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diff --git a/41743.txt b/41743.txt deleted file mode 100644 index ea4b0a0..0000000 --- a/41743.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,5911 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Pintoricchio, by Evelyn March Phillipps - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: Pintoricchio - The Great Masters in Painting and Sculpture - -Author: Evelyn March Phillipps - -Editor: G. C. Williamson - -Release Date: December 31, 2012 [EBook #41743] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PINTORICCHIO *** - - - - -Produced by Thierry Alberto, Lam Hiu-yin and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - - - - - - - - -The Great Masters in Painting and Sculpture - -Edited by G. C. Williamson - -PINTORICCHIO - - - - -THE GREAT MASTERS IN PAINTING AND SCULPTURE. - - -_The following Volumes have been issued, price 5s. net each._ - - BERNARDINO LUINI. By GEORGE C. WILLIAMSON, Litt.D., Editor of the - Series. - - VELASQUEZ. By R. A. M. STEVENSON. - - ANDREA DEL SARTO. By H. GUINNESS. - - LUCA SIGNORELLI. By MAUD CRUTTWELL. - - RAPHAEL. By H. STRACHEY. - - CARLO CRIVELLI. By G. MCNEIL RUSHFORTH, M.A., Lecturer in Classics, - Oriel College, Oxford. - - CORREGGIO. By SELWYN BRINTON, M.A., Author of "The Renaissance in - Italian Art." - - DONATELLO. By HOPE REA, Author of "Tuscan Artists." - - PERUGINO. By G. C. WILLIAMSON, Litt.D. - - SODOMA. By the CONTESSA LORENZO PRIULI-BON. - - LUCA DELLA ROBBIA. By the MARCHESA BURLAMACCHI. - - GIORGIONE. By HERBERT COOK, M.A., F.S.A. - - MEMLINC. By W. H. JAMES WEALE, late Keeper of the National Art - Library. - - PIERO DELLA FRANCESCA. By W. G. WATERS, M.A. - - PINTORICCHIO. By EVELYN MARCH PHILLIPPS. - - -_In preparation._ - - EL GRECO. By MANUEL B. COSSIO, Litt.D., Ph.D., Director of the Musee - Pedagogique, Madrid. - - MICHAEL ANGELO. By CHARLES HOLROYD, Keeper of the National Gallery - of British Art. - - FRANCIA. By GEORGE C. WILLIAMSON, Litt.D. - - THE BROTHERS BELLINI. By S. ARTHUR STRONG, M.A., Librarian to the - House of Lords. - - DURER. By HANS W. SINGER, M.A., Ph.D., Assistant Director of the - Royal Print Room, Dresden. - - WILKIE. By LORD RONALD SUTHERLAND-GOWER, M.A., F.S.A., Trustee of - the National Portrait Gallery. - - TINTORETTO. By J. B. STOUGHTON HOLBORN, M.A. of Merton College, - Oxford. - - MANTEGNA. By MAUD CRUTTWELL. - - GIOTTO. By F. MASON PERKINS. - - BRUNELLESCHI. By LEADER SCOTT. - -_Others to follow._ - -LONDON: GEORGE BELL & SONS - - - - - [Illustration: - Hanfstangl, photo. Dresden Gallery - - Portrait of a Boy, - by Pintoricchio.] - - - - -PINTORICCHIO - - BY - EVELYN MARCH PHILLIPPS - -[Illustration] - - LONDON - GEORGE BELL & SONS - - 1901 - - - - -CONTENTS - - - PAGE - - LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS vii - - BIBLIOGRAPHY xi - - PEDIGREE xiii - - Chapter I. BIOGRAPHICAL 1 - - II. DERIVATION AND CHARACTER OF HIS ART 19 - - III. FIRST PERIOD IN ROME 36 - - IV. LIFE IN ROME--CONTINUED 55 - - V. THE BORGIA APARTMENTS 64 - - VI. THE SAME, AND THE CASTEL SANT' ANGELO 86 - - VII. SPELLO 100 - - VIII. SIENA AND THE LAST OF ROME 106 - - IX. THE LIBRARY AT SIENA 115 - - X. PANEL PAINTINGS 139 - - CATALOGUE OF THE WORKS OF PINTORICCHIO 153 - - AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 155 - - BRITISH ISLES 155 - - FRANCE 156 - - GERMANY 156 - - ITALY 157 - - SPAIN 162 - - CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE 163 - - INDEX 167 - - - - -LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS - - - PAGE - - Portrait of a Boy _Dresden Gallery_ _Frontispiece_ 16 - - A Miracle of San Bernardino, by Fiorenzo di Lorenzo - _Perugia Gallery_ 24 - - Four Heads of Women (From the Sketch-Book) _Venice_ 40 - - The Journey of Moses _Sixtine Chapel, Rome_ 42 - - The Baptism of Christ _The same_ 44 - - The Burial of San Bernardino. (From the Buffalini Chapel) - _Church of Ara Coeli, Rome_ 50 - - The Glorification of San Bernardino, from the same _The same_ 54 - - The Annunciation _Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ 68 - - Pope Alexander VI. adoring the Risen Christ _The same_ 70 - - Detail, Figure of the Pope _The same_ 72 - - Detail from the Assumption of the Virgin--the Kneeling Man - _The same_ 74 - - The Story of Susanna _The same_ 74 - - St. Anthony and St. Paul--Hermits _The same_ 76 - - The Demon Women, a Detail from the above _The same_ 78 - - The Martyrdom of St. Sebastian _The same_ 78 - - The Dispute of St. Catherine _The same_ 80 - - The Figure of St. Catherine, another Detail from the same - _Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ 80 - - Group of Heads, a Detail from the above _The same_ 82 - - General View of the Hall of Liberal Arts and Sciences - _The same_ 86 - - The Madonna and Child, with Angels (over the door) - _The same_ 88 - - Figure representing Arithmetic _The same_ 90 - - Figure representing Music _The same_ 92 - - The Adoration of the Shepherds - _Sta. Maria Maggiore, Spello_ 102 - - The Annunciation _The same_ 104 - - Portrait of Pintoricchio _The same_ 104 - - The Knight of Aringhieri _Siena_ 110 - - Symbolical Scene, from the Pavement in the Cathedral - _The same_ 112 - - The Return of Ulysses _National Gallery, London_ 114 - - Study for Fresco I., by Raphael _Venice_ 118 - - Aeneas Piccolomini on his way to the Council at Basel - _The Library, Siena_ 120 - - Frederick III. crowning Aeneas Piccolomini as Poet Laureate - _The same_ 126 - - Aeneas Piccolomini sent by Frederick III. to Pope Eugenius IV. - _The same_ 128 - - A Group of Men, Detail from Fresco IX. _The same_ 132 - - Aeneas Piccolomini elected Pope under the name of Pius II. - _The same_ 134 - - Pope Pius II. at Ancona _The same_ 136 - - The Madonna and Child, with St. John. (From the - large _ancona_) _Perugia Gallery_ 140 - - The Madonna and Child, with Angels and a Donor - _Duomo, San Severino_ 142 - - The Madonna and Child _National Gallery, London_ 146 - - St. Augustine, St. Benedict, and St. Bernard, from - the Reliquary _Berlin Gallery_ 148 - - The Christ-Child and St John the Baptist. (From - the Holy Family) _Siena Gallery_ 148 - - Christ bearing the Cross _Pal. Borromeo, Milan_ 150 - - - - -BIBLIOGRAPHY - - - VASARI. Ed. G. C. Sansoni. Firenze, 1878. - - CROWE AND CAVALCASELLE. "History of Painting in Italy." 1866. - - VERMIGLIOLI. "Memorie di Pinturicchio." Perugia, 1837. - - EHRLE AND STEVENSON. "Gli affreschi del Pinturicchio nell' - Appartamento, Borgia." 1897. - - A. SCHMARSOW. "Raphael und Pinturicchio in Siena." Stuttgart, 1880. - - A. SCHMARSOW. "Pinturicchio in Rom." Stuttgart, 1882. - - E. STEINMANN. "Pinturicchio," No. 37, Knackfuss Series. 1898. - - B. BERENSON. "Central Italian Painters of the Renaissance." 