymen of Perugia. Pascoli has not, indeed, the merits of the three first writers; but he does not deserve the discredit thrown on him by Ratti and Bottari, the latter of whom, in his notes to Vasari, does not hesitate to call him a wretched writer, and unworthy of credit. His work, indeed, on the artists of Perugia, shows that he indiscriminately copied what he found in others, whether good or bad; and to the vulgar traditions of the early artists he paid more than due attention. But his other work, on the history of the modern painters, sculptors, and architects, is a book of authority. In every branch of history much credit is attached to the accounts of contemporary writers, particularly if they were acquaintances or friends of the persons of whom they wrote; and Pascoli has this advantage; for, in addition to information from their own mouths, he derived materials from their surviving friends, nor spared any pains to arrive at the truth, (see Vita del Cozza). The judgment, therefore, which he passes on each artist, is not wholly to be despised, since he formed it on those of the various professors then living in Rome, as Winckelmann has observed (tom. i. p. 450); and, if these persons, as it is pretended, have erred in their judgment on the Greek sculptors, they have certainly not erred in their estimate of modern painters, particularly Luti, to whom I imagine Pascoli, from esteem and intimacy, deferred more than to any other artist.

We have from Bellori other lives, written with more learning and criticism, some of which are supposed to be lost. He had originally applied himself to painting, but deserted that art, as we may conjecture from Pascoli (vita del Canini), and attached himself to poetry, and the study of antiquities: and his skill in both arts manifests itself in the lives he has left, which are few, but interspersed with interesting and minute particulars of the characters of the painters and their works. In his plan, he informs us he has followed the advice of Niccolo Poussin. He composed also a "Description of the figures painted by Raffaello, in the churches of the Vatican;" a tract which contains some severe reflections on Vasari,[^[2]] but is nevertheless highly useful. We also find a profusion of entertaining anecdotes in Taja, in his "Description of the Vatican;" and in Titi, in his account of the pictures, sculpture, and architecture of Rome. This work has recently been republished, with additions; and we shall occasionally quote it under the name of the Guide. Pesaro is indebted for a similar Guide to Signor Becci, and Ascoli and Perugia to Signor Baldassare Orsini, a celebrated architect. We have also the Lettere Perugine of Sig. Dottore Annibale Mariotti, which treat of the early painters of Perugia, with a store of information and critical acumen that render them highly valuable. To these may also be added, the Risposta of the above named Sig. Orsini, whom I regret to see entering on Etruscan ground, as he there repeats many ancient errors, which have been long exploded by common consent: in other points it is a treatise worth perusal. If we turn to Descriptions, we have them of several periods, as that of the Basilica Loretana, and that of Assisi, composed by P. Angeli; and the account of the Duomo of Orvieto, written by P. della Valle; and the works on the churches of S. Francesco di Perugia, and S. Pietro di Fano, by anonymous writers. The Abbate Colucci has favoured us with recent notices on various artists of Piceno and Umbria, and Urbino, in his Antichità Picene, extended, as far as my observation goes, to tom. xxxi.[^[3]] The learned authors whom I have named, and others to whom I shall occasionally refer, have furnished the chief materials of my present treatise, although I have myself collected a considerable part from artists and lovers of art, either in conversation, or in my correspondence. Thus far in the way of introduction.

[1] Bellori, Vite de' Pittori, p. 191. "The Roman School, of which Raffaello and Michel Angiolo were the great masters, derived its principles from the study of the statues and works of the ancients."

[2] Lett. Pittor. tom. ii. p. 323; and Dialoghi sopra le tre Arti del Disegno. In Lucca, 1754.

[3] This work contains contributions from various quarters. I have not, however, made an equal use of all; as I believe some pictures to be copies, which are there referred to as originals; and as several names there mentioned, may with propriety be omitted. In my references, I shall often cite the collections; sometimes also the authors of some more considerable treatises, as P. Civalli, Terzi, Sig. Agostino Rossi, Sig. Arciprete Lazzari, respecting whom I must refer to the second index, where will be found the titles of their respective works.

ROMAN SCHOOL

EPOCH I.

Early Artists.

If we turn our eyes for a moment to that tract of country which we have designated as falling within the limits of the Roman School, amidst the claims of modern art, we shall occasionally meet with both Greek and Latin pictures of the rude ages; from the first of which we may conclude, that Greek artists formerly painted in this part of Italy; and from the latter, that our own countrymen were emulous to follow their example. One of these artists is said to have had the name of Luca, and to him is ascribed the picture of the Virgin, at S. Maria Maggiore, and many others in Italy, which are believed to be painted by S. Luke the Evangelist. Who this Luca was, or whether one painter or more of that name ever existed, we shall presently inquire. The tradition was impugned by Manni,[^[4]] and after him by Piacenza, (tom. ii. p. 120,) and is now only preserved among the vulgar, a numerous class indeed, who shut their ears to every rational criticism as an innovation on their faith. This vulgar opinion is alike oppugned by the silence of the early artists, and the well attested fact, that in the first ages of the church the Virgin was not represented with the holy Infant in her arms;[^[5]] but had her hands extended in the act of prayer. This is exemplified in the funeral vase of glass in the Museo Trombelli at Bologna, with the inscription maria, and in many bassirilievi of christian sarcophagi, where she is represented in a similar attitude. Rome possesses several of these specimens, and several are to be found in Velletri.[^[6]] It is however a common opinion, that these pictures are by a painter of the name of Luca. Lami refers to a legend of the 14th century of the Madonna dell'Impruneta, where they are said to be the works of a Florentine of the name of Luca, who for his many christian virtues obtained the title of saint.[^[7]] They are not however all in the same style, and some of them bear Greek inscriptions, whence we may conclude that they are by various hands; although they all appear to be painted in or about the 12th century. This tradition was not confined to Italy alone, but found its way also into many of the eastern churches. The author of the Anecdotes des Beaux Arts, relates that the memory of a Luca, a hermit, who had painted many rude portraits of the Virgin, was held in great veneration in Greece; and that through a popular superstition he had succeeded to the title of S. Luke the Evangelist. Tournefort (Voyage, &c.) mentions an image of the Virgin at Mount Lebanon, attributed by the vulgar to S. Luke; but which was doubtless also the work of some Luke, a monk in one of the early ages.

More considerable remains both of the Greek and Italian artists of the 13th century are to be found in Assisi, as related in my first book; and to those already mentioned as painted on the walls, may be added others on panel, and all by unknown artists; particularly a crucifixion in S. Chiara, of which there is a tradition, that it was painted before Giunta appeared. Another picture anterior to this period, and bearing the date of 1219, is to be seen at Subiaco; it is a consecration of a church, and the painter informs us that Conciolus pinxit. If in addition to these artists we inquire after the miniature painters, we may find specimens of them in abundance, in the library of the Vatican, and other collections in Rome. I shall name S. Agostino, in the public library of Perugia, where the Redeemer is seen in the midst of saints, and the opening of Genesis is painted in miniature; a design which, from the angular folds of the drapery, partakes of the Greek style, but still serves to prove this art to have been known at that time in Umbria. In addition to what I have remarked, I may also observe, that in Perugia, in the course of the same century, the artists were sufficiently numerous to form an academy, as we may collect from the Lettere Perugine, and these, when we consider the time, must have been in great part miniature painters.

It is now time to notice Oderigi of Gubbio, a town very near to Perugia. Vasari tells us that he was a man of celebrity, and a friend of Giotto, in Rome; and Dante, in his second Cantica, calls him an honour to Agobbio, and excelling in the art of miniature. These are the only authorities that Baldinucci could have for transferring this ancient artist to the school of Cimabue, and ingrafting him in his usual manner on that stock. Upon these he founded his conjecture; and, according to his custom, gave them more weight than they deserved. His opinion, however amplified, reduces itself to the assumption that Giotto, Oderigi, and Dante, were lovers of art, and common friends, and became therefore acquainted in the school of Cimabue; a very uncertain conclusion. We shall consider this subject more maturely in the school of Bologna, since Oderigi lived there, and instructed Franco, from whom Bologna dates the series of her painters. It is thought, too, that he left some scholars in his native place, and not long after him, in 1321, we find Cecco, and Puccio da Gubbio, engaged as painters of the Cathedral of Orvieto; and about the year 1342, Guido Palmerucci of the same place, employed in the palace of his native city. There remains a work of his in fresco in the hall, much injured by time; but some figures of saints are still preserved, which do not yield to the best style of Giotto. Some other vestiges of very ancient paintings are to be seen in the Confraternita de' Bianchi; in whose archives it is mentioned that the picture of S. Biagio was repaired by Donato, in 1374; whence it must necessarily be of a very early period. This and other interesting information I obtained from Sig. Sebastiano Rangliasci, a noble inhabitant of Gubbio, who has formed a catalogue of the artists of his native city, inserted in the fourth volume of the last edition of Vasari.

We are now arrived at the age of Giotto, and the first who presents himself to us is Pietro Cavallini, who was instructed by Giotto, in Rome,[^[8]] in the arts of painting and mosaic, both of which he followed with skill and intelligence. The Roman Guide makes mention of him, and that of Florence refers to a Nunziata at S. Mark; and there are others mentioned by Vasari as being in the chapels of that city; one of which is in the Loggia del Grano. The most remarkable of his works is to be seen in Assisi. It is a fresco, and occupies a large façade in one division of the church. It represents the crucifixion of our Saviour, surrounded by bands of soldiers, foot and horse, and a numerous crowd of spectators, all varying in their dress and the expression of their passions. In the sky is a band of angels, whose sympathizing sorrow is vividly depicted. In extent and spirit of design it partakes of the style of Memmi, and in one of the sufferers on the cross he has shewn that he justly appreciated and successfully followed his guide. The colours are well preserved, particularly the blue, which there, and in other parts of the church, presents to our admiring gaze, to use the language of our poets, a heaven of oriental sapphire.

Vasari does not appear to have been acquainted with any scholar of Pietro Cavallini, except it be Giovanni da Pistoja; but Pietro, who lived in Rome the greater part of his life, which was extended to a period of eighty-five years, must have contributed his aid in no small degree to the advancement of art, in the capital, as well as in other places. However this may be, in that part of Italy, pictures of his school are still found; or at least memorials of art of the age in which he flourished. We have an Andrea of Velletri, of whom a specimen is preserved in the select collection of the Museo Borgia, with the Virgin surrounded by saints, a common subject at that period in the churches, as I have before observed. It has the name of the painter, with the year 1334, and in execution approaches nearer to the school of Siena than any other. In the year 1321 we find Ugolino Orvietano, Gio. Bonini di Assisi, Lello Perugino, and F. Giacomo da Camerino, noticed by us in another place, all employed in painting in the Cathedral of Orvieto. Mariotti, in his letters, mentions other artists of Perugia, and the memory of a very early painter of Fabriano is preserved by Ascevolini, the historian of that city, who informs us, that in the country church of S. Maria Maddalena, in his time, there was a picture in fresco, by Bocco, executed in 1306. A Francesco Tio da Fabriano, who in 1318 painted the tribune of the Conventuals at Mondaino, is mentioned by Colucci, (tom. xxv. p. 183). This work has perished; but the productions of a successor of his at Fabriano are to be seen in the oratory of S. Antonio Abate, the walls of which remain. Many histories of the saint are there to be found, divided into pictures, in the early style, and inscribed, Allegrettus Nutii de Fabriano hoc opus fecit 136.... The art in these parts was not a little advanced by their proximity to Assisi, where Giotto's scholars were employed after his death, particularly Puccio Capanna of Florence. This artist, who is esteemed one of the most successful followers of Giotto, after painting in Florence, in Pistoja, Rimino, and Bologna, is conjectured by Vasari to have settled in Assisi, where he left many works behind him.

We shall find the succeeding century more fruitful in art, as the Popes at that time forsook Avignon, and, re-establishing themselves in Rome, began to decorate the palace of the Vatican, and to employ painters of celebrity both there and in the churches. There does not appear any person of distinction amongst them as a native of Rome. From the Roman State we find Gentile da Fabriano, Piero della Francesca, Bonfigli, Vannucci, and Melozzo, who first practised the art of sotto in su; and amongst the strangers are Pisanello, Masaccio, Beato Angelico, Botticelli and his colleagues. Amongst these too, it is said, was to be found Mantegna, and there still remains the chapel painted by him for Innocent VIII. although since converted to another purpose. Each of these artists I shall notice in their respective schools, and shall here only mention such as were found in the country from the Ufente to the Tronto, and from thence to the Metauro, which are the confines of our present class. The names of many others may be collected from books; as an Andrea, and a Bartolommeo, both of Orvieto, and a Mariotto da Viterbo, and others who worked at Orvieto from 1405 to 1457; and some who painted in Rome itself, a Giovenale and a Salli di Celano, and others now forgotten. But without pausing on these, we will advert to the artists of Piceno, of the State of Urbino, and the remaining parts of Umbria: where we shall meet with the traces of schools which remained for many years.

The school of Fabriano, which seems very ancient in Picenum, produced at that time Gentile, one of the first painters of his age, of whom Bonarruoti is reported to have said, that his style was in unison with his name. The first notice we have of him is among the painters of the church of Orvieto, in 1417; and then, or soon afterwards, he received from the historians of that period the appellation of magister magistrorum, and they mention the Madonna which he there painted, and which still remains. He afterwards resided in Venice, where, after ornamenting the Palazzo Publico, he was rewarded by the republic with a salary, and with the privilege of wearing the patrician dress of that city. He there, says Vasari, became the master, and, in a manner, the father of Jacopo Bellini, the father and preceptor of two of the ornaments of the Venetian school. These were Gentile, who assumed that name in memory of Gentile da Fabriano, born in 1421; and Giovanni, who surpassed his brother in reputation, and from whose school arose Giorgione and Titian. He (Gentile da Fabriano) was employed in the Lateran, at Rome, where he rivalled Pisanello, in the time of Martin V.; and it is to be regretted that his works, both there and in Venice, have perished. Facio, who eulogizes him, and who had seen his most finished performances, extols him as a man of universal art, who represented, not only the human form and edifices in the most correct manner, but painted also the stormy appearances of nature in a style that struck terror into the spectator. In painting the history of St. John, in the Lateran, and the Five Prophets over it, of the colour of marble, he is said to have used more than common care, as if he at that time prognosticated his own approaching death, which soon afterwards occurred, and the work remained unfinished. Notwithstanding this, Ruggier da Bruggia, as Facio relates, when he went to Rome, in the holy year, and saw it, considered it a stupendous work, which placed Gentile at the head of all the painters of Italy. According to Vasari and Borghini, he executed a countless number of works in the Marca, and in the state of Urbino, and particularly in Gubbio, and in Città di Castello, which are in the neighbourhood of his native place; and there still remain in those districts, and in Perugia, some paintings in his style. A remarkable one is mentioned in a country church called la Romita, near Fabriano.[^[9]] Florence possesses two beautiful specimens: the one in S. Niccolo, with the effigy and history of the sainted bishop, the other in the sacristy of S. Trinità, with an Epiphany, having the date of 1423. They bear a near resemblance to the style of B. Angelico, except that the proportions of the figures are not so correct, the conception is less just, and the fringe of gold and brocades more frequent. Vasari pronounces him a pupil of Beato, and Baldinucci confirms this opinion, although he says that Beato took religious orders at an early age in 1407, a period which would exclude Gentile from his tuition. I conjecture both the one and the other to have been scholars of miniature painters, from the fineness of their execution, and from the size of their works, which are generally on a small scale. The name of an Antonio da Fabriano appears in a Crucifixion, in 1454, painted on wood, which I saw in Matelica, in the possession of the Signori Piersanti; but it is inferior to Gentile in style.[^[10]]

On an ancient picture, which is preserved in Perugia, in the convent of S. Domenico, is the name of a painter of Camerino, a place in the same neighbourhood, who flourished in 1447. The inscription is Opus Johannis Bochatis de Chamereno. In the same district is S. Severino, where we find a Lorenzo, who, in conjunction with his brother, painted in the oratory of S. John the Baptist in Urbino, the life of that saint. These two artists were much behind their age. I have seen some other works by them, from which it appears that they were living in 1470, and painted in the Florentine style of 1400. Other artists of the same province are named in the Storia del Piceno, particularly at S. Ginesio, a Fabio di Gentile di Andrea, a Domenico Balestrieri, and a Stefano Folchetti, whose works are cited, with the date of their execution attached to them.[^[11]] In this district also resided several strangers, scarcely known to their native places, as Francesco d'Imola, a scholar of Francia, who, in the convent of Cingoli, painted a Descent from the Cross; and Carlo Crivelli, a Venetian, who passed from one state to another, and finally settled in Ascoli. His works are to be met with there more frequently than in any other city of Picenum. I shall speak of his merits in the Venetian school, and shall here only add, that he had for a pupil Pietro Alamanni, the chief of the painters of Ascoli, a respectable quattrocentista, who painted an altarpiece at S. Maria della Carità, in 1489. About this time also we find amongst their names a Vittorio Crivelli, a Venetian, of the family, as I conjecture, and perhaps of the school of Carlo. There is frequent mention of him in the Antichità Picene.

Urbino, too, had her artists, as her princes were not behind the other rulers of Italy in good taste. At the restoration of the art, we find Giotto, and several of his scholars, there; and afterwards Gentile da Fabriano,[^[12]] a Galeazzo, and, possibly, a Gentile di Urbino. At Pesaro, in the convent of S. Agostino, I have seen a Madonna, accompanied with beautiful architecture, and an inscription—Bartholomaeus Magistri Gentilis de Urbino, 1497; and at Monte Cicardo, I saw the same name on an ancient picture of 1508, but without his birthplace. (Ant. Pic. tom. xvii. 145.) I am in doubt whether this M. Gentilis refers to the father of Bartolommeo or his master, as the scholars at that time often took their designation from their masters. At all events, this artist is not to be confounded with Bartolommeo from Ferrara, whose son, Benedetto, subscribes himself Benedictus quondam Bartholomaei de Fer. Pictor. 1492. This is to be seen in the church of S. Domenico di Urbino, on the altarpiece in the Chapel of the Muccioli, their descendants.

In the city of Urbino there remain some works of the father of Raffaello, who, in a letter of the Duchess Giovanna della Rovere, which is the first of the Lettere Pittoriche, is designated as molto virtuoso. There is by him in the church of S. Francis, a good picture of S. Sebastian, with figures in an attitude of supplication. There is one attributed also to him in a small church dedicated to the same saint, representing his martyrdom, with a figure foreshortened, which Raffaello, when young, imitated in a picture of the Virgin, at Città di Castello. He subscribed himself Io. Sanctis Urbi. (Urbinas). So I read it in the sacristy of the Conventuals of Sinigaglia in an Annunciation in which there is a beautiful angel, and an infant Christ descending from the father; and which seems to be copied from those of Pietro Perugino, with whom Raffaello worked some time, though it has a still more ancient style. The other figures are less beautiful, but yet graceful, and the extremities are carefully executed. But the most distinguished painter in Urbino was F. Bartolommeo Corradini d'Urbino, a Domenican, called Fra. Carnevale. To an accurate eye his pictures are defective in perspective, and retain in the drapery the dryness of his age, but the portraits are so strongly expressed that they seem to live and speak; the architecture is beautiful, and the colours bright, and the air of the heads at the same time noble and unaffected. It is known that Bramante and Raffaello studied him, as there were not, at that time, any better works in Urbino. In Gubbio, which formed a part of this dukedom, were to be seen in that age the remains of the early school. There exists a fresco by Ottaviano Martis in S. Maria Nuova, painted in 1403. The Virgin is surrounded by a choir of angels, certainly too much resembling each other, but in their forms and attitudes as graceful and pleasing as any contemporary productions.

Borgo S. Sepolcro, Foligno, and Perugia, present us with artists of greater celebrity. Borgo was a part of Umbria subject to the Holy See, and was, in 1440, pledged to the Florentines,[^[13]] by Eugenius IV. at the time Piero della Francesca, or Piero Borghese, one of the most memorable painters of this age, was at the summit of his reputation. He must have been born about 1398, since Vasari states that "he painted about the year 1458,"[^[14]] and that he became blind at sixty years of age, and remained so until his death, in his eighty-sixth year. From his fifteenth year he applied himself to painting, at which age he had made himself master of the principles of mathematics, and he rose to great eminence both in art and science.[^[15]] I have not been able to ascertain who was his master, but it is probable that as he was the son of a poor widow, who had barely the means of bringing him up, he did not leave his native place; and that under the guidance of obscure masters he raised himself, by his own genius, to the high degree of fame which he enjoyed. He first appeared, says Vasari, in the court of the elder Guidubaldo Feltro, Duke of Urbino, where he left only some pictures of figures on a small scale, which was the case with such as were not the pupils of the great masters. He was celebrated for a remarkable drawing of a Vase, so ingeniously designed that the front, the back, the sides, the bottom, and the mouth, were all shewn; the whole drawn with the greatest correctness, and the circles gracefully foreshortened. The art of perspective, the principles of which he was, as some affirm, the first among the Italians to develope and to cultivate, was much indebted to him;[^[16]] and painting, too, owed much to his example in imitating the effects of light, in marking correctly the muscles of the naked figure, in preparing models of clay for his figures, and in the study of his drapery, the folds of which he fixed on the model itself, and drew very accurately and minutely. On examining the style of Bramante and his Milanese contemporaries, I have often thought that they derived some light from Piero, for, as I have before said, he painted in Urbino where Bramante studied, and afterwards executed many works in Rome, where Bramantino came and was employed by Nicholas V.

In the Floreria of the Vatican is still to be seen a large fresco painting, in which the above named pontiff is represented with cardinals and prelates, and there is a degree of truth in the countenances highly interesting. Taja does not assert that it is by Pietro, but says that it is attributed to him.[^[17]] Those which are pointed out in Arezzo doubtless belong to him, and the most remarkable are the histories of the holy cross in the choir of the church of the Conventuals, which shew that the art was already advanced beyond its infancy; there is so much new in the Giotto manner of foreshortening, in the relief, and in many difficulties of the art overcome in his works. If he had possessed the grace of Masaccio he might with justice have been placed at his side. At Città S. Sepolcro there still remain some works attributed to him; a S. Lodovico Vescovo, in the public palace, at S. Chiara a picture of the Assumption, with the apostles in the distance, and a choir of angels at the top, but in the foreground are S. Francis, S. Jerome, and other figures, which injure the unity of the composition. There are, however, still traces in them of the old style; a poverty of design, a hardness in the foldings of the drapery, feet which are well foreshortened, but too far apart. As to the rest, in design, in the air, and in the colouring of the figures, it seems to be a rude sketch of that style which was ameliorated by P. Perugino, and perfected by Raffaello.

In the latter part of this century there flourished several good painters at Foligno, but it is not known from whom they derived their instructions. In the twenty-fifth volume of the Antichità Picene we read, that in the church of S. Francesco di Cagli there exists (I know not whether it be now there) a most beautiful composition, painted in 1461, at the price of 115 ducats of gold, by M. Pietro di Mazzaforte and M. Niccolo Deliberatore of Foligno. At S. Venanzio di Camerino is a large altarpiece on a ground of gold, with Christ on the Cross, surrounded by many Saints, with three small evangelical histories added to it. The inscription is Opus Nicolai Fulginatis, 1480; it is in the style of the last imitators of Giotto, and there is scarcely a doubt that the artist studied at Florence. I believe him to be the same artist as Niccolo Deliberatore, or di Liberatore; and different from Niccolò Alunno, also of Foligno, whom Vasari mentions as an excellent painter in the time of Pinturicchio. He painted in distemper, as was common before Pietro Perugino, but in tints that have survived uninjured to our own times. In the distribution of his colours he was original; his heads possess expression, though they are common, and sometimes heavy, when they represent the vulgar. There is at S. Niccolò di Foligno a picture by him, composed in the style of the fourteenth century, the Virgin surrounded by saints, and underneath small histories of the Passion, where the perspicuity is more to be praised than the disposition. In the same style some of his pieces in Foligno are painted after 1500. Vasari thinks they are all surpassed by his Pietà in a chapel of the Duomo, in which are represented two angels, "whose grief is so vividly expressed, that any other artist, however ambitious he might be, would find it difficult to surpass it."

Perugia, from whence the art derived no common lustre, abounded in painters beyond any other city. The celebrated Mariotti formed a long catalogue of the painters of the fourteenth century, and among the most conspicuous are Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, and Bartolommeo Caporali, of whom we have pictures of the date of 1487. Some strangers were also to be found amongst them, as that Lello da Velletri, the author of an altarpiece, and its lower compartments, noticed by Signor Orsini. Benedetto Bonfigli was distinguished above all others, and was the most eminent artist of Perugia in his day. I have seen by him, besides the picture in fresco in the Palazzo Publico, mentioned by Vasari, a picture of the Magi, in S. Domenico, in a style similar to Gentile, and with a large proportion of gold; and another in a more modern style, an Annunciation, in the church of the Orfanelli. The angel in it is most beautiful, and the whole picture would bear comparison with the works of the best artists of this period, if the drawing were more correct.[^[18]]

What I have already adduced sufficiently proves that the art was not neglected in the Papal States, even in the ruder ages; and that men of genius from time to time appeared there, who, without leaving their native places, still gave an impulse to art. Florence, however, has ever been the great capital of design, the leading academy, and the Athens of Italy. It would be idle to question her indisputable claim to this high honour; and Sixtus IV., who, as we have before mentioned, sought through all Italy for artists to ornament the Sistine chapel, procured the greatest number from Tuscany; nor were there to be found amongst them any who were his own subjects, except Pietro Perugino, and he too had risen to notice and celebrity in Florence. These then are the first mature fruits of the Roman school, for until this period they had been crude and tasteless. Pietro is her Masaccio, her Ghirlandajo, her all. We will here take a short view of him and his scholars, reserving, however, the divine Raffaello to the next epoch, which indeed is designated by his illustrious name.

Pietro Vannucci della Pieve,[^[19]] as he calls himself in some pictures, or of Perugia in others, from the citizenship which he there enjoyed, had studied under a master of no great celebrity, if we are to believe Vasari; and this was a Pietro da Perugia, as Bottari conjectured, or Niccolò Alunno, as it was reported in Foligno. Mariotti pretends that Pietro advanced himself greatly in Perugia in the schools of Bonfigli, and Pietro della Francesca, from which he not only derived that excellence in perspective, which, from the testimony of Vasari was so much admired in Florence, but also much of his design and colouring.[^[20]] Mariotti then raises a doubt whether, when he went as an artist to Florence, he became the scholar of Verrocchio, as writers report, or whether he did not rather perfect himself from the great examples of Masaccio, and the excellent painters who at that time flourished there; and he finally determines in favour of the opinion held by Pascoli, Bottari, and Taja, and adopted by Padre Resta, in his Galleria Portatile, p. 10, that Verrocchio was never his master. It is well worth while to read the disquisitions of this able writer in his fifth letter, where we may admire the dexterity with which he settles a point so perplexed and so interesting to the history of art. I will only add that it appears to me not improbable, that Pietro, when he arrived at Florence, attached himself to this most celebrated artist, and was instructed by him in design, and in the plastic art particularly, and in that fine style of painting with which Verrocchio, without much practising it himself, imbued both Vinci and Credi. Traditions are seldom wholly groundless; they have generally some foundation in truth.

The manner of Pietro is somewhat hard and dry, like that of other painters of his time; and he occasionally exhibits a poverty in the drapery of his figures; his garments and mantles being curtailed and confined. But he atones for these faults by the grace of his heads, particularly in his boys and in his women; which have an air of elegance and a charm of colour unknown to his contemporaries. It is delightful to behold in his pictures, and in his frescos which remain in Perugia and Rome, the bright azure ground which affords such high relief to his figures; the green, purple, and violet tints so chastely harmonized, the beautiful and well drawn landscape and edifices, which, as Vasari says, was a thing until that time never seen in Florence. In his altarpieces he is not sufficiently varied. There is a remarkable painting executed for the church of S. Simone, at Perugia, of a Holy Family, one of the first specimens of a well designed and well composed altarpiece. In other respects Pietro did not make any great advances in invention; his Crucifixions and his Descents from the Cross are numerous, and of an uniform character. He has thus represented, with little variation, the Ascensions of our Lord and of the Virgin, in Bologna, in Florence, Perugia, and Città di S. Sepolcro. He was reproached with this circumstance in his lifetime, and defended himself by saying that no one had a right to complain, as the designs were all his own. There is also another defence, which is, that compositions, really beautiful, are still seen with delight when repeated in different places; whoever sees in the Sistine his S. Peter invested with the keys, will not be displeased at finding at Perugia the same landscape, in a picture of the Marriage of the Virgin. On the contrary, this picture is one of the finest objects that noble city affords; and may be considered as containing an epitome of the various styles of Pietro. In the opinion of some persons, his frescos exhibit a more fertile invention, and greater delicacy and harmony of colour. Of these, his masterpiece is in his native city, in the Sala del Cambio. It is an evangelical subject, with saints from the Old Testament, and with his own portrait, to which his grateful fellow citizens attached an elegant eulogy. He is most eminent, and adopts a sort of Raffaellesque style, in some of his latter pictures. I have observed it in a Holy Family, in the Carmine in Perugia. The same may be said too of certain small pictures, almost of a miniature class; as in the grado of S. Peter, in Perugia, than which nothing can be more finished and beautiful; and in many other pieces in which he has spared no pains,[^[21]] but which are few in comparison to the multitude by his scholars, attributed to him.

In treating of the school of Pietro Perugino, it is necessary to advert to what Taja,[^[22]] and after him the author of the Lettere Perugine, notices respecting his scholars, "that they were most scrupulous in adhering to the manner of their master, and as they were very numerous, they have filled the world with pictures, which both by painters and connoisseurs are very commonly considered as his." When his works in Perugia are inspected, he generally rises in the esteem of travellers, of whom many have only seen paintings incorrectly ascribed to him. In Florence there are some of his pictures in the Grand Duke's collection: and in the church of S. Chiara, his beautiful Descent from the Cross, and some other works; but in private collections both here and in other cities of Tuscany, many Holy Families are assigned to him, which are most probably by Gerino da Pistoja, or some of his Tuscan scholars, of whom there is a catalogue in our first book. The Papal states also possessed many of his scholars, who were of higher reputation, nor so wholly attached to his manner as the strangers. Bernardino Pinturicchio, his scholar and assistant in Perugia and in Rome, was a painter little valued by Vasari, who has not allowed him his full share of merit. He has not the style of design of his master, and retains more than consistent with his age, the ornaments of gold in his drapery; but he is magnificent in his edifices, spirited in his countenances, and extremely natural in every thing he introduces into his composition. As he was on the most familiar footing with Raffaello, with whom he painted at Siena, he has emulated his grace in some of his figures, as in his picture of S. Lorenzo in the church of the Francescani di Spello, in which there is a small S. John the Baptist, thought by some to be by Raphael himself. He was very successful in arabesques and perspective; in which way he was the first to represent cities in the ornaments of his fresco paintings, as in an apartment of the Vatican, where in his landscapes he introduced views of the principal cities of Italy. In many of his paintings he retained the ancient custom of making part of his decorations of stucco, as the arches, a custom which was observed in the Milanese school to the time of Gaudenzio. Rome possesses some of his works, particularly in the Vatican, and in Araceli. There is a good picture by him in the duomo of Spello.[^[23]] His best is at Siena, in the magnificent sacristy of which we have already made mention. They consist of ten historical subjects, containing the most memorable passages in the life of Pius II., and on the outside is an eleventh, which represents the Coronation of Pius III., by whom this work was ordered.

Vasari has added to the life of Pinturicchio that of Girolamo Genga, of Urbino, at first a scholar of Signorelli, afterwards of Perugino, and who remained some time pursuing his studies in Florence. He was, for a long period, in the service of the Duke of Urbino, and attached himself more to architecture than to painting, though, in the latter, he was sufficiently distinguished to deserve a place in the history of art. We cannot form a correct judgment of him, as a great part of his own works have perished; and as he assisted Signorelli in Orvieto and other places; and was assisted by Timoteo della Vite in Urbino, and in the imperial palace of Pesaro by Raffaelle del Colle, and various others. In the Petrucci palace at Siena, which now belongs to the noble family of Savini, some historical pieces are ascribed to him near those of Signorelli. They are described in the Lettere Senesi, and in the notes published at Siena to the fourth volume of Vasari. These pieces are praised as superior to those of Signorelli, and as in many parts approaching the early style of Raffaello. Nor do I see how, in the above mentioned letters, they could be supposed to be by Razzi, or Peruzzi, or Pacchiarotto, "in their hard dry manner" when history assures us that Girolamo was with Pandolfo a considerable time, which cannot be asserted of the other three; and as it appears that Petrucci, to finish the work of Signorelli, selected Genga from among his scholars. If we deprive him of this work, which is the only one which can be called his own, what can he have executed in all this time? In this house there is no other picture that can be assigned to him, although Vasari asserts that he there painted other rooms. A most beautiful picture by Genga, and of the greatest rarity, is to be seen in S. Caterina da Siena in Rome; the subject is the Resurrection of our Saviour.

Of the other scholars of Perugino we have no distinct account; but we find some notice of them in the life of their master. Giovanni Spagnuolo, named Lo Spagna, was one of the many oltramontani whom Perugino instructed. The greater part of these introduced his manner into their own countries, but Giovanni established himself at Spoleti, at which place, and in Assisi, he left his best works. In the opinion of Vasari the colouring of Perugino survived in him more than in any of his fellow scholars. In a chapel of the Angioli, below Assisi, there remains the picture described by Vasari, in which are the portraits of the brotherhood of S. Francis, who closed his days on this spot, and, perhaps, no other pupil of this school has painted portraits with more truth, if we except Raffaello himself, with whom no other painter is to be compared.