1897. - - DEAN KITCHIN. "History of Pius II." - - GREGOROVIUS. "History of the City of Rome in the Middle Ages." - - - - - BIAGIO. - | - BENEDETTO. - | - BERNARDINO, - Painter, called Il Pintoricchio, - _b. circa_ 1454; _d._ 1513; - _m._ Grania, daughter of Niccolo of Modena or Bologna - | - +-----------+---------+----------+-------------+----------+ - | | | | | | - GIULIO CAMILLO, FAUSTINA EGIDIA, FAUSTINA, ADRIANA, - CESARE, _b._ 1509 GIROLAMA, or GILIA, _m._ _d._ 1519; - _b._ 1506 in Siena. _b._ 1510 _m._ Filippodi _m._ - in Siena. in Siena. Girolamo di Guiseppe - di Paolo, Paolo da - a Perugian, of Giovanni - called Il Deruta. of - Paffo, Perugia - soldier - of the - Piazza - in Siena. - - (From MILANESI'S _Appendix to Vasari_.) - - - - - -PINTORICCHIO - - -CHAPTER I - -BIOGRAPHICAL - - -Pintoricchio is not one of the most famous painters of the Italian -Renaissance, and perhaps no painter who has left us such a mass of work, -and work of such interest, has attracted so little criticism and -inquiry. From the time of Vasari's slighting biography onwards, he has -been included among minor painters and passed over with very superficial -examination. No separate life of him in English exists, no attempt has -been made to consider his work in anything like exhaustive detail, or to -define his charm. It would be idle to claim for him a place in the first -rank: some may question his right to stand in the second; in some of the -greatest essentials he will not pass muster--yet charm he does possess, -qualities whose fascination draws those who are open to it back to him -again and again with fresh pleasure; and for this, and because he -presents us with so true a type of the Umbrian painter of the -Renaissance, it is worth while trying to unravel his history. - -Before we try to disentangle the origin of his art, before we compare -his different periods and examine the paintings he has left us, we must -make some attempt to arrive at his personality, to see the man as he -was, to gain what clue we may, by this means, to the work in which his -life was spent. - -Nothing can be more meagre than the few hints we have of his origin and -early history, and yet we can probably construct a pretty correct -outline of their chief features. Vermiglioli in 1837 made a careful -examination of the archives of Perugia and Siena, and was the first to -endeavour to rehabilitate the artist, and to re-awaken that public -interest which was so liberally bestowed on him in his lifetime. He was -born at Perugia about 1454, if we are to believe Vasari, who tells us -that when he died in 1513 he was in his fifty-ninth year. His father was -one Benedetto or Benedecto, and he was christened Bernardino Benedetto -(afterwards shortened to Betto or Betti). The famous saint, Bernardino -of Siena, had died ten years earlier and was canonised in 1550. During -his last years his preaching had made a great sensation in Perugia, and -no doubt numbers of children born at this time were dedicated to him. A -document of 1502 exists at Siena,[1] in which Pintoricchio is styled the -son of Benedetto di Biagio, so that we thus learn the bare names of his -father and grandfather. We have no means of knowing their standing, but -the entire absence of any mention of relatives or inheritance makes it -probable that he came of poor people, and was not blessed with any close -family ties. We know nothing of what was the childhood of the "little -painter," only the nickname of "il sordicchio," the deaf one, suggests -that this infirmity may have been one reason why he was dedicated to an -artist's career; but the deafness could hardly have been very -remarkable, as it is never alluded to otherwise, nor does it appear to -have hampered Bernardino's intercourse with the world. There is a faint -tradition[2] that his home was near the Porto San Christoforo, which, -while hardly worth notice, indicates that his youth was passed in -Perugia. - - [1] _Archivio dei Contratti._ Vasari, iii. p. 513, note I._e._ - - [2] Vermiglioli, p. 8. - -From the tendencies which all his life clung about his work, we surmise -that he began his artistic career under one of the miniature painters -who then flourished in Perugia. Vermiglioli refers to a series of -miniature paintings belonging to his family, which Orsini, in his -researches into the history of Umbrian painting, had already mentioned -as resembling Pintoricchio's work, especially in the use made of -architecture. At the time he was growing up there was a flourishing -college of miniaturists in Perugia, which had reconstructed its statutes -in 1436. - -Vasari thus comments upon Bernardino: "Some are helped by fortune, -without being much endowed by merit; ... one knows that Fortune has sons -who depend on her help without any virtue of their own, and she is -pleased that they should owe their exaltation to her favour, when they -would never have been known for their own merit."[3] But Vasari -evidently knew nothing of the good or bad fortune of Pintoricchio's -early days, and was merely balancing his own estimate of the artist -against the consideration he received in later years. - - [3] Vasari, iii. p. 493. - -Natural bent and circumstance combined to form Bernardino Betti into an -Umbrian of the Umbrians, placing him on the less powerful but more -indigenous side of the sharply-divided line which ran through the -artistic life of the country. There is sufficient suggestion of -Benedetto Bonfigli in some of his work, to make it probable that he -joined the school which Bonfigli had established in Perugia in the early -part of the fifteenth century. Vasari speaks of him as an assistant and -friend of the older master. Here he would have been brought into close -contact with Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, who must have been considerably the -senior of Pintoricchio, as he was undertaking important commissions as -early as 1472.