A more memorable person is Andrea Luigi di Assisi, a competitor of Raffaello, although of more mature years, who, from his happy genius was named L'Ingegno. He assisted Perugino in the Sala del Cambio, and in other works of more consequence; and he may be said to be the first of that school who began to enlarge the style, and soften the colouring. This is observable in several of his works, and singularly so in the sybils and prophets in fresco in the church of Assisi; if they are by his hand, as is generally believed. It is impossible to behold his pictures without a feeling of compassion, when we recollect that he was visited with blindness at the most valuable period of his life. Domenico di Paris Alfani also enlarged the manner of his master, and even more than him Orazio his son, and not his brother, as has been imagined. This artist bears a great resemblance to Raffaello. There are some of his pictures in Perugia, which, if it were not for a more delicate colouring, and something of the suavity of Baroccio, might be assigned to the school of Raffaello; and there are pictures on which a question arises whether they belong to that school or to Orazio; particularly some Madonnas, which are preserved in various collections. I have seen one in the possession of the accomplished Sig. Auditor Frigeri in Perugia; and there is another in the ducal gallery in Florence. The reputation of the younger Alfani has injured that of the other; and even in Perugia some fine pieces were long considered to be by Orazio, which have since been restored to Domenico. An account of these, and other works of eminent artists, may be found in modern writers; and particularly in Mariotti, who mentions the altarpiece of the Crucifixion, between S. Apollonia and S. Jerome, at the church of the Conventuals, a work by the two Alfanis, father and son. In commendation of the latter he adds, that he was the chief of the academy for design, which was founded in 1573, and which, after many honourable struggles, has been revived in our own time.

There are other artists of less celebrity in Perugia, though not omitted by Vasari. Eusebio da S. Giorgio painted in the church of S. Francesco di Matelica, a picture with several saints, and on the grado, part of the history of S. Anthony, with his name, and the year 1512. We may recognize in it the drawing of Perugino, but the colouring is feeble. His picture of the Magi at S. Agostino is better coloured, and in this he followed Paris. The works of Giannicola da Perugia, a good colourist, and therefore willingly received by Pietro to assist him in his labours, however inferior to that artist in design and perspective, are recognized in the Cappella del Cambio, which is near the celebrated sala of Perugino, and was painted by him with the life of John the Baptist. In the church of S. Thomas, is his picture of that Apostle about to touch the wounds of our Saviour, and excepting a degree of sameness in the heads, it possesses much of the character of Perugino. Giambatista Caporali, erroneously called Benedetto by Vasari, Baldinucci, and others, holds likewise a moderate rank in this school, and is more celebrated among the architects. Giulio, his natural son, afterwards legitimatized, also cultivated the same profession.

The succeeding names belonging to this school are not mentioned by Vasari; a circumstance which does not prove the impropriety of their admission, as there are many deserving of notice. Mariotti, our guide in the chronology of this age, and a correct judge of the conformity of style, notices Mariano di Ser Eusterio, whom Vasari calls Mariano da Perugia (tom. iv. p. 162), referring to a picture in the church of S. Agostino in Ancona, which is "not of much interest." In opposition to this opinion of Vasari, however, Mariotti adduces another picture, of a respectable class, by Mariano, to be found in S. Domenico di Perugia; whence we may conclude that this painting is deserving of a place in the history of art. He also mentions Berto di Giovanni, whom Raffaello engaged as his assistant to paint a picture for the monks of Monteluci (of which we shall speak in our notice of Penni) and who was appointed in this contract by Raphael himself to paint the grado. This grado is in the sacristy, and is so entirely in the manner of Raffaello, in the history of the virgin which it represents, that we may conclude either that Raffaello made the design, or that it was painted by one of his school. If it was by Berto, it proves him to have been one of those who exchanged the school of Perugino for that of Raffaello; and if he did not paint it, he must always be held in consideration for the regard he received from the master of the art. Of this artist more information may be obtained from Bianconi, in the Antologia Romana, vol. iii. p. 121. Mariotti enumerates also Sinibaldo da Perugia, who must be esteemed an excellent painter from his works in his native place, and more so from those in the cathedral at Gubbio, where he painted a fine picture in 1505, and a gonfalon still more beautiful, which would rank him among the first artists of the ancient school. To the above painters Pascoli adds a female artist of the name of Teodora Danti, who painted cabinet pictures in the style of Perugino and his scholars.

From tradition, as well as conjecture, we may notice in Città di Castello a Francesco of that city, a scholar of Perugino, who, in an altarpiece in the church of the Conventuals, left an Annunciation with a fine landscape. He is named in the Guida di Roma, in the account of the chapel of S. Bernardino in Ara Caeli, where he is supposed to have worked with Pinturicchio and Signorelli. There is a conjecture, though no decided proof, that a Giacomo di Guglielmo was a pupil of Pietro, who, at Castel della Pieve, his native place, painted a gonfalon, estimated by good judges in Perugia at sixty-five florins; and also a Tiberio di Assisi, who, in many of the coloured lunettes in the convent degli Angeli, containing the history of the Life of S. Francis, shews clearly that Perugino was his prototype, though he had not talent enough to imitate him. Besides Tiberio, some have assigned to the instructions of Perugino, the most eminent painter of Assisi, Adone (or Dono) Doni, not unknown to Vasari, who often mentions him, and particularly in his life of Gherardi (vol. v. p. 142). He is there called of Ascoli, an opinion which Bottari maintains against Orlandi, who, on the best grounds, changed it to Assisi. In Ascoli he is not at all known, but he is well known in Perugia by a large picture of the Last Judgment in the church of S. Francis, and still better in Assisi, where he painted in fresco, in the church of the Angeli, the life of the founder, and of S. Stephen, and many other pieces, which, for a long period, served as a school for youth. He had very little of the ancient manner; the truth of his portraits is occasionally wonderful; his colouring is that of the latest of the scholars of Perugino; and he appears to be an artist of more correctness than spirit. I find also a Lattanzio della Marca, of the school of Perugino, commemorated by Vasari in the above mentioned life. He is thought to be the same as Lattanzio da Rimino, of whom Ridolfi makes mention, among the scholars of Giovanni Bellino, as painting a picture in Venice in rivalship with Conegliano.[^[24]] We are enabled more correctly to ascertain this from a document in the possession of Mariotti, of which we shall shortly speak, from which we not only learn to a certainty his native place, but further, that he was the son of Vincenzo Pagani, a celebrated painter, as will hereafter be seen, and that both were living in the year 1553. It appears, therefore, very probable that Lattanzio was instructed by his father, and that we may doubt of his being under Bellini, who died about 1516, or under Perugino, among whose disciples he is not enumerated by the very accurate Mariotti. It seems certain, that on the death of Vannucci he succeeded to his fame, and obtained for himself some of the most important orders in Perugia, as, for instance, the great work of painting the chambers in the castle. He accomplished this task by the assistance of Raffaellino del Colle, Gherardi, Doni, and Paperello. He there commenced the picture of S. Maria del Popolo, and executed the lower part, where there is a great number of persons in the attitude of prayer; a fine expression is observable in the countenances, the figures are well disposed, the landscape beautiful, and there is a strength and clearness in the colouring, and a taste which, on the whole, is different from that of Perugino. The upper part of the picture, which is by Gherardi, has not an equal degree of force. Lattanzio finished his career by being sheriff of his native city; and of this office, a more honourable distinction than at the present day, it appears he took possession in the year 1553, and at that time renounced the art. It is certain, that, in the before mentioned paper, the Capitano Lattanzio di Vincenzo Pagani da Monte Rubbiano acknowledges to have received six scudi of gold from Sforza degli Oddi, as earnest money for a picture representing the Trinity, with four saints; and engages that in the ensuing August it should be executed by his father Vincenzo and Tommaso da Cortona, and this must be the picture still existing in the chapel of the Oddi in S. Francesco, since the figures particularized in the agreement are found there; we shall have an opportunity of noticing it again.

In the Antichità Picene, tom. xxi. p. 148, Ercole Ramazzani di Roccacontrada is recorded as a scholar of Pietro Perugino, and for some time of Raffaello. A picture of the circumcision, by him, is there mentioned to be at Castel Planio, with his name and the date of 1588; and in speaking of the artist it is added, that he possessed a beautiful style of colour, a charming invention, and a manner approaching to Barocci. I have never seen the above mentioned picture, nor the others which he left in his native city, mentioned in the Memorie of Abbondanziere: but only one by a Ramazzani di Roccacontrada, painted in the church of S. Francesco, in Matelica, in 1573. Although I cannot affirm to a certainty that this painter called himself Ercole, I still suspect him to be the same. It represents the conception of the Virgin, in which the idea of the subject is taken from Vasari, where Adam, and others of the Old Testament, are seen bound to the tree of knowledge of good and evil, as the heirs of sin, while the Virgin triumphs over them in her exemption from the penalty of the first parents. Ramazzani has adopted this design, which he had probably seen, but he has executed his picture on a much larger scale, with better colouring, and much more expression in the countenances. To conclude, we do not see a trace of the manner of Perugino, and the period at which he lived seems too late for him to have received instructions from that artist; and it is most probable that he was taught by some of his latter scholars, in whom, if I mistake not, that more fascinating than correct style of colouring had its origin, before it was adopted by Barocci.

I may further observe, that as Perugino was the most celebrated name at the beginning of the sixteenth century, many other artists of the Roman States, who studied the art about his time, are given to his school without any sufficient authority; and particularly those who retained a share of the old style. Such was a Palmerini of Urbino, a contemporary of Raphael, and probably his fellow scholar in early life, of whom there remains at S. Antonio, a picture of various saints, truly beautiful, and approaching to a more modern style. In the same style I found, in the Borghese Gallery at Rome, the Woman of Samaria at the Well, painted by a Pietro Giulianello, or perhaps da Giulianello, a little district not far from Rome; an artist deserving to be placed in the first rank of quattrocentisti, although not mentioned by any writer. There are besides, some pictures by Pietro Paolo Agabiti, who in tom. xx. of the Ant. Pic. is said to be of Masaccio, where he painted in 1531, and some time afterwards. But I have seen a work by him in the church of S. Agostino in Sassoferrato, a series of small histories, with an inscription in which he names Sassoferrato as his native place, with the date of 1514; a date that will carry him from the moderns to the better class of the old school. Lorenzo Pittori da Macerata painted in the church of the Virgin, highly esteemed for its architecture, a picture of Christ in 1533, in a manner which has been called antico moderno. Two artists, Bartolommeo, and Pompeo his son, flourished in Fano, and painted in 1534 in conjunction, in the church of S. Michele, the resurrection of Lazarus. It is wonderful to observe how little they regarded the reform which the art had undergone. These artists strictly followed the dry style of the quattrocentisti, with a thorough contempt of the modern style. Nor was the son at all modernized on leaving his father's studio. I found at S. Andrea di Pesaro a picture by him of various saints, which might have done him honour in the preceding age. Civalli mentions other works by him in a better style: and he certainly in his lifetime enjoyed a degree of reputation, and was one of the masters of Taddeo Zuccaro. There are a number of painters of this class, of whom a long list might be compiled; they are generally represented to be pupils of some well known master, and in such cases Pietro Perugino is selected; though it would be more candid to confess our ignorance on the subject.

It would be improper to pass on to another epoch of art, without adverting to the grotesque. This branch of the art is censured by Vitruvius[^[25]] as a creation of portentous monsters beyond the reign of nature, transferring to canvas the dreams and ravings of a disordered fancy, as wild as the waves of a convulsed sea, lashed into a thousand varying forms by the fury of the tempest. This style took its name from the grotte, for so those beautiful antique edifices may be called, where paintings of this kind are found, covered with earth, and with buildings of a later period. This style was revived in Rome, where a greater proportion of these ancient specimens is found, and was restored at this epoch. Vasari ascribes the revival of them to Morto da Feltro, and the perfecting of the style to Giovanni da Udine. But he himself, notwithstanding the little esteem he had for Pinturicchio, calls him the friend of Morto da Feltro, and allows that he executed many works in the same manner in Castel S. Angelo. Before him too Pietro his master had painted some of the same kind in the Sala del Cambio, which Orsini says are well conceived, and to him likewise a precedent had been afforded by Benedetto Bonfigli, of whom Taja, in his description of the Vatican palace, says, that he painted for Innocent VIII. in Rome some singularly beautiful grotesques. This branch of art was afterwards cultivated in many of the schools of Italy, particularly in that of Siena. Peruzzi approved of it in architecture, and adopted it in his painting, and gave occasion to Lomazzo to offer a defence of it, and precepts, as I before noticed, and as may be seen in the sixth book of his Trattato della Pittura, chapter forty-eight.

[4] Dell'errore, che persiste, &c. see the second index. It was opposed by Crespi, in his Dissertazione Anticritica, referred to in the same index. It was also opposed by P. dell'Aquila, in the Dizionario portatile della Bibbia, tradotto dal francese, in a note of some length, on the article S. Luca.

[5] See the Opuscoli Calogeriani, tom. xliii. where a learned dissertation is inserted, which shews that this custom was introduced about the middle of the fifth century, on occasion of the Council of Ephesus.

[6] Engraved by command of the learned Cardinal Borgia. The artists began about the middle of the fifth century, to represent her with the Infant in her arms. See Opuscoli Calogeriani, as above.

[7] "The painter was a man of holy life, and a Florentine, whose name was Luca, and who was honoured by the common people with the title of saint." Lami, Deliciæ Eruditorum, tom. xv.

[8] So says Vasari, who writes his life, but Padre della Valle thinks it highly probable that he was the scholar of Cosimati, and not of Giotto; as Cavallini was contemporary with Giotto. I agree that he was only a very few years younger, and might have received some instructions in the school of Cosimati: but who, except Giotto himself, could have taught him that Giottesque and improved style scarcely inferior to Gaddi?

[9] In the archives of the Collegiate Church of S. Niccolo, in Fabriano, is preserved a catalogue of the pictures of the city, which has been communicated to me by Sig. Can. Claudio Serafini. This picture, which is divided into five compartments, is there mentioned; and it is added, that "many celebrated painters visited the place to view this excellent work, and in particular, the illustrious Raffaello."

[10] In the archives before alluded to, are also mentioned two ancient pictures of a Giuliano da Fabriano, the one in the church of the Domenicans, the other in the Church of the Capuchins.

[11] Tom. xxiii. page 83, &c. By the first, is the ancient picture of S. Maria della Consolazione in that church, erected in 1442. By the second, are the pictures in the church of S. Rocco, painted about the year 1463. The third artist painted a picture in the church of S. Liberato, in 1494.

[12] Galeazzo Sanzio and his sons will be noticed in the second epoch.

[13] See Vasari, Bologna edition, p. 260.

[14] The commentators of Vasari remark, that when he uses this phrase, he refers to the year of the death of the artist, or to the period when he relinquished his art. Pietro must therefore have become blind about the year 1458, in the sixtieth year of his age, and must have died about 1484, aged eighty-six. This painter was intimately connected with the family of Vasari. Lazaro the great-grandfather of Vasari, who died in 1452, was the friend and imitator of Pietro, and some time before his death assigned him his nephew Signorelli as a scholar. We must, therefore, give credit to Vasari's account of Borghese; for if we discredit him on this occasion, as some have done, when are we to believe him? It is true, indeed, that he is guilty of a strange anachronism in mentioning Guidubaldo, the old Duke of Urbino, as his first patron; but this kind of error is frequent in him, and not to be regarded.

[15] "Fu eccellentissimo prospettivo, e il maggior geometra de' suoi tempi." Romano Alberti, Trattato della nobiltà della pittura, p. 32. See also Pascoli, Vite, tom. i. p. 90.

[16] It appears that in this art he was preceded by Van Eych of Flanders. See tom. i. p. 81, &c.; and also the eulogium on him by Bartolommeo Facio, p. 46, where he praises his skill in geometry, and refers to several of his pictures, which prove him to have been highly accomplished, and almost unrivalled in perspective.

[17] If there be any truth in Pietro having been blind for twenty-four years, I do not know how he could have painted Sixtus IV. On the other hand this tradition of his blindness comes from Vasari, whose family was so intimately connected with that of Pietro della Francesca, that there was less room for error in the life of that artist than in any other. This excellent picture, of which I have seen a beautiful copy in the possession of the Duke di Ceri, I should myself rather attribute to Melozzo.

[18] He is favorably mentioned by Crispolti, in the Perugia Augusta; by Ciatti, in the Istorie di Perugia; Alessi, in the Elogi de' Perugini illustri; and by Pascoli, in the Vite de' Pittori Sc. Arch. Perugini; with whom I can in no manner concur in opinion, that "Benedetto was equal to the best artists of his time, and probably the first among the early masters who contributed to the introduction of an improved style," (p. 21). An assertion singularly unjust to Masaccio.

[19] He subscribed himself de Castro Plebis, now Città della Pieve. There, according to Pascoli, the father was born, who afterwards removed to Perugia, where Pietro was born; but the greater probability is, that Pietro also was born in Città della Pieve. Mariotti.

[20] This resemblance might have arisen from his imitation of the works of Borghese, (Pietro della Francesca) which he saw in Perugia, as it most assuredly cannot be proved that Perugino was ever in his school. P. Valle and others express great doubts of it, and when I reflect that Vannucci was only twelve years old when Borghese lost his sight, I regard it as an absurd tradition.

[21] Vasari, at the close of his Life observes, "none of his scholars ever equalled Pietro in application or in amenity of colour." Padre della Valle asserts on the contrary, "that he was indebted for a great portion of his celebrity to the talents displayed by his scholars;" and says that he detected the touch of Raffaello in his picture in the Grand Duke's collection; but we must have a stronger testimony before we submit ourselves to this decision.

[22] Descrizione del Palazzo Vaticano, p. 36.

[23] Consisting of three subjects from the Life of Christ, in the Chapel of the Holy Sacraments. The Annunciation, the Birth of Christ, and the Dispute with the Doctors, the best of the three. In one of these he introduced his own portrait. Vasari does not mention this fine production.

[24] He probably came to Venice from Rimino, or resided there for some time. We find other early painters assigned first to one country and then to another, as Jacopo Davanzo, Pietro Vannucci, Lorenzo Lotto, &c.

[25] It is said that Mengs, who was desirous of being considered a philosophical painter, coincided with Vitruvius in opinion. But this opinion should be restricted to some indifferent specimens; for when he afterwards saw them painted in the true style of the ancients, he regarded them with extraordinary pleasure; as in Genoa, which possesses some beautiful arabesques by Vaga. So the defender of Ratti assures us.

ROMAN SCHOOL.

EPOCH II.

Raffaello and his School.

We are now arrived at the most brilliant period, not only of the Roman School, but of modern painting itself. We have seen the art carried to a high degree of perfection by Da Vinci and Bonarruoti, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, and it is a remarkable fact that the same period embraces not only Raphael, but also Coreggio, Giorgione, and Titian, and the most celebrated Venetian painters: so that a man enjoying the common term of life might have seen the works of all these illustrious masters. The art in but a few years thus reached a height to which it had never before attained, and which has never been rivalled, except in the attempt to imitate these early masters, or to unite in one style their varied and divided excellences. It seems indeed an ordinary law of providence, that individuals of consummate genius should be born and flourish at the same period, or at least at short intervals from each other, a circumstance of which Velleius Paterculus, after a diligent investigation, protested he could never discover the real cause. I observe, he says, men of the same commanding genius making their appearance together, in the smallest possible space of time; as it happens in the case of animals of different kinds, which, confined in a close place, nevertheless each selects its own class, and those of a kindred race separate themselves from the rest, and unite in the closest manner. A single age was sufficient to illustrate Tragedy, in the persons of Æschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides: ancient comedy under Cratinus, Aristophanes, and Eumolpides; and in like manner the new comedy under Menander, Diphilus, and Philemon. There appeared few philosophers of note after the days of Plato and Aristotle, and whoever has made himself acquainted with Isocrates and his school, is acquainted with the summit of Grecian eloquence. The same remark applies also to other countries. The great Roman writers are included under the single age of Octavius: Leo X. was the Augustus of modern Italy; the reign of Louis XIV. was the brilliant era of French letters, that of Charles II. of the English.

This rule applies equally to the fine arts. Hoc idem, proceeds Velleius, evenisse plastis, pictoribus, sculptoribus, quisquis temporum institerit notis reperiet, et eminentiam cujusque operis arctissimis temporum claustris circumdatam.[^[26]] Of this union of men of genius in the same age, Causas, he says, quum semper requiro, numquam invenio quas veras confidam. It seems to him probable that when a man finds the first station in art occupied by another, he considers it as a post that has been rightfully seized on, and no longer aspires to the possession of it, but is humiliated, and contented to follow at a distance. But this solution I confess does not satisfy my mind. It may indeed account to us why no other Michelangiolo, or Raffaello, has ever appeared; but it does not satisfy me why these two, and the others before mentioned, should all have appeared together in the same age. For myself, I am of opinion that the age is always influenced by certain principles, universally adopted both by professors of the art, and by amateurs: which principles happening at a particular period to be the most just and accurate of their kind, produce in that age some supereminent professors, and a number of good ones. These principles change through the instability of all human affairs, and the age partakes in the change. I may add, nevertheless, that these happy periods never occur without the circumstance of a number of princes and influential individuals rivalling each other in the encouragement of works of taste; and amidst these there always arise some persons of commanding genius, who give a bias and tone to art. The history of sculpture in Athens, a city where munificence and taste went hand in hand, favours my opinion, and it is further confirmed by this golden period of Italian art. Nevertheless I do not pretend to give a verdict on this important question, but leave the decision of it to a more competent tribunal.

But although it be a matter of difficulty to account for this developement and union of rare talent at one particular period, we may however hope to trace the steps of a single individual to excellence; and I would wish to do so of Raffaello. Nature and fortune seemed to unite in lavishing their favours on this artist; the first in investing him with the rarest gifts of genius, the other in adding to these a singular combination of propitious circumstances. In order to illustrate our inquiry it will be necessary to observe him from his earliest years,[^[27]] and to note the progress of his mind. He was born in Urbino in 1483; and if climate, as seems not improbable, have any influence on the genius of an artist, I know not a happier spot that could have been chosen for his birth, than that part of Italy which gave to architecture a Bramante, supplied the art of painting with a successor to Raffaello in Baroccio, and bestowed on sculpture the plastic hand of a Brandani, without referring to many less celebrated, but still deserving artists, who are the boast of Urbino and her state. The father of this illustrious artist was Giovanni di Santi,[^[28]] or as he has been commonly called Giovanni Sanzio, an artist of moderate talents, and who could contribute but little to the instruction of his son; although it was no small advantage to have been initiated in a simple style, divested of mannerism. He made some further progress from studying the works of F. Carnevale, an artist of great merit, for the times in which he flourished; and being placed at Perugia, under Pietro, he soon became master of his style, as Vasari observes, and had then probably already formed the design of excelling him. I was informed in Città di Castello, that at the age of seventeen he painted the picture of S. Nicholas of Tolentino in the church of the Eremitani. The style was that of Perugino, but the composition differed from that of the age, being the throne of our Saviour surrounded by saints. The Beato (beatified saint) is there represented, while the Virgin and St. Augustine, concealed in part by a cloud, bind his temples with a crown; there are two angels at the right hand, and two at the left, graceful, and in different attitudes; with inscriptions variously folded, on which are inscribed some words in praise of S. Eremitano. Above is the Eternal Father surrounded by a majestic choir of angels. The actors of the scene appear to be in a temple, the pillars of which are ornamented in the minute and laboured style of Mantegna, and the ancient manner is still perceptible in the folds of the drapery, though there is an evident improvement in the design, as in the figure of Satan, who lies under the feet of the saint. This figure is free from the singular deformity with which the ancient painters represented him; and has the genuine features of an Ethiopian. To this picture another of this period may be added in the church of S. Domenico; a Crucifixion, with two attendant angels; the one receives in a cup the sacred blood which flows from the right hand, the other, in two cups, collects that of the left hand and the side; the weeping mother and disciples contribute their aid, while the Magdalen and an aged saint kneeling in silence contemplate the solemn mystery; above is the Deity. These figures might all pass for those of Pietro, except the Virgin, the beauty of which he never equalled, unless perhaps in the latter part of his life. Another specimen of this period is noticed by the Abate Morcelli, (de Stylo Inscript. Latin, p. 476). He states, that in the possession of Sig. Annibale Maggiori, a nobleman of Fermo, he saw the picture of a Madonna, raising with both hands a veil of delicate texture from the holy Infant, as he lies in a cradle asleep. Nigh at hand is S. Joseph, whose eyes rest in contemplation on the happy scene, and on his staff the same writer detected an inscription in extremely minute characters, r. s. v. a. a. xvii. p. Raphael Sanctius Urbinas an. ætatis 17 pinxit. This must have been the first attempt of the design which he perfected at a more mature age, and which is in the Treasury of Loreto, where the holy Infant is represented, not in the act of sleeping, but gracefully stretching out his hand to the Virgin: of the same epoch I judge the tondini to be, which I shall describe in the course of a few pages, when I refer to the Madonna della Seggiola.

Vasari informs us, that before executing these two pictures, he had already painted in Perugia an Assumption in the church of the Conventuals, with three subjects from the life of Christ in the grado; which may however be doubted, as it is a more perfect work. This picture possesses all the best parts of the style of Vannucci; but the varied expressions which the apostles discover on finding the sepulchre void, are beyond the reach of that artist's powers. Raffaello still further excelled his master, as Vasari observes, in the third picture painted for Città di Castello. This is the marriage of the Virgin, in the church of S. Francesco. The composition very much resembles that which he adopted in a picture of the same subject in Perugia; but there is sufficient of modern art in it to indicate the commencement of a new style. The two espoused have a degree of beauty which Raffaello scarcely surpassed in his mature age, in any other countenances. The Virgin particularly is a model of celestial beauty. A youthful band festively adorned accompany her to her espousals; splendour vies with elegance; the attitudes are engaging, the veils variously arranged, and there is a mixture of ancient and modern drapery, which at so early a period cannot be considered as a fault. In the midst of these accompaniments the principal figure triumphantly appears, not ornamented by the hand of art, but distinguished by her native nobility, beauty, modesty, and grace. The first sight of this performance strikes us with astonishment, and we involuntarily exclaim, how divine and noble the spirit that animates her heavenly form! The group of the men of the party of S. Joseph are equally well conceived. In these figures we see nothing of the stiffness of the drapery, the dryness of execution, and the peculiar style of Pietro, which sometimes approaches to harshness: all is action, and an animating spirit breathes in every gesture and in every countenance. The landscapes are not represented with sterile and impoverished trees, as in the backgrounds of Pietro; but are drawn from nature, and finished with care. The round temple in the summit is ornamented with columns, and executed, Vasari observes, with such admirable art, that it is wonderful to observe the difficulties he has willingly incurred. In the distance are beautiful groups, and there is a figure of a poor man imploring charity depicted to the life, and, more near, a youth, a figure which proves the artist to have been master of the then novel art of foreshortening. I have purposely described these specimens of the early years of Raphael, more particularly than any other writer, in order to acquaint the reader with the rise of his divine talents. In the labours of his more mature years, the various masters whose works he studied may each claim his own; but in his first flight he was exclusively supported by the vigour of his own talents. The bent of his genius, which was not less voluptuous and graceful than it was noble and elevated, led him to that ideal beauty, grace, and expression, which is the most refined and difficult province of painting. To insure success in this department neither study nor art is sufficient. A natural taste for the beautiful, an intellectual faculty of combining the several excellences of many individuals in one perfect whole, a vivid apprehension, and a sort of fervour in seizing the sudden and momentary expressions of passion, a facility of touch, obedient to the conceptions of the imagination; these were the means which nature alone could furnish, and these, as we have seen, he possessed from his earliest years. Whoever ascribes the success of Raffaello to the effects of study, and not to the felicity of his genius, does not justly appreciate the gifts which were lavished on him by nature.[^[29]]

He now became the admiration of his master and his fellow scholars; and about the same time Pinturicchio, after having painted with so much applause at Rome before Raffaello was born, aspired to become, as it were, his scholar in the great work at Siena. He did not himself possess a genius sufficiently elevated for the sublime composition which the place required; nor had Pietro himself sufficient fertility, or a conception of mind equal to so novel an undertaking. It was intended to represent the life and actions of Æneas Silvius Piccolomini, afterwards Pope Pius II.; the embassies entrusted to him by the council of Constance to various princes; and by Felix, the antipope, to Frederick III., who conferred on him the laurel crown; and also the various embassies which he undertook for Frederick himself to Eugenius IV., and afterwards to Callistus IV., who created him a Cardinal. His subsequent exaltation to the Papacy, and the most remarkable events of his reign, were also to be represented; the canonization of S. Catherine; his attendance on the Council of Mantua, where he was received in a princely manner by the Duke; and finally his death, and the removal of his body from Ancona to Rome. Never perhaps was an undertaking of such magnitude entrusted to a single master. The art itself had not as yet attempted any great flight. The principal figures in composition generally stood isolated, as Pietro exhibited them in Perugia, without aiming at composition. In consequence of this the proportions were seldom true, nor did the artists depart much from sacred subjects, the frequent repetition of which had already opened the way to plagiarism. Historical subjects of this nature were new to Raffaello, and to him, unaccustomed to reside in a metropolis, it must have been most difficult, in painting so many as eleven pictures, to imitate the splendour of different courts, and as we may say, the manners of all Europe, varying the composition agreeably to the occasion. Nevertheless, being conducted by his friend to Siena, he made the sketches and cartoons of all these subjects, says Vasari in his life of Pinturicchio, and that he made the sketches of the whole is the common report at Siena. In the life of Raffaello he states that he made some of the designs and cartoons for this work, and that the reason of his not continuing them, was his haste to proceed to Florence, to see the cartoons of Da Vinci and Bonarruoti. But I am more inclined to the first statement of Vasari, than the subsequent one. In April, 1503, Raffaello was employed in the Library, as is proved by the will of Cardinal Francesco Piccolomini.[^[30]] While the Library was yet unfinished, Piccolomini was elected Pope on the twenty-first day of September; and his coronation following on the eighth of October, Pinturicchio commemorated the event on the outside of the Library, in the part opposite to the duomo. Bottari remarks, that in this façade we may detect not only the design, but in many of the heads the colouring also of Raffaello. It appears probable therefore that he remained to complete the work, the last subject of which might perhaps be finished in the following year, 1504, in which he departed to Florence. We may here observe, that this work, which has maintained its colours so well that it almost appears of recent execution, confers great honour on a young artist of twenty years of age; as we do not find a composition of such magnitude, in the passage from ancient to modern art, conceived by any single painter. So that if Raffaello stood not entirely alone in this work, the best part of it must still be assigned to him, since Pinturicchio himself was improving at this time, and the works which he afterwards executed at Spello and Siena itself, incline more to the modern than any he had before done. This will justify us in concluding that Raffaello had already, at that early age, far outstripped his master; his contour being more full, his composition more rich and free, accompanied by an ornamental and grander style, and an ability unlimited, and capable of embracing every subject that was presented to him.

The works which he saw in Florence did not lead him out of his own path, as, to mention one instance, afterwards happened to Franco, who, coming from Venice, applied himself to a style of design and a career entirely new. Raffaello had formed his own system, and only sought examples, to enlarge his ideas and facilitate his execution. He therefore studied the works of Masaccio, an elegant and expressive painter, whose Adam and Eve he afterwards adopted in the Vatican. He also became acquainted with Fra Bartolommeo, who, about this time, had returned to the exercise of his profession. To this artist he taught the principles of perspective, and acquired from him, in return, a better style of colouring. We have not any record to prove that he made himself known to Da Vinci; and the portrait of Raffaello, in the ducal gallery in Florence, which is said to be by Lionardo, is an unknown head. I would willingly, however, flatter myself, that a congeniality of mind and an affinity of genius, emulous in the pursuit of perfection, must have produced a knowledge of each other, if it did not conciliate a mutual attachment. No one certainly was more capable than Da Vinci, of communicating to Raffaello a degree of refinement and knowledge, which he could not have received from Pietro; and to introduce him into the more subtle views of art. As to Michelangiolo, his pictures were rare, and less analogous to the genius of Raffaello. His celebrated Cartoon was not yet finished, in 1504, and that great master was jealous of its being seen, before its entire completion. He finished it some few years afterwards, when he returned to Florence on his flight from Rome, occasioned by the anger of Julius II. Raffaello therefore could not have had the opportunity of studying it at that time, nor did he then long remain in Florence, for, as Vasari states, he was soon obliged to return to his native place, in consequence of the death of his parents.[^[31]] In 1505 we find him in Perugia: and to this year belongs the chapel of S. Severo, and the Crucifixion, which was severed from the wall, and preserved by the Padri Camaldolensi. From these works, which are all in fresco, we may ascertain the style which he acquired in Florence; and I think we may assert, that it was not anatomical, no traces of it being visible in the body of the Redeemer, which was an opportunity well adapted for the exhibition of it. Nor was it the study of the beautiful, of which he had previously exhibited such delightful specimens; nor that of expression, as there were not to be found in Florence, heads more expressive and lovely than those he had painted. But after his visit to Florence, we find his colouring more delicate, and his grouping and the foreshortening of his figures improved; whether or not he owed it to the example of Da Vinci or Bonarruoti, or both together, or to some of the older masters. He afterwards repaired to Florence, but soon quitted it again, in order to paint in the church of S. Francis, in Perugia, a dead Christ entombed, the cartoon of which he had designed at Florence; and which picture was first placed in the church of S. Francis, was afterwards, in the pontificate of Paul V., transferred to Rome, and is now in the Borghese palace. After this he returned again to Florence, and remained there until his departure for Rome, at the end of the year 1508. In this interval, more particularly, he executed the works which are said to be in his second style, though it is a very delicate matter to attempt to point them out. Vasari assigns to this period the Holy Family in the Rinuccini gallery, and yet it bears the date of 1506. Of this second style is undoubtedly the picture of the Madonna and the infant Christ and S. John, in a beautiful landscape, with ruins in the distance, which is in the gallery of the Grand Duke, and others, some of which are to be found in foreign countries. His pictures of this period are composed in the more usual style of a Madonna, accompanied by saints, like the picture of the Pitti palace, formerly at Pescia, and that of S. Fiorenzo in Perugia, which passed into England. The attitudes, however, the air of the heads, and smaller features of composition, are beyond a common style. The dead Christ above mentioned, is in a more novel and superior style. Vasari calls it a most divine picture; the figures are not numerous; but each fulfils perfectly the part assigned to it; the subject is most affecting; the heads are remarkably beautiful, and the earliest of the kind in the restoration of art, while the expression of profound sorrow and extreme anguish does not divest them of their beauty. After finishing this work, Raphael was ambitious of painting an apartment in Florence, one, I believe, of the Palazzo Pubblico. There remains a letter of his, in which he requests the Duke of Urbino to write to the Gonfaloniere Soderini, in April, 1508.[^[32]] But his relative, Bramante, procured him a nobler employ in Rome, recommending him to Julius II. to ornament the Vatican. He removed thither, and was already established there in the September of the same year.[^[33]]

We at length, then, behold him fixed in Rome, and placed in the Vatican at a period, and under circumstances calculated to render him the first painter in the world. His biographers do not mention his literary attainments; and, if we were to judge from his letter just cited, and now in the Museo Borgia, we might consider him grossly illiterate. But he was then writing to his uncle; and therefore made use of his native dialect, as is still done even in the public acts in Venice; though he might be master of, and might use on proper occasions, a more correct language. Raffaello, too, was of a family fully competent to afford him the necessary instructions in his early years. Other letters of his are found in the Lettere Pittoriche, in a very different style; and of his knowledge in matters of importance, it is sufficient to refer to what Celio Calcagnini, an eminent literary character of the age of Leo, states of him to Giacomo Zieglero: "I need not," he says, "mention Vitruvius, whose precepts he not only explains, but defends or impugns with evident justice, and with so much temper, that in his objections there does not appear the slightest asperity. He has excited the admiration of the Pontiff Leo, and of all the Romans, in such a way, that they regard him as a man sent down from heaven purposely to restore the eternal city to its ancient splendour."[^[34]] This acknowledged skill in architecture must suppose an adequate acquaintance with the Latin language and geometry; and we know from other quarters, that he assiduously cultivated anatomy, history, and poetry.[^[35]] But his principal pursuit in Rome was the study of the remains of Grecian genius, and by which he perfected his knowledge of art. He studied, too, the ancient buildings, and was instructed in the principles of architecture for six years by Bramante, in order that on his death he might succeed him in the management of the building of S. Peter.[^[36]] He lived among the ancient sculptors, and derived from them not only their contours and drapery, and attitudes, but the spirit and principles of the art itself. Nor yet content with what he saw in Rome, he employed artists to copy the remains of antiquity at Pozzuolo and throughout all Italy, and even in Greece. Nor did he derive less assistance from living artists whom he consulted on his compositions. "The universal esteem which he enjoyed,"[^[37]] and his attractive person and engaging manners, which all accounts unite in describing as incomparable, conciliated him the favour of the most eminent men of letters of his age; and Bembo, Castiglione, Giovio, Navagero, Ariosto, Aretino, Fulvio, and Calcagnini, set a high value on his friendship, and supplied him, we may be allowed to suppose, with hints and ideas for his works.

His rival Michelangiolo, too, and his party, contributed not a little to the success of Raffaello. As the contest between Zeuxis and Parrhasius was beneficial to them both, so the rivalship of Bonarruoti and Sanzio aided the fame of Michelangiolo, and produced the paintings of the Sistine chapel; and at the same time contributed to the celebrity of Raffaello, by producing the pictures of the Vatican, and not a few others. Michelangiolo disdaining any secondary honours, came to the combat, as it were, attended by his shield bearer; for he made drawings in his grand style, and then gave them to F. Sebastiano, the scholar of Giorgione, to execute; and by these means he hoped that Raffaello would never be able to rival his productions either in design or colour. Raffaello stood alone; but aimed at producing works with a degree of perfection beyond the united efforts of Michelangiolo and Sebastian del Piombo, combining in himself a fertile invention, ideal beauty founded on a correct imitation of the Greek style, grace, ease, amenity, and an universality of genius in every department of the art. The noble determination of triumphing in such a powerful contest animated him night and day, and did not allow him any respite. It also excited him to surpass both his rivals and himself in every new work which he produced. The subjects, too, chosen for these chambers, aided him, as they were in a great measure new, or required to be treated in a novel manner. They did not profess to represent bacchanalian or vulgar scenes, but the exalted symbols of science; the sacred functions of religion; military actions, which contributed to establish the peace of the world; important events of former days, under which were typified the reigns of the Pontiffs Julius and Leo X.: the latter the most powerful protector, and one of the most accomplished judges of art. More favourable circumstances could not have conspired to stimulate a noble mind. The eulogizing of Augustus was a theme for the poets of his age, which produced the richest fruits of genius. Propertius, accustomed to sing only of the charms or the disdain of his Cinthia, felt himself another poet when called on to celebrate the triumphs of Augustus; and with newborn fervour invoked Jove himself to suspend the functions of his divinity whilst he sang the praises of the emperor.[^[38]] It is certain that such elevated subjects, in minds richly stored, must excite corresponding ideas, and thus both in poets and painters, give birth to the sublime.

Raffaello, on his arrival in Rome, says Vasari, was commissioned to paint a chamber, which was at that time called La Segnatura, and which, from the subject of the pictures, was also called the chamber of the Sciences. On the ceiling are represented Theology, Philosophy, Poetry, and Jurisprudence. Each of them has on the neighbouring façade a grand historical piece illustrative of the subject. On the basement are also historical pieces which belong to the same sciences; and these smaller performances, and the caryatides and telamoni distributed around, are monocromati or chiaroscuri, an idea entirely of Raffaello, and afterwards, it is said, continued by Polidoro da Caravaggio. Raffaello commenced with Theology, and imitated Petrarch, who in one of his visions has assembled together men of the same condition, though living in different ages. He there placed the evangelists, whose volumes are the foundation of theology; the sacred writers, who have preserved its traditions; the theologists, S. Thomas, S. Bonaventura, Scotus, and the rest who have illustrated it by their arguments; above all, the Trinity in the midst of the beatified, and beneath on an altar the eucharist, as if to express the mystery of that doctrine. There are traces of the ancient style in this piece. Gold is made use of in the glories of the saints, and in other ornamental parts; the upper glory is formed on the plan of that of S. Severo, which I have already noticed: the composition is more symmetrical and less free than in other pieces; and the whole, compared with the other compositions, seems too minute. Nevertheless, whosoever regards each part in itself, will find it of such careful and admirable execution, that he will be disposed to prefer it to all other works. It has been observed, that Raffaello began this piece at the right side, and that by the time he had arrived at the left side portion, he had made rapid strides in the art. This work must have been finished about the year 1508: and such was the surprise and admiration of the Pope, that he ordered all the works of Bramantino, Pier della Francesca, Signorelli, l'Abate di Arezzo, and Sodoma (though some of the ornamental parts by this last are preserved) to be effaced, in order that the whole chamber might be decorated by Raffaello.

In the subsequent works of Raffaello, and after the year 1509, we do not find any traces of his first style. He had adopted a nobler manner, and henceforth applied all his powers to the perfecting of it. He had now to represent, on the opposite side, Philosophy. In this he designed a gymnasium in the form of a temple, and placed the learned ancients, some in the precincts of the building, some on the ascent of the steps, and others in the plain below. In this, more than on any other occasion, he was aided by his favourite Petrarch in the third capitolo of his Fame. Plato, "che in quella schiera andò più presso al segno," is there represented with Aristotle, "più d'ingegno," in the act of disputation; and they possess also in the composition, the highest place of honour; Socrates is represented instructing Alcibiades; Pythagoras is seen, and before him a youth holds a tablet with the harmonious concords; and Zoroaster, King of Bactriana, appears with an elementary globe in his hand. Diogenes is stretched near on the ground, with his wooden bowl in his hand, "assai più che non vuol vergogna aperto:" Archimedes is seen "star col capo basso," and turning the compasses on the table, instructs the youth in geometry; and others are represented meditating, or in disputation, whose names and characters it would be possible, with careful observation, to distinguish more truly than Vasari has done. This picture is commonly called the School of Athens, which in my judgment is just as appropriate, as the name of the Sacrament bestowed on the first subject. The third picture, representing Jurisprudence, is divided into two parts. On the left side of the window stands Justinian, with the book of the Civil Law; Trebonian receives it from his hand with an expression of submission and acquiescence, which no other pencil can ever hope to equal. On the right side is seen Gregory IX. who delivers the book of the Decretals to an advocate of the Consistory, and bears the features of Julius II., who is thus honoured in the character of his predecessor. In the concluding picture, which is a personification of Poetry, is seen Mount Parnassus, where, in company of Apollo and the muses, the Greek, Roman, and Tuscan poets are represented in their own portraitures, as far as records will allow. Homer, seated between Virgil and Dante, is, perhaps, the most striking figure; he is evidently gifted with a divine spirit, and unites in his person the characters of the prophet and the poet. The historical pieces in chiaroscuro contribute, by their ornaments, to charm the sight, and preserve the unity of design. Beneath the Theology, for instance, is represented S. Augustine on the borders of the sea, instructed by the angels not to explore the mystery of the Trinity, incomprehensible to the human mind. Under the Philosophy, Archimedes is seen surprised and slain by a soldier, whilst immersed in his studies. This first chamber was finished in 1511, as that year appears inscribed near the Parnassus.

Vasari, until the finishing of the first chamber, does not speak of the improvement of his manner; on the contrary, in his life of Raffaello, he says, "although he had seen so many monuments of antiquity in that city, and studied so unremittingly, still his figures, up to this period, did not possess that breadth and majesty which they afterwards exhibited. For it happened, that the breach between Michelangiolo and the Pope, which we have before mentioned in his life, occurred about this time, and compelled Bonarruoti to flee to Florence; from which circumstance, Bramante obtaining possession of the keys of the chapel, exhibited it to his friend Raffaello, in order that he might make himself acquainted with the style of Michelangiolo;" and he then proceeds to mention the Isaiah of S. Agostino, and the Sibyls della Pace, painted after this period, and the Heliodorus. In the life of Michelangiolo, he again informs us of the quarrel which obliged him to depart from Rome, and proceeds to say, that when, on his return, he had finished one half of the work, the Pope suddenly commanded it to be exposed; "whereupon Raffaello d'Urbino, who possessed great facility of imitation, immediately changed his style, and at one effort designed the Prophets and Sibyls della Pace." This brings us to a dispute prosecuted with the greatest warmth both in Italy and other countries. Bellori attacked Vasari in a violent manner, in a work entitled: "Se Raffaello ingrandì e migliorò la maniera per aver vedute le opere di Michelangiolo," (Whether Raffaello enlarged and improved his style on seeing the works of Michelangiolo). Crespi replied to him in three letters, inserted in the Lettere Pittoriche,[^[39]] and many other disputants have arisen and stated fresh arguments.

It is not, however, our province to engage the reader in these disputations. It was greatly to the advantage of Michelangiolo's fame to have had two scholars, who, while he was yet living, and after the death of Raffaello, employed themselves in writing his life; and a great misfortune to Raffaello not to have been commemorated in the same manner. If he had survived to the time when Vasari and Condivi wrote, he would not have passed over their charges in silence. Raffaello would then have easily proved, that when Bonarruoti fled to Florence, in 1506, he himself was not in Rome, nor was called thither until two years afterwards; and that he could not, therefore, have obtained a furtive glance of the Sistine chapel. It would have been proved too, that from the year 1508, when Michelangiolo had, perhaps, not commenced his work, until 1511, in which year he exhibited the first half of it,[^[40]] Raffaello had been endeavouring to enlarge his style; and as Michelangiolo had before studied the Torso of the Belvidere, so Raffaello also formed himself on this and other marbles,[^[41]] a circumstance easily discoverable in his style. He might too have asked Vasari, in what he considered grandeur and majesty of style to consist; and from the example of the Greeks, and from reason herself, he might have informed him, that the grand does not consist in the enlargement of the muscles, or in an extravagance of attitude, but in adopting, as Mengs has observed, the noblest, and neglecting the inferior and meaner parts;[^[42]] and exercising the higher powers of invention. Hence he would have proceeded to point out the grandeur of style in the School of Athens, in the majestic edifice, in the contour of the figures, in the folds of the drapery, in the expression of the countenances, and in the attitudes; and he would have easily traced the source of that sublimity in the relics of antiquity. And if he appeared still greater in his Isaiah, he might have refuted Vasari from his own account, who assigns this work to a period anterior to 1511, and therefore contemporary as it were with the School of Athens: adding, that he elevated his style by propriety of character, and by the study of Grecian art. The Greeks observed an essential difference between common men and heroes, and again between their heroes and their gods; and Raffaello, after having represented philosophers immersed in human doubts, might well elevate his style when he came to figure a prophet meditating the revelations of God.[^[43]] All this might have been advanced by Raffaello, in order to relieve Bramante and himself from so ill supported an imputation. As to the rest, I believe he never would have denied, that the works of Michelangiolo had inspired him with a more daring spirit of design, and that in the exhibition of strong character, he had sometimes even imitated him. But how imitated him? In rendering, as Crespi himself observes, that very style more beautiful and more majestic, (p. 344). It is indeed a great triumph to the admirers of Raffaello to be able to say, whoever wishes to see what is wanting in the Sibyls of Michelangiolo, let him inspect those of Raffaello; and let him view the Isaiah of Raffaello, who would know what is wanting in the prophets of Michelangiolo.

After public curiosity was gratified, and Raffaello had obtained a glimpse of this new style, Bonarruoti closed the doors, and hastened to finish the other half of his work, which was completed at the close of 1512, so that the Pope, on the solemnization of the Feast of Christmas, was enabled to perform mass in the Sistine chapel. In the course of this year, Raffaello was employed in the second chamber on the subject of Heliodorus driven from the Temple by the prayers of Onias the high priest, one of the most celebrated pictures of the place. In this painting, the armed vision that appears to Heliodorus, scatters lightnings from his hand, while the neighing of the steed is heard amidst the attendant thunder. In the numerous bands, some of which are plundering the riches of the Temple, and others are ignorant of the cause of the surprise and terror exhibited in Heliodorus, consternation, amazement, joy, and abasement, and a host of passions, are expressed. In this work, and in others of these chambers, Raffaello, says Mengs, gave to painting all the augmentation it could receive after Michelangiolo. In this picture he introduced the portrait of Julius II., whose zeal and authority is represented in Onias. He appears in a litter borne by his grooms, in the manner in which he was accustomed to repair to the Vatican, to view this work. The Miracle of Bolsena was also painted in the lifetime of Julius.

The remaining decorations of these chambers were all illustrative of the history of Leo X., whose imprisonment in Ravenna, and subsequent liberation, is typified by St. Peter released from prison by the angel. It was in this piece that the painter exhibited an astonishing proof of his knowledge of light. The figures of the soldiers, who stand without the prison, are illuminated by the beams of the moon: there is a torch which produces a second light; and from the angel emanates a celestial splendour, that rivals the beams of the sun. He has here, too, afforded another proof how art may convert the impediments thrown in her way to her own advantage; for the place where he was painting being broken by a window, he has imagined on each side of it a staircase, which affords an ascent to the prison, and on the steps he has placed the guards overpowered with sleep; so that the painter does not seem to have accommodated himself to the place, but the place to have become subservient to the painter. The composition of S. Leo the Great, who checks Attila at the head of his army, and that of the other chamber, the battle with the Saracens in the port of Ostium, and the victory obtained by S. Leo IV., justify Raffaello's claim to the epic crown: so powerfully has he depicted the military array of men and horse, the arms peculiar to each nation, the fury of the combat, and the despair and humiliation of the prisoners. Near this performance, too, is the wonderful piece of the Incendio di Borgo (a city enveloped in fire), which is miraculously extinguished by the same S. Leo. This wonderful piece alternately chills the heart with terror, or warms it with compassion. The calamity of fire is carried to its extreme point, as it is the hour of midnight, and the fire, which already occupies a considerable space, is increased by a violent wind, which agitates the flames that leap with rapidity from house to house. The affright and misery of the inhabitants is also carried to the utmost extremity. Some rush forward with water, but are driven back by the scorching flames; others seek safety in flight, with naked feet, robeless, and with dishevelled hair; women are seen turning an imploring look to the Pontiff; mothers, whose own terrors are absorbed in fear for their offspring; and here a youth, who bearing on his shoulders his aged and infirm sire, and sinking beneath the weight, collects his almost exhausted strength to place him out of danger. The concluding subjects refer to Leo III.; the Coronation of Charlemagne, by the hand of that Pontiff, and the Oath taken by the Pope on the Holy Evangelists, to exculpate himself from the calumnies laid to his charge. In Leo, is meant to be represented Leo X., who is thus honoured in the persons of his predecessors; and in Charlemagne is represented Francis I., King of France. Many persons of the age are also figured in the surrounding group, so that there is not an historical subject in these chambers that does not contain the most accurate likenesses. In this latter department of art, also, Raffaello may be said to have been transcendant. His portraits have deceived even persons the most intimately acquainted with the subjects of them. He painted a remarkable picture of Leo X., and on one occasion the Cardinal Datary of that time, found himself approaching it with a bull, and pen and ink, for the Pope's signature.[^[44]]

The six subjects which relate to Leo, elected in 1513, were finished in 1517. In the nine years which Raphael employed on these three chambers, and also in the three following years, he made additional decorations to the Pontifical Palace; he observed the style of ornament suitable to each part of it, and thus made the Pope's residence a model of magnificence and taste for all Europe. Few have adverted to this instance of his merit. He superintended the new gallery of the palace, availing himself in part of the design of Bramante, and in part improving on him. "He then made designs for the stuccos, and the various subjects there painted, and also for the divisions, and he then appointed Giovanni da Udine to finish the stuccos and arabesques, and Giulio Romano the figures." The exposure of this gallery to the inclemencies of the air, has left little remaining besides the squalid grotesques; but those who saw it at an early period, when the unsullied splendor of the gold, the pure white of the stuccos, the brilliancy of the colours, and the newness of the marble, rendered every part of it beautiful and resplendent, must have thought it a vision of paradise. Vasari, in eulogizing it, says, "It is impossible to execute, or to conceive, a more exquisite work." The best which now remain are the thirteen ceilings, in each of which are distributed four subjects from holy writ, the first of which, the Creation of the World, Raffaello executed with his own hand as a model for the others, which were painted by his scholars, and afterwards retouched and rendered uniform by himself, as was his custom. I have seen copies of these in Rome, executed at great cost, and with great fidelity, for Catherine, Empress of Russia, under the direction of Mr. Hunterberger, and from the effect which was produced by the freshness of the colours, I could easily conceive how highly enchanting the originals must have been. But their great value consisted in Raffaello having enriched them by his invention, expression, and design, and every one is agreed that each subject is a school in itself. It appears certain too, that he was desirous of competing with Michelangiolo, who had treated the same subject in the Sistine chapel; and of appealing to the public to judge whether or not he had equalled him. To describe in a suitable manner the other pictures in chiaroscuro, and the numerous landscapes and architectural subjects, the trophies, imitations of cameos, masks, and other things which this divine artist either designed himself or formed into new combinations from the antique, is a task, says Taja, far above the reach of human powers. Taja has however himself given us a delightful description of these works.[^[45]] It confers the highest honour on Raffaello, to whom we owe the fifty-two subjects, and all the ornamental parts.

Nor were the pavements, or the doors, or other interior works in the palace of the Vatican, completed without his superintendence. He directed the pavements to be formed of terra invetriata, an ancient invention of Luca della Robbia, which having continued for many generations as a family secret, was then in the hands of another Luca. Raffaello invited him to Florence to execute this vast work, employed him in the gallery, and in many of the chambers, which he adorned with the arms of the Pope. For the couches and other ornaments of the Camera di Segnatura he brought to Rome F. Giovanni da Verona, who formed them of mosaic with the most beautiful views. For the entablatures of the chambers, and for several of the windows and doors, he engaged Giovanni Barile, a celebrated Florentine engraver of gems. This work was executed in so masterly a manner, that Louis XIII., wishing to ornament the palace of the Louvre, had all these intaglios separately copied. The drawings of them were made by Poussin, and Mariette boasted of having them in his collection. Nor was there any other work either of stone or marble for which a design was required, which did not come under the inspection of Raffaello, and on which he did not impress his taste, which was consummate also in the sister art of sculpture. A proof of this is to be seen in the Jonah, in the church of the Madonna del Popolo, in the Chigi chapel, which was executed by Lorenzetto under his direction, and which, Bottari says, may assume its place by the side of the Greek statues. Among his most remarkable works may be mentioned his designs for the tapestry in the papal chapel, the subjects of which were from the lives of the Evangelists, and the Acts of the Apostles. The cartoons for them were both designed and coloured by Raffaello; and after the tapestries were finished in the Low Countries, the cartoons passed into England, where they still remain. In these tapestries the art attained its highest pitch, nor has the world since beheld anything to equal them in beauty. They are exposed annually in the great portico of S. Peter, in the procession of the Corpus Domini, and it is wonderful to behold the crowds that flock to see them, and who ever regard them with fresh avidity and delight. But all these works of Raffaello would not have contributed to the extension of art at that period, beyond the meridian of Rome, if he had not succeeded in extending the fruits of his genius, by the means of prints. We have already noticed M. A. Raimondi, in the first book, and we have shewn that this great engraver was courteously received, and was afterwards assisted by Sanzio, whence an abundance of copies of the designs and the works of this master have been given to the world. A fine taste was thus rapidly propagated throughout Europe, and the beautiful style of Raffaello began to be justly appreciated. In a short time it became the prevailing taste, and if his maxims had remained unaltered, Italian painting would probably have flourished for as long a period as Greek sculpture.

In the midst of such a variety of occupations, Raffaello did not fail to gratify the wishes of many private individuals, who were desirous of having his designs for buildings, in which branch of art he was highly celebrated, and also of possessing his pictures. I need only to refer to the gallery of Agostini Chigi, which he ornamented with his own hand, with the well known fable of Galatea. He afterwards, with the assistance of his pupils, painted the Marriage of Psyche, at the banquet of which he assembled all the heathen deities, with such propriety of form, with their attendant symbols and genii, that in these fabulous subjects he almost rivalled the Greeks. These pictures, and those also of the chambers of the Vatican, were retouched by Maratta, with incredible care; and the method he adopted, as described by Bellori, may serve as a guide in similar cases. Raffaello also painted many altarpieces, with saints generally introduced; as that Delle Contesse at Foligno, where he introduced the Chamberlain of the Pope, alive, rather than drawn from the life: that for S. Giovanni in Monte, at Bologna, of S. Cecilia, who, charmed to rapture by a celestial melody, forgets her musical instrument, which falls neglected from her hands; that for Palermo, of Christ ascending Mount Calvary, called dello Spasimo, which, however much disparaged by Cumberland, for having been retouched, is a noble ornament of the royal collection at Madrid; and the others at Naples and at Piacenza, which are mentioned by his biographers. He also painted S. Michael for the King of France, and many other holy families[^[46]] and devotional subjects, which neither Vasari nor his other biographers have fully enumerated.

But although the creation of these wonderful works was become a habit in this great artist, still every part of his productions cannot be considered as equally successful. It is known, that in the frescos of the palace, and in the Chigi gallery, he was censured in some naked figures for errors committed, as Vasari says, by some of his school. Mengs, who varied his opinions at different periods of his life, insinuates, that Raffaello for some time seemed to slumber, and did not make those rapid strides in the art, which might have been expected from his genius. This was, probably, when Michelangiolo was for some years absent from Rome. But when he returned, and heard it reported that many persons considered the paintings of Raffaello superior to his in colour, of more beauty and grace in composition, and of a correspondent excellence in design, whilst his works were said to possess none of these qualities except the last; he was stimulated to avail himself of the pencil of Fra Sebastiano, and at the same time supplied him with his own designs. The most celebrated work which they produced in conjunction, was a Transfiguration, in fresco, with a Flagellation, and other figures, in a chapel of S. Peter in Montorio. Raffaello being subsequently employed to paint a picture for the Cardinal Giulio de' Medici, afterwards Clement VII., Sebastiano, in a sort of competition, painted another picture of the same size. In the latter was represented the raising of Lazarus; in the former, with the master's accustomed spirit of emulation, the Transfiguration. "This is a picture which combines," says Mengs, "more excellences than any of the previous works of Raffaello. The expression in it is more exalted and more refined, the chiaroscuro more correct, the perspective better understood, the penciling finer, and there is a greater variety in the drapery, more grace in the heads, and more grandeur in the style."[^[47]] It represents the mystery of the Transfiguration of Christ on the summit of Mount Tabor. On the side of the hill he has placed a band of his disciples, and with the happiest invention has engaged them in an action conformable to their powers, and has thus formed an episode not beyond the bounds of probability. A youth possessed is presented to them, that they may expel the evil spirit that torments him; and in the possessed, struggling with the presence of the demon, the confiding faith of the father, the affliction of a beautiful and interesting female, and the compassion visible in the countenances of the surrounding apostles, we are presented with perhaps the most pathetic incident ever conceived. Yet this part of the composition does not fix our regard so much as the principal subject on the summit of the mountain. There the two prophets, and the three disciples, are most admirably delineated, and the Saviour appears enveloped in a glory emanating from the fountain of eternal light, and surrounded by that chaste and celestial radiance, that is reserved exclusively for the eyes of the elect. The countenance of Christ, in which he has developed all his combined ideas of majesty and beauty, may be considered the masterpiece of Raffaello, and seems to us the most sublime height to which the genius of the artist, or even the art itself, was capable of aspiring. After this effort he never resumed his pencil, as he was soon afterwards suddenly seized with a mortal distemper, of which he died, in the bosom of the church, on Good Friday, (also the anniversary of his birthday,) 1520, aged thirty-seven years. His body reposed for some days in the chamber where he was accustomed to paint, and over it was placed this noble picture of the Transfiguration, previous to his mortal remains being transferred to the church of the Rotonda for interment. There was not an artist that was not moved to tears at this affecting sight. Raffaello had always possessed the power of engaging the affections of all with whom he was acquainted. Respectful to his master, he obtained from the Pope an assurance that his works, in one of the ceilings of the Vatican, should remain unmolested; just towards his rivals, he expressed his gratitude to God that he had been born in the days of Bonarruoti; gracious towards his pupils, he loved them, and intrusted them as his own sons; courteous even to strangers, he cheerfully lent his aid to all who asked his advice; and in order to make designs for others, or to direct them in their studies, he sometimes even neglected his own work, being alike incapable of refusing or delaying his inestimable aid. All these reflections forced themselves on the minds of the spectators, whose eyes were at one moment directed to the view of his youthful remains, and of those divine hands that had, in the imitation of her works, almost excelled nature herself; and at another moment, to the contemplation of this his latest production, which appeared to exhibit the dawn of a new and wonderful style; and the painful reflection presented itself, that, with the life of Raffaello, the brightest prospects of art were thus suddenly obscured. The Pope himself was deeply affected at his death, and requested Bembo to compose the epitaph which is now read on his tomb; and his loss was considered as a national calamity throughout all Italy. True indeed it is, that soon after his decease, Rome herself, and her territory, experienced such unheard of calamities, that many had just cause to envy him, not only the celebrity of his life, but the opportune period of his death. He was not doomed to see the illustrious Leo X., at a time when he extended the most exalted patronage to the arts, poisoned by a sacrilegious hand; nor Clement VII., pressed by an enraged enemy, seeking shelter in the Castle of S. Angelo, afterwards compelled to fly for his life, and obliged to purchase, at enormous sums, the liberty of his servants. Nor did he witness the horrors attending the sacking of Rome, the nobility robbed and plundered in their own palaces, the violation of hapless females in the convents; prelates unrelentingly dragged to the scaffold, and priests torn from the altars, and from the images of their saints, to whom they looked in vain for refuge, slaughtered by the sword, and their bodies thrown out of the churches a prey to the dogs. Nor did he survive to see that city, which he had so illustrated by his genius, and where he had for so many years shared the public admiration and esteem, wasted with fire and sword. But of this we shall speak in another place, and shall here adduce some observations on his style, selected from various authors, and more particularly from Mengs, who has ably criticised it in his works already enumerated by me, as well as in some others.

Raffaello is by common consent placed at the head of his art; not because he excelled all others in every department of painting, but because no other artist has ever possessed the various parts of the art united in so high a degree. Lazzarini even asserts, that he was guilty of errors, and that he is only the first, because he did not commit so many as others. He ought, however, to have allowed, that his defects would be excellences in any other artist, being nothing more in him than the neglect of that higher degree of perfection to which he was capable of attaining. The art, indeed, comprehends so many and such difficult parts, that no individual artist has been alike distinguished in all; even Apelles was said to yield to Amphion in disposition and harmony, to Asclepiadorus in proportion, and to Protogenes in application.

The style of design of Raffaello, as seen in those drawings, divested of colours, which now form the chief ornaments of cabinets, presents us, if we may use the term, with the pure transcript of his imagination, and we stand in amaze at the contours, grace, precision, diligence, and genius, which they exhibit. One of the most admired of his drawings I once saw in the gallery of the Duke of Modena, a most finished and superior specimen, uniting in style all the invention of the best painters of Greece, and the execution of the first artists of Italy. It has been made a question whether Raffaello did not yield to Michelangiolo in drawing; and Mengs himself confesses, that he did, as far as regards the anatomy of the muscles, and in strong expression, in which he considers Raffaello to have imitated Michelangiolo. But we need not say with Vasari, that in order to prove that he understood the naked figure as well as Michelangiolo, he appropriated to himself the designs of that great master. On the contrary, in the figures of the two youths in the Incendio di Borgo, criticised by Vasari, one of whom is in the act of leaping from a wall to escape the flames, and the other is fleeing with his father on his shoulders, he not only proved that he had a perfect knowledge of the action of the muscles and the anatomy requisite for a painter, but prescribed the occasion when this style might be used without impropriety, as in figures of a robust form engaged in violent action. He moreover commonly marked the principal parts in the naked figure, and indicated the others after the example of the better ancient masters, and where he wrought from his own ideas, his execution was most correct. On this subject Bellori may be consulted at page 223 of the work already quoted, and the annotations to vol. ii. of Mengs, (page 197,) made by the Cavaliere d'Azzara, minister of the king of Spain at Rome, an individual, who, in conferring honour on the artist, has by his own writing conferred honour on art itself.

In chasteness of design, Raffaello was by some placed on a level with the Greeks, though this praise we must consider as extravagant. Agostino Caracci commends him as a model of symmetry; and in that respect, more than in any other, he approached the ancients; except, observes Mengs, in the hands, which being rarely found perfect in the ancient statues, he had not an equal opportunity of studying, and did not therefore design them so elegantly as the other parts. He selected the beautiful from nature, and as Mariette observes, whose collection was rich in his designs, he copied it with all its imperfections, which he afterwards gradually corrected, as he proceeded with his work. Above all things, he aimed at perfecting the heads, and from a letter addressed to Castiglione on the Galatea of the Palazzo Chigi, or of the Farnesina, he discovers how intent he was to select the best models of nature, and to perfect them in his own mind.[^[48]] His own Fornarina assisted him in this object. Her portrait, by Raffaello's own hand, was formerly in the Barberini palace, and it is repeated in many of his Madonnas, in the picture of S. Cecilia, in Bologna, and in many female heads. Critics have often expressed a wish that these heads had possessed a more dignified character, and in this respect he was, perhaps, excelled by Guido Reni, and however engaging his children may be, those of Titian are still more beautiful. His true empire was in the heads of his men, which are portraits selected with judgment, and depicted with a dignity proportioned to his subject. Vasari calls the air of these heads superhuman, and calls on us to admire the expression of age in the patriarchs, simplicity of life in the apostles, and constancy of faith in the martyrs; and in Christ in the Transfiguration, he says, there is a portion of the divine essence itself transferred to his countenance, and made visible to mortal eyes.

This effect is the result of that quality that is called expression, and which, in the drawing of Raffaello has attracted more admiration of late years than formerly. It is remarkable, that not only Zuccaro, who was indeed a superficial writer, but that Vasari, and Lomazzo himself, so much more profound than either of them, should not have conferred on him that praise which he afterwards received from Algarotti, Lazzarini, and Mengs. Lionardo was the first, as we shall see in the Milanese School, to lead the way to delicacy of expression; but that master, who painted so little, and with such labour, is not to be compared to Raffaello, who possessed the whole quality in its fullest extent. There is not a movement of the soul, there is not a character of passion known to the ancients, and capable of being expressed by art, that he has not caught, expressed, and varied, in a thousand different ways, and always within the bounds of propriety. We have no tradition of his having, like Da Vinci, frequented the public streets to seek for subjects for his pencil; and his numerous pictures prove that he could not have devoted so much time to this study, while his drawings clearly evince, that he had not equal occasion for such assistance. Nature, as I have before remarked, had endowed him with an imagination which transported his mind to the scene of the event, either fabulous or remote, in which he was engaged, and awoke in him the very same emotions which the subjects of such story must themselves have experienced; and this vivid conception assisted him until he had designed his subject with that distinctness which he had either observed in other countenances, or found in his own mind. This faculty, seldom found in poets, and still more rarely in painters, no one possessed in a more eminent degree than Raffaello. His figures are passions personified; and love, fear, hope, and desire, anger, placability, humility, or pride, assume their places by turns, as the subject changes; and while the spectator regards the countenances, the air, and the gestures of his figures, he forgets that they are the work of art, and is surprised to find his own feelings excited, and himself an actor in the scene before him. There is another delicacy of expression, and this is the gradation of the passions, by which every one perceives whether they are in their commencement or at their height, or in their decline. He had observed their shades of difference in the intercourse of life, and on every occasion he knew how to transfer the result of his observations to his canvas. Even his silence is eloquent, and every actor

"Il cor negli occhi, e nella fronte ha scritto:"

the smallest perceptible motion of the eyes, of the nostrils, of the mouth, and of the fingers, corresponds to the chief movements of every passion; the most animated and vivid actions discover the violence of the passion that excites them; and what is more, they vary in innumerable degrees, without ever departing from nature, and conform themselves to a diversity of character without ever risking propriety. His heroes possess the mien of valour; his vulgar, an air of debasement; and that, which neither the pen nor the tongue could describe, the genius and art of Raffaello would delineate with a few strokes of the pencil. Numbers have in vain sought to imitate him; his figures are governed by a sentiment of the mind, while those of others, if we except Poussin and a very few more, seem the imitation of tragic actors from the scenes. This is Raffaello's chief excellence; and he may justly be denominated the painter of mind. If in this faculty be included all that is difficult, philosophical, and sublime, who shall compete with him in the sovereignty of art?