[4] It is this master whose influence is most strongly -stamped upon him. Afterwards, as we shall see, he constantly transferred -figures from Fiorenzo's panels to his own, while in the older man's -compositions we can pick out others which have more of Pintoricchio than -Fiorenzo; but the latter, though full of originality and attraction as -he is, never advances beyond a certain point, and always retains -something of the archaic. - - [4] Crowe and Cavalcaselle, iii. 153. - -It is in 1482 that Bernardino first emerges from the realm of -conjecture, and appears, forming part of that brilliant group which was -gathered together in Rome to decorate the walls of Sixtus IV.'s -newly-built chapel. - -Already he may have been confused in Umbria with the very inferior -master, Bernardino Mariotto of Perugia, who lived for many years at San -Severino, where he had a school in the monastery of the old town. His -paintings have often been assigned to his contemporary, and this is -very likely the reason that the latter always signs and calls himself -Pintoricchio. While he endeavoured to guard against being credited with -works he had not produced, he has been robbed of those really due to -him. It is strange indeed that for several centuries the part he took in -such a great work as the Sixtine Chapel should have been ignored, for it -was the success of these frescoes which sufficed to establish his fame -in Rome, and for some years after this we find him in full employment -there. The chapel was completed in 1485, but Pintoricchio's part was -probably finished earlier, and it is at this time that most critics -concur in placing his work in the church of Ara Coeli. He had -commended himself to the patronage and friendship of Domenico della -Rovere, brother of Pope Sixtus, and was a guest at his house in the -Palazzo di SS. Apostoli, where he painted a decoration, and he was also -employed at this time in the Palazzo Colonna. In the two following -years, Pintoricchio was employed in the Belvedere of the Vatican by Pope -Innocent VIII. He painted there the series of pictures of towns owning -the papal sway, which Taja mentions as existing, though in a much -injured condition, in 1750, and which was repainted under Pius VII.[5] -In the years immediately following he was decorating the chapels in -Santa Maria del Popolo, doing much with his own hand, but already -employing assistants and superintending their share. - - [5] Vasari, iii. p. 498, note "Milanesi." - -A document in the archives of the cathedral at Orvieto, as to which -Vasari knew nothing, or was silent, dated 1492, informs us of an -agreement made with the chapter to paint two evangelists and two -Fathers in the cathedral. The price was to be a hundred ducats. There -was a good deal of coming and going between Rome and Orvieto, and in -that year he was paid fifty ducats for the portion of work done, and -also began a small picture in the tribune, but fell into a violent -quarrel with the ecclesiastics, who averred that the first part of the -work was not painted according to agreement. Their real objection seems -to have been that they were getting frightened at the quantity of gold -and ultramarine employed, which was more than the chapter could afford. -There was some talk of taking the work from him, and it was certainly -interrupted for a time.[6] He was probably very willing to return to -Rome, for a third Pope was now providing him with work,--no less a -personage than Alexander VI., who, as Cardinal Borgia, had already given -great encouragement to the artist in Rome, and who now entrusted -Pintoricchio with the decoration of his private apartments. The quarrel -with the monks at Orvieto must, however, have been made up, and he -returned to finish their transept, for we find Pope Alexander writing to -the Orvietans in March 1494 to beg that they will release Pintoricchio -and let him come back to Rome to finish what he had begun in the Borgia -rooms. - - [6] Della Valle. _Storia del duomo d'Orvieto._ - -In this year the Pope remunerated him by adding to the money paid in the -contracts a grant of an ample piece of land, situated at Chiugi near -Perugia, at an annual rent of thirty baskets of grain.[7] The Borgia -rooms could but just have been completed when, in January 1495, the Pope -was driven to take refuge from the French king's invasion of his city in -the fortified castle of Sant' Angelo. His court painter would naturally -have gone with him, and when the Pope fled to Orvieto and Perugia in the -summer of 1495, Pintoricchio went homewards in his train. In the next -few months, an altar-piece for the monks of the monastery of Santa Maria -degli Angeli must have been under discussion; for in February 1496 the -contract was signed for the great polyptych now in the Gallery at -Perugia. The fulfilment of this contract had to await the master's -leisure; for a month later, on March 15th, he signs a fresh contract -with the Orvietans for two Fathers of the church to be painted in the -great chapel over the principal altar. He was to receive fifty ducats, -six quarters of grain, such wine as might be necessary, and to have the -use of a house, besides what gold and ultramarine he might require. The -archives of the cathedral contain minute records of every payment made, -and on the 15th November of that year he received the last -instalment.[8] The documents contain allusions to other paintings by -him, but the only traces that remain are a St. Gregory, a prophet, and -two angels which have some likeness to his school or his followers. - - [7] _Archives of Perugia_, vol. viii. ter. - - [8] Della Valle. _Storia del duomo d'Orvieto._ - -In 1497 we have a deed, issued October 24th, commuting the tax levied -upon the painter's grant of land. In this is recited and set forth -Pintoricchio's complaint that the tax is too heavy, and that it swallows -up all the revenues. The claim is admitted to be well founded on the -part of "a faithful and devoted servant of Alexander and the Church, to -whom a recompense is due for his art in painting and adorning the -apostolic palace and our residence in arc castri Angeli." Instead of the -grain, a yearly tax of two pounds of white wax was adjudged on July -28th, to be paid on the Feast of the Assumption, for two years, by -decree of the Cardinal Camerlengo.[9] A further endorsement shows that -the municipal authorities were inclined to ignore the papal decree; but -a third brief, in May 1498, confirms the tenure of the land and -tenements, and in February 1499 the first commutation is extended for a -further term. After all these gracious concessions, it is surprising to -find the tax-gatherers in the same year again trying to exact the -condoned thirty baskets. Pintoricchio once more appealed to the Pontiff, -with whom he was in high favour, and Alexander ordered that restitution -should be made in effects or money, according to the price at which -grain was valued on the Piazza in Perugia on the first Saturday in -August; and in September we find Pintoricchio receiving of the -vice-treasurer, Bonifazio Coppi, eighty florins in return for the tax -extorted in opposition to the papal behest.