Another quality which Raffaello possessed in an eminent degree was grace, a quality which may be said to confer an additional charm on beauty itself. Apelles, who was supremely endowed with it among the ancients, was so vain of the possession that he preferred it to every other attribute of art.[^[49]] Raffaello rivalled him among the moderns, and thence obtained the name of the new Apelles. Something might, perhaps, be advantageously added to the forms of his children, and other delicate figures which he represented, but nothing can add to their gracefulness, for if it were attempted to be carried further it would degenerate into affectation, as we find in Parmegiano. His Madonnas enchant us, as Mengs observes, not because they possess the perfect lineaments of the Medicean Venus, or of the celebrated daughter of Niobe; but because the painter in their portraits and in their expressive smiles, has personified modesty, maternal love, purity of mind, and, in a word, grace itself. Nor did he impress this quality on the countenance alone, but distributed it throughout the figure in its attitude, gesture, and action, and in the folds of the drapery, with a dexterity which may be admired, but can never be rivalled. His freedom of execution was a component part of this grace, which indeed vanishes as soon as labour and study appear; for it is with the painter as with the orator, in whom a natural and spontaneous eloquence delights us, while we turn away with indifference from an artificial and studied harangue.

In regard to the province of colour, Raffaello must yield the palm to Titian and Correggio, although he himself excelled Michelangiolo and many others. His frescos may rank with the first works of other schools in that line: not so his pictures in oil. In the latter he availed himself of the sketches of Giulio, which were composed with a degree of hardness and timidity; and though finished by Raffaello, they have frequently lost the lustre of his last touch. This defect was not immediately apparent, and if Raffaello's life had been prolonged, he would have been aware of the injuries his pictures received from the lapse of time, and would not have finished them in so light a manner. He is on this account more admired in his first subject in the Vatican, painted under Julius II., than in those he executed under Leo X., for being there pressed by a multiplicity of business, and an idea of the importance of a grander style, he became less rich and firm in his colouring. That, however, he excelled in these respects is evinced by his portraits, when not having an opportunity of displaying his invention, composition, and beautiful style of design, he appears ambitious to distinguish himself by his colouring. In this respect his two portraits of Julius II. are truly admirable, the Medicean and the Corsinian: that of Leo X. between the two cardinals; and above all, in the opinion of an eminent judge, Renfesthein, that of Bindo Altoviti, in the possession of his noble descendants at Florence, by many regarded as a portrait of Raphael himself.[^[50]] The heads in his Transfiguration are esteemed the most perfect he ever painted, and Mengs extols the colouring of them as eminently beautiful. If there be any exception, it is in the complexion of the principal female, of a greyish tint, as is often the case in his delicate figures; in which he is therefore considered to excel less than in the heads of his men. Mengs has made many exceptions to the chiaroscuro of Raffaello, as compared with that of Correggio, on which connoisseurs will form their own decision. We are told that he disposed it with the aid of models of wax; and the relief of his pictures, and the beautiful effect in his Heliodorus, and in the Transfiguration, are ascribed to this mode of practice. To his perspective, too, he was most attentive. De Piles found, in some of his sketches, the scale of proportion.[^[51]] It is affirmed by Algarotti, that he did not attempt to paint di sotto in su. But to this opinion we may oppose the example we find in the third arch of the gallery of the Vatican, where there is a perspective of small columns, says Taja, imitated di sotto in su. It is true, that in his larger works he avoided it; and in order to preserve the appearance of nature, he represented his pictures as painted on a tapestry, attached by means of a running knot to the entablature of the room.

But all the great qualities which we have enumerated, would not have procured for Raffaello such an extraordinary celebrity, if he had not possessed a wonderful felicity in the invention and disposition of his subjects, and this circumstance is, indeed, his highest merit. It may with truth be said, that in aid of this object he availed himself of every example, ancient and modern; and that these two requisites have not since been so united in any other artist. He accomplishes in his pictures that which every orator ought to aim at in his speech—he instructs, moves, and delights us. This is an easy task to a narrator, since he can regularly unfold to us the whole progress of an event. The painter, on the contrary, has but the space of a moment to make himself understood, and his talent consists in describing not only what is passing, and what is likely to ensue, but that which has already occurred. It is here that the genius of Raffaello triumphs. He embraces the whole subject. From a thousand circumstances he selects those alone which can interest us; he arranges the actors in the most expressive manner; he invents the most novel modes of conveying much meaning by a few touches; and numberless minute circumstances, all uniting in one purpose, render the story not only intelligible, but palpable. Various writers have adduced in example the S. Paul at Lystra, which is to be seen in one of the tapestries of the Vatican. The artist has there represented the sacrifice prepared for him and S. Barnabas his companion, as to two gods, for having restored a lame man to the use of his limbs. The altar, the attendants, the victims, the musicians, and the axe, sufficiently indicate the intentions of the Lystrians. S. Paul, who is in the act of tearing his robe, shews that he rejects and abhors the sacrilegious honours, and is endeavouring to dissuade the populace from persisting in them. But all this were vain, if it had not indicated the miracle which had just happened, and which had given rise to the event. Raffaello added to the group the lame man restored to the use of his limbs, now easily recognized again by all the spectators. He stands before the apostles rejoicing in his restoration; and raises his hands in transport towards his benefactors, while at his feet lie the crutches which had recently supported him, now cast away as useless. This had been sufficient for any other artist; but Raffaello, who wished to carry reality to the utmost point, has added a throng of people, who, in their eager curiosity, remove the garment of the man, to behold his limbs restored to their former state. Raffaello abounds with examples like these, and he may be compared to some of the classical writers, who afford the more matter for reflection the more they are studied. It is sufficient to have noticed in the inventive powers of Raffaello, those circumstances which have been less frequently remarked; the movement of the passions, which is entirely the work of expression, the delight which proceeds from poetical conceptions, or from graceful episodes, may be said to speak for themselves, nor have any occasion to be pointed out by us.

Other things might contribute to the beauty of his works, as unity, sublimity, costume, and erudition; for which it is sufficient to refer to those delightful poetical pieces, with which he adorned the gallery of Leo X., and which were engraved by Lanfranco and Badalocchi, and are called the Bible of Raffaello. In the Return of Jacob, who does not immediately discover, in the number and variety of domestic animals, the multitude of servants, and the women carrying with them their children, a patriarchal family migrating from a long possessed abode into a new territory? In the Creation of the World, where the Deity stretches out his arms, and with one hand calls forth the sun and with the other the moon, do we not see a grandeur, which, with the simplest expression, awakes in us the most sublime ideas? And in the Adoration of the Golden Calf, how could he better have represented the idolatrous ceremony, and its departure from true religion, than by depicting the people as carried away by an insane joy, and mad with fanaticism? In point of erudition it is sufficient to notice the Triumph of David, which Taja describes and compares with the ancient bassirelievi, and is inclined to believe that there is not any thing in marble that excels the art and skill of this picture. I am aware that on another occasion he has not been exempted from blame, as when he repeated the figure of S. Peter out of prison, which hurts the unity of the subject; and in assigning to Apollo and to the muses instruments not proper to antiquity. Yet it is the glory of Raffaello to have introduced into his pictures numberless circumstances unknown to his predecessors, and to have left little to be added by his successors.

In composition also he is at the head of his art. In every picture the principal figure is obvious to the spectator; we have no occasion to inquire for it; the groups, divided by situation, are united in the principal action; the contrast is not dictated by affectation, but by truth and propriety; a figure absorbed in thought, often serves as a relief to another that acts and speaks; the masses of light and shade are not arbitrarily poised, but are in the most select imitation of nature; all is art, but all is consummate skill and concealment of art. The School of Athens, as it is called, in the Vatican, is in this respect amongst the most wonderful compositions in the world. They who succeeded Raffaello, and followed other principles, have afforded more pleasure to the eye, but have not given such satisfaction to the mind. The compositions of Paul Veronese contain a greater number of figures, and more decoration; Lanfranco and the machinists introduced a powerful effect, and a vigorous contrast of light and shade: but who would exchange for such a manner the chaste and dignified style of Raffaello? Poussin alone, in the opinion of Mengs, obtained a superior mode of composition in the groundwork, or economy of his subject; that is to say, in the judicious selection of the scene of the event.

We have thus concisely stated the perfection to which Raffaello carried his art, in the short space allotted him. There is not a work in nature or art where he has not practically illustrated his own axiom, as handed down to us by Federigo Zuccaro, that things must be represented, not as they are, but as they ought to be; the country, the elements, animals, buildings, every age of man, every condition of life, every affection, all was embraced and rendered more beautiful by the divine genius of Raffaello. And if his life had been prolonged to a more advanced period, without even approaching the term allowed to Titian or Michelangiolo, who shall say to what height of perfection he might not have carried his favourite art? Who can divine his success in architecture and sculpture, if he had applied himself to the study of them; having so wonderfully succeeded in his few attempts in those branches of art?

Of his pictures a considerable number are to be found in private collections, particularly on sacred subjects, such as the Madonna and Child, and other compositions of the Holy Family. They are in the three styles which we have before described: the Grand Duke has some specimens of each. The most admired is that which is named the Madonna della Seggiola.[^[52]] Of this class of pictures it is often doubted whether they ought to be considered as originals, or copies, as some of them have been three, five, or ten times repeated. The same may be said of other cabinet pictures by him, particularly the S. John in the desart, which is in the Grand Ducal gallery at Florence, and is found repeated in many collections both in Italy and in other countries. This was likely to happen in a school where the most common mode was the following:—The subject was designed by Raffaello, the picture prepared by Giulio, and finished by the master so exquisitely, that one might almost count the hairs of the head. When the pictures were thus finished, they were copied by the scholars of Raffaello, who were very numerous, and of the second and third order; and these were also sometimes retouched by Giulio and by Raffaello himself. But whoever is experienced in the freedom and delicacy of the chief of this school, need not fear confounding his productions with those of the scholars, or of Giulio himself; who, besides having a more timid pencil, made use of a darker tint than his master was accustomed to do. I have met with an experienced person, who declared that he could recognize the character of Giulio in the dark parts of the flesh tints, and in the middle dark tints, not of a leaden colour as Raffaello used, nor so well harmonized; in the greater quantity of light, and in the eyes designed more roundly, which Raffaello painted somewhat long, after the manner of Pietro.

On this propitious commencement was founded the school which we call Roman, rather from the city of Rome itself, than from the people, as I have before observed. For as the inhabitants of Rome are a mixture of many tongues, and many different nations, of whom the descendants of Romulus form the least proportion; so the school of painting has been increased in its numbers by foreigners whom she has received and united to her own, and who are considered in her academy of S. Luke, as if they had been born in Rome, and enjoyed the ancient rights of Romans. Hence is derived the great variety of names that we find in the course of it. Some, as Caravaggio, derived no assistance from the study of the ancient marbles, and other aids peculiar to the capital; and these may be said to have been in the Roman School, but not to have formed a part of it. Others adopted the principles of the disciples of Raffaello, and their usual method was to study diligently both Raffaello and the ancient marbles; and from the imitation of him, and more particularly of the antique, resulted, if I err not, the general character, if I may so express it, of the Roman School: the young artists who were expert in copying statues and bassirelievi, and who had those objects always before their eyes, could easily transfer their forms to the panel or the canvas. Hence their style is formed on the antique, and their beauty is more ideal than that of other schools. This circumstance, which was an advantage to those who knew how to use it, became a disadvantage to others, leading them to give their figures the air of statues, beautiful, but isolated, and not sufficiently animated. Others have done themselves greater injury from copying the modern statues of saints; a practice which facilitated the representation of devout attitudes, the disposition of the folds in the garments of the monks and priests, and other peculiarities which are not found in ancient sculpture. But as sculpture has gradually deteriorated, it could not have any beneficial influence on the sister art; and it has hence led many into mannerism in the folds of their drapery, after Bernino and Algardi; excellent artists, but who ought not to have influenced the art of painting, as they did, in a city like Rome. The style of invention in this school is, in general, judicious, the composition chaste, the costume carefully observed, with a moderate study of ornament. I speak of pictures in oil, for the frescos of this later period ought to be separately considered. The colouring, on the whole, is not the most brilliant, nor is it yet the most feeble; there being always a supply of artists from the Lombards, or Flemings, who prevented it being entirely neglected.

We may now return to the original subject of our inquiry, examine the principles of the Roman School, and attend it to its latest epoch. Raffaello at all times employed a number of scholars, constantly instructing and teaching them; whence he never went to court, as we are assured by Vasari, without being accompanied by probably fifty of the first artists, who attended him out of respect. He employed every one in the way most agreeable to his talent. Some having received sufficient instruction, returned to their native country, others remained with him as long as he lived, and after his death established themselves in Rome, where they became the germs of this new school. At the head of all was Giulio Romano, whom, with Gio. Francesco Penni, Raffaello appointed his heir, whence they both united in finishing the works on which their master was employed at his death. They associated to themselves as an assistant Perino del Vaga, and to render the connexion permanent, they gave him a sister of Penni to his wife. To these three were also joined some others who had worked under Raffaello. On their first establishment they did not meet with any great success, for, as Vasari informs us, the chief place in art being by universal consent assigned to Fra Sebastiano, through the partiality of Michelangiolo, the followers of Raffaello were kept in the back ground. We may also add, as another cause, the death of Leo X., in 1521, and the election of his successor, Adrian VI., a decided enemy to the fine arts, by whom the public works contemplated, and already commenced by his predecessor, remained neglected; and many artists, in consequence of the want of employment, occasioned by this event, and by the plague, in 1523, were reduced to the greatest distress. But Adrian dying after a reign of twenty-three months, and Giulio de' Medici being elected in his place under the name of Clement VII., the arts again revived. Raffaello, before his death, had begun to paint the great saloon, and had designed some figures, and left many sketches for the completion of it. It was intended to represent four historical events, although the subjects of some of them are disputed. These were the Apparition of the Cross, or the harangue of Constantine; the battle wherein Maxentius is drowned, and Constantine remains victor; the Baptism of Constantine, received from the hands of S. Silvester; and the Donative of the city of Rome, made to the same pontiff. Giulio finished the two first subjects, and Giovanni Francesco the other two, and they added to them bassirelievi, painted in imitation of bronze under each of the same subjects, with some additional figures. They afterwards painted, or rather finished the pictures of the villa at Monte Mario, a work ordered by the Cardinal Giulio de' Medici, and suspended until the second or third year of his papal reign. This villa was afterwards called di Madama, and there still remain many traces, although suffering from time, of the munificence of that prince, and the taste of the school of Raffaello. Giulio meanwhile, with the permission of the pope, established himself in Mantua, Il Fattore went to Naples; and some little time afterwards, in 1527, in consequence of the sacking of Rome, and the unrestrained licence of the invading army, Vaga, Polidoro, Giovanni da Udine, Peruzzi, and Vincenzio di S. Gimignano left Rome, and with them Parmigianino, who was at this time in the capital, and passionately employed in studying the works of Raffaello. This illustrious school was thus separated and dispersed over Italy, and hence it happened that the new style was quickly propagated, and gave birth to the florid schools, which form the subjects of our other books. Although some of the scholars of Raffaello might return to Rome, yet the brilliant epoch was past. The decline became apparent soon after the sacking of the city, and from the time of that event, the art daily degenerated in the capital, and ultimately terminated in mannerism. But of this in its proper place. At present, after this general notice of the school of Raffaello, we shall treat of each particular scholar and of his assistants.

Giulio Pippi, or Giulio Romano, the most distinguished pupil of Raffaello, resembled his master more in energy than in delicacy of style, and was particularly successful in subjects of war and battles, which he represented with equal spirit and correctness. In his noble style of design he emulates Michelangiolo, commands the whole mechanism of the human body, and with a masterly hand renders it subservient to all his wishes. His only fault is, that his demonstrations of motion are sometimes too violent. Vasari preferred his drawings to his pictures, as he thought that the fire of his original conception was apt to evaporate, in some degree, in the finishing. Some have objected to the squareness of his physiognomies, and have complained of his middle tints being too dark. But Niccolo Poussin admired this asperity of colour in his battle of Constantine, as suitable to the character of the subject. In the picture of the church dell'Anima, which is a Madonna, accompanied by Saints, and in others of that description, it does not produce so good an effect. His cabinet pictures are rare, and sometimes too free in their subjects. He generally painted in fresco, and his vast works at Mantua place him at the head of that school, which indeed venerates him as its founder.

Gianfrancesco Penni of Florence, called Il Fattore, who when a boy was a servant in the studio of Raffaello, became one of his principal scholars, and assisted him more than any other in the cartoons of the tapestries: he painted in the gallery of the Vatican the Histories of Abraham and Isaac, noticed by Taja. Among other works left incomplete by his master, and which he finished, is the Assumption of Monte Luci in Perugia, the lower part of which, with the apostles, is painted by Giulio, and the upper part, which abounds with Raffaellesque grace, is ascribed to Il Fattore, although Vasari assigns it to Perino. Of the works which he performed alone, his frescos in Rome have perished, and so few of his oil pictures remain, that they are rarely to be found in any collection. He is characterised by fertility of conception, grace of execution, and a singular talent for landscape. He was joint heir of Raffaello with Giulio, and wished to unite himself with him in his profession; but being coldly received by Giulio in Mantua, he proceeded to Naples, where he, as we shall see, contributed greatly to the improvement of art, although cut off by an early death. Orlandi notices two Penni in the school of Raffaello, comprehending Luca, a brother of Gianfrancesco, a circumstance not improbable, and not, as far as I know, contradicted by history. We are also told by Vasari, that Luca united himself to Perino del Vaga, and worked with him at Lucca, and in other places of Italy; that he followed Rosso into France, as we have before observed; and that he ultimately passed into England, where he painted for the king and private persons, and made designs for prints.

Perino del Vaga, whose true name was Pierino Buonaccorsi, was a relation and fellow citizen of Penni. He had a share in the works of the Vatican, where he at one time worked stuccos and arabesques with Giovanni da Udine, at another time painted chiaroscuri with Polidoro, or finished subjects from the sketches and after the style of Raffaello. Vasari considered him the best designer of the Florentine School, after Michelangiolo, and at the head of all those who assisted Raffaello. It is certain, at least, that no one could, like him, compete with Giulio, in that universality of talent so conspicuous in Raffaello; and the subjects from the New Testament, which he painted in the papal gallery, were praised by Taja above all others. In his style there is a great mixture of the Florentine, as may be seen at Rome, in the Birth of Eve, in the church of S. Marcello, where there are some children painted to the life, a most finished performance. A convent at Tivoli possesses a S. John in the desart, by him, with a landscape in the best style. There are many works by him in Lucca, and Pisa, but more particularly in Genoa, where we shall have occasion again to consider him as the origin of a celebrated school.

Giovanni da Udine, by a writer of Udine called Giovanni di Francesco Ricamatore, (Boni, p. 25,) likewise assisted Sanzio in arabesques and stuccos, and painted ornaments in the gallery of the Vatican, in the apartments of the pope, and in many other places. Indeed, in the art of working in stucco, he is ranked as the first among the moderns,[^[53]] having, after long experience, imitated the style of the baths of Titus, discovered at that time in Rome, and opened afresh in our own days.[^[54]] His foliage and shells, his aviaries and birds, painted in the above mentioned places, and in other parts of Rome and Italy, deceive the eye by their exquisite imitation; and in the animals more particularly, and the indigenous and foreign birds, he seems to have reached the highest point of excellence. He was also remarkable for counterfeiting with his pencil every species of furniture; and a story is told, that having left some imitations of carpets one day in the gallery of Raffaello, a groom in the service of the Pope coming in haste in search of a carpet to place in a room, ran to snatch up one of those of Giovanni, deceived by the similitude. After the sacking of Rome he visited other parts of Italy, leaving wherever he went, works in the most perfect and brilliant style of ornament. This will occasion us to notice him in other schools. At an advanced age he returned to Rome, where he was provided with a pension from the Pope, till the time of his death.[^[55]]

Polidoro da Caravaggio, from a manual labourer in the works of the Vatican, became an artist of the first celebrity, and distinguished himself in the imitation of antique bassirelievi, painting both sacred and profane subjects in a most beautiful chiaroscuro. Nothing of this kind was ever seen more perfect, whether we consider the composition, the mechanism, or the design; and Raffaello and he, of all artists, are considered in this respect to have approached nearest to the style of the ancients. Rome was filled with the richest friezes, façades, and ornaments over doors, painted by him and Maturino of Florence, an excellent designer, and his partner; but these, to the great loss of art, have nearly all perished. The fable of Niobe, in the Maschera d'Oro, which was one of their most celebrated works, has suffered less than any other from the ravages of time and the hand of barbarism. This loss has been in some measure mitigated by the prints of Cherubino Alberti, and Santi Bartoli, who engraved many of these works before they perished. Polidoro lost his comrade by death in Rome, as was supposed, by the plague, and he himself repaired to Naples, and from thence to Sicily, where he fell a victim to the cupidity of his own servant, who assassinated him. With him invention, grace, and freedom of hand, seem to have died. This notice of him as an artist may suffice for the present, as we shall again recur to him in the fourth book, as one of the masters of the Neapolitan School.

Pellegrino da Modena, of the family of Munari, of all the scholars of Raffaello, perhaps resembled him the most in the air of his heads, and a peculiar grace of attitude. After having painted in an incomparable manner the history of Jacob, before mentioned, and others of the same patriarch, and some from the life of Solomon, in the gallery of the Vatican, under Raffaello, he remained in Rome employed in the decoration of many of the churches, until his master's death. He then returned to his native place, where he became the head of a numerous succession of Raffaellesque painters, as we shall in due time relate.

Bartolommeo Ramenghi, or as he is sometimes named, Bagnacavallo, and by Vasari Il Bologna, is also included in the catalogue of those who worked in the gallery. There is not however any known work of his in Rome, and we may say the same of Biagio Pupini, a Bolognese, with whom he afterwards united himself to paint in Bologna. Vasari is not prodigal of praise towards the first, and writes with the most direct censure against the second. Of their merits we shall speak more fully in the Bolognese School, to which Bagnacavallo was the first to communicate a new and better style.

Besides these, Vasari mentions Vincenzio di S. Gimignano, in Tuscany, to whom, as a highly successful imitator of Raffaello, he gives great praise, referring to some façades in fresco by him, which have now perished. After the sacking of Rome he returned home, but so changed and dispirited, that he appeared quite another person, and we have no account of any of his subsequent works. Schizzone, a comrade of Vincenzio, a most promising artist, shared the same fate; and we find also, in the Bolognese School, Cavedone losing his powers by some great mental affliction. Among the subjects of the Vatican we do not find any ascribed to Vincenzio, but we may perhaps assign to him the history of Moses in Horeb, which Taja, on mere conjecture, ascribes to the bold pencil of Raffaele del Colle, who was employed by Raffaello in the Farnesina, and in the Hall of Constantine, under Giulio. Of this artist and his successors we have spoken in the first book, where we have made some additions to the account of Vasari.

Timoteo della Vite, of Urbino, after some years spent at Bologna in studying under Francesco Francia, returned to his native city, and from thence repaired to the academy which his countryman and relation Raffaello had opened in the Vatican. He assisted Raffaello at the Pace, in the fresco of the Sybils, of which he retained the cartoons; and after some time, from some cause or other, he returned to Urbino, and there passed the remainder of his days. He brought with him to Rome, a method of painting which partook much of the manner of the early masters, as may be seen in some of his Madonnas, at the palace Bonaventura, and the chapter of Urbino; and in a Discovery of the Cross in the church of the conventuals of Pesaro. He improved his style under Raffaello, and acquired much of his grace, attitudes, and colour, though he always remained a limited inventor, with a certain timidity of touch, more correct than vigorous. The picture of the Conception at the Osservanti of Urbino, and the Noli me Tangere, in the church of S. Angelo, at Cagli, are the best pieces that remain of Timoteo. Pietro della Vite, who is supposed to have been his brother, painted in the same style, but in an inferior manner. This Pietro is, perhaps, the relative and heir of Raffaello, whom Baldinucci mentions in his fifth volume. The same writer affirms, at the end of his fourth volume, that the artists of Urbino included amongst the scholars of Raffaello one Crocchia, and assign to him a picture at the Capuchins in Urbino, of which I have no further knowledge.

Benvenuto Tisi, of Ferrara, or as he is generally called, Il Garofalo, also studied only a little time under Sanzio; but it was sufficient to enable him to become, as we shall notice hereafter, the chief of the Ferrarese School. He imitated Raffaello in design, in the character of his faces, and in expression, and considerably also in his colouring, although he added something of a warmer and stronger cast, derived from his own school. Rome, Bologna, and other cities of Italy, abound with his pictures from the lives of the apostles. They are of various merit, and are not wholly painted by himself. In his large pictures he stands more alone, and many of these are to be found in the Chigi gallery. The Visitation in the Palazzo Doria, is one of the first pieces in that rich collection. This artist was accustomed, in allusion to his name, to mark his pictures with a violet, which the common people in Italy call garofalo. It does not appear from Vasari, Titi, and Taja, that Garofalo had any share in the works which were executed by Raffaello and his scholars.

Gaudenzio Ferrari is mentioned by Titi, as an assistant of Raffaello in the story of Psyche, and we shall advert to him again in another book as chief of the Milanese School. Orlandi, on the credit of some more modern writers, asserts, that he worked with Raffaello also at Torre Borgia; and before that time, he considers him to have been a scholar of Scotto and Perugino. In Florence, and in other places in Lower Italy, some highly finished pictures are attributed to him, which partake of the preceding century, though they do not seem allied to the school of Perugino. Of these pictures we shall resume our notice hereafter; at present it may be sufficient to remark, that in Lombardy, where he resided, there is not a picture in that style to be found with his name attached to it. He is always Raffaellesque, and follows the chiefs of the Roman School.

Vasari also notices Jacomone da Faenza. This artist assiduously studied the works of Raffaello, and from long practice in copying them, became himself an inventor. He flourished in Romagna, and it was from him that a Raffaellesque taste was diffused throughout that part of Italy. He is also mentioned by Baldinucci, and we shall endeavour to make him better known in his proper place.

Besides the above mentioned scholars and assistants of Raffaello, several others are enumerated by writers, of whom we may give a short notice. Il Pistoja, a scholar of Il Fattore, and probably employed by him in the works of Sanzio, as Raffaellino del Colle was with Giulio, is mentioned as a scholar of Raffaello by Baglione, and, on the credit of that writer, also by Taja. We mentioned him among the Tuscans, and shall further notice him in Naples, where we shall also find Andrea da Salerno, head of that school, whom Dominici proves to be a scholar of Raffaello.

In the Memorie di Monte Rubbiano, edited by Colucci, at page 10, Vincenzo Pagani, a native of that country, is mentioned as a pupil of the same master. There remains of him in the collegiate church there, a most beautiful picture of the Assumption; and the Padre Civalli points out another in Fallerone and two at Sarnano, in the church of his religious fraternity, much extolled, and in a Raffaellesque manner, if we are to credit report. This painter, of whom, in Piceno, I find traces to the year 1529, again appears in Umbria in 1553, where Lattanzio his son, being elected a magistrate of Perugia, he transferred himself thither, and was employed to paint the altarpiece of the Cappella degli Oddi, in the church of the Conventuals, as we have already mentioned. According to the conditions of the contract, Paparelli had a share with him in this work, and he must be considered as an assistant of Vincenzo, both because he is named as holding the second place, and because he is reported by Vasari on other occasions, as having been an assistant. But as history mentions nothing relative to this picture, except the contract, we shall content ourselves with observing, that this praiseworthy artist, who was passed over in silence for so many years, still painted in the year 1553. Whether he was a scholar of Raffaello, or whether this was a tradition which arose in his own country in progress of time, supported only on the consideration of his age and his style, is a point to be decided by proofs of more authority than those we possess. I agree with the Sig. Arciprete Lazzari, when, writing of F. Bernardo Catelani of Urbino, who painted in Cagli the picture of the great altar in the church of the Capucins, he says, that he had there exhibited the style of the school of Raffaello, but he does not consider him his scholar.

It has been asserted, that Marcantonio Raimondi painted some pictures from the sketches of Raffaello, in a style which excited the admiration of the designer himself; but this appears doubtful, and is so considered by Malvasia. L'Armenini also assigns to this school, Scipione Sacco, a painter of Cesena, and Orlandi, Don Pietro da Bagnaja, whom we shall mention in the Romagna School. Some have added to it Bernardino Lovino, and others Baldassare Peruzzi, a supposition which we shall shew to be erroneous. Padre della Valle has more recently revived an opinion, that Correggio may be ranked in the same school, and that he was probably employed in the gallery, and might have painted the subject of the Magi, attributed by Vasari to Perino. This is conjectured from the peculiar smile of the mother and the infant. But these surmises and conjectures we may consider as the chaff of that author, who has nevertheless presented us with much substantial information. We shall now advert to the foreigners of this school. Bellori has enumerated, among the imitators of Raffaello, Michele Cockier, or Cocxie, of Malines, of whom there remain some pictures in fresco in the church dell'Anima. Being afterwards in Flanders, where several works of Raffaello were engraved by Cock, he was accused of plagiarism, but still maintained a considerable reputation; as to a fertile invention he added a graceful style of execution. Many of his best pictures passed into Spain, and were there purchased at great prices. Palomino acquaints us with another excellent scholar of Sanzio, Pier Campanna, of Flanders, who, although he could not entirely divest himself of the hardness of his native school, was still highly esteemed in his day. He resided twenty years in Italy, and was employed in Venice by the Patriarch Grimani, for whom he painted several portraits, and the celebrated picture of the Magdalen led by Saint Martha to the Temple, to hear the preaching of Christ. This picture, which was bequeathed by the Patriarch to a friend, after a lapse of many years, passed into the hands of Mr. Slade, an English gentleman. Pier Campanna distinguished himself in Bologna, by painting a triumphal arch on the arrival of Charles V., by whom he was invited to Seville, where he resided a considerable time, painting and instructing pupils, among whom is reckoned Morales, who, from his countrymen, had the appellation of the divine. He was accustomed to paint small pictures, which were eagerly sought after by the English, and transferred to their country, where they are highly prized. Of his altarpieces, several remain in Seville, and we may mention the Purification, in the Cathedral, and the Deposition at S. Croce, as the most esteemed. Murillo, who was himself a truly noble artist, greatly admired and studied this latter picture, which, even after we have seen the masterpieces of the Italian School, still excites our astonishment and admiration. This artist, to some one, who, in his latter years, inquired why he so often repaired to this picture, replied, that he waited the moment when the body of Christ should reach the ground. Mention is also made of one Mosca, whether a native or foreigner I know not, as a doubtful disciple of this school. Christ on his way to Mount Calvary, now in the Academy in Mantua, is certainly a Raffaellesque picture, but we may rather consider Mosca an imitator and copyist, than a pupil of Raffaello. In the edition of Palomino, published in London, 1742, I find some others noticed as scholars of Raffaello, who being born a little before or after 1520, could not possibly belong to him; as Gaspare Bacerra, the assistant of Vasari; Alfonso Sanchez, of Portugal; Giovanni di Valencia; Fernando Jannes. It is not unusual to find similar instances in the history of painting, and the reports have for the most part originated in the last age. Whenever the artists of a country began to collect notices of the masters who had preceded them, their style had become the prevailing taste; and as if human genius could attain no improvement beyond that which it receives subserviently from another, every imitator was supposed to be a scholar of the artist imitated, and every school, arrogating to itself the names of the first masters, endeavoured to load itself with fresh honours.

[26] Hist. Rom. vol. i. ad calcem.

[27] Besides his life by Vasari, another was published by Sig. Abate Comolli, which I consider posterior to that of Vasari. Memoirs of him were also collected by Piacenza, Bottari, and other authors whom I shall notice; and I shall also avail myself of the information derived from the inspection of his pictures, and their character, and the various dates of his works.

[28] We find his name written Io. Sanctis in the Nunziata of Sinigaglia; and it appears that he was born of a father called, according to the expression of that age, Santi or Sante; a name in common use in many parts of Italy. In support of the surname of Sanzio, Bottari produces a portrait of Antonio Sanzio, which exists in the Palazzo Albani, representing him holding in his hands a document, with the title of Genealogia Raphaelis Sanctii Urbinatis. Julius Sanctius is there named as the head of the family, familiæ quæ adhuc Urbini illustris extat, ab agris dividendis cognomen imposuit, and was the progenitor of Antonio. From the latter, and through a Sebastiano, and afterwards through a Gio. Batista, descends Giovanni, ex quo ortus est Raphael qui pinxit a. 1519. It is also recorded that Sebastiano had a brother, Galeazzo, egregium pictorem, and the father of three painters, Antonio, Vincenzio, and Giulio, called maximus pictor. Thus in this branch of the Sanzii are enumerated four painters, of whom I do not find any memorial in Urbino. The family also boasts of a Canon in divinity, and a distinguished captain of infantry. The anonymous writer of Comolli confirms this illustrious origin of Raffaello; but it is highly probable, that in that age, when the forgery of genealogies, as Tiraboschi observes, was a common practice, he may have adopted it without any examination. The portrait of Antonio is well executed, but it has been said that it would have been much more so, if Raffaello had painted it a year before his death, according to the inscription. If connoisseurs (who alone ought to decide this point) should be of this opinion, it may be suspected that the person that counterfeited the hand of the artist, might also substitute the writing; or we may at least conclude, that the etymology of Sanzio should be sought for in the word Sanctis, the name of the grandfather of Raffaello, not in sancire, (to divide fields or property). In tom. xxxi. of the Ant. Picene, a will is produced of Ser Simone di Antonio, in 1477, where a Magister Baptista, qu. Peri Sanctis de Peris, who is called Pittor di grido e di eccellenza, leaves his son Tommaso his heir, to whom is substituted a son of Antonio his brother, of the name of Francesco. I may remark, that in this Batista di Pier Sante de' Pieri, we may find the surname of a family different from that of Sanzia. But on this subject I hope we shall shortly be favoured with more certain information by the Sig. Arciprete Lazzari, who has obliged me with many valuable contributions to the present edition of this work.

[29] Condivi, in his Life of Bonarruoti, (num. 67.) assures us that Michael Angelo was not of a jealous temper, but spoke well of all artists, not excepting Raffaello di Urbino, "between whom and himself there existed, as I have mentioned, an emulation in painting; and the utmost that he said was, that Raffaello did not inherit his excellences from nature, but obtained them through study and application."

[30] See the Preface to the Life of Raffaello, by Vasari, ediz. Senese, p. 228, where the will is quoted.

[31] Vasari states, that that event occurred either whilst Michaelangelo was employed upon the Statues in S. Pietro in Vincoli, or whilst he was painting the vault of the Sistine Chapel, that is, some years afterwards, when Raffaello was in Rome. To this second opinion, which is the most common one, I formerly assented; but since, on perusal of a Brief of Julius II. (Lett. Pittoriche, tom. iii. p. 320) in which that Pope invites Michael Angelo back to Rome, and promises that illæsus, inviolatusque erit, I am inclined to believe that the Cartoon was finished in 1506, which is the date of the brief; so that Raffaello, if he could not see it on his first visit to Florence, might at least have done so on his second or third.

[32] See Vasari, ed. Sen. tom. v. p. 238, where we find the Letter written from him to one of his uncles, with all the provincialisms common to the inhabitants of Urbino and its neighbourhood.

[33] Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, tom. i. p. 45. There are some facts, however, in opposition to this letter, and which seem to prove that Raffaello did not go to Rome until 1510. But the Sig. Abate Francesconi is now employed in rectifying the chronology of the Life and Works of Sanzio; and from his critical sagacity we may expect the solution of this difficulty.

[34] See Le Aggiunte al Vasari. Ed. Senese, p. 223.

[35] A sonnet by him is referred to by Sig. Piacenza, in his notes to Baldinucci, tom. xi. p. 371.

[36] In compliance with the wishes of Leo X. he made drawings of the buildings of Ancient Rome, and accompanied them with descriptions, employing the compass to ascertain their admeasurement. We owe this information to Sig. Abate Francesconi, who has restored to Sanzio a letter, formerly attributed to Castiglione. It is a sort of dedication of the work to Leo X.; but the work itself and the drawings are lost; and many of the edifices measured by Raffaello were destroyed in the following Pontificates. The Abate Morelli has made public a high eulogium on this work, by a contemporary pen, in the notes to the Notizia, page 210. It is written by one Marcantonio Michiel, who asserts, that Raffaello had drawn the ancient buildings of Rome in such a manner, and shewn their proportions, forms, and ornaments so correctly, that whoever had inspected them might be said to have seen Ancient Rome.

[37] In a brief of Leo X. 1514, mentioned by Sig. Piacenza, tom. ii. p. 321.

[38]

Cæsaris in nomen ducuntur carmina: Cæsar Dum canitur, quæso, Jupiter ipse vaces. Prop. lib. iv. Eleg. vi.

[39] Vol. ii. p. 323 et seq.

[40] See the first letter of Crespi, Lettere Pittoriche, tom. ii. p. 338.

[41] Mengs has observed, that Raffaello diligently studied the bassirelievi of the arches of Titus and Constantine, which were on the arch of Trajan, and adopted from them his manner of marking the articulations of the joints, and a more simple and an easier mode of expressing the contour of the fleshy parts. Riflessioni sopra i tre gran Pittori, &c. cap. 1.

[42] Riflessioni su la bellezza e sul gusto della Pittura, parte iii. cap. 1, and see the Osservazioni of the Cav. Azara on that tract, §. xii.

[43] A doubt has arisen on the exact time in which he painted the Prophet and the Sybils, and from the grandeur of their style doubts have been thrown on Vasari's account, that they were painted anterior to 1511. But a painter who is the master of his art, elevates or lowers his style according to his subject. The Sybils are in Raffaello's grandest style; and that they are amongst his earliest works, is proved from his having had Timoteo della Vite, as his assistant in them.

[44] Lett. Pittor. tom. v. p. 131.

[45] Commencing at p. 139.

[46] I do not find that any mention has been made of his picture in the possession of the Olivieri family at Pesaro, or of the one in the Basilica di Loreto in the Treasury, which seems to be the same which was formerly in the church of the Madonna del Popolo, or a copy of it. I have seen a similar subject in the Lauretana, belonging to the Signori Pirri, in Rome. At Sassoferrato also, on the great altar of the church of the Capucins, there is a Virgin and child, said to be by him; but it is more probably by Fra Bernardo Catelani. There exist engravings of the two first, but I have not seen any of the last.

[47] Riflessioni sopra i tre gran Pittori, &c., cap. i. § 2.

[48] Lo dico con questa condizione che V. S. si trovasse meco a far la scelta del meglio: ma essendo carestia e di buoni giudici e di belle donne, mi servo di una certa idea che mi viene in mente. Lett. Pittor. tom. i. p. 84.

[49] Plin. Hist. Natur. lib. xxxv. cap. 10. Quintil. Instit. Orat. xii. 10.

[50] Portraits of Raffaello are to be found in the Duomo, and in the Sacristy of Siena, in more than one picture; but it is doubtful whether by his own hand or that of Pinturicchio. That which is mentioned in the Guida di Perugia, as being in a picture of the Resurrection at the Conventuals, is said to be by Pietro Perugino: and in the Borghese gallery in Rome, there is one, supposed to be by the hand of Timoteo della Vite. The portrait in the gallery in Florence, by Da Vinci, bears some resemblance to Raffaello, but it is not he. Another which I have seen in Bologna, ought, perhaps, to be ascribed to Giulio Romano. One of the most authentic portraits of Raffaello, by his own hand, next to the one in the picture of S. Luke, is that in the Medici Collection in the Stanza de' Pittori, though this is not in his best manner.

[51] Idée de Peintre parfait, chap. xix.

[52] Engraved by Morghen. The three figures, the Madonna, the Infant, and St. John, appear almost alive. It should seem that Raffaello made several studies for this picture, and he painted one without the St. John, which remained for some time in Urbino. I saw a copy in the possession of the Calamini family, at Recanati, which was said to be by Baroccio, and at all events belonging to his school. I have seen the same subject in the Casa Olivieri, at Pesaro, and at Cortona, in the possession of another noble family, to whom it had passed by inheritance from Urbino, and was considered to be by Raffaello. The faces in these are not so beautiful, nor the colours so fine; they are round, and in a larger circle, with some variations: I have also seen a copy in the Sacristy of S. Luigi de' Franzesi, in Rome, and in the Palazzo Giustiniani.

[53] Morto da Feltro sotto Alessandro VI., cominciò a dipingere a grottesco, ma senza stucchi. Baglione, Vite, p. 21.

[54] The entrance into these baths was designedly and maliciously closed. Serlio, in speaking of the various arabesques in Pozzuolo, Baja, and Rome, says that they were injured or destroyed by the artists who had copied them, through a jealous feeling lest others should also avail themselves of the opportunity of studying them, (lib. iv. c. 11). The names of these destroyers, which Serlio has suppressed, posterity has been desirous of recovering, and some have accused Raffaello, others Pinturicchio, and others Vaga, or Giovanni da Udine, or rather his scholars and assistants, "of whom," says Vasari, "there were an infinite number in every part of Italy." This subject is ably discussed by Mariotti, in Lettera ix. p. 224, and in the Memorie delle belle Arti, per l'anno 1788, p. 24.

[55] It was charged on the office of the Piombo, or papal signet, when Sebastiano da Venezia was invested with it, and was a pension of three hundred scudi. Padre Federici observes that the one was designated Fra Sebastiano, but that the other was not called Fra Giovanni; nor is this remarkable, for a Bishop is called Monsignore, but the person who enjoys a pension charged upon a Bishoprick has not the same title. It cannot however be deduced from this, as Federici wishes to do, that Sebastiano was first Frate di S. Domenico, by the name of F. Marco Pensaben, and afterwards secularized by the Pope, and appointed to the signet, and that he retained the Fra in consequence of his former situation.

ROMAN SCHOOL.

EPOCH III.

The art declines in consequence of the public calamities of Rome, and gradually falls into mannerism.

After the mournful events of the year 1527, Rome for some time remained in a state of stupor, contemplating her past misfortunes and her future destiny; and, like a vessel escaped from shipwreck, began slowly to repair her numerous losses. The soldiers of the besieging army, among other injuries committed in the Apostolic palace, had defaced some heads of Raffaello; and F. Sebastiano, an artist by no means competent to such a task, was employed to repair them. This, at least, was the opinion of Titian, who was introduced to these works, and ignorant of the circumstances, asked Sebastiano what presumptuous wretch had had the audacity to attempt their restoration;[^[56]] an impartial observation, against which even the patronage of Michelangiolo could not shield the artist. Paul III. was now in possession of the papal chair, and under his auspices the arts again began to revive. The decoration of the palace of Caprarola, and other works of Paul and his nephews, gave employment to the painters, and happy had these patrons been, could they have found a second Raffaello. Bonarruoti, as we have observed, was engaged by the Pope, and gave to the Roman School many noble specimens of art, though he formed but few scholars. Sebastiano, after the death of Raffaello, freed from all further competition with that great artist, and honoured with the lucrative office of the papal signet, seemed disposed to rest from his labours; and as he had never, at any time, discovered great application, he now resigned himself to a life of vacant leisure, and Vasari does not mention with commendation any pupil of his school except Laureti.[^[57]] Giulio Romano was now invited back to Rome, and the superintendence of the building of S. Peter's offered to him, but death prevented his return to his native city. Perino del Vaga, however, repaired to Rome, and might, himself, have effected the restoration of art, if his magnanimity had corresponded with the sublimity of his mind. But he did not inherit the daring genius of his master. He communicated his instructions with jealousy, and worked with a spirit of gain, or to speak correctly, he did not paint himself, but undertaking works of more or less consequence, he allowed his scholars to execute them, often to the injury of his own reputation. He continued to secure to himself artists of the first talents, as we shall see; but this was done with the intention of making them dependant on him, and to prevent their interfering with his emoluments and commissions. But together with the good, he engaged also many indifferent and inferior artists, whence it happens, that in the chambers of the castle of S. Angelo, and in other places, we meet with so marked a difference in many of his works. Few of his scholars attained celebrity. Luzio Romano is the most noted, and possessed a good execution. Of him there exists a frieze in the Palazzo Spada; and for some time, too, he had for an assistant Marcello Venusti of Mantua, a young man of great talents, but diffident, and probably standing in need of more instruction than Perino afforded him. He afterwards received some instructions from Bonarruoti, whose ideas he executed in an excellent manner, as I have mentioned before, and by his aid he became himself also a good designer.[^[58]] Perino, by these means, always abounded in work and in money. A similar traffic in the art was carried on by Taddeo Zuccaro, if we are to believe Vasari; and by Vasari himself, too, if we may be allowed to judge from his pictures.

The actual state of the art at this period may be ascertained from a view of the numerous works produced; but none are so distinguished as the paintings in the Sala Regia, commenced under Paul III., and scarcely finished, after a lapse of thirty years, in 1573. Of these Vaga had the direction, as Raffaello had formerly had, of the chambers of the Vatican. He planned the compartments, ornamented the ceiling, directed all the stuccos, cornices, devices, and large figures, and all in the style of a great master. He then applied himself to design the subjects for his pencil, and was employed on them when he was carried off by death in 1547. Through the partiality of Michelangiolo, he was succeeded by Daniel di Volterra, who had already worked in stucco, under his direction, in the same place. Volterra resolved to represent the donations of those sovereigns who had extended or consolidated the temporal dominion of the church, whence the chamber was called Sala dei Regi, and this idea was, in some degree, though with variations, continued by succeeding artists. Volterra was naturally slow and irresolute, and after painting the Deposition from the Cross, which we have mentioned as being executed with the assistance of Michelangiolo, he produced no more of these prodigies of art. He had indeed begun some designs, but on the death of the Pope, in 1549, he was compelled, in order to accommodate the conclave, to remove the scaffolding, and expose the work unfinished. It did not meet with public approbation, nor was it continued under Julius III., and still less under Paul IV., in whose reign the art was held in so little respect, that the apostles, painted by Raffaello in one of the chambers of the Vatican, were displaced.

Pius IV., who resumed the work, on the suggestion of Vasari, in 1561, had intended to charge Salviati with the entire execution of it; but, by the intercessions of Bonarruoti, was at length prevailed on to assign one half of the apartment to Salviati, and the other half to Ricciarelli, though this did not contribute to expedite the work. Pirro Ligorio, a Neapolitan, was at this time held in high esteem by the Pope. He was an antiquarian, though not of great celebrity, but a good architect, and a fresco painter of some merit;[^[59]] an enthusiast too, and alike jealous of Ricciarelli, for the homage he paid to Bonarruoti, and of Salviati, for the respect which he did not shew to Ligorio himself. Remarking that the Pope wished to hasten the completion of the work, he proposed to select a number of scholars, and to divide the work amongst them. Vasari adds, that Salviati was disgusted and left Rome; where, on his return, he died, without finishing his work; and that Ricciarelli, who was always slow, never touched it again, and died also after the lapse of some little time. The completion of the work was then entrusted, as far as possible, to the successors of Raffaello. Livio Agresti da Forli, Girolamo Siciolante da Sermoneta, and Marco da Pino, of Sienna, although they had received their first instructions from other masters, had been instructed by Perino del Vaga, and had assisted in his cartoons. Taddeo Zuccaro had accomplished himself under Giacomone da Faenza, and had made his younger brother Federigo an able artist. To these the work was assigned, and there were added to them Samacchini and Fiorini, Bolognese artists; and Giuseppe Porta della Garfagnana, called Giuseppe Salviati. This latter had been the pupil of Francesco Salviati, from whom he learnt the principles of design; he was afterwards a follower of the school of Venice, where he resided. Of these numerous artists Vasari assigns the palm to Taddeo Zuccaro, but the court was so much pleased with Porta, that it was in contemplation to destroy the works of the other artists, in order that the apartment might be finished by him alone. He represented Alexander III. in the act of bestowing his benediction on Frederick Barbarossa, in the Piazza of S. Mark, in Venice; and he here indulged his taste for architectural ornaments, in the Venetian manner. When however this work is viewed and compared with that of other artists, we discover a sameness of style, the character of the time; a deficiency of strength in the colours and shadows is the common failing. It seems as if the art, through a long course of years, had become debilitated: it discovers the lineaments of a better age, but feebly expressed and deprived of their primitive vigour. That portion of the work which remained unfinished, was, after the death of Pius IV., completed by Vasari and his school, under his successor; and some little was supplied under Gregory XIII., who was elected in 1572.

With that year a reign commenced but little auspicious to art, and still less so was the Pontificate of Sixtus V., the successor of Gregory. These Pontiffs erected or ornamented so many public buildings, that we can scarcely move a step in Rome, without meeting with the papal arms of a dragon or a lion. Baglione has accurately described them, and to him we are indebted for the lives of the artists of this and the following period. It is natural for men advanced in years to content themselves with mediocrity in the works which they order, from the apprehension of not living to see them, if they wait for the riper efforts of talent. Hence those artists were the most esteemed, and the most employed, who possessed despatch and facility of execution, particularly by Sixtus, of whose severity towards dilatory artists we shall shortly adduce a memorable instance. This inaccuracy of style was continued to the time of Clement VIII., when a number of works were hastily finished to meet the opening of the holy year 1600. Under these pontiffs the painters of Italy, and even the oltramontani, inundated Rome with their works, in the same manner that the poets and philosophers had filled that city with their writings in the time of Domitian and Marcus Aurelius. Every one indulged his own taste; and the style of many was deteriorated through rapidity of execution. Thus the art, particularly in fresco, became the employment of a mechanic, not founded in the just imitation of nature, but in the capricious ideas of the artist.[^[60]] Nor was the colouring better than the design. At no period do we find such an abuse of the simple tints, in none so feeble a chiaroscuro, or less harmony. These are the mannerists, who peopled the churches, convents, and saloons of Rome with their works, but in the collections of the nobility they have not had the same good fortune.

This era, nevertheless, is not wholly to be condemned, as it contains several great names, the relics of the preceding illustrious age. We have enumerated the painters who flourished in Rome in the first reigns of this century, and we ought to notice a number of others. They were for the most part foreigners, and ought to be introduced in other schools. I shall here describe those particularly, who were born within the limits of the Roman School, and those who, being established in it, taught and propagated their own peculiar style.

Girolamo Siciolante da Sermoneta, who adopted Raffaello's style, may be enumerated among the scholars of that great man, from his felicitous imitation of their common master. In the Sala de' Regi, in the Vatican, he painted Pepin, King of France, bestowing Ravenna on the church, after having made Astolfo, King of the Lombards, his prisoner. But he approached Raffaello more closely in some of his oil pictures than in his frescos, as in the martyrdom of S. Lucia, in the church of S. Maria Maggiore; in the Transfiguration in Ara Cœli, and in the Nativity in the church della Pace, a subject which he repeated in the most graceful style in the church of Osimo. His masterpiece is in Ancona on the great altar in the church of S. Bartolommeo, a vast composition, original and rich in invention, and commensurate with the grandeur of the subject, and the multitude of saints that are introduced in it. The throne of the Virgin is seen above, amidst a brilliant choir of angels, and on either side a virgin saint in the attitude of adoration. To this height there is a beautiful ascent on each side, and the picture is thus divided into a higher and lower part, in the latter of which is the titular saint, a half naked figure vigorously coloured, together with S. Paul and two other saints, the whole in a truly Raffaellesque style. This altarpiece possesses so much harmony, and such a force of colour, that it is esteemed by some persons the best picture in the city. If any thing be wanting in it, it is perhaps a more correct observance of the perspective. Sermoneta did not paint many pictures for collections. He excelled in portrait painting.

A similar manner, though more laboured, and formed on the styles of Raffaello and Andrea del Sarto, was adopted by Scipione Pulzone da Gaeta, who was educated in the studio of Jacopino del Conte. He died young in his thirty-eighth year, but left behind him a great reputation, partly in the painting of portraits, of which he executed a great number for the popes and princes of his day, and with so much success, that by some he is called the Vandyke of the Roman School. He was a forerunner of Seybolt in the high finishing of the hair, and in representing in the pupil of the eye the reflexion of the windows, and other objects as minute and exact as in real life. He also painted some pictures in the finest style, as the Crucifixion in the Vallicella, and the Assumption in S. Silvestro at Monte Cavallo, a composition of chaste design, great beauty of colouring, and brilliant in effect. In the Borghese collection is a Holy Family by him, and in the gallery in Florence, a Christ praying in the garden; and in other places are to be found some of his cabinet pictures, deservedly held in high esteem.

Taddeo and Federigo Zuccaro have been called the Vasaris of this school; for as Vasari trod in the steps of Michelangiolo, so these artists professed to follow Raffaello. They were the sons of an indifferent painter of S. Angiolo in Vado, called Ottaviano Zuccaro, and came to Rome one after the other, and in the Roman state executed a vast number of works, some good, some indifferent, and others, when they allowed their pupils to take a share in them, absolutely bad. A salesman, who dealt in the pictures of these artists, was accustomed, like a retailer of merchandize, to ask his purchasers whether they wished for a Zuccaro of Holland, of France, or of Portugal; intimating by this that he possessed them of all qualities. Taddeo, who was the elder of the two, studied first under Pompeo da Fano, and afterwards with Giacomone da Faenza. From the latter and other good Italian artists, whom he assiduously studied, he acquired sufficient talent to distinguish himself. He adopted a style which, though not very correct, was unconstrained and engaging, and very attractive to such as do not look for grandeur of design. He may be compared to that class of orators who keep the attention of their hearers awake, not from the nature of their subject, but from the clearness of their language, and from their finding, or thinking they find, truth and nature in every word. His pictures may be called compositions of portraits; the heads are beautiful, the hands and feet not negligently painted, nor yet laboured, as in the Florentine manner; the dress and ornaments, and form of the beard, are agreeable to the times; the disposition is simple, and he often imitates the old painters in shewing on the canvass only half figures in the foreground, as if they were on a lower plain. He often repeated the same countenance, and his own portrait. In his hands, feet, and the folds of his drapery, he is still less varied, and not unfrequently errs in his proportions.

In Rome are vast works of Taddeo, in fresco, and amongst the best may be ranked the history of the Evangelists, in the church of the Consolazione. He left few pictures in oil. There is a Pentecost by him in the church of the Spirito Santo in Urbino, which city also possesses some other of his works, though not in his best style. He is most pleasing in his small cabinet pictures, which are finished in the first style of excellence. One of the best of these, formerly possessed by the Duke of Urbino, is now in the collection of the noble family of Leopardi, in Osimo. It is a Nativity of our Lord, in Taddeo's best manner, but none of his productions have added so much to his celebrity as the pictures in the Farnese Palace of Caprarola, which were engraved by Preninner in 1748. They represent the civil and military history of the illustrious family of the Farnesi. There occur also other subjects, sacred and profane, of which the most remarkable is the Stanza del Sonno, the subject of which was executed in a highly poetical manner, from the suggestions of Caro in a delightful letter, which was circulated among his friends, and is reprinted in the Lettere Pittoriche, (tom. iii. l. 99). Strangers who visit Caprarola, often return with a higher opinion of this artist than they carried with them. It is true that a number of young artists, fully his equal, or perhaps superior to him, were employed there, both in conjunction with him and after his death, whose works ought not to be confounded with his, though it is not always easy to distinguish them. Like Raffaello, he died at the age of thirty-seven, and his monument is to be seen at the side of that illustrious master in the Rotunda.

Federigo, his brother and scholar, resembled him in style, but was not equal to him in design, having more mannerism than Taddeo, being more addicted to ornament, and more crowded in his composition. He was engaged to finish in the Vatican, in the Farnese Palace, in the church of La Trinità de' Monti, and other places, the various works which his brother had left incomplete at his death; and he thus succeeded, as it were, to the inheritance of his own house. He had the reputation of possessing a noble style, and was invited by the Grand Duke Francis I. to paint the great dome of the metropolitan church at Florence, which was commenced by Vasari, and left unfinished at his death. Federigo in that task designed more than three hundred figures, fifty feet in height, without mentioning that of Lucifer, so gigantic that the rest appeared like children, for so he informs us, adding, that they were the largest figures that the world had ever seen.[^[61]] But there is little to admire in this work except the vastness of the conception,[^[62]] and in the time of Pier da Cortona, there was an intention of engaging that artist to substitute for it a composition of his own, had not the apprehension that his life might not be long enough to finish it, frustrated the design. After the painting of this dome, every work on a large scale in Rome was assigned to Federigo, and the Pope engaged him to paint the vault of the Paolina, and thus give the last touch to a work commenced by Michelangiolo. About this period, in order to revenge himself on some of the principal officers of the Pope who had treated him with indignity, he painted, and exposed to public view, an allegorical picture of Calumny,[^[63]] in which he introduced the portraits of all those persons who had given him offence, representing them with asses' ears. His enemies, on this, made such complaints, that he was compelled to quit the dominions of the Pope. He therefore left Rome and visited Flanders, Holland, and England, and was afterwards invited to Venice to paint the submission of the Emperor Federigo Barbarossa to Pope Alexander III., in the Palazzo Pubblico, and he was there highly esteemed and constantly employed. The Pontiff being by this time appeased, Federigo returned to finish the work he had left imperfect, and which is perhaps the best of all he executed in Rome, without the assistance of his brother. The larger picture also of S. Lorenzo in Damaso, and that of the Angels in the Gesù, and other of his works in various churches, are not deficient in merit. Federigo built for himself a house in the Monte Pincio, and decorated it with pictures in fresco, portraits of his own family, conversazioni, and many novel and strange subjects, which he painted with the assistance of his scholars, and at little expense; but on this occasion more than on any other, he appears an indifferent artist, and may be called the champion of mediocrity.

Federigo was afterwards invited to Madrid by Philip II.; but that monarch not being satisfied with his works, they were effaced, and their places supplied by Tibaldi, and he himself, with an adequate pension, was sent back to Italy. He undertook another journey late in life, visiting the principal cities of Italy, and leaving specimens of his art in every place where he was called to exercise his talents. One of the best of these is an Assumption of the Virgin, in an Oratory of Rimino, on which he inscribed his name, and the Death of the Virgin, at S. Maria in Acumine, with some figures of the Apostles, more finished than usual with him. A simple and graceful style is observable in his Presepio, in the cathedral of Foligno, and in two pictures from the life of the Virgin, in a chapel of Loreto, painted for the Duke of Urbino. The Cistercian monks, at Milan, possess two large pictures in their library on the Miracle della Neve, with a numerous assemblage of figures, the countenances in his usual lively manner, the colouring varied and well preserved. In the Borromei college, in Pavia, is a saloon painted in fresco, with subjects from the life of S. Carlo. The most admired of these is the saint at prayer in his retirement; the other pieces, the Consistory in which was his chapel, and the Plague of Milan, would be much better, if the figures were fewer. He returned to Venice, where his great picture remained, and which had not been so much injured by time, as by a sarcasm of Boschini on certain sugar [Zucchero] of very poor quality lately imported into Venice, in consequence of which he retouched his work, and wrote on it, by way of a memorial, Federicus Zuccarus f. an. sal. 1582, perfecit an. 1603. It is one of his best works, copious, and, agreeably to Zanetti, beautiful and well sustained. He then went to Turin, where he painted a S. Paul, for the Jesuits, and began to ornament a gallery for Charles Emanuel, Duke of Savoy; and it was in that city that he first published La idea de' Pittori, Scultori, e Architetti, which he dedicated to the Duke. He afterwards returned into Lombardy, where he composed two other works, the one intitled La Dimora di Parma del Sig. Cav. Federigo Zuccaro: the other, Il Passaggio per Italia colla dimora di Parma del Sig. Cav. Federigo Zuccaro, both printed in Bologna, in 1608. In the following year, on his return to his native place, he fell sick in Ancona, where he died. Baglione admired the versatility of talent in this artist, which extended to sculpture and architecture; but more than all he admired his good fortune, in which he exceeded all his contemporaries. This distinction he owed in a great measure to his personal qualities, to his noble presence, his encouragement of letters, his quality of attaching persons to him, and his liberality, which led him to expend in a generous manner the large sums he derived from his works.

He appears to have written with the intention of rivalling and excelling Vasari. Whatever was the cause, Vasari was disliked by him, as may be gathered from the notes to his Lives, occasionally cited by the annotator of the Roman edition; and is charged by him with spleen and malignity, particularly in the life of Taddeo Zuccaro. In order to excel Vasari, it seems he chose an abstruse mode of writing, in opposition to the plain style of that author. The whole work, printed in Turin, is involved in its design, and instead of precepts, contains speculative metaphysical opinions, which tend more to raise disputes than to convey information. The language is incongruous and affected, and even the very titles to the chapters are interwoven with many absurdities, as that of the 12th, Che la filosofia e il filosofare è disegno Metaforico similitudinario. This style may perhaps impose on the ignorant, but cannot deceive the learned.[^[64]] The latter do not esteem a writer for pedantic expressions adopted from the Greek and Latin authors; but for a correct mode of definition, for an accuracy of analysis, for a sagacity in tracing effects to their true causes, and for a manner strictly adapted to the subject. These qualities are not to be found in the works of Federigo, where we find philosophical expressions mingled with puerile reflections, as in the etymology of the word disegno, which after much circumlocution, he informs us, owes its derivation to Segno di Dio; and instead of affording any instructive maxims to youth, he presents them with a mass of sterile and ill directed speculations. Hence we may be said to derive more information from a single page of Vasari, than from this author's whole work. Both Mariette and Bottari have shewn the little esteem in which they held this work, by their correspondence, inserted in the 6th volume of the Lettere Pittoriche. Nor are his other two works of greater utility, one of which contains some arguments in the same style, which are proposed as a theme for disputation in the Academy of the Innominati, in Parma.

It is generally thought that this treatise of Zuccaro was composed in Rome, where he presided in the Academy of S. Luke. That academy was instituted in the pontificate of Gregory XIII., who signed the brief for its foundation at the instance of Muziano, as Baglione relates in the life of that artist. He further states, that when the ancient church of S. Luke, on the Esquiline, was demolished, the seat I believe of the society of painters, the church of S. Martina was allotted to them, at the foot of the Campidoglio. But this brief does not seem to have been used until the return of Zuccaro from Spain, as according to the same writer, it was he who put it in execution. And this must have occurred in 1595, if the year which was celebrated by the painters of S. Luke in 1695, was the true centenary of the Academy. But the origin of the institution may be dated, agreeably to some persons, from the month of November, 1593, as mentioned by the Sig. Barone Vernazza, who, among the first promoters, or members, includes the Piedmontese Arbasia, on the relation of Romano Alberti. Baglione says that Federigo was declared president by common consent; and that that day was a sort of triumph to him, as he was accompanied on his return home by a company of artists and literary persons; and in a little time afterwards he assigned a saloon in his own house for the use of the academy. He wrote both in poetry and in prose in the Academy of S. Luke, which is referred to more than once in his greater work. He evinced an extraordinary affection for this institution, and according to the example of Muziano, he named it the heir of his estate, in the event of the extinction of his family. He was succeeded in the presidency by Laureti, and a series of eminent artists down to our own time. The sittings of the academy have now for a long time past been fixed in a house contiguous to the church of S. Martina, which is decorated with the portraits and works of its members. The picture of S. Luke, by Raffaello, is there religiously preserved, together with his own portrait; and there too is to be seen the skull of Raffaello, in a casket, the richest spoil ever won by death from the empire of art. Of this academy we shall speak further towards the conclusion of this third book. We will now return to Federigo.

The school of this artist received distinction from Passignano and other scholars, elsewhere mentioned by us. To these we may add Niccolo da Pesaro, who painted in the church of Ara Cœli; but whose best piece is a Last Supper in the church of the sacrament at Pesaro. It is a picture so well conceived and harmonized, and so rich in pictorial ornament, that Lazzarini has descanted on it in his lectures as one of the first of the city. It is said that Baroccio held this artist in great esteem. Baglione commended him for his early works, but it must be confessed that he did not persevere in his first style, and fell into an insipid manner, whence he suffered both in reputation and fortune. Another artist of Pesaro, instructed by Zuccaro, was Gio. Giacomo Pandolfi, whose works are celebrated in his native city, and do not yield the palm to those of Federigo, as the picture of S. George and S. Carlo in the Duomo. He ornamented the whole chapel in the Nome di Dio, with a variety of subjects in fresco, from the Old and New Testament; but as he was then become infirm from age and the gout, they did not add much to his fame. His greatest merit was the instilling good principles into Simon Canterini, of whom, as well as of the Pesarese artists his followers, we shall write at large in the school of Bologna. One Paolo Cespede, a Spaniard, called in Rome Cedaspe, also received his education from Zuccaro. He commenced his career in Rome, and excited great expectations from some pictures in fresco, which are still to be seen at the church of Trinità de' Monti, and other places. He had adopted a natural style, and was in a way to rise in his profession, when he obtained an ecclesiastical benefice in his native country, and retired to reside upon it. Marco Tullio Montagna accompanied Federigo to Turin as an assistant; and a small picture of S. Saverio and other saints in a church of that city, generally attributed to the school of Zuccaro, is probably by him. He painted in Rome in the church of S. Niccolo in Carcere, in the vaults of the Vatican, and in many other places, in a tolerable style, but nothing more.

After the above named artists a crowd of contemporaries present themselves, more particularly those who had the direction of the works under Gregory XIII. The Sala de' Duchi was entrusted to Lorenzino of Bologna, who was invited to Rome from his native city, where he enjoyed the reputation of an excellent painter, and deservedly so, as we shall see in his place. He undertook the decoration of the gallery of the Vatican, which, from the vast size of that building, forms a boundless field of art. Niccolò Circignani, or delle Pomarance, already mentioned in the first book, distributed the work amongst a number of young artists, who there painted historical subjects, landscapes, and arabesques. The Pope was desirous that the walls also should serve the cause of science, and ordered the compartments to be adorned with geographical delineations of ancient and modern Italy, a task which was assigned to Padre Ignazio Danti, a Domenican, a mathematician and geographer of his court, and who was afterwards promoted to the bishopric of Alatri. Ignazio was born in Perugia, of a family devoted to the fine arts, and had two brothers, painters; Girolamo, of whom there remain some works in S. Pietro, on the model of Vasari; and Vincenzio, who in Rome assisted Ignazio, and there died, and was a good fresco painter. Another grand work was also undertaken about this time, which was the continuation of the gallery of Raffaello, in an arm of the building contiguous to it, where, in conformity to the plan of Raffaello, it was intended to paint four subjects in every arcade, all from the New Testament. Roncelli, the scholar of Circignano, our notice of whom we shall reserve to a subsequent epoch, was charged with the execution of this plan, but was himself subject to the direction of Padre Danti, experience having shewn that the entire abandonment of a design to the direction of practical artists is injurious to its execution, as there are few that, in the choice of inferior artists, are not governed by influence, avarice, or jealousy. The selection, therefore, was reserved to Danti, who to an excellent practical knowledge of the art of design, united moral qualities that insured success: and under his direction the whole work was regulated and conducted in such a manner, that the spirit of Raffaello seemed to be resuscitated in the precincts of the Vatican. But the hand was no longer the same, and the imbecility which was apparent in the new productions, when compared with the old, betrayed the decline of the art, though we occasionally meet with subjects by Tempesti, Raffaellino da Reggio, the younger Palma, and Girolamo Massei, which reflect a ray of honour on the age.