[10] - - [9] Vermiglioli, App. pp. viii. and x. - - [10] Mariotti, p. 131. - -While this interesting decision was in the balance, Bernardino was once -more in Rome, and able to plead his own cause, for about July 1497 he -was recalled there, and spent a year frescoing the castle of Sant' -Angelo for the Pope, but in the following year he was back at home, and -finished the polyptych for Santa Maria dei Fossi. Probably about this -time he married, and he may also have visited Spoleto, besides -producing a good many panel paintings, for no very definite work can be -assigned to these years in Perugia. He was very naturally engrossed with -his new wife, and busy with his little property, and not undertaking any -important commissions. - -In October of the following year, Caesar Borgia, son of the painter's -great patron, was encamped at Deruta, the little town that lies out -among the hills, a few miles west of Perugia. Pintoricchio visited him -here while he was resting after his campaign in the Romagna, and -obtained an order desiring the vice-treasurer to get permission for him -to sink a cistern in his house in Perugia. What interests us even more -than this domestic detail is Caesar's statement that he has "again" taken -into his service Bernardino Pintoricchio of Perosa, whom he always loved -because of his talents and gifts, and he desires that in all things he -shall be treated "as one of ours."[11] Caesar's expression that he had -"again" taken him into his service, suggests that he had not quite -recently been retained by the Pope. - - [11] _Conestabile Archives._ - -Very soon after his visit to the Borgia's camp, he was in treaty with -the Cardinal of Spello, thirteen miles from Perugia, to decorate the -chapel of his House; but before leaving home he was elected Decemvir of -the city, a proof of how high he stood in repute among his -fellow-citizens. It could only have been an honorary distinction, for -his work in Spello must have taken all his remaining time in Umbria to -accomplish. One short visit he was to pay to his own province, but -early in 1502 the summons reached him which changed the course of his -life. Cardinal Francesco Piccolomini made him the offer which caused him -to move to Siena and begin one of his most important undertakings. - -Siena is a long journey from Perugia across the hills and plains that -lie around Lake Thrasymene, past Chiugi, and so through the breadth of -Italy. It brought the painter into new surroundings, and took him quite -out of the beaten track. The long and elaborate contract between the -Cardinal and the painter must have taken no little time to discuss and -agree upon, but it was finished and signed June 29, 1502. During the -following autumn and winter, he made his preparations, gathered his -workmen and assistants together, and by the spring of 1503 was hard at -work in the building, beginning with the ceiling, which we are able, -with tolerable certainty, to determine was nearly completed by the -autumn. - -This part of the work may have been just seen by the Cardinal, who -became Pope, September 21st, 1503, dying three weeks later, and bringing -Pintoricchio's work to a standstill. His patron's death freed him for -the time from his inability to take private orders, and he promptly -accepted one from the family of Aringhieri, and between this autumn and -the following August, painted the frescoes in the Chapel of San Giovanni -in Siena Cathedral; while on March 13th, in the spring of 1505, he was -paid for the design of Fortune for the cathedral pavement. Rather before -this, the work in the library had been begun, as it was only in abeyance -for a little over a year; but the death of Cardinal Andrea Piccolomini -in June 1505 again delayed its progress for a short time. Pintoricchio -started thereupon on a visit to Rome, which must have been crowded with -work if he now accomplished the decoration of the choir of Santa Maria -del Popolo, and returned early in 1506 to continue the work in the -library. It now went on with no further hindrance. In May or June 1508 -all the compartments were finished, and the building handed over to the -Piccolomini family, from whom the last payment under the contract was -received in January 1509. - -There is no document to show exactly when he married, but from the table -in Milanesi's edition of Vasari, a daughter, Adriana, who had married a -Perugian, died in 1519. She, and probably two others, Faustina and -Egidia, must have been born before he left for Siena. There is, however, -no trace in the Perugian archives of his wife or children, and Mariotti, -writing in 1788, suggests that a search among the documents of Siena may -determine the question. Here it is that we find entries of the birth of -those children born after he moved to Siena, Giulio Cesare, Camillo -Giuliano, and a second Faustina. His wife, as we learn from the -petitions she presented after his death, was Grania, daughter of one -Niccolo of Bologna or Modena. From the number of her children, and the -unhappy relations which seem to have existed between husband and wife, -we surmise that Pintoricchio married a woman much younger than himself. -If three children were born before 1502, he probably married about -1496-98, at which time he was living in Perugia, after his return from -Rome, when he would have been forty-two to forty-four years of age. - -In the year that his first son was born, Pintoricchio matriculated at -the College of Painters at Perugia. He is there described as -_Bernardinus Becti, detto il Pinturicchio_, whose habitation was at the -Porta San Angelo.[12] In December of the same year, the magistrates of -Siena approve of the Commune of Montemassi making him a donation of -twenty "_moggie_" of land.[13] Fortified, doubtless, by his success in -combating Perugian taxes, he immediately applies to the Council of Siena -to free the grant for thirty years from taxes of "_dazzi_ and -_gabelli_." This was conceded, with the exception of the gate tax. The -petition runs: - - [12] Vermiglioli, App. (3). - - [13] _Archives of Siena._ Vermiglioli, App. xx. and xxi. - -"Bernardino Pintoricchio, who now addresses the most respected officials -(of the Balia), is the servant of your Lordships, and not the least -among renowned painters; for whom, as Cicero has written, the Romans in -early times held but little. Yet after the increase of the empire, and -in consequence of Eastern victories and the conquest of the Greek -cities, they called the best from all parts of the world, not hesitating -to seize all the finest pictures and sculptures which they could -discover. They admitted painting to be supreme, similar to the liberal -arts, and a rival to poesy. And artists being usually esteemed by those -who govern republics, the said Bernardino has elected Sienna to be his -home, hoping to live and reside there; (therefore) confiding in the -clemency of your Lordships, and considering the adverse nature of the -times, the smallness and diminution of profits, and the weight of his -family; having heard also that craftsmen taking up their abode here -receive grants of immunities, he prays exemption for thirty years from -all taxes whatever, whether present or to come."