Another superintendant of the works of the Vatican, but rather in architecture than in painting, was Girolamo Muziano da Brescia, who, undistinguished in his native place, came young to Rome, and was there considered the great supporter of true taste. He derived his principles both in design and colour from the Venetian School, and early acquired such skill in landscape, that he was named in Rome Il Giovane de' Paesi. But he soon afterwards adopted a more elevated style, and devoted himself with such obstinate assiduity to study, that he shaved his head in order to prevent himself from going out of the house. It was at this time that he painted the Raising of Lazarus, afterwards transferred from the church of S. Maria Maggiore to the Quirinal Palace; and which, when exposed to public view, immediately conciliated to him the esteem and protection of Bonarruoti. His pictures occur in various churches and palaces of Rome, and are often ornamented with landscapes in the style of Titian. The church of the Carthusians possesses one of singular beauty. It represents a troop of Anchorets attentively listening to a Saint. There is great elegance and good disposition in the picture of the Circumcision in the Gesù, and the Ascension in Ara Cœli displays an intimate knowledge of art. The picture too of S. Francis receiving the Stigmata, in the church of the Conception, is an enchanting piece, both as regards the figures and the landscape. Nor was he beneath himself in the pictures which he executed in the Duomo at Orvieto, which are highly commended by Vasari. The chapel of the Visitation in the Basilica Loretana, possesses three pictures by him, and that of the Probatica discovers great originality and expression. In the Duomo of Foligno, a picture by him in fresco, of the Miracles of S. Feliciano is pointed out, which was formerly hidden by dust, but was a few years ago restored in a wonderful manner to all its original freshness and charm of colour.

The figures of Muziano are accurately drawn, and we not unfrequently trace in them the anatomy of Michelangiolo. He excelled in painting military and foreign dresses; and above all, in representing hermits and anchorets, men of severe aspects, whose bodies are attenuated by abstinence, and his style, in general, inclines rather to the dry than the florid. We are indebted to this artist for the engraving of the Trajan Column. Giulio Romano had begun to copy it, and the laborious undertaking was continued and perfected by Muziano, and so prepared for the engraver.

The most celebrated scholar of Muziano, was Cesare Nebbia of Orvieto. He presided over the works of Sixtus, entrusting the completion of his own designs to the younger painters. In this task he was assisted by Gio. Guerra da Modena, who suggested to him the subjects, and apportioned the work among the scholars. Both the one and the other of these artists, was endowed with a facility which was essential to the vast works on which they were employed in the five years reign of Sixtus, in the chapel of S. Maria Maggiore, in the library of the Vatican itself, in the Quirinal and Lateran palaces, and at the Scala Santa, and many other places. But in other respects, Muziano left his scholars far behind, as he was possessed of a great and inventive genius, while Nebbia was more remarkable for the mechanism of his art; particularly when he decorated walls. There are, however, some beautiful and well coloured pictures by him; among which may be mentioned the Epiphany, in the church of S. Francis at Viterbo, quite in Muziano's style. Baglione associates with Nebbia Giovanni Paolo della Torre, a gentleman of Rome, who was raised by Girolamo above the rank of a mere dilettante. Taja too, adds Giacomo Stella da Brescia, who, he observes, had degenerated in some degree from the style of his master. He was employed, nevertheless, both in the gallery of Gregory XIII., and in other places, not without commendation. It may be observed, that M. Bardon states him to have been a native of Lyons, long resident in Italy.

Another foreigner, but who came a considerable time after Muziano, was Raffaellino da Reggio, who, after being instructed in the first principles of the art by Lelio di Novellara, formed a master style in Rome. Nothing was wanting to this artist except a greater knowledge of design, as he possessed spirit, disposition, delicacy, relief, and grace; qualities not common in that age. His pictures in oil are occasionally, though not often, found in galleries, but his best works are his frescos of small figures, such as the two charming fables of Hercules, in the ducal hall at Florence, and the two gospel stories in the gallery adjoining to that of Raffaello d'Urbino. He painted also at Caprarola in competition with the Zuccari, and Vecchi, and with such success, that his figures seem living, while those of his comrades are inanimate. This excellent artist died immaturely, greatly lamented, without leaving any pupil worthy of his name. He was however considered as the head of a school in Rome, and his works were studied by the youth of the academy. Many artists adopted his manner of fresco, particularly Paris Nogari of Rome, who left there numerous works, which are known for their peculiar manner; amongst others, some subjects in the gallery. He had another follower in Gio. Batista della Marca, of the family of Lombardelli, a young man of great natural talents, but which were rendered unavailing from his want of application. Many pictures in fresco by him remain in Perugia and in Rome, but the best are in Montenovo, his native place. None, however, approached so near to Raffaellino as Giambatista Pozzo, who also died young, and who, as far as regards ideal beauty, may be considered the Guido of his day. To be convinced of this it is only necessary to see the Choir of Angels, which he painted in the chapel of the Gesù. If he had survived to the time of the Caracci, it is impossible to say to what degree of perfection he might not have attained.

Tommaso Laureti, a Sicilian, already noticed with commendation by us among the scholars of F. Sebastiano, and deserving honourable mention among the professors of Bologna, was invited to Rome in the pontificate of Gregory XIII., and was entrusted with a work of an invidious nature. This was the decoration of the ceiling and lunettes in the Hall of Constantine, the lower part of which had been illustrated by the pencils of Giulio Romano and Perino. The subjects chosen by this master were intended to commemorate the piety of Constantine, idols subverted, the cross exalted, and provinces added to the church. Baglione informs us that Laureti was entertained by the Pope in his palace in a princely manner; and either from his natural indolence, or his reluctance to return to a laborious profession, procrastinated the work so much, that Gregory died, and Sixtus commenced his reign before it was completed. The new pontiff was aware that the artist had abused the patience of his predecessor, and became so exasperated, that Laureti, in order to avert his wrath, proceeded in all haste to finish his labours. When the work however was exposed to public view, in the first year of the new pontificate, it was judged unworthy of the situation. The figures were too vast and heavy, the colouring crude, the forms vulgar. The best part of it was a temple in the ceiling, drawn in excellent perspective, in which art indeed Laureti may be considered as one of the first masters of his day. Misfortune was added to his disgrace; for he was not only not rewarded as he had expected, but the cost of his living and provisions were placed to his charge, even to the corn supplied to his horse. So that he gained no remuneration, and actually died in poverty in the succeeding pontificate. He had however an opportunity afforded him of redeeming his credit, particularly in the stories of Brutus and Horatius on the bridge, which he painted in the Campidoglio, in a much better style. Intimately acquainted with the theory of art, and possessing an agreeable manner of inculcating its principles, he taught at Rome with considerable applause. He had a scholar and assistant in the Vatican, in Antonio Scalvati, a Bolognese, who in the time of Sixtus was employed among the painters of the Library, and who was afterwards engaged in painting portraits under Clement VIII., Leo XI., and Paul V.; and was highly celebrated in this department.

A better fortune attended Gio. Batista Ricci da Novara, who arrived at Rome in the pontificate of Sixtus, and who from his despatch manifested in the works at the Scala Lateranense, and the Vatican Library, was immediately taken into employ by the Pope, who appointed him superintendant for the decorations of the palace of the Quirinal. He was also held in favour by Clement VIII., in whose time he painted in S. Giovanni Laterano the history of the consecration of that church: and there, according to Baglione, he succeeded better than in any other place. He left not a few works in Rome, and elsewhere his pictures display a facility of pencil, and a brilliancy and elegance which attract the eye. He was born in a city into which Gaudenzio Ferrari had introduced the Raffaellesque style, and where Lanini, his son-in-law had practised it; but in whose hands it seemed to decline, and still more so under Ricci, when he came to Rome; so that his style was Raffaellesque reduced to mannerism, like that professed by Circignani, Nebbia, and others of this age.

Giuseppe Cesari, also called Il Cavaliere d'Arpino, is a name as celebrated among painters, as that of Marino among poets. These two individuals, each in his line, contributed to corrupt the taste of an age already depraved, and attached more to shew than to reality. Both the one and the other exhibited considerable talents, and it is an old observation, that the arts, like republican states, have received their subversion from master spirits. Cesari discovered great capacity from his infancy, and soon attracted the admiration of Danti, and obtained the protection of Gregory XIII., with the reputation of the first master in Rome. Some pictures painted in conjunction with Giacomo Rocca,[^[65]] from designs of Michelangiolo, (in which Giacomo was very rich,) established his reputation. So much talent was not required to secure him general applause, as the public of that day were chiefly attracted by the energy, fire, tumult, and crowds, that filled his composition. His horses, which he drew in a masterly manner, and his countenances, which were painted with all the force of life, won the admiration of the many; while few attended to the incorrect design, the monotony of the extremities, the poverty of the drapery, the faulty perspective and chiaroscuro. Of these few however were Caravaggio, and Annibale Caracci. With these he became involved in disputes, and challenges were mutually exchanged. Cesari refused the challenge of Caravaggio, as he was not a cavaliere, and Annibale declined that of the Cavaliere d'Arpino, alleging that the pencil was his proper weapon. Thus these two eminent professors met with no greater obstacle in Rome in their attempts to reform the art, than Cesari and his adherents.

The Cavaliere d'Arpino survived both these masters more than thirty years, and left behind him progeniem vitiosiorem. To conclude, he was born a painter, and in so vast and difficult an art, he had endowments sufficient to atone, in part, for his defects. His colouring in fresco was admirable, his imagination was fruitful and felicitous, his figures were animated, and possessed a charm that Baglione, who himself entertained very different principles, could not refrain from admiring. Cesari moreover practised two distinct manners. The one, the most to be commended, is that in which he painted the Ascension, at S. Prassede, and several prophets, di sotto in su: the Madonna in the ceiling of S. Giovanni Grisogono, which is remarkable for its fine colouring; the gallery of the Casa Orsini; and in the Campidoglio, the Birth of Romulus, and the battle of the Romans and the Sabines, a painting in fresco, preferred by some to all his other works. Others of his pictures may be added, particularly some smaller works, with lights in gold, exquisitely finished, as if they were by an entirely different artist. Of this kind there is an Epiphany in possession of the Count Simonetti, in Osimo, and S. Francis in extacies, in the house of the Belmonti at Rimino. His other style was sufficiently free, but negligent, and this latter he used too frequently, partly through impatience of labour, and partly through old age, as may be seen in three other subjects in the Campidoglio, painted in the same saloon forty years after the first. His works are almost innumerable, not only in Rome, where he worked in the pontificates of Gregory and Sixtus, and where, under Clement VIII., he presided over the decorations in S. Gio. Laterano, and there continued under Paul V., but also in Naples, at Monte Casino, and in various cities of the Roman state, without mentioning the pictures sent to foreign courts, and painted for private individuals. For the latter indeed, and even for persons of inferior rank in life, he worked more willingly than for princes, with whom, like the Tigellius of Horace, he was capricious and morose. He was indeed desirous of being solicited by persons of rank, and often affected to neglect them, so much had the applause of a corrupted age flattered his vanity.

Cesari had many scholars and assistants, whom he more particularly employed in the works of the Lateran; as he did not deign in those times often to take up the pencil himself. Some of these pupils adopted his faults, and as they did not possess the same genius, their works proved intolerably bad. A vicious example, easy of imitation, is, as Horace has observed, highly seductive. There were however some of his school, who in part at least corrected themselves from the works of others. His brother, too, Bernardino Cesari, was an excellent copyist of the designs of Bonarruoti, and worked assiduously under the Cav. Giuseppe, but little remains of him, as he died young. One Cesare Rossetti, a Roman, served under Arpino a longer time, and of him there are many works in his own name. There are also to be found some public memorials of Bernardino Parasole, who was cut off in the flower of his age. Guido Ubaldo Abatini of Città di Castello, merited commendation from Passeri as a good fresco painter, particularly for a vault at the Vittoria. Francesco Allegrini di Gubbio was a fresco painter, in design very much resembling his master, if we may judge from the cupola of the Sacrament in the Cathedral of Gubbio, and from another at the Madonna de' Bianchi. We there observe the same attenuated proportions, and the same predominant facility of execution. He nevertheless shewed himself capable of better things, when his mind became matured, and he worked with more care. He is commended by Ratti for various works in fresco, executed at Savona, in the Duomo, and in the Casa Gavotti, and for others in the Casa Durazzo at Genoa; where one may particularly admire the freshness of the colouring, and the skill exhibited in his sotto in su. He is also commended by Baldinucci for similar works in the Casa Panfili, and merits praise for his smaller pieces and battles frequently found in Rome and Gubbio. He also added figures to the landscapes of Claude, two of which are to be seen, in the Colonna palace. He lived a long time in Rome, and his son Flaminio with him, commemorated by Taja for some works in the Vatican. Baglione has enumerated not a few other artists, in part belonging to the Roman state, and in part foreigners. Donato of Formello (a fief of the dukes of Bracciano) had greatly improved on the style of Vasari his master, as is proved by his histories of S. Peter, in a staircase of the Vatican, particularly the one of the piece of money found in the fish's mouth. He died whilst yet young, and the art had real cause to lament his loss. Giuseppe Franco, also called dalle Lodole, in consequence of his painting a lark in one of his pieces in S. Maria in Via, and on other occasions, and Prospero Orsi, both Romans, had a share in the works prosecuted by Sixtus. When these were finished, the former repaired to Milan, where he remained some years; the latter, from painting historical subjects, passed to arabesque, and from his singular talents in that line, was called Prosperino dalle Grottesche. Of the same place was Girolamo Nanni, deserving of particular mention, because, during all the time that he was engaged in these works, he never hurried himself, and to the directors who urged him to despatch, he answered always poco e buono, which expression was ever afterwards attached to him as a surname. He continued to work with the same study and devotion, as far as his talents would carry him, at S. Bartolommeo all'Isola, at S. Caterina de' Funai, and in many other places: he was not however much distinguished, except for his great application. Of him however, and of Giuseppe Puglia, or Bastaro, and of Cesare Torelli, also Romans; and of Pasquale Cati da Jesi, an inexhaustible painter of that age, though somewhat affected, and of many professors, that are in fact forgotten in Rome itself, I have thought it my duty to give this short notice, as I had pledged myself to include a number of the second rate artists. It would be an endless task to enumerate here all the foreign artists. It may be sufficient to observe, that in the Vatican library more than a hundred artists, almost all foreigners, were employed. In the first book I have mentioned Gio. de' Vecchi, an eminent master, who, from the time of his works for the Farnese family, was considered a first rate artist; and the colony of painters, his fellow citizens, whom Raffaellino brought to Rome. In the same book we meet with Titi, Naldini, Zucchi, Coscj, and a number of Florentines, and in the following book Matteo da Siena and some others of his school. Again, in the fourth book, Matteo da Leccio and Giuseppe Valeriani dell' Aquila will have place; and in the third volume will be described Palma the younger (amongst the Venetians) who worked in the gallery; about which time Salvator Fontana, a Venetian, painted at S. Maria Maggiore, whom it is sufficient to have named. We may also enumerate Nappi and Paroni of Milan, Croce of Bologna, Mainardi, Lavinia Fontana, and not a few others of various schools, who in those times painted in Rome, without ultimately remaining there, or leaving scholars.

A more circumstantial mention may be made of some oltramontani, who, in conjunction with our countrymen, were employed in the works in these pontificates; and it may be done with the more propriety, as we do not speak of them in any other part of our work. But those who worked in Rome were very numerous in every period, and it would be too much to attempt to enumerate them all in a history of Italian painting. One Arrigo, from Flanders, painted a Resurrection in the Sistine chapel, and also worked in fresco in other places in Rome; and is commended by Baglione as an excellent artist. Francesco da Castello, was also of Flanders, and of a more refined and correct taste. There is a picture by him at S. Rocco, with various saints; and it is perhaps the best piece the world possesses of him; but almost all his works were painted for the cabinet, and in miniature, in which he excelled. The Brilli we may include among the landscape painters.

The states of the church possessed in this epoch painters of consideration, besides those in Perugia, where flourished the two Alfani and others, followers of a good style; but whether they were known or employed in Rome, I am not able to say. I included them in the school of Pietro, in order that they might not be separated from the artists of Perugia, but they continued to live and to work for many years in the 16th century. To these may be added Piero and Serafino Cesarei,[^[66]] and others of less note. In the city of Assisi, there resided, in the beginning of the 16th century, a Francesco Vagnucci, and there remain some works by him in the spirit of the old masters. There, also, afterwards resided Cesare Sermei Cavaliere, who was born in Orvieto, and married in Assisi, and lived there until 1600, when he died at the age of 84. He painted both there and in Perugia, and if not in a grand style of fresco, still with a felicity of design, with much spirit in his attitudes, and with a vigorous pencil. He was a good machinist, and of great merit in his oil pictures. At Spello I saw a picture by him of the Beatified Andrea Caccioli; and it seems to me, that few other painters of the Roman School had at that time equalled him. His heirs, in Assisi, possess some pictures by him of fairs, processions, and ceremonies which occur in that city on occasion of the Perdono; and the numbers and variety and grace of the small figures, the architecture, and the humour displayed, are very captivating. At Spello, just above mentioned, in the church of S. Giacomo, is a picture which represents that saint and S. Catherine before the Madonna: where we read Tandini Mevanatis, 1580; that is, of Tandino di Bevagna, a place near Assisi; nor is it a picture to be passed over.

Gubbio possessed two painters, brothers of the family de' Nucci; Virgilio, who was said to be the scholar of Daniel di Volterra, whose Deposition he copied for an altar at S. Francis in Gubbio; and Benedetto, a disciple of Raffaellino del Colle, considered the best of the painters of Gubbio.[^[67]] Both of them have left works in their native place, and in the neighbouring districts; the first of them always following the Florentine, and the second the Roman School. Of the latter there are many pictures at Gubbio, which shew the progress he had made in the style of Raffaello; and to see him in his best work, we must inspect his S. Thomas in the Duomo, which would be taken for a picture of Garofalo, or some such artist, if we were not acquainted with the master. A little time afterwards flourished Felice Damiani, or Felice da Gubbio, who is said to have studied in the Venetian School. The Circumcision at S. Domenico has certainly a good deal of that style; but in pencil he inclines more to the Roman taste, which he, perhaps, derived from Benedetto Nucci. The Decollation of St. Paul, at the Castel Nuovo, in Recanati, is by him: the attitude of the saint excites our sympathy: the spectators are represented in various attitudes, all appropriate and animated: the drawing is correct, and the colours vivid and harmonious. It is inscribed with the year 1584. About ten years afterwards, he painted two chapels at the Madonna de' Lumi, at S. Severino, with subjects from the life of Christ; and there likewise displayed more elegance than grandeur of style. His most studied and powerful work is at S. Agostino di Gubbio, the Baptism of the Saint, painted in 1594, a picture abounding in figures, and which surprises by the novelty of the attire, by its correct architecture, and by the air of devotion exhibited in the countenances. He received for this picture two hundred scudi, by no means a low price in those times; and it should seem that his work was regulated by the price, since in some other pictures, and particularly in one in 1604, he is exceedingly negligent. Federigo Brunori, called also Brunorini, issued, it is said, from his school, and still more decidedly than his master, followed the Venetian style. His portraits are natural; and he was a lover of foreign drapery, and coloured with a strong effect. The Bianchi have an Ecce Homo by him, in which the figures are small, but boldly expressed, and shew that he had profited from the engravings of Albert Durer. Pierangiolo Basilj, instructed by Damiani, and also by Roncalli, partakes of their more delicate manner. His frescos, in the choir of S. Ubaldo, are held in esteem; and at S. Marziale, there is by him a Christ preaching, with a beautiful portico in perspective, and a great number of auditors: the figures in this are also small, and such as are seen in the compositions of Albert Durer. The pictures appear to be painted in competition. Brunori displays more energy, Basilj more variety and grace.

In the former edition of this work I made mention of Castel Durante, now Urbania, in the state of Urbino. I noticed Luzio Dolce among the ancient painters, of whom I had at that time seen no performance, except an indifferent picture, in the country church of Cagli, in 1536. Since that period Colucci has published (tom. xxvii.) a Cronaca di Castel Durante, wherein he gives a full account of Luzio, and of others that belong to that place. Bernardino, his grandfather, and Ottaviano, his father, excelled in stucco, and had exercised their art in other places; and he himself, who was living in 1589, is commended for his altarpieces and other pictures, in the churches, both in his native city and other places: and further, it is stated that he was employed by the duke to paint at the Imperiale. He also makes honourable mention of a brother of Luzio, and extols Giustino Episcopio, called formerly de' Salvolini, who, in conjunction with Luzio, painted in the abbey the picture of the Spirito Santo, and the other pictures around it. He also executed many other works by himself in Castel Durante and elsewhere, and in Rome as well, where he studied and resided for a considerable time. It is probable that Luzio was, in the latter part of his life, assisted by Agostino Apolonio, who was his sister's son, married in S. Angelo in Vado, and who removed and settled in Castel Durante where he executed works both in stucco and in oils, particularly at S. Francesco, and succeeded alike to the business and the property of his maternal uncle.

At Fratta, which is also in the state of Urbino, there died young, one Flori, of whom scarcely any thing remains, except the Supper of our Lord, at S. Bernardino. But this picture is composed in the manner of the best period of art, and deserves commemoration. Not far from thence is Città di Castello, where, in the days of Vasari, flourished Gio. Batista della Bilia, a fresco painter, and another Gio. Batista, employed in the Palazzo Vitelli, (tom. v. p. 131). I know not whether it was from him, or some other artist, that Avanzino Nucci had his first instructions, who repairing to Rome, designed after the best examples, and was a scholar and fellow labourer in many of the works of Niccolo Circignano. He had a share in almost all the works under Sixtus, and executed many others, in various churches and palaces. He possessed facility and despatch, and a style not very dissimilar to that of his master, though inferior in grandeur. He resided some time in Naples, and worked also in his native place. There is a picture by him, of the Slaughter of the Innocents, at S. Silvestro di Fabriano. Somewhat later than he, was Sguazzino, noticed by Orlandi for the pictures painted at the Gesù in Perugia; though he left better works in Città di Castello, as the S. Angelo, in the Duomo; and the lunettes, containing various histories of our Lady, at the Spirito Santo, besides others in various churches. He was not very correct in his drawing, but had a despatch and a contrast of colours, and a general effect that entitled him to approbation.

Another considerable painter, though less known, was Gaspare Gasparrini, of Macerata. He was of noble birth, and followed the art through predilection, and painted both in fresco and oils. From the information which I received from Macerata,[^[68]] it seems he learned to paint from Girolamo di Sermoneta.[^[69]] However this may be, Gasparrini pursued a similar path, although his manner is not so finished, if we may judge from the two chapels at S. Venanzio di Fabriano, in one of which is the Last Supper, and in the other the Baptism of Christ. Other subjects are added on the side walls, and the best is that of S. Peter and S. John healing the Sick, a charming composition, in the style of Raffaello. We find by him, in his native place, a picture of the Stigmata, at the Conventuals, and some cabinet pictures, in the collection of the Signori Ferri, relations of the family of Gaspare. Others too are to be found, but either doubtful in themselves, or injured by retouching. Padre Civalli M. C., who wrote at the close of the sixteenth century, mentions this master with high commendation, as may be seen on reference to the Antichità Picene, tom. xxv. In a recent description of the pictures at Ascoli, I find that a Sebastian Gasparrini, of Macerata, a scholar of the Cav. Pomaranci, decorated a chapel of S. Biagio in that city with historical paintings in fresco. But it is probable that this may be Giuseppe Bastiani, the scholar of Gasparrini. Another chapel at the Carmelites in Macerata, contains many pictures by him, with the date of 1594.

Of Marcantonio di Tolentino, mentioned by Borghini in his account of the Tuscan artists, and after him by Colucci (tom. xxv. p. 80), I do not know whether or not he returned to practise his art in his native country. In Caldarola, in the territory of Macerata, flourished a Durante de' Nobili, a painter who formed himself on the style of Michelangiolo. A picture of a Madonna by him is to be seen in Ascoli, at S. Pier di Castello, on which he inscribed his name and country, and the year 1571. From another school I believe arose a Simon de Magistris, a painter as well as sculptor, who left many works in the province. One of his pictures of S. Philip and S. James, in the Duomo of Osimo, in 1585, discovers a poverty in the composition, and little felicity of execution; but he appears to greater advantage, at a more advanced period of life, in the works he left at Ascoli. There is one, of the Rosario, at S. Domenico, where Orsini found much to commend in the arrangement of the figures, in the design, and in the colouring. There is another, of the same subject, at S. Rocco, which is preferred to the former, except for the shortness of the figures, and which we have described in writing of Andrea del Sarto, and afterwards of Taddeo Zuccaro. For the same reason he reproaches Carlo Allegretti, who, in the same city, committed a similar fault. He painted in various styles, as may be seen from an Epiphany, in Bassano's manner, which he placed in the cathedral, a picture which will apologize for the others. Baldassini, in his Storia di Jesi, speaking of Colucci, records there the priest Antonio Massi, who studied and gave to the world some pictures in Bologna; and Antonio Sarti, whom I esteem superior to Massi; praising highly his picture of the Circumcision, in the collegiate church of Massaccio. This city gave birth to Paolo Pittori, who ornamented his native place and its vicinity. These may serve as an example of the provincial painters of this age. I purposely omit many names, several of whom are fresco painters, who were indifferent artists; and others who were below mediocrity. It is indeed true, that many have escaped, from being unknown to me, and there still remain, in the Roman state, many works highly beautiful, deserving of research and notice.

From the time of the preceding epoch, the art became divided into various departments; and at this period, they began to multiply, in consequence of many men of talent choosing to cultivate different manners. After Jacopo del Conte and Scipione da Gaeta, the portraits of Antonio de' Monti, a Roman, are celebrated, who was considered the first among the portrait painters under Gregory; as also those of Prospero and Livia Fontana, and of Antonio Scalvati; all three of the School of Bologna; to whom may be added Pietro Fachetti, of Mantua.

With regard to perspective, it was successfully cultivated by Jacopo Barocci, commonly called Il Vignola, an illustrious name in architecture; owing to which his celebrity in the other branches has been overlooked. But it ought to be observed that his first studies were directed to painting, in the school of Passarotti, in Bologna; until he was led by the impulse of his genius, to apply himself to perspective, and by the aid of that science, as he was accustomed to say, to architecture, in which he executed some wonderful works, and amongst others the palace of Caprarola. There, and I know not whether in other places, are to be seen some pictures by him. As a writer, we shall refer to him in the second index, where, omitting his other works, we shall cite the two books which he wrote in this department of art. Great progress was made in Rome, in the art of perspective, after Laureti, by the genius of Gio. Alberti di Città S. Sepolcro, whose eulogy I shall not here stop to repeat, having already spoken of it in the first volume. Baglione names two friends, Tarquinio di Viterbo and Giovanni Zanna, of Rome; the first of whom painted landscapes, and the second adorned them with figures. He mentions the two brothers, Conti, of Ancona; Cesare, who excelled in arabesques, and Vincenzio in figures: these artists painted for private persons. Marco da Faenza was much employed under Gregory XIII., in arabesques, and the more elegant decorations of the Vatican, and had also the direction of other artists. Of him we shall make more particular mention amongst the artists of Romagna.

The landscapes in the Apostolic palace, and in various places of Rome, were many of them painted by Matteo da Siena, and by Gio. Fiammingo, with whom Taja makes us acquainted, in the ducal hall, and particularly the two brothers Brilli, of Flanders, who painted both in fresco and oil. Matteo always retained his ultramontane manner, rather dry, and not very true in colour. Paolo, who survived him, improved his style, from the study of Titian and the Caracci, and was an excellent artist in every department of landscape, and in the power of adapting it to historical subjects. Italy abounds with his pictures. Two other landscape painters also lived in Rome at this time, Fabrizio of Parma, who may be ranked with Matteo, and Cesare, a Piedmontese, more attached to the style of Paolo. Nor ought we to omit Filippo d'Angeli, who, from his long residence in Naples, is called a Neapolitan, though he was born in Rome, where, and as we have observed in Florence, he was highly esteemed. His works are generally of a small size; his prospects are painted with great care, and ornamented with figures admirably introduced. There are also some battle pieces by him.

But in battles and in hunting pieces, none in these times equalled Antonio Tempesti. He was followed, though at a considerable interval, by Francesco Allegrini, a name not new to those who have read the preceding pages. To these we may add Marzio di Colantonio, a Roman, though he has left fewer works in Rome than in Turin, where he was employed by the Cardinal, prince of Savoy. He was also accomplished in arabesque and landscapes, and painted small frescos in an agreeable manner.

It is at this epoch that Vasari describes the manufacture of earthen vases, painted with a variety of colours, with such exquisite art, that they seemed to rival the oil pictures of the first masters. He pretends that this art was unknown to the ancients, and it is at any rate certain that it was not carried to such perfection by them. Signor Gio. Batista Passeri, who composed l'Istoria delle pitture in Majolica fatte in Pesaro e ne' luoghi circonvicini, derives the art from Luca della Robbia, a Florentine, who discovered a mode of giving to the clay a glazing to resist the injuries of time. In this manner were formed the bassirelievi and altars which still exist, and the pavements which are described at page 81. Others derive this art from Cina, whence it passed to the island of Majolica, and from thence into Italy; and this invention was particularly cultivated in the state of Urbino. The coarse manufacture had been for a long time in use. The fine earthenware commenced there about 1500, and was manufactured by an excellent artist, of whom there exists in the convent of Domenicans, of Gubbio, a statue of an abbot, S. Antonio, well modelled and painted, and many services in various noble houses with his name M. Giorgio da Ugubio. The year is also inscribed, from which it appears that his manufacture of these articles began in 1519, and ended in 1537. At this time Urbino also cultivated the plastic art, and the individual of his day, who most excelled, was Federigo Brandani. Whoever thinks that I exaggerate, may view the Nativity, which he left at S. Joseph, and say, whether, except Begarelli of Modena, there is any one that can be compared with him for liveliness and grace in his figures, for variety and propriety of attitude, and for natural expression of the accessory parts; the animals, which seem alive; the satchels and a key suspended; the humble furniture, and other things admirably appropriate, and all wonderfully represented: the figure of the divine Infant is not so highly finished, and is perhaps the object which least surprises us. Nor in the meanwhile did the people of Urbino neglect to advance the art of painted vases, in which fabric a M. Rovigo of Urbino is much celebrated. The subjects which were first painted in porcelain, were poor in design, but were highly valued for the colouring, particularly for a most beautiful red, which was subsequently disused, either because the secret was lost, or because it did not amalgamate with the other colours.

But the art did not attain the perfection which Vasari describes, until about the year 1540, and was indebted for it to Orazio Fontana, of Urbino, whose vases, for the polish of the varnish, for the figures, and for their forms, may perhaps be ranked before any that have come down to us from antiquity. He practised this art in many parts of the state, but more especially in Castel Durante, now called Urbania, which possesses a light clay, extremely well adapted for every thing of this nature. His brother, Flamminio, worked in conjunction with him, and was afterwards invited to Florence by the grand duke of Tuscany, and introduced there a beautiful manner of painting vases. This information is given us by the Sig. Lazzari, and for which the Florentine history of art ought to express its obligations to him. The establishment of this fine taste in Urbino, was, in a great measure, owing to the Duke Guidobaldo, who was a prince enthusiastically devoted to the fine arts, and who established a manufactory, and supported it at his own expense. He did not allow the painters of these vases to copy their own designs, but obliged them to execute those of the first artists, and particularly those of Raffaello; and gave them for subjects many designs of Sanzio never before seen, and which formed part of his rich collection. Hence these articles are commonly known in Italy by the name of Raphael ware, and from thence arose certain idle traditions respecting the father of Raffaello, and Raffaello himself; and the appellation of boccalajo di Urbino (the potter of Urbino), was in consequence applied, as we shall mention, to that great master.[^[70]] Some designs of Michelangiolo, and many of Raffaele del Colle, and other distinguished masters, were adopted for this purpose. In the life of Batista Franco, we are informed that that artist made an infinite number of designs for this purpose, and in that of Taddeo Zuccaro it is related that all the designs of the service, which was manufactured for Philip II., were entrusted to him. Services of porcelain were also prepared there for Charles V. and other princes, and the duke ordered not a few for his own court. Several of his vases were transferred to, and are now in the S. Casa di Loreto; and the Queen of Sweden was so much charmed with them, that she offered to replace them with vases of silver. A large collection of them passed into the hands of the Grand Duke of Florence, in common with other things inherited from the Duke of Urbino, and specimens of them are to be seen in the ducal gallery, some with the names of the places where they were manufactured. There are many, too, to be found in the houses of the nobility of Rome, and in the state of Urbino, and, indeed, in all parts of Italy. The art was in its highest perfection for about the space of twenty years, or from 1540 to 1560; and the specimens of that period are not unworthy a place in any collection of art. If we are to believe Lazzari, the secret of the art died with the Fontani, and the practice daily declined until it ended in a common manufactory and object of merchandize. Whoever wishes for further information on this subject, may consult the above cited Passeri, who inserted his treatise in the fourth volume of the Calogeriani, not forgetting the Dizionario Urbinate, and the Cronaca Durantina.

The art of painting on leather deserves little attention; nevertheless, as Baglione mentions it with commendation in his life of Vespasian Strada, a fresco painter of some merit in Rome, I did not think it right to pass it over without this slight notice.

[56] Dolce, Dial. della Pittura, p. 11.

[57] We shall notice him again in the school of Bologna, where he passed his best years, and also in the Roman School, in which he was a master. Sebastiano had also another scholar, or imitator, as we find a Communion of S. Lucia, painted in his style, in the collegiate church of Spello. The artist inscribes his name, Camillus Bagazotus Camers faciebat.—Orsini Risposta, p. 16.

[58] He painted the S. Catherine in S. Agostino, the Presepio in S. Silvestro at Monte Cavallo, and left works in many other churches.

[59] He painted some façades in Rome. In the oratory of S. Giovanni Decollato, there remains the Dance before Herod, not very correctly designed, and feeble in colouring; but the perspective, and the richness of the drapery in the Venetian style, may confer some value on the picture.

[60] Bellori, Vite de' Pittori, p. 20.

[61] Idea de' Pittori, Scultori, e Architetti, reprinted in the Lett. Pitt. tom. vi. p. 147.

[62] The charming poet Lasca noticed this work as soon as the Cupola was opened to public view, in a madrigal inserted in the edition of his poems in the year 1741. He blamed Giorgio d'Arezzo (Vasari) more than Federigo, that for sordid motives he had designed and undertaken a work, which in the judgment of the Florentines, injured the Cupola of Brunellesco, which was the admiration of every one, and which Benvenuto Cellini was accustomed to call, la Maraviglia delle cose belle. He concludes by saying, that the Florentine people

"Non sarà mai di lamentarsi stanco Se forse un dì non le si dà di bianco."

[63] This is not the large picture of the Calumny of Apelles painted in distemper for the Orsini family, and engraved, and which is now to be seen in the Palazzo Lante, and is one of the most finished productions of Federigo.

[64] The same inflated style has of late become prevalent in some parts of Italy, with no little injury to our language and to good taste. In the Arte di vedere we find for example le pieghe longitudinali, la trombeggiata resurrezzione del Bello, &c. Some one has also attempted to illustrate the qualities of the art of painting by those of music, which has given occasion to a clever Maestro di Capella to write a humorous letter, an extract of which is given in the Difesa del Ratti, pag. 15, &c., and is the most entertaining and least ill tempered thing to be met with in that work.

[65] A scholar of Daniel di Volterra, from whom he inherited these designs, with many others by the same great master. He painted but little, and generally from the designs of others, and which he did not execute in a happy manner; and Baglione says, his pictures were deficient in taste.

[66] There remained, in the time of Pascoli, some pitture saporite, as he terms them, by this artist, at Spoleto, where Piero established himself, and in the neighbouring towns; and which often pass for the works of Pietro Perugino, from a similarity of names. It appears however that Cesarei was desirous of preventing this error, as he inscribed his name Perinus Perusinus, or Perinus Cesareus Perusinus, as in the picture of the Rosary at Scheggino, painted in 1595. Vasari, in the life of Agnol Gaddi, names among his scholars Stefano da Verona, and says, that "all his works were imitated and drawn by that Pietro di Perugia, the painter in miniature, who ornamented the books at the cathedral of Siena, in the Library of Pope Pius, and who worked well in fresco." These words have puzzled more than one person. Pascoli (P. P. p. 134.) and Mariotti (L. P. p. 59.) consider them as written of Piero Cesarei; as if a man born in the golden age should so far extol an old trecentista; or as if the canons of Siena could approve such a style after possessing Razzi and Vanni. Padre della Valle interprets it to mean Pietro Vannucci, and not finding the books of the Choir adorned in such a style as he wished, reproves Vasari for having confounded so great a master with a common fresco painter and a Miniatore. It is most likely that this Miniatore and Frescante of Vasari was a third Pietro, hitherto unknown in Perugia, and whom we shall notice in the Venetian School.

[67] See Il Sig. Cav. Reposati Appendice del tomo ii. della Zecca di Gubbio; and the Sig. Conte Ranghiasci in the Elenco de' Professori Eugubini, inserted in vol. iv. of Vasari (ediz. Senese), at the end of the volume.

[68] I am indebted for it, to the noble Sig. Cav. Ercolani, who obligingly transmitted it to me, after procuring it from the Sig. Cav. Piani and the Sig. Paolo Antonio Ciccolini, of Macerata.

[69] In a former edition, on the authority of a MS. I called him Serj, and was doubtful whether Siciolante was not his surname. Sig. Brandolese has informed me of an epitaph, in the hands of Mons. Galletti, in which he is called Siciolante, whence Serio was most probably his surname.

[70] Another probable cause of this appellation, is to be found in the name of Raffaello Ciarla, who was one of the most celebrated painters of this ware, and was appointed by the duke to convey a large assortment of it to the court of Spain. Hence the vulgar, when they heard the name of Raffaello, might attribute them to Sanzio.

ROMAN SCHOOL.

FOURTH EPOCH.

Restoration of the Roman School by Barocci, and other Artists, Subjects of the Roman State, and Foreigners.

The numerous works carried on by the Pontiffs Gregory and Sixtus, and continued under Clement VIII., while they in a manner corrupted the pure taste of the Roman School, contributed, nevertheless, at the same time, to regenerate it. Rome, from the desire of possessing the best specimens of art, became by degrees the resort of the best painters, as it had formerly been in the time of Leo X. Every place sent thither its first artists, as the cities of Greece formerly sent forth the most valiant of their citizens to contend for the palm and the crown at Olympia. Barocci, of Urbino, was the first restorer of the Roman School. He had formed himself on the style of Correggio, a style the best calculated to reform an age which had neglected the true principles of art, and particularly colouring and chiaroscuro. Happy indeed had it been, had he remained in Rome, and retained the direction of the works which were entrusted to Nebbia, Ricci, and Circignani! He was there, indeed, for some time, and assisted the Zuccari in the apartments of Pius IV., but was compelled to fly in consequence of some pretended friends having, in an execrable manner, administered poison to him through jealousy of his talents, and so materially injured his health, that he could only paint at intervals, and for a short space of time. Forsaking Rome, therefore, he resided for some time in Perugia, and a longer period in Urbino, from whence he despatched his pictures from time to time to Rome and other places. By means of these, the Tuscan School derived great benefit through Cigoli, Passignano, and Vanni, as we have before observed; and it is not improbable, that Roncalli and Baglione may have profited by them, if we may judge from some works of both the one and the other of these artists to be seen in various places.

However this might be, at the commencement of the seventeenth century, these five were in the highest repute as artists who were not corrupted by the prevailing taste. An idea had subsisted from the time of Clement VIII., of decorating the church of the Vatican, with the History of S. Peter, and of employing in that work the best artists. The execution of this design occupied a considerable time, the pictures being reduced to mosaic, as the painting on wood and slate did not resist the humidity of the church. The five before mentioned artists were selected to paint each a subject; and Bernardo Castelli, one of the first painters of the Genoese School, was the sixth, and the least celebrated. These artists were all liberally paid, and the five first raised to the rank of Cavalieri, and their works had a beneficial influence on the rising generation, and proved that the reign of the mannerists was on the decline. Caravaggio gave it a severe shock by his powerful and natural style, and Baglione attests, that this young artist, by the great applause which he gained, excited the jealousy of Federigo Zuccaro, then advanced in years, and entered into competition with Cesare, his former master. But the most serious blow the mannerists received, was from the Caracci and their school. Annibale arrived in Rome not much before the year 1600, invited by the Cardinal Farnese to paint his gallery; a work which occupied him for nearly eight years, and for which he received only five hundred scudi, a sum so inadequate that we can scarcely believe it to be correct. He also decorated several churches. Lodovico, his cousin, was with him for a short time; Agostino, his brother, for a longer period; and he had his scholars with him, amongst whom we may enumerate Domenichino, Guido, Albano, and Lanfranc. They came thither at different periods, matured in their talents, and able to assist their master not only in execution but design.

Rome had for some years seen only the two extreme styles of painting. Caravaggio and his followers were mere naturalists; Arpino and his scholars pure idealists. Annibale introduced a style founded in nature, yet ennobled by the ideal, and supported his ideal by his knowledge of nature. He was at first denounced as cold and insipid, because he was not affected and extravagant, or rather because great merit was never unaccompanied by envy. But though envy for a time, by her insidious suggestions and subterfuges, may derive a mean pleasure in persecuting a man of genius, she can never hope to succeed in blinding the public, who ever decide impartially on the merits of individuals, and whose judgment is not disregarded even by princes. The Farnese gallery was opened, and Rome beheld in it a grandeur of style, which might claim a place after the Sistine chapel, and the chambers of the Vatican. It was then discovered, that the preceding Pontiffs had only lavished their wealth for the corruption of art; and that the true secret which the great ought to put in practice lay in a few words: a judicious selection of masters, and a more liberal allowance of time. Hence, though somewhat tardy indeed in consequence of the death of Annibale, came the order from Paul V., to distribute the work among the Bolognese; for so the Caracci and their scholars were at that time designated; one of whom, Ottaviano Mascherini, was the Pope's architect.[^[71]] A new spirit was thus introduced into the Roman School, which, if it did not wholly destroy the former extravagance of style, still in a great degree repressed it. The pontificate of Gregory XV. (Lodovisi) was short, but still, through national partiality, highly favourable to the Bolognese, amongst whom we may reckon Guercino da Cento, although a follower of Caravaggio rather than Annibale. He was the most employed in St. Peter's, and in the villa Lodovisi. This reign was followed by the pontificate of Urban VIII., favourable both to poets and painters, though, perhaps, more so to the latter than the former; since it embraced, besides the Caracci and their school, Poussin, Pietro da Cortona, and the best landscape painters that the world had seen. The leading masters then all found employment, either from the Pope himself, or his nephew the Cardinal, or other branches of that family, and were engaged in the decoration of St. Peter's, or their own palaces, or in the new church of the Capucins, where the altarpieces were distributed among Lanfranc, Guido, Sacchi, Berrettini, and other considerable artists. The same liberal plan was followed by Alexander VII. a prince of great taste, and by his successors. It was during the reign of Alexander, that Christina, Queen of Sweden, established herself in Rome, and her passion for the fine arts inspired and maintained not a few of the painters whom we shall mention. It must indeed be premised, that we are under the necessity of deferring our notice of the greatest names of this epoch to another place, as they belong of right to the school of Bologna, and some we have already recorded in the Florentine School. But to proceed.

Federigo Barocci might from the time of his birth be placed in the preceding epoch, but his merit assigns him to this period, in which I comprise the reformers of art. He learned the principles of his art from Batista Franco, a Venetian by birth, but a Florentine in style. This artist going young to Rome, to prosecute his studies there, was struck with the grand style of Michelangiolo, and copied both there and in Florence, all his works, as well his paintings and drawings as statues. He became an excellent designer, but was not equally eminent as a colourist, having turned his attention at a late period to that branch of the art. In Rome he may be seen in some evangelical subjects painted in fresco, in a chapel in the Minerva, and preferred by Vasari to any other of his works. He also decorated the choir of the Metropolitan church of Urbino in fresco, and there left a Madonna in oil, placed between S. Peter and S. Paul, in the best Florentine style, except that the figure of S. Paul is somewhat attenuated. There is a grand picture in oil by him in the tribune of S. Venanzio, in Fabriano; containing the Virgin, with the titular and two other protecting Saints. In the sacristy of the cathedral of Osimo, I saw many small pictures representing the life of Christ, painted by him in the year 1547, as we learn from the archives of that church; a thing of rare occurrence, as Franco was scarcely ever known to paint pictures of this class. Under this artist, whilst he resided in Urbino, Barocci designed and studied from the antique. He then went to Pesaro, where he employed himself in copying after Titian, and was instructed in geometry and perspective by Bartolommeo Genga, the architect, the son of Girolamo and the uncle of Barocci. From thence he passed to Rome, and acquired a more correct style of design, and adopted the manner of Raffaello, in which style he painted the S. Cecilia for the Duomo of Urbino, and in a still more improved and original manner, the S. Sebastian, a work which Mancini, in point of solid taste, sets above all the works of Barocci. But the amenity and gracefulness of his style led him almost instinctively to the imitation of Correggio, in whose manner he painted in his native city the delightful picture of S. Simon and S. Judas, in the church of the Conventuals.

Nevertheless this was not the style which he permanently adopted as his own, but as a free imitation of that great master. In the heads of his children and of his female figures, he approaches nearly to him; also in the easy flow of his drapery, in the pure contour, in the mode of foreshortening his figures; but in general his design is not so grand, and his chiaroscuro less ideal; his tints are lucid and well arranged, and bear a resemblance to the beautiful hues of Correggio, but they have neither his strength nor truth. It is however delightful to see the great variety of colours he has employed, so exquisitely blended by his pencil, and there is perhaps no music more finely harmonized to the ear, than his pictures are to the eye. This is in a great measure the effect of the chiaroscuro, to which he paid great attention, and which he was the first to introduce into the schools of Lower Italy. In order to obtain an accurate chiaroscuro, he formed small statues of earthenware, or wax, in which art he did not yield the palm to the most experienced sculptors. In the composition and expression of every figure, he consulted the truth. He made use of models too, in order to obtain the most striking attitudes, and those most consonant to nature; and in every garment, and every fold of it, he did not shew a line that was not to be found in the model. Having made his design, he prepared a cartoon the size of his intended picture, from which he traced the contours on his canvass; he then on a small scale tried the disposition of his colours, and proceeded to the execution of his work. Before colouring, however, he formed his chiaroscuro very accurately after the best ancient masters, (vol. i. p. 187,) of which method he left traces in a Madonna and Saints, which I saw in Rome in the Albani palace, a picture which I imagine the artist was prevented by death from finishing. Another picture unfinished, and on that account very instructive and highly prized, is in possession of the noble family of Graziani in Perugia. To conclude, perfection was his aim in every picture, a maxim which insures excellence to artists of genius.

Bellori, who wrote the life of Barocci, has given us a catalogue of his pictures. There are few found which are not of religious subjects; some portraits, and the Burning of Troy, which he painted in two pictures, one of which now adorns the Borghese gallery. Except on this occasion his pencil may be said to have been dedicated to religion; so devout, so tender, and so calculated to awaken feelings of piety, are the sentiments expressed in his pictures. The Minerva, in Rome, possesses his Institution of the Sacrament, a picture which Clement X. employed him to paint; the Vallicella has his two pictures of the Visitation and the Presentation. In the Duomo of Genoa is a Crucifixion by him, with the Virgin and S. John, and S. Sebastian; in that of Perugia, the Deposition from the Cross; in that of Fermo, S. John the Evangelist; in that of Urbino, the Last Supper of our Lord. Another Deposition, and a picture of the Rosario, and mysteries, is in Sinigaglia; and, in the neighbouring city of Pesaro, the calling of St. Andrew, the Circumcision, the Ecstacy of S. Michelina on Mount Cavalry, a single figure, which fills the whole picture, and esteemed, it is said, by Simon Cantarini, as his masterpiece. Urbino, besides the pictures already noticed, and some others, possesses a S. Francis in prayer, at the Capucins; and at the Conventuals, the great picture of the Perdono, in which he consumed seven years. The perspective, the beautiful play of light, the speaking countenances, the colour and harmony of the work, cannot be imagined by any one who has not seen it. The artist himself was delighted with it, wrote his name on it, and etched it. His Annunciation, at Loreto, is a beautiful picture, and the same subject at Gubbio, unfinished; the Martyrdom of S. Vitale, at the church of that saint, in Ravenna, and the picture of the Misericordia, painted for the Duomo of Arezzo, and afterwards transferred to the ducal gallery of Florence. The same subject exists also in the hospital of Sinigaglia, copied there by the scholars of Barocci, who have repeated the pictures of their master in numerous churches of the state of Urbino, and of Umbria, and in some in Piceno, and these are, occasionally, so well painted, that one might imagine he had finished them himself.

The same may be said of some of his cabinet pictures, which are to be seen in collections; such is the Virgin adoring the Infant Christ, which I remarked in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, in the Casa Bolognetti in Rome, and in a noble house in Cortona, and which I find mentioned also in the imperial gallery at Vienna. A head of the Ecce Homo has also been often repeated, and some Holy Families, which he varied in a singular manner; I have seen a S. Joseph sleeping, and another S. Joseph, in the Casa Zaccaria, in the act of raising a tapestry; and in the Repose in Egypt, which was transferred from the sacristy of the Jesuits at Perugia to the chamber of the Pope, he is represented plucking some cherries for the Infant Christ, a picture, which seems painted to rival Correggio. Bellori remarks, that he was so fond of it that he frequently repeated it.

The school of Barocci extended itself through this duchy and the neighbouring places; although his best imitator was Vanni of Siena, who had never studied in Urbino. The disciples of Federigo were very numerous, but remaining in general in their own country they did not disseminate the principles, and few of them inherited the true spirit of their master's style: the most confining themselves to the exterior of the art of colouring; and even this was deteriorated by the use of large quantities of cinnabar and azure, colours which their master had employed with greater moderation; and they were not unfrequently condemned for this practice, as Bellori and Algarotti remark. The flesh tints under their pencil often became livid, and the contours too much charged. I cannot give an accurate catalogue of these scholars, but independent of the writers on the works in Urbino, and other guides and traditions in various parts, I am certain, that if they were not instructed by Barocci himself, they must at all events, from their country, and from the period at which they flourished, have formed themselves on his pictures. There is little to be observed respecting Francesco Baldelli, the nephew and scholar of Federigo. I do not find any memorial of him, except a picture which he placed in the Capella Danzetta, of S. Agostino, in Perugia, and which is mentioned by Crispolti, in his history of that city, at page 133.

Of Bertuzzi and Porino I have not seen any works, except copies in the style of Barocci, or feeble productions of their own. An excellent copyist was found in Alessandro Vitali of Urbino, in which city, at the Suore della Torre, is found the Annunciation of Loreto, copied by him in such a manner that it might be taken for the original picture. Barocci was pleased with his talent, and willingly retouched some of his pictures, and probably favoured him in this way in the S. Agnes and S. Agostino, placed by Vitali, the one in the Duomo, the other in the church of the Eremitani, where he may be said to surpass himself. Antonio Viviani, called il Sordo of Urbino, also made some very accurate copies of his master, which are still preserved by his noble posterity. He too was a great favourite of Federigo, and was in his native city called his nephew; although Baglione, who wrote his life, is silent on this head. He left some pictures in Urbino, in the best style of Barocci; particularly the S. Donato, in a suburban church of the saint of that name. This however cannot be called his own style, for he visited Rome at various times, where, having received instructions from Mascherini, and employed himself for a time in the imitation of Cesari, and of the rapid manner of the practicians recorded by us, he exhibited in that metropolis various styles, and some of the most feeble which he adopted. Assuredly his fresco pictures, which remain in various places in Rome, do not support the opinion which is inspired by a view of the vast work which he conducted in the church de' Filippini at Fano. There, in the vault, and in the chapel, are executed various histories of the chief of the apostles to whom the church is dedicated. His style in these exhibits a beautiful imitation of Barocci and Raffaello, in which the manner of the latter predominates. Lazzari maintains that this Antonio Viviani repaired to Genoa, and that Soprani changed his name to Antonio Antoniani; thus giving to Barocci a scholar who never existed. Of this supposition we shall speak with more propriety in the Genoese School. Another Viviani is mentioned by tradition in Urbino, Lodovico, a brother or cousin of the preceding. This painter sometimes imitates Barocci, as in the S. Girolamo in the Duomo, and sometimes approaches the Venetian style, as in the Epiphany at the Monastery della Torre.

Another painter almost unknown in the history of art, but of singular merit, is Filippo Bellini of Urbino, of whom I have not seen any works in his native place, but a number in oil and fresco scattered through many cities of the March. He is in general an imitator of Barocci, as in the picture of the Circumcision in the church of Loreto, in the Espousals of the Virgin in the Duomo in Ancona, and in a Madonna belonging to the Counts Leopardi at Osimo. He affords, however, sometimes an example of a vigorous and lively style, and exhibits a powerful colouring, and a grandeur of composition. He discovered this character in some works in Fabriano in his best time, and particularly in the Opere della Misericordia, which are fourteen subjects taken from Scripture, and represented in the church della Carità.[^[72]] They are beheld by cultivated foreigners with admiration, and it appears strange that such a painter, whose life and works are alike worthy of remembrance, should not have found a place in the catalogues. He is also extolled for his works in fresco, in the chapel of the Conventuals in Montalboddo, where he has represented the Martyrdom of S. Gaudenzio, and which is described in the guide book of that city.

We may next notice Antonio Cimatori, called also Antonio Visacci, not only by the vulgar, but also by Girolamo Benedetti, in the Relazione, which in the lifetime of the artist he composed on the festival at Urbino, in honour of Giulia de' Medici, married to the Prince Federigo. Cimatori was there engaged to paint the arches and pictures, which were exhibited, in conjunction with the younger Viviani, Mazzi, and Urbani. His forte lay in pen drawing, and in chiaroscuro; as may be seen from his Prophets, in a grand style, transferred from the Duomo to the apostolic palace. He did not leave many works in his native place; but amongst them is his picture of S. Monica, at S. Agostino. His copies from the original pictures of Barocci are to be found in various places, particularly in the Duomo of Cagli. He resided, and worked for a long time in Pesaro, where he instructed Giulio Cesare Begni, a bold and animated artist, a good perspective painter, and in a great degree a follower of the Venetian School, in which he studied and painted. He left many works in Udine, and many more in his native place, in a rapid and unfinished style, but of a good general effect. In the Descrizione odeporica della Spagna, (tom. ii. p. 130), we find Giovanni and Francesco d'Urbino mentioned, who about the year 1575, it seems, were both engaged by the court to decorate the Escurial. The latter came early in life to Spain, and being endowed with a noble genius, soon became an excellent artist, and is extolled by his contemporary P. Siguenza, and by all who have seen the Judgment of Solomon, and his other pictures in a choir in that magnificent place: he died young. That these works belong to the pencil of Barocci might be suspected from their era, and the practice of that splendid court, which was in the habit of engaging in its service the first masters of Italy or their scholars. But not possessing positive information, nor finding any indication of their style, I dare not assign these two to Barocci. I feel a pleasure however in restoring them to the glorious country from which they had been separated.

Passing from the fellow countrymen of Barocci to foreigners, some persons have imagined Andrea Lilio, of Ancona, to have been his disciple. I rather consider him to have been an imitator of him, but more in respect to colour than any thing else. He had a share in the works which were carried on under Sixtus, and painted for the churches, chiefly in fresco, and sometimes in partnership with Viviani of Urbino. He went to Rome when young, and lived there until the reign of Paul V., but suffered both in body and mind from domestic misfortunes, which interrupted not a little his progress in art. Ancona possesses several of his pictures in fresco, varying in their merit, as well as some of his oil pictures at the Paolotti in S. Agostino, and in the sacristy some pieces, from the Life of S. Nicholas, highly prized. The most celebrated is his Martyrdom of S. Lorenzo, by many ascribed to Barocci, for which I refer to the Guida of Montalboddo, and the church of S. Catherine, where it is placed. His greatest work is the altarpiece in the Duomo at Fano, representing all the saints, containing a vast number of figures well grouped and well contrasted, and if not very correctly designed, still possessing Barocci's tone of colour.

Giorgio Picchi of Durante I included in a former edition among the scholars of Barocci, in conformity to the general opinion prevalent in Pesaro and Rimini; but I have not found this confirmed in the chronicle of Castel Durante, published by Colucci, which contains a particular account of this artist, written soon after his death. I am therefore inclined to think him only a follower, like Lilio, with whom he was associated in Rome in the time of Sixtus V., if the chronicle is to be relied on. It relates that he worked in the library of the Vatican, at the Scala Santa, and at the Palazzo di S. Giovanni; and it appears unaccountable that all this was unknown to Baglione, who narrates the same circumstances of Lilio and others, and makes no mention of Picchi. However this may be, he was certainly a considerable artist, and was attached to the style of Barocci, which was in vogue at that period, as we may perceive from his great picture of the Cintura, in the church of S. Agostino, in Rimini, and still more from the history of S. Marino, which he painted in the church of that saint in the same city. Others of his works are to be found both in oil and fresco in Urbino, in his native place, at Cremona, and elsewhere; and although on a vast scale, embracing whole oratories and churches, they could not have cost him any great labour, from the rapid manner which he had acquired in Rome.

In S. Ginesio, a place in the March, Domenico Malpiedi is considered as belonging to Federigo's school, and of him there are preserved in the collegiate church, the Martyrdoms of S. Ginesio and S. Eleuterio, which are highly commended. From Colucci we learn that there also remain other works by him; and from the prices paid, we may conclude that he was esteemed an excellent artist. He was living in 1596, and about the same time there flourished also another Malpiedi, who painted a Deposition from the Cross in S. Francesco di Osimo, and inscribed on it Franciscus Malpedius di S. Ginesio, a picture feeble in composition, deficient in expression, and little resembling the school of Barocci, except in a distant approximation of colour.

The Guida of Pesaro assigns to the same school Terenzio Terenzj, called il Rondolino, whom it characterises as an eminent painter, and of whom there exist four specimens in public, and many more in the neighbourhood of the city (page 80). It is also mentioned that he was employed by the Cardinal della Rovere in Rome, and that he placed a picture in the church of S. Silvestro. The picture of S. Silvestro in capite, which represents the Madonna, attended by Saints, is ascribed by Titi to a Terenzio of Urbino, who, according to Baglione, served the Cardinal Montalto. It is most probable, that in the records of Pesaro there arose some equivoque on the name of the cardinal, and that these two painters might, or rather ought to be merged in one. Terenzio Rondolino, it appears to me, is the same as Terenzio d'Urbino, and very probably in Rome took his name from Urbino, the capital of Pesaro. But by whatever name this painter may be distinguished, we learn from Baglione that Terenzio d'Urbino was a noted cheat; and that, after having sold to inexperienced persons many of his own pictures for those of ancient masters, he attempted to pass the same deceit upon the Cardinal Peretti, the nephew of Sixtus V. and his own patron, offering to his notice one of his own pieces as a Raphael: but the fraud was detected, and Terenzio in consequence banished from the court; a circumstance which he took to heart, and died whilst yet young.

Two brothers, Felice and Vincenzio Pellegrini, born and resident in Perugia, are recorded by Orlandi and Pascoli, as scholars of Barocci. The first became an excellent designer, and in the pontificate of Clement VIII. was called to Rome, probably to assist Cesari, though it is not known that he left any work in his own name. Some copies after Barocci by him exist in Perugia, and it is well known that his master was highly satisfied with his labours in that line. The other brother is mentioned by Bottari in the notes to his life of Raffaello; and I recollect having seen in Perugia a picture in the sacristy of S. Philip, in rather a hard manner, in which it is difficult to recognize the style of his supposed master. It is possible that these two artists might have had their first instructions from Barocci, and that they afterwards returned to another manner. A similar instance occurs in Ventura Marzi. In the Biographical Dictionary of the Painters of Urbino he is given to the school of Barocci. His manner however is different, and I should say bad, if all his pictures were similar to that of S. Uomobuono, which I saw in the sacristy of the metropolitan church; but he did indeed paint some better, and it is an ancient maxim, that to improve we must sometimes err. Benedetto Bandiera, of Perugia, who approaches nearer to the style of Barocci than most others, is said to have been a relative of Vanni, from whom he derived that manner, if we may believe Orlandi. But Pascoli, both on this point, and on the period in which he flourished, confutes him, and considers him to have been instructed by Barocci in Urbino for many years, and that afterwards he became a diligent observer of all his pictures which he could discover in other places.

Whilst Italy was filled with the fame of Barocci, there came to Urbino, and resided in his house for some time, Claudio Ridolfi, called also Claudio Veronese, from his native city, of which he was a noble. He was there instructed by Dario Pozzo, an author of few but excellent works, and after these first instructions he remained many years without further applying himself. Being afterwards compelled by necessity to practise the art, he became the scholar of Paolo, and the rival of the Bassani; and not finding employment in his native place, which then abounded with painters, he removed to Rome, and from thence to Urbino. It is said that he derived from Federigo the amenity of his style, and the beautiful airs of his heads. He married in Urbino, and afterwards fixed his residence in the district of Corinaldo, where, and in the neighbouring places, he left a great number of pictures, which yield little in tone to the best colourists of his native school, and are often conducted with a design, a sobriety, and a delicacy sufficient to excite their envy. Ridolfi, who wrote a brief life of him, enumerates scarcely one half of his works. There are some at Fossombrone, Cantiano, and Fabriano; and Rimino possesses a Deposition from the Cross, a beautiful composition. There are several mentioned in the Guida di Montalboddo, lately edited. Urbino is rich in them, where the Nascita del S. Precursore, (the Birth of S. John the Baptist), at S. Lucia, and the Presentation of the Virgin at the Spirito Santo, are highly valued. Many of his works are also to be seen in the Palazzo Albani, and in other collections of the nobility in Urbino. He there indeed formed a school, which gave birth to Cialdieri, of whom there are works remaining, both public and private; the most noted of which is a Martyrdom of S. John, at the church of S. Bartholomew. He possessed a facility and elegance of style, was highly accomplished in landscape, which he often introduced into his pictures, and is remarkable for his accurate perspective. Urbinelli, of Urbino, and Cesare Maggieri[^[73]] of the same city, lived also about this time. The first was a vigorous painter, an excellent colourist, and partial to the Venetian style. The second an industrious artist, inclining to the style of Barocci and Roman School. The history of art does not assign either of these to the school of Ridolfi; but there is a greater probability of the first rather than the second belonging to it. Another painter of uncertain school, but who partakes more of Claudio than of Barocci, is Patanazzi, who is mentioned in the Galleria de' Pittori Urbinati, (v. Coluc. tom. xvi.), and poetic incense is bestowed on his risentito pennello e l'ottima invenzione. I have seen by him in a chapel of the Duomo a Marriage of the Virgin, the figures not large, but well coloured and correctly drawn, if indeed some of them may not be thought rather attenuated than slender and elegant. A celebrated scholar of Ridolfi, Benedetto Marini, of Urbino, went to Piacenza, where he left some highly valued pictures in several churches, in which the style of Barocci is mixed with the Lombard and Venetian. The work which excites our greatest admiration is the Miracle of the Loaves in the Desert, which he painted in the refectory of the Conventuals in 1625. It is one of the largest compositions in oil which is to be seen, well grouped and well contrasted, and displaying uncommon powers.[^[74]] I should not hesitate to prefer the scholar to the master in grandeur of idea and vigour of execution, though in the fundamental principles of the art he may not be equal to him. The history of his life, as well as his works, scattered in that neighbourhood, in Pavia, and elsewhere, were deserving of commemoration; yet this artist as well as Bellini remains unnoticed by the catalogues, and what is more, he is little known in his native place, which has no other specimen of his pencil than a picture of S. Carlo at the Trinità, with some angels, which does not excite the same admiration as his works in Lombardy.[^[75]] Some other scholars of Claudio are found in Verona, to which city he returned, and remained for a short time; and in the Bolognese School mention will be made of Cantarini, among the masters of which he is numbered. In the meantime let us turn from these provincial schools, which were the first that felt the reviving influence of the age, to the capital, where we shall find Caravaggio, the Caracci, and other reformers of the art.

Michelangiolo Amerighi, or Morigi da Caravaggio, is memorable in this epoch, for having recalled the art from mannerism to truth, as well in his forms, which he always drew from nature, as in his colours, banishing the cinnabar and azures, and composing his colours of few but true tints, after the manner of Giorgione. Annibale Caracci extolling him, declares that he did not paint, but grind flesh, and both Guercino and Guido highly admired him, and profited from his example. He was instructed in the art in Milan, from whence he went to Venice to study Giorgione; and he adopted at the commencement of his career that subdued style of shadow, which he had learnt from that great artist, and in which some of the most highly prized works of Caravaggio are executed. He was however afterwards led away by his sombre genius, and represented objects with very little light, overcharging his pictures with shade. His figures inhabit dungeons, illuminated from above by only a single and melancholy ray. His backgrounds are always dark, and the actors are all placed in the same line, so that there is little perspective in his pictures; yet they enchant us, from the powerful effect which results from the strong contrast of light and shade. We must not look in him for correct design, or elegant proportion, as he ridiculed all artists who attempted a noble expression of countenance, or graceful foldings of drapery, or who imitated the forms of the antique, as exhibited in sculpture, his sense of the beautiful being all derived from visible nature. There is to be seen by him in the Spada palace a S. Anne, with the Virgin at her side, occupied in female work. Their features are remarkable only for their vulgarity, and they are both attired in the common dress of Rome, and are doubtless portraits, taken from the first elderly and young women that offered themselves to his observation. This was his usual manner; and he appeared most highly pleased when he could load his pictures with rusty armour, broken vessels, shreds of old garments, and attenuated and wasted bodies. On this account some of his works were removed from the altars, and one in particular at the Scala, which represented the Death of the Virgin, in which was figured a corpse, hideously swelled.

Few of his pictures are to be seen in Rome, and amongst them is the Madonna of Loreto, in the church of S. Agostino; but the best is the Deposition from the Cross, in the church of the Vallicella, which forms a singular contrast to the gracefulness of Barocci, and the seductive style of Guido, exhibited on the adjoining altars. He generally painted for collections. On his arrival in Rome he painted flowers and fruit; afterwards long pictures of half figures, a custom much practised after his time. In these he represented subjects sacred and profane, and particularly the manners of the lower classes, drinking parties, conjurors, and feasts. His most admired works are his Supper at Emmaus, in the Casa Borghese; S. Bastiano in Campidoglio; Agar, with Ishmael Dying, in the Panfili collection; and the picture of a Fruit Girl, which exhibits great resemblance of nature, both in the figures and accompaniments. He was still more successful in representing quarrels and nightly broils, to which he was himself no stranger, and by which too he rendered his own life scandalous. He fled from Rome for homicide, and resided for some time in Naples; from thence he passed to Malta, where, after having been honoured with the Cross by the Grand Master, for his talent displayed in his picture of the Decollation of S. John, in the oratory of the church of the Conventuals, he quarrelled with a cavalier and was thrown into prison. Escaping from thence with difficulty, he resided for some time in Sicily, and wished to return to Rome; but had not proceeded further on his journey than Porto Ercole, when he died of a malignant fever, in the year 1609. He left numerous works in these different countries, as we learn from Gio. Pietro Bellori, who wrote his life at considerable length. Of his chief scholars we shall treat in the following book. At present we will enumerate his followers in Rome and its territories.

His school, or rather the crowd of his imitators, who were greatly increased on his death, does not afford an instance of a single bad colourist; it has nevertheless been accused of neglect, both in design and grace. Bartolommeo Manfredi, of Mantua, formerly a scholar of Roncalli, might be called a second Caravaggio, except that he was rather more refined in his composition. His works are seldom found in collections, although he painted for them, as he died young, and is often supplanted by his master, as I believe was the case with some pictures painted for the Casa Medicea, mentioned by Baglione.

Carlo Saracino, or Saraceni, also called Veneziano, wishing to be thought a second Caravaggio, affected the same singular mode of dress as that master, and provided himself with a huge shagged dog, to which he gave the same name that Caravaggio had attached to his own. He left many works in Rome, both in fresco and oils. He too was a naturalista, but possessed a more clear style of colour. He displayed a Venetian taste in his figures, dressing them richly in the Levant fashion, and was fond of introducing into his compositions corpulent persons, eunuchs, and shaven heads. His principal frescos are in a hall of the Quirinal; his best oil pictures are thought to be those of S. Bonone, and a martyred bishop in the church dell'Anima. He is seldom found in collections; but, from the above peculiarities, I have more than once recognized his works. He returned to Venice, and soon afterwards died there; hence he was omitted by Ridolfi, and scarcely noticed by Zanetti.

Monsieur Valentino, as he is called in Italy, who was born at Brie, near Paris, and studied in Rome, became one of the most judicious followers of Caravaggio. He painted in the Quirinal the Martyrdom of the Saints Processo and Martiniano. He was a young artist of great promise, but was cut off by a premature death. His easel pictures are not very rare in Rome. The Denial of S. Peter, in the Palazzo Corsini, is a delightful picture.

Simone Vovet, the restorer of the French School, and the master of Le Brun, formed his style from the pictures of Caravaggio and Valentino. In Rome there are some charming productions by him both in public and private, particularly in the Barberini gallery. I have heard them preferred to many others that he painted in France in his noted rapid style.

Angiolo Caroselli was a Roman, in whose works, consisting chiefly of portraits and small figures, if we except the S. Vinceslao of the Quirinal palace, and a few similar pictures, we find the style of Caravaggio improved by an addition of grace and delicacy. He was remarkable for not making his design on paper, or using any preparatory study for his canvass. He is lively in his attitudes, rich in his tints, and finished and refined in his pictures, which are highly prized, but few in number, when we consider the term of his life. Besides practising the style of Caravaggio, in which he frequently deceived the most experienced, he imitated other artists in a wonderful manner. A S. Elena by him was considered as a production of Titian even by his rivals, until they found the cipher A. C. marked on the picture in small letters, and Poussin affirms, that he should have taken his two copies of Raffaello for genuine pictures, if he had not known where the originals were deposited.

Gherardo Hundhorst is called Gherardo dalle Notti, from having painted few subjects except illuminated night pieces, in which he chiefly excelled. He imitated Caravaggio, adopting only his better parts, his carnations, his vigorous pencil, and grand masses of light and shade: but he aimed also at correctness in his costume, selection in his forms, gracefulness of attitude, and represented religious subjects with great propriety. His pictures are very numerous, and the Prince Giustiniani possesses the one of Christ led by night to the Judgment Seat, which is one of his most celebrated works.

The school of Caravaggio flourished for a considerable period, but its followers, painting chiefly for private individuals, have in a great degree remained unknown. Baglione makes particular mention of Gio. Serodine, of Ascona, in Lombardy, and enumerates many works by him, more remarkable for their facility of execution than their excellence. There remains no public specimen of him, except a Decollation of S. John at S. Lorenzo fuor delle Mura. One of the latest of the school of Caravaggio was Tommaso Luini, a Roman, who, from his quarrelsome disposition, and his style, was called Il Caravaggino. He worked in Rome, and appeared most to advantage when he painted the designs of his master, Sacchi, as at S. Maria in Via. When he embodied his own ideas, his design was rather dry and his colouring dark. About the same time Gio. Campino of Camerino, who received his first instructions under Gianson in Flanders, resided in Rome for some years, and increased the number of this school. He was afterwards painter to the court of Madrid, and died in Spain. It is not known whether or not Gio. Francesco Guerrieri di Fossombrone ever studied in Rome, but his works are to be seen at Filippini di Fano, where he painted in a chapel, S. Carlo contemplating the Mysteries of the Passion, with two lateral pictures from the life of that saint; and in another chapel, where he represented the Dream of S. Joseph, his style resembles that of Caravaggio, but possesses more softness of colour, and more gracefulness of form. In the Duomo of Fabriano is also a S. Joseph by him. He has left, in his native place, an abundance of works, which, if distributed more widely, would give him a celebrity which it has not hitherto been his lot to receive. I there saw, in a church, a night piece of S. Sebastian attended by S. Irene, a picture of most beautiful effect; a Judith, in possession of the Franceschini family; other works in the Casa Passionei and elsewhere, very charming, and which often shew that he had very much imitated Guercino. His female forms are almost all cast in the same mould, and are copied from the person of a favorite mistress.

We now come to the Caracci and their school. Before Annibale arrived in Rome, he had already formed a style which left nothing to be desired, except to be more strongly imbued with the antique. Annibale added this to his other noble qualities when he came to Rome; and his disciples, who trod in his steps, and continued after his death to paint in that city, are particularly distinguished by this characteristic from those who remained in Bologna under the instruction of his cousin Lodovico. The disciples of Annibale left scholars in Rome; but no one except Sacchi approached so near in merit to his master, as they had done to Annibale, nor did there appear, like them, any founder of an original style. Still they were sufficient to put a check on the mannerists, and the followers of Caravaggio, and to restore the Roman School to a better taste. We shall now proceed to enumerate their scholars in their various classes.

Domenichino Zampieri, to his talents as a painter, added commensurate powers of instruction. Besides Alessandro Fortuna, who under the direction of his master painted some fables from Apollo, in the villa Aldobrandini in Frescati, and died young, Zampieri had in Rome two scholars of great repute, mentioned only by Bellori; Antonio Barbalunga, of Messina, and Andrea Camassei of Bevagna, both of whom honoured their country with their name and works, although they did not live many years. The first was a happy imitator of his master, who had long employed him in copying for himself. In the church of the P. P. Teatini, at Monte Cavallo, is his picture of their Founder, and of S. Andrea Avellino, attended by angels, which might be ascribed to Zampieri himself, whose forms in this class of subjects were select, and his attitudes elegant, and most engaging. To him I shall return in the fourth book. The second, who had also studied in the school of Sacchi, lived longer in Rome; and whoever wishes justly to appreciate him, must not judge from the chapel which he painted whilst yet young in his native place, but must inspect his works in the capital. There, in S. Andrea della Valle, is the S. Gaetano, painted at the same time, and in competition with the S. Andrea of Barbalunga, before mentioned with commendation; the Assumption at the Rotonda, and the Pietà at the Capucins; and many excellent frescos in the Baptistery of the Lateran, and in the church of S. Peter; which evince that he had almost an equal claim to fame with his comrade. If, indeed, he was somewhat less bold, and less select, yet he had a natural style, a grace, and a tone of colour, that do honour to the Roman School, to which he contributed Giovanni Carbone, of S. Severino, a scholar of some note. It has been remarked, that his fate resembles that of Domenichino, as his merits were undervalued, and himself persecuted by his relatives, and he was also prematurely cut off by domestic afflictions.

Francesco Cozza was born in Calabria, but settled in Rome. He was the faithful companion of Domenichino during the life of that master, and after his death completed some works left unfinished by that artist, and executed them in the genuine spirit of his departed friend, as may be seen in Titi. He appears to have inherited from his teacher his learning rather than his taste. One of his most beautiful pictures is the Virgin del Riscatto at S. Francesca Romana a Capo alle Case. Out of Rome there are few public or private works to be met with by him. He was considered exceedingly expert in his knowledge of the hands of the different masters, and on disputed points, which often arose on this subject in Rome, his opinion was always asked and acted on, without any appeal from his judgment. Of Pietro del Po, also a disciple of Domenichino, and of his family, we shall speak more at large in the fourth book.

Giannangiolo Canini, of Rome, was first instructed by Domenichino, and afterwards by Barbalunga, and would have obtained a great reputation for his inventive genius, if, seduced by the study of antiquities, he had not for his pleasure taken a short way to the art; which led him to neglect the component parts, and to satisfy himself with a general harmonious effect. He possessed, however, great force and energy in subjects which required it, as in the Martyrdom of S. Stephen at S. Martino a' Monti. The works which he executed with the greatest labour and care, were some sacred and profane subjects, which he was commissioned to paint for the Queen of Sweden. But although he was appointed painter to that court, and was also a great favourite with the queen, it should seem that he did not much exercise his profession either for her or others, as his great pleasure was in designing from the antique. He filled a large volume with a collection of portraits of illustrious ancients, and heads of the heathen deities, from gems and marbles. This book, the Cardinal Chigi having carried it with him into France, he presented to Louis XIV., and received a collar of gold as a remuneration for it. On his return to Rome he was intending to eulogize the queen in verse, and to continue in prose the lives of the painters, which he had in part prepared when he died. His biographical work probably afforded assistance to Passeri or to Bellori, his intimate friends.

With Canini worked Giambatista Passeri, a Roman, a man of letters, and who became afterwards a secular priest. It is recorded, that in the early part of his life he lived on very intimate terms with Domenichino at Frescati, and he adhered much to his style. There exists by him a Crucifixion between two Saints at S. Giovanni della Malva, but no other work in public, as most of his pictures are in private collections. In the Palazzo Mattei are some pictures representing butcher's meat, birds, and game, touched with a masterly pencil; to these are added some half figures, and also some sparrows (passere), in allusion to his name. There is also, by his hand, at the academy of S. Luke, the portrait of Domenichino, painted on the occasion of his funeral; on which occasion Passeri, and not Passerino, as Malvasia states, recited a funeral oration, and probably paid some poetical tribute to his memory, since he was accustomed to write both verse and prose as Bellori did; and his silence on the Lives of Bellori, which had then appeared, and which he had numerous opportunities of noticing, probably arose from feelings of jealousy. He is esteemed one of the most authentic writers on Italian art; and if Mariette expressed himself dissatisfied with him, (v. Lett. Pitt. tom. vi. p. 10,) it probably arose from his having seen only his Life of Pietro da Cortona, which was left unfinished by the author. He possessed a profound knowledge of the principles of art, was just in his criticisms, accurate in his facts; if, indeed, as has been pretended by a writer in the Pittoriche Lettere, he did not in some degree depreciate Lanfranc, in order to raise his own master, Zampieri. His work contains the lives of many painters, at that time deceased, and was published anonymously, it is supposed, by Bottari, who in many places shortened it, and improved the style, which was too elaborate, containing useless preambles, and was occasionally too severe against Bernino and others, on which account the work remained unedited for more than a century.

Vincenzio Manenti, of Sabina, who was first the scholar of Cesari, and afterwards of Domenichino, left many works in his native place. Some pictures by him are to be seen in Tivoli, as the S. Stefano in the Duomo, and the S. Saverio at the Gesù, which do not exhibit him as an artist of very great genius, but assiduous and expert in colouring. Of Ruggieri, of Bologna, we shall speak elsewhere.

Guido cannot be said to have contributed much to the Roman School, except in leaving in the capital a great number of works displaying that charm of style, and distinguished by that superhuman beauty, which were his characteristics. We are told of two scholars who came to him at the same time from Perugia, Giandomenico Cerrini, and Luigi, the son of Giovanni Antonio Scaramuccia. The pictures of Cerrini, (who was commonly called Il Cav. Perugino) were frequently touched by his master Guido, and passed for originals of that artist, and were much sought after. In his other works he varies, having sometimes followed the elder Scaramuccia. His fellow disciple is more consistent. He displays grace in every part of his work, and if he does not soar, still he does not fall to the ground. There are many of his paintings in Perugia, both in public and private, amongst which is a Presentation at the Filippini, from all accounts a beautiful performance. He left many works in Milan, where in the church of S. Marco, is a S. Barbera by him; a large composition, and extremely well coloured. He published a book in Pavia, in 1654, which he intituled Le Finezze de' Pennelli Italiani. It is full, says the Abbate Bianconi, di buona volontà pittorica. It possesses nevertheless some interesting remarks.

Gio. Batista Michelini, called Il Folignate, is almost forgotten in this catalogue; but there are in Gubbio various works by him, and particularly a Pietà, worthy of the school of Guido. Macerata possessed a noble disciple of Guido, in the person of the Cav. Sforza Compagnoni, by whose hand there is, in the academy de' Catinati, the device of that society, which might be taken for a design of Guido. He gave a picture to the church of S. Giorgio, which is still there, and presented a still more beautiful one to the church of S. Giovanni, which was long to be seen over the great altar, but is now in the possession of the Conte Cav. Mario Compagnoni. Malvasia mentions him in the life of Viola, but makes him a scholar of Albano. The Ginesini boast of Cesare Renzi, as a respectable scholar of Guido, and, in the church of S. Tommaso, they shew a picture of that saint by his hand. In addition to the scholars of Guido, whose names have been handed down to us, I shall here beg leave to add an imitator of Guido, who from the time in which he flourished, and from his noble style of colour, probably belonged to the same school. I found his name subscribed Giorgio Giuliani da Cività Castellana, 161.., on a large picture of the Martyrdom of S. Andrew, which Guido painted for the Camaldolesi di S. Gregorio at Rome: and which this artist copied for the celebrated monastery of the Camaldolesi all'Avellana. It is exposed in the refectory, and notwithstanding the dampness of the place, maintains a freshness of colour very unusual in pictures of that antiquity.

The Cav. Gio. Lanfranco came to Rome whilst yet young, and there formed that free and noble style, which served to decorate many cupolas and noble edifices, and which pleases also in his cabinet pictures when he executed them with care. Giacinto Brandi di Poli was his most celebrated scholar in Rome. He at first adopted his master's moderate tone of colour, the variety and contrast of his composition, and his flowing pencil; but in consequence of his filling, as he did, Rome and the state with his works, he neglected correctness of design, and never arrived at that grandeur of style which we admire in Lanfranc. He sometimes indeed went beyond himself, as in the S. Rocco of the Ripetta, and in the forty martyrs of the Stigmata in Rome; but his inordinate love of gain would not allow him to finish many works in the same good style. I have been informed by a connoisseur, on whose opinion I can rely, that the best works of this artist are at Gaeta, where he painted at the Nunziata a picture of the Madonna with the Holy Infant; and where, in the inferior part of the Duomo, he painted in the vault three recesses and ten angles, adding over the altar the picture of the martyrdom of S. Erasmus, bishop of the city, who was buried in that church. Brandi did not perpetuate the taste of his school, not leaving any pupil of eminence except Felice Ottini, who painted in his youth a chapel at the P. P. di Gesù e Maria, and did not long survive that work. Orlandi also mentions a Carlo Lamparelli di Spello, who left in Rome a picture at the church of the Spirito Santo, but nothing further. An Alessandro Vaselli also left some works in another church in Rome.

After Brandi, we ought to commemorate Giacomo Giorgetti, of Assisi, who is little known beyond his native city, and the neighbouring towns. He is said to have first studied the art of design in Rome, when he learned colouring from Lanfranc, and became a good fresco painter. There is by him in a chapel of the Duomo at Assisi, a large composition in fresco, and in the sacristy of the Conventuals, various subjects from the Life of the Virgin, also in fresco; works coloured in a fine style, and much more finished than was usual with Lanfranc. If there be any fault to be found with them, it is the proportions of the figures, which not unfrequently incline to awkwardness. His name is found in the Descrizione della Chiesa di S. Francesco di Perugia, together with that of Girolamo Marinelli, his fellow citizen and contemporary, of whom I never found any other notice.

Lanfranc instructed in Rome a noble lady, who filled the church of S. Lucia with her pictures. These were designed by her master, and coloured by herself. Her name was Caterina Ginnasi. There were also with Lanfranc in Rome, Mengucci, of Pesaro, and others, who afterwards left Rome, and will be mentioned by us elsewhere. Some have added to these Beinaschi, but he was only an excellent copyist and imitator, as we shall see in the fourth book. At the same time, we may assert, that none of the Caracci school had a greater number of followers than Lanfranc; as Pietro di Cortona, the chief of a numerous family, derived much of his style from him, and the whole tribe of machinists adopted him as their leader, and still regard him as their prototype.

Albano too, here deserves a conspicuous place as a master of the Roman School. Giambatista Speranza, a Roman, learned from him the principles of the art, and became a fresco painter of the best taste in Rome. If we inspect his works at S. Agostino, and S. Lorenzo in Lucina, and in other places where he painted religious subjects, we immediately perceive that his age is not that of the Zuccari, and that the true style of fresco still flourished. From Albano too, and from Guercino, Pierfrancesco Mola di Como derived that charming style, which partook of the excellences of both these artists. He renounced the principles of Cesari, who had instructed him for many years; and after having diligently studied colouring at Venice, he attached himself to the school of the Caracci, but more particularly to Albano. He never, however, equalled his master in grace, although he had a bolder tone of colour, greater invention, and more vigour of subject. He died in the prime of life whilst preparing for his journey to Paris, where he was appointed painter to the court. Rome possesses many of his pictures, particularly in fresco, in the churches; and in the Quirinal palace, is Joseph found by his Brethren, which is esteemed a most beautiful piece. There are also many of his pictures to be found in private collections; and in his landscapes, in which he excelled, it is doubted whether the figures are by him or Albano. He had in Rome three pupils, who, aspiring to be good colourists, frequented the same fountains of art as their master had done, and travelled through all Italy. They were Antonio Gherardi da Rieti, who on the death of Mola frequented the school of Cortona; and painted in many churches in Rome with more despatch than elegance;[^[76]] Gio. Batista Boncuore, of Abruzzo, a painter in a grand though somewhat heavy style;[^[77]] and Giovanni Bonatti, of Ferrara, whom we shall reserve for his native school.

Virgilio Ducci, of Città di Castello, is little known among the scholars of Albano, though he does not yield to many of the Bolognese in the imitation of their common master. Two pictures of Tobias, in a chapel of the Duomo, in his native place, are painted in an elegant and graceful style. An Antonio Catalani, of Rome, is mentioned to us by Malvasia, and with him Girolamo Bonini, of Ancona, the intimate friend of Albani. These artists resided in Bologna, and were employed there, as we shall see in our history of that school. Of the second we are told that he painted both in Venice and in Rome; and Orlandi praises his works in the Sala Farnese, which either no longer exist, or are neglected to be mentioned in the Guida of Titi.

Lastly, from the studio of Albani issued Andrea Sacchi, after its chief the best colourist of the Roman School, and one of the most celebrated in design, in the practice of which he continued until his death. Profoundly skilled in the theory of art, he was yet slow in the execution. It was a maxim with him that the merit of a painter does not consist in giving to the world a number of works of mediocrity, but a few perfect ones; and hence his pictures are rare. His compositions do not abound with figures, but every figure appears appropriate to its place; and the attitudes seem not so much chosen by the artist, as regulated by the subject itself. Sacchi did not, indeed, shun the elegant, though he seems born for the grand style—grave miens, majestic attitudes, draperies folded with care and simplicity; a sober colouring, and a general tone, which gave to all objects a pleasing harmony, and a grateful repose to the eye. He seems to have disdained minuteness, and, after the example of many of the ancient sculptors, to have left some part always unfinished; so at least his admirers assert. Mengs expresses himself differently, and says, that Sacchi's principle was to leave his pictures, as it were, merely indicated, and to take his ideas from natural objects, without giving them any determinate form: on this matter the professors of the art must decide. His picture of S. Romualdo surrounded by his monks, is ranked among the four best compositions in Rome; and the subject was a difficult one to treat, as the great quantity of white in the vestures tends to produce a sameness of colour. The means which Sacchi adopted on this occasion have always been justly admired. He has placed a large tree near the foreground, the shade of which serves to break the uniformity of the figures, and he thus introduced a pleasing variety in the monotony of the colours. His Transito di S. Anna at S. Carlo a' Catinari, his S. Andrea in the Quirinal, and his S. Joseph at Capo alle Case, are also beautiful pictures. Perugia, Foligno, and Camerino, possess altarpieces by him which are the boast of these cities. He enjoyed the reputation of an amiable and learned instructor. One of his lectures, communicated by his celebrated scholar, Francesco Lauri, may be read in the life of that artist, written by Pascoli, who, as I have before remarked, collected the greater part of his information from the old painters in Rome. He has probably engrafted on them some sentiments either of his own or of others, as often happens in a narrative when the related facts are founded more in probability than in certainty; but the maxims there inculcated by Sacchi are worthy of an artist strongly attached to the true, the select, and the grand; and who, to give dignity to his figures, seems to have had his eyes on the precepts of Quintilian respecting the action of his orator. He had a vast number of scholars, among whom we may reckon Giuseppe Sacchi, his son, who became a conventual monk, and painted a picture in the sacristy, in the church of the Apostles. But his most illustrious disciple was Maratta, of whom, and of whose scholars, we shall speak in another epoch.

We find a follower of the Caracci, though we know not of what particular master, in Giambatista Salvi, called from the place in which he was born, Sassoferrato,[^[78]] and whom we shall notice further when we speak of Carlo Dolci, and his very devotional pictures. This artist excelled Dolci in the beauty of his Madonnas, but yielded to him in the fineness of his pencil. Their style was dissimilar, Salvi having formed himself on other models; he first studied in his native place under Tarquinio, his father,[^[79]] then in Rome and afterwards in Naples; it is not known precisely under what masters, except that in his MS. Memoirs we read of one Domenico. The period in which Salvi studied corresponds in a remarkable manner with the time in which Domenichino was employed in Naples, and his manner of painting shews that he adopted the style of that master, though not exclusively. I have seen in the possession of his heirs many copies from the first masters, which he executed for his own pleasure. I observed several of Albano, Guido, Barocci, Raffaello, reduced to a small size, and painted, as one may say, all in one breath. There are also some landscapes of his composition, and a vast number of sacred portraits; several of S. John the Baptist, but more than all of the Madonna. Though not possessing the ideal beauty of the Greeks, he has yet a style of countenance peculiarly appropriate to the Virgin, in which an air of humility predominates, and the simplicity of the dress and the attire of the head corresponds with the expression of the features, without at the same time lessening the dignity of her character. He painted with a flowing pencil, was varied in his colouring, had a fine relief and chiaroscuro; but in his local tints he was somewhat hard. He delighted most in designing heads with a part of the bust, which frequently occur in collections; his portraits are very often of the size of life, and of that size, or larger, is a Madonna, by him, with the infant Christ, in the Casali palace at Rome. The picture of the Rosario, that he painted at S. Sabina, is one of the smallest pictures in Rome. It is, however, well composed, and conducted with his usual spirit, and is regarded as a gem. In other places the largest picture by him which is to be seen, is an altarpiece in the cathedral of Montefiascone.

A follower of the Caracci also, though of an uncertain school, was Giuseppino da Macerata, whom a dubious tradition has assigned to Agostino. His works are to be seen in the two collegiate churches of Fabriano; an Annunciation, in oils, in S. Niccolò, and at S. Venanzio two chapels, painted in fresco, in one of which, where he represented the miracles of the apostles, he surpassed himself in the beauty of the heads and in the general composition; in other respects he is somewhat hasty and indecisive. Two of his works remain in his native place; at the Carmelites the Madonna in Glory, with S. Nicola and S. Girolamo on the foreground; and at the Capucins, S. Peter receiving the Keys. Both these pictures are in the Caracci style, but the second is most so; corresponding in a singular manner with one of the same subject which the Filippini of Fano have in their church, and which is an authentic and historical work of Guido Reni. The second, therefore, is probably a copy. There is written on it Joseph Ma. faciebat 1630, but the figures of the year are not very legible. Marcello Gobbi, and Girolamo Boniforti,[^[80]] a tolerable good imitator of Titian, lived at this time in Macerata. Perugia presents us with two scholars of the Caracci, Giulio Cesare Angeli and Anton. Maria Fabrizzi, the one the pupil of Annibale in Rome, the other of Lodovico in Bologna. They were attracted by the fame of their masters, and secretly leaving their native place for about the space of twelve years, they obtained admission for some time into their school, if we may rely on Pascoli. Fabrizzi, who is also said to have worked under Annibale, does not shew great correctness; and the cause may be ascribed to his too ardent temperament, and the want of more mature instruction; for Annibale dying after three years, from a scholar he became a master, and was celebrated for his vigorous colouring, his composition, and the freedom of his pencil. Angeli was more remarkable for expression and colour than design, and excelled rather in the draped than in the naked figure. There is a vast work by him in fresco in the oratory of the church of S. Agostino in Perugia, and in part of it a limbo of saints, certainly not designed by the light of Lodovico's lamp, if indeed it ought not to be considered that this lunette is by another hand. This branch of the Bolognese School, which was constantly degenerating from the excellence of its origin, being at such a distance from Bologna as not to be able to be revivified by the pictures of the Caracci, still survived for a long time. Angeli instructed Cesare Franchi, who excelled in small pictures, which were highly prized in collections; and Stefano Amadei also, who was formed more on the Florentine School of that age than on the School of Bologna. Stefano was also attached to letters, and opened a school, and by frequent meetings and instructive lectures improved the minds of the young artists who frequented it. One of the most assiduous of these was Fabio, brother of the Duke of Cornia, of whom some works are mentioned in the Guida di Roma, and who entitled himself to a higher rank than that of a mere dilettante.

Besides the Bolognese, a number of Tuscans who were employed by Paul V. in the two churches of S. Peter and S. M. Maggiore, also contributed to the melioration of the Roman School; and some others who, deprived of that opportunity of distinguishing themselves, are yet memorable for the scholars they left behind them. Of the diocese of Volterra was Cristoforo Roncalli, called Il Cav. delle Pomarance, cursorily noticed by us among the Tuscans. I now place him in this school, because he both painted and taught for a considerable time in Rome; and I assign him to this epoch, not from the generality of his works, but from his best having been executed in it. He was the scholar of Niccolò delle Pomarance, for whom he worked much with little reward; and from his example he learnt to avail himself of the labour of others, and to content himself with mediocrity. Yet there are several pictures by him, in which he appears excellent, except that he too often repeats himself in his backgrounds, his foreshortened heads, and full and rubicund countenances. His style of design is a mixture of the Florentine and Roman. In his frescos he displayed fresh and brilliant colours; in his oil pictures, on the contrary, he adopted more sober tints, harmonized by a general tone of tranquillity and placidness. He frequently decorated these with landscapes gracefully disposed. Among his best labours is reckoned the death of Ananias and Sapphira, which is at the Certosa, and which was copied in mosaic in S. Peter's. Other mosaics also in the same church were executed after his cartoons, and in the Lateranense is his Baptism of Constantine, a grand historical composition. But his most celebrated work is the cupola of Loreto, very rich in figures, but injured by time, except some prophets, which are in a truly grand style. He painted considerably in the treasury of that church; and there are some histories of the Madonna not conducted with equal felicity, particularly in the perspective. He obtained this vast commission through the patronage of the Cardinal Crescenzi, in competition with Caravaggio, who, to gratify his revenge, hired an assassin to wound him in the face; and in rivalship too with Guido Reni, who retaliated in a more laudable manner, by proving his superiority by his works. Roncalli from this time was in great request in the cities of Picenum, which in consequence abound with his pictures. There is to be seen at the Eremitani at S. Severino, a Noli me tangere; at S. Agostino in Ancona, a S. Francis praying; and at S. Palazia in Osimo, a picture of a saint, one of his most finished productions. In the same city, in the Casa Galli, he painted di sotto in su the Judgment of Solomon; and this is perhaps the best fresco that he ever executed. He could vary his manner at will. There is an Epiphany in the possession of the Marquis Mancinforti in Ancona, quite in the style of the Venetian School.

There were two artists who approached this master in style, the Cav. Gaspare Celio, a Roman, and Antonio, the son of Niccolò Circignani. Celio was the pupil of Niccolò, according to Baglione, but of Roncalli, if we are to believe Titi. He designed and engraved antique statues, and painted in a commendable manner whilst young, after the designs of P. Gio. Bat. Fiammeri, at the Gesù, and at a more mature age after his own, in numerous churches. The S. Francis, on the altar of the Ospizio, at Ponte Sisto, is by him; and he also painted the history of S. Raimondo at the Minerva, and the Moses passing the Red Sea, in a vault of the Mattei gallery, where he competed with other first rate artists. Antonio is not well known in Rome, where he worked with his father, after whose death he decorated by himself a chapel at the Traspontina, another at the Consolazione, and painted also in private houses. Città di Castello, where he passed some of the best years of his life, possesses many of his pictures, and amongst the rest, that of the Conception, at the Conventuals, which may be called a mixture of Barocci and Roncalli, from whom he probably learned to improve the style he had inherited from his father.

The Cav. delle Pomarance instructed the Marchese Gio. Batista Crescenzi, who became a great patron of the fine arts, and who was so much skilled in them, that Paul V. appointed him superintendent of the works which he was carrying on in Rome; and Philip III., the Catholic, also availed himself of his services in the Escurial. He did not execute many works, and his chief talent lay in flower painting. His house was frequented by literary men, and particularly by Marino; he formed in it a gallery containing an extensive collection of pictures and drawings, of which he himself says, "I believe I may indeed safely affirm that there is not a prince in Europe that does not yield to me in this respect." (Lett. p. 89.) There the artists were always to be found, one of whom, his disciple, was called Bartolommeo del Crescenzi, of the family of Cavarozzi of Viterbo. He was a most correct artist, a follower first of Roncalli, and afterwards became the author of a captivating natural style. There exist many excellent pictures by him in collections, and in the church of S. Anna, a picture of that saint, executed, says Baglione, in his best taste, and with a vigorous pencil.

Among the scholars of Roncalli may also be ranked Giovanni Antonio, father of Luigi Scaramuccia, who also saw and imitated the Caracci. His works are often met with in Perugia. The spirit and freedom of his pencil are more commended than his tints, which are too dark, and which in the churches easily distinguish him amidst a crowd of other artists. It is probable that he used too great a quantity of terra d'ombra, like others of his day. Girolamo Buratti, of the same school, painted in Ascoli the beautiful picture of the Presepio at the Carità, and some subjects in fresco, highly commended by Orsini. Of Alessandro Casolani, who belongs to this master, we spoke in the Sienese School. With him, too, was included Cristoforo his son, who, with Giuseppe Agellio of Sorrento, may be ranked with the inferior artists.

Francesco Morelli, a Florentine, demands our notice only as having imparted the rudiments of the art to the Cav. Gio. Baglione of Rome. His pupil, however, did not remain with him for any length of time, but formed a style for himself from a close application to the works of the best masters, and was employed by Paul V., by the Duke of Mantua, and by persons of distinction. He is less vigorous in design and expression, than in colour and chiaroscuro. We meet with his works, not only in Rome, where he painted much, but also in several provincial towns, as the S. Stephen in the Duomo of Perugia, and the S. Catherine at the Basilica Loretana. In his colours he resembled Cigoli, but was far behind him in other respects. The picture which procured him great applause in the Vatican, the Resuscitation of Tabitha, is defaced by time; but both there and at the Cappella Paolina in S. Maria Maggiore, which was the most considerable work of Paul V., his pieces in fresco still remain, and are not unworthy of their age. He is not often found in collections, but in that of the Propaganda I saw a S. Rocco painted by him with great force of colour. He lived to a considerable age, and left behind him a compendium of the lives of professors of the fine arts, who had been his contemporaries in Rome from 1572 to 1642. He wrote in an unostentatious manner, and free from party spirit, and was on all occasions more disposed to commend the good than to censure the bad. Whenever I peruse him, I seem to hear the words of a venerable teacher, inclined rather to inculcate precepts of morals, than maxims on the fine arts. Of the latter, indeed, he is very sparing, and it would almost lead one to suppose that he had succeeded in his profession, more from a natural bias, and a talent of imitation, than from scientific principles and sound taste. It was, perhaps, in order that he might not be tied to treat of the art theoretically, and to write profoundly, that he distributed his work in five dialogues, in the course of which we do not meet with professors of art, but are introduced to a foreigner and to a Roman gentleman, who act the respective parts of master and scholar. Dialogues, indeed, were never composed in a more simple style, in any language. The two interlocutors meet in the cloisters of the Minerva, and after a slight salutation, one of them recounts the lives of the masters of the art, to the number of eighty, which are commenced, continued, and ended, in a style sufficiently monotonous, both as to manner and language; the other listens to this long narrative, without either interrupting or answering, or adding a word in reply: and thus the dialogue, or rather soliloquy, concludes, without the slightest expression of thanks on the part of the auditor, or even the ceremony of a farewell. We shall now return to the Tuscan scholars.