[14] - - [14] _Doc. Sen._ iii. 33-4. Trans. Crowe and Cavalcaselle, - vol. iii. p. 285. - -In the spring of 1508 he was back across Italy to little Spello, where, -in the transept of Sant' Andrea, he left an altar-painting, a Madonna -and Saints, which does not add materially to his reputation. On a little -stool in the foreground of the picture is painted a letter of Cardinal -Baglioni, dated April 8th, 1508, written from his castle of Rocca di -Zocco, full of affectionate assurances, and asking the painter to return -to Siena. Its inclusion has been imputed to Pintoricchio's vanity; but a -man who had been friends with Popes, and who had long been courted on -all sides, was hardly likely to be uplifted by the friendship of a -simple Cardinal-bishop. It is more likely that he was bitten with a -rather inartistic fancy for painting objects lying about, to deceive the -eye, and hit upon this as an appropriate one. - -He now paid his last visit to Rome: Pope Julius II. had summoned him, -together with Perugino, Signorelli, and others, to consider the -decoration of the Vatican rooms. Giambattista Caporali, the historian, -speaks of a supper at which they were all present at the house of -Bramante. Their host was the man who had introduced young Raphael to the -Pope, and Pintoricchio, among the rest, had the mortification of seeing -himself superseded in the city where he had been foremost a few years -earlier. He and Signorelli returned to Siena together, and the master -of Cortona stood sponsor to the child born in January 1509. In October, -Pintoricchio had sold a house in the third ward of the city to Pandolfo -Petrucci for 420 florins. He was in close contact at this time with that -great merchant prince, and was employed with Signorelli on Petrucci's -new palace, where he painted the frescoes, of which one, the "Return of -Ulysses," in the National Gallery, is all that remains. We find him -buying land in Siena and selling it in Perugia, making his will, and -arranging his affairs. In the last year of his life he painted that -brilliant and tender little picture of "Christ bearing the Cross," now -in the Borromeo Palace at Milan. He was suspicious and unhappy about his -wife's behaviour, and a fresh will was made, to which a codicil was -added in September and another in October. In the first he deprived her -of some of the money he had already left her, but he returned it in the -last addition. - -Vasari's story of the cause of his death, which took place December -11th, 1513, can be nothing but a fable. He tells us that Pintoricchio -was executing some work for the Fathers of San Francesco, and being -hampered by a heavy bureau in the room assigned to him, insisted on -having it moved. In the transit it broke open, and a treasure of gold -was discovered in the secret drawer, so much to the chagrin of the -painter that he never held up his head again. The friends who knew the -painter in Siena do not allude to any such occurrence; and the popular -master, entrusted with more commissions than he could execute, well paid -and honoured by all men, was not likely to be upset by the sight of -some gold coins, even if he could persuade himself that he had any right -to them. The real circumstances of his death were sadder, if less -sensational. Sigismondo Tizio, a Sienese historian, writer of a mass of -almost unedited matter, who was his attached friend and his neighbour in -the parish of San Vincenzo and Sant' Anastasia, has left a record of his -last illness, in which he accuses his wife Grania of causing his death -by her neglect. Tizio says that she went about with her lover, Girolamo -di Paolo, nicknamed il Paffo, a soldier of the Piazza at Siena, and that -Bernardino was shut up and left to die of starvation; that some women -heard his cries and went to his assistance, and that it was from them -that Tizio afterwards learned these particulars. From Tizio's way of -describing it he seems to accuse her of a deliberate attempt to starve -her husband; but as no proceedings were ever taken against her, and she -succeeded in peace to her inheritance, we may gather that she was not -guilty of actually criminal conduct, though her neglect was sufficient -to hasten the death of a man attacked by serious illness and needing -careful nursing. Bernardino Betti lies buried in the Parish Church of -San Vincenzo, joining the Oratory of the Contrade of the Ostrich. In -1830 the Abbe de Angelis put up a plate with an inscription to his -memory. Mariotti speaks of a Giovanni di Pintoricchio who was a canon of -the Cathedral of Perugia in 1525; but Pintoricchio's own sons would have -then been too young to hold such a post, and we hear nothing in later -years of his descendants. - -After his death Grania lived on in Siena, and two years after, as his -executor and trustee, sold two lots of land to one of the Chigi for 1677 -florins. Again, in the following year, she sought permission to sell the -land which was the portion of her daughter Faustina, and she makes a -will which is dated May 22nd, 1518. The man who was said to be her lover -afterwards married her daughter Egidia. - -We possess several portraits of Pintoricchio from his own hand; all are -sufficiently like one another, though painted at different periods of -his life, to assure us that they were like the original. The first is in -the fresco of the "Argument of St. Catherine," in the Borgia Apartments. -The painter at this time must have been about thirty-nine years old. His -portrait certainly looks much younger; but he was a thin, dark man who -very possibly looked less than his years, or he may have purposely -represented himself so, as we notice this in other portraits. The face -is an interesting and sensitive one, with speaking eyes and a melancholy -expression. In the striking head which he has signed and placed as a -picture on the walls of the Virgin's chamber in the chapel of the -Baglioni at Spello, the face has sharpened and aged considerably, though -it still looks young for a man of fifty-two. The lines have deepened, -the mouth is compressed, and the face wears a look of ill-health, almost -of suffering. It has the dark, arched brows of the artist, and clever, -observant eyes which look out at us, sideways, tending to give a -suspicious look, though probably it was only that he saw himself so in a -mirror. Again, he stands in the row of portraits in the fresco of the -"Canonisation of St. Catherine," in the Library at Siena. This face, -too, has an expression of bitterness and melancholy--pinched lips, and -sad, regretful eyes.[15] The self-conscious expression of all leads us to -suspect that his was a self-tormenting, morbid nature, such as the -artistic temperament and keen sense of beauty might well have combined -with a sickly body to produce. In the eyes, too, it is easy to read that -fantastic touch which came out in his love for story and for the -grotesque, and perhaps there is something of that aloofness which the -deafness, which led to his nickname, so often gives. - - [15] In the group of Apostles in the "Assumption" at Naples is - one, the fifth on the left, which he is said to have meant for - himself, but it is less characteristic than those already noticed. - -That he was a lovable man is, I think, evident. We hear of no quarrels -with his fellow-artists; Perugino secured him some of the best positions -in the Sixtine, Signorelli was his child's sponsor. He had clearly the -art of managing his assistants, who everywhere worked intelligently -under him. With Fiorenzo his artistic relations must have been of the -closest. Pope Alexander valued him, and Caesar's mention is an -affectionate one, while the letter of Cardinal Baglioni is full of -friendliness. Besides this, few things are more interesting in the -history of artists' friendships than the close confidence and affection -which all study of the frescoes at Siena convinces us existed between -him and the young Raphael. Sigismondo Tizio, in his MS., gives his -opinion that Bernardino surpassed Perugino as a painter, but that he had -less sense and prudence than Vannucci, and was given to empty chatter. - -A small number of Pintoricchio's works cannot be dated, and we must be -satisfied with mentioning them, and considering the times at which they -might have been produced. - -His name is written variously in the documents of the time. In the -grants of land signed by Cardinal Camerlengo, it is Pentoricchio, and -Pentorichio on the fresco of Geometry in the Borgia rooms. Cardinal -Baglioni writes it Pintorichio. In Grania's petition it appears as -Pinturicchio. He himself signs his last picture, the "Cross-bearing -Christ" in the Palazzo Borromeo, Pintoricchio, and to this form I have -adhered. In the documents he is usually styled Messer Bernardino. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -DERIVATION AND CHARACTER OF HIS ART - - -Umbria is a land of late development in the history of Italian painting, -and of a sharp division in the character of its art. No town of the -importance of Siena, second only to Florence, held sway in that part of -Italy, nor do we find any name in its early history which we can place -side by side with Giotto, Orcagna, or Duccio di Buoninsegna. It is -difficult to account for this: the Umbrian plains were indeed ravaged -again and again with blood and carnage, were seized upon, now by this -party, and now by that; but all acquaintance with the art of the -Renaissance bears in upon us that art as a rule only flourished more -strongly when fed by war and ruin. One tyrant after another, as he -rested from his conquests, became the patron of the painters. Pictures -were painted to immortalise great victories, the altar-piece upon which -the fame of Duccio chiefly hangs, was ordered by the Consiglio of Siena -as a thank-offering to the Virgin after the battle of Monte Aperto. - -The accounts of the cathedral at Orvieto give us names of artists who -devoted themselves to its decoration towards the end of the fourteenth -century--others were working in Perugia, painting effigies of traitors, -hanging head downwards on the walls of the Palazzo Pubblico, but we have -no reason to rank them higher than those who have left traces of their -work in the little votive chapels that lie in the hills and -out-of-the-way corners of Umbria. Some of these, going back to 1393, are -not without a character of their own, guiltless indeed, of technique, -but naive, vivid, and full of energy; yet they show little of that -gradual growth which marks the Florentine school, nor do we find in them -any trace of the fine, precise touch, which the early Sienese painters -drew from the school of Byzantium. According to Mariotti, the art of -miniature painting and illumination was carried on with great enthusiasm -in Perugia, in the fourteenth century. Dante speaks of Oderisio of -Gubbio: - - "--Non se' tu Oderisi, - L'Onor d'Agobbio, e l'onor di quell' arte, - Ch' alluminare e chiamata in Parisi?" - -Then, when the fifteenth century was unfolding, two streams of art sweep -across the province, distinct, yet mighty, mingling like the waters of -the Rhine and Rhone. The many scattered towns of Umbria led to a far -greater variety of type, individuality was more frequently maintained, -influences spread more fitfully and partially than in those parts of -Italy where all studied together, and practice and theory flew like -wildfire from one to the other, emulations flourished, traditions were -quickly formed and earnestly followed. - -Gentile da Fabriano stands forth among the dearth of talent in Umbria at -the dawn of the century, as the one master who was great enough to add -realism to glowing colour and vivacity of fancy, and who, taking the -old missal-painting character as a groundwork, could transplant all the -pride of pageantry of the Middle Ages on to his panels, and give us in -the gold brocades and velvet robes, in fairy princes and beautiful -ladies, tropic birds and strange beasts, such a scene of joyous -gallantry that, as in the "Adoration of the Magi," we can hear the -tinkle of bells and the clang of gilded trappings, as the long -procession winds down the gay hillside. - -After a space, while a dainty colourist like Ottaviano Nelli painted -enlarged miniatures and vapid angel faces, there arose a few miles off, -at Arezzo, one of the strongest of masters; Piero della Francesca set a -star of grand simplicity as a constraining guide, calm and broad, before -those men who had the gift of the open eye. The character of that art -was as exacting as it was scientific. It was as much geometrical and -mathematical as artistic, and was occupied more with problems than with -religious feeling. Its power was felt over a wide area, and moved even -those who were least naturally alive to it. There seemed a likelihood -that Umbrian art would, on the one hand, become absorbed in the -Florentine character, hardly distinguishable from it, and, on the other, -degenerate into puerile prattle; but there had wandered to Montefalco, -one from Florence, who, to the enlightenment and the conscious effort -drawn from those who clustered round Donatello and Masaccio, added a -temper which appealed directly to the native feeling of Umbria. Benozzo -Gozzoli was not a great painter, but his talent for narrative painting -set a new model before those whose aptitude in that direction responded -to the impulse. A school arose which combined in curious harmony the -love of decorative detail of the miniature pictures, the space effects -of Piero's large and airy settings, and the story-telling proclivities -of the naive and garrulous Florentine. - -Though Pintoricchio's early years are obscure, little doubt can exist as -to his artistic derivation from Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, who combined the -characteristics of the newly developed school in a pre-eminent degree. -Rumohr ascribes Pintoricchio's style primarily to the school of Niccolo -da Foligno. This attribution is founded partly on the "Altar-piece of -Santa Maria dei Fossi," the arrangement of which is similar to some of -Niccolo's great anconas, the Madonna and Child enthroned in the centre, -saints in panels on either side, a Pieta above, which divides an -Annunciation into two parts. The types in this last scene certainly -resemble Niccolo's, and were constantly repeated by Bernardino; but the -angels in the Pieta are from Fiorenzo, and the whole spirit is opposed -to that of the intense and austere Folignate. It was painted, too, so -long after Bernardino's art was fully formed that it can hardly serve to -illustrate any early influence. No doubt, when he visited Foligno at -this time, he took many ideas from what Niccolo had left there. -Something too he owed to Benedetto Bonfigli; the cheerful naivete, the -quaint adornments of dress and garland which attract us in Bonfigli, are -traits which we find in Pintoricchio. The little oval, pointed face, -with its arched brows, and small, close shut mouth, the type to which -Bonfigli is constant, is that to which Pintoricchio adheres for his -Madonna and angels; but this type is to be found too in Fiorenzo's -earlier work, as in his "Adoration of the Child" in the Gallery in -Perugia. If we compare this picture with Pintoricchio's "Nativity" in -San Girolamo's Chapel in Santa Maria del Popolo in Rome, we see at a -glance the resemblance that underlies a few superficial variations. The -whole construction of the two groups is similar. The Madonna's bent -head, elbows squared, joined palms and finger-tips, the Child, lying -partly on His Mother's robe, the position of the grey-bearded St. Joseph -and the shepherds--everywhere Pintoricchio has been guided by the -earlier master, though instead of the donor and two young men, who may -have been his sons, and who kneel with their great hound behind them, he -has substituted St. Jerome and his lion, and shepherds of a more -acceptedly religious type, while the group of singing angels overhead is -transferred from Fiorenzo's panel to that other Nativity at Spello. - -Over the door of the Sala del Censo in the Palazzo Pubblico at Perugia, -is a lunette of a Madonna and Child by Fiorenzo, which might well be -Pintoricchio's own. It has his full touch and copious brush. We find the -Mother again in the exquisite little fresco over the door of the Hall of -Arts and Sciences in the Borgia Apartments, transplanted almost without -alteration of line or expression; while the two angels on either side -are those which he uses to support the dead Christ in the Pieta at the -top of the polyptych painted for Santa Maria dei Fossi. - -We have no trace of Pintoricchio himself ever having visited Florence, -but the water flowed to him none the less from the fountainhead, and he -assimilated it in his own manner. Fiorenzo, we feel sure, must have been -there, and that in those years when Verrocchio and Pollaiuolo approached -most nearly to one another; and it was Fiorenzo, and not Perugino, who -was the channel through which Florentine influence filtered to -Pintoricchio. We recognise Verrocchio in the wide and swollen nostrils, -the broad head, the hooking of the little finger, and the treatment of -the hair which Fiorenzo adopts; while we perceive that Pollaiuolo has -aroused a wish to show more animated action. From Pollaiuolo, too, comes -the careful handling of brocaded stuffs, the little, crab-like, -clutching hands, the delight in using the costume of the day in all its -fantastic picturesqueness. Even more striking is the architectural -influence which Fiorenzo conveyed to Pintoricchio. The masters of Umbria -became singularly alive to the charm of airy architectural space, and -such classic settings as we may date from Brunelleschi's visit to Rome -in 1403, and more especially attribute in their working out, to the -high, imaginative faculty and Greek spirit of Leo Battista Alberti, -whose spacious arcades are often used merely as decoration. At Urbino, -in the court of the Ducal Palace, the Umbrians had one example of the -highest interest: here was the taste which Lauranna drew from the -Florentines, and which passed onwards to Bramante. Piero della Francesca -shows, in his "Flagellation" at Urbino, how keenly he feels the charm of -placing groups in this wide, distinguished setting; but none assimilates -his teaching so fully in those early days as Fiorenzo, whose -remarkable series of small panels of the miracles of San Bernardino, -give us, as Dr. Schmarsow says, "the first step, without which -Pintoricchio is unthinkable."[16] - - [16] "Pintoricchio in Rom." - -The natural features of Umbrian scenery, its high-skied plains, its wide -valleys, account in a measure for the pre-eminent feeling for space -shown by its artists, and for their power to give air and atmosphere to -those lofty structures in which they love to place their personages. -These little panels, painted at Fiorenzo's finest period, are sharp and -strong, yet fine as miniatures. The figures stand well on the stage. The -point of sight is very low, at scarce a third of the whole, so that we -have an undue proportion of airy surrounding, though all is on such a -small scale. The perspective drawing shows how well-fitted Fiorenzo was -to ground his pupil accurately in this, however insufficient his study -of anatomy may have been. The drawing of the architecture is fine and -true throughout, but in the figures, even if we allow for variations in -Fiorenzo himself, we can hardly avoid seeing two different hands. They -have all the charm of his manner, a manner essentially Umbrian, while we -see a very distinct spirit, a spirit which was shared by Bonfigli, and -by such a lesser master as Boccatis da Camerino, a naive and cheerful -tone, a direct simplicity, which is as far removed from the melancholy -which broods in the eyes of the rapt saints of Siena, as it is from the -scientific temper that ruled within sound of the Arno. Many of the -figures are childish in their desire to express emotion, and are almost -grotesque in detail, the hair is in a mop, exaggerated till it looks -like a huge bird's nest, the hands are cramped and claw-like, but here -and there we meet with graceful, well-proportioned beings, keeping their -slender grace, without the angular and unpleasing length of limb which -marks their companions. In the panel where San Bernardino raises a youth -from the dead, a child playing with a dog recalls Pintoricchio's _putti_ -on the pilasters at Siena. The young man on the right in the same scene, -is supple and gracefully draped; a contrast to the wooden movements and -stiff draperies of his fellow-pages. Even better is the youth reasoning, -in a repetition of the same miracle, with his hand upon his hip and a -dark cap perched upon his rippled curls. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Picture Gallery, Perugia_ - - A MIRACLE OF SAN BERNARDINO - (By Fiorenzo di Lorenzo)] - -We begin to speculate as to whether Pintoricchio, who was a young man of -twenty-two at this time, was helping Fiorenzo; and to ask, Have we here -the sign of that talent which was marked by Perugino, with whom he must -have been for some years, before he was chosen as his chief assistant in -the Sixtine Chapel? Above all, Pintoricchio's landscape is derived from -Fiorenzo. The open distance, cut up by small hills and trees, the -winding streams flowing through the valleys, and, most characteristic, -the poised and toppling rocks, forming archways and overhanging masses, -often set about with houses and peopled with tiny figures. An -examination of the "Crucifixion" in the Borghese, illustrates the -difficulty at this time of distinguishing between Fiorenzo and his -pupil. The hard brightness of colour, the drawing of the crucified -figure and that of St. Christopher, the heavily marked folds of -drapery, the landscape--all recall Fiorenzo; but the figure and head of -St. Jerome, the hands, the expressive head of St. Christopher, the free -and natural attitude of the Child, are something better than we look for -in the earlier painter. If we may really accept this panel, as both -Morelli and Berenson assert, as Pintoricchio's work, we may place it as -his earliest on his arrival in Rome. The St. Christopher and the Moses -of the meeting with the angel in the Sixtine, seem drawn from the same -model. The round forehead, full mouth, shape of jaw and broad throat are -identical, and it is a very individual face. - -His knowledge of architecture, his composition of landscape, the type of -many of his figures, Pintoricchio derived from Fiorenzo, and Fiorenzo's -was the influence that remained with him most strongly; but though -permeating him less thoroughly, less akin to his own temper, Perugino, -his elder by only four years, a much greater master, both as regards -form and colour, had something to say to his development. We cannot tell -when the two first came into contact, but Morelli considers that -Perugino went to Florence about 1470. Milanesi, in his notes on -Perugino's life by Vasari, says that he received a commission to paint -in the Palazzo Pubblico in Perugia in 1475. He was certainly working in -1478 at Cerqueto, in Umbria, so that most likely it was about that date -that Pintoricchio joined him, which would have given them at least four -years together, before the time came to go to Rome. - -We have so little knowledge of any work of Pintoricchio's before his -Roman period, that it is difficult to certainly assign paintings to -this time. The "Crucifixion" shows no trace of Perugino, but the boy's -head at Dresden, which Morelli believes to be an early work, has the -solid character and realism which distinguish Perugino's portraits. His -influence comes out fully developed in the Sixtine frescoes. That the -two men had been working together for some time is obvious, not only by -the importance of the share with which the younger was entrusted, but -also by the number of drawings which he prepared for Perugino's own -frescoes. The elder painter's guiding hand is apparent in the draping, -simpler and larger than that of Fiorenzo, the more careful drawing and -calmer dignity. - -These frescoes might possibly be taken for Perugino's, but scarcely for -Fiorenzo's; and though Pintoricchio still adheres to the traditions of -the latter in his treatment of the details of landscape, he begins to -formulate his own scheme of colour and composition. In his angels flying -forward from above, on either side of a group of sacred persons, -Perugino is copied almost stroke for stroke (allowing for Pintoricchio's -heavier touch) in the assimilation of _motifs_ drawn from older masters. -The fold of drapery falling between the knees and narrowing to a point, -the over-sleeve flying out in a sweeping curve, the draped tunic and the -fluttering ribbons, all become a formula of Perugino's manner--adopted -by all his followers--Lo Spagna, Tiberio d'Assisi, and the rest. Yet, -where the treatment approaches most nearly, there remains a constantly -differing type. Perugino, in a half-profile, almost invariably inclines -the head one way or another, giving to the eye a peculiar ecstatic -upward gaze. Pintoricchio rarely uses this attitude. In his drawing of -St. John, for Perugino's fresco, of the giving of the keys, this is just -the change the older master, on adopting it, has made to suit his fancy. -Pintoricchio has an ineradicable tendency to bring the knees of his -figures together. They sway with a peculiar, knock-kneed grace. If we -contrast the central group in the "Baptism of Christ" in the Sixtine, -with those of Perugino at Rouen, or that at Foligno, painted many years -later, we note the sweep inward from the hips, and outward from the -knees in the first, while the inclined head and upward gaze in -Perugino's St. John gives place to a more simple and direct expression -in that of his pupil. We are always conscious, too, of a less strong, -less confident spirit--one more nervous, more personally reflective of -moods and idiosyncrasies. - -The golden atmospheric effects which were Perugino's greatest gift to -art, the feeling for distance, and for the sun-warmed calm of summer, -taught Pintoricchio new methods, modified without effacing the teaching -of Fiorenzo, and certainly led to a more natural treatment. That -Fiorenzo was impressed by the vigorous art of Signorelli, his neighbour -of Cortona, is to be seen in his late work, "The Adoration of the Magi." -The young men, more strongly drawn than is customary with him, the kings -in Eastern dress, the heads of Joseph and of the old king, the drawing -of the hands and the Madonna's draperies--all show a freer and closer -study of nature, all point to some fresh impulse, the impression of a -strong talent upon a weaker one. - -The problems which absorbed the great master of Cortona had never much -attraction for Pintoricchio, who had not a scientific mind, and whose -artistic education, deficient to begin with, was brought to a premature -end by his sudden popularity. Yet something he drew from Signorelli, a -firmer treatment of the youths in hose and doublet, some attempt to -study limbs and muscle. The series left by Benozzo Gozzoli at -Montefalco, the paintings of Perugino and Signorelli, were the best -examples of form which came in Pintoricchio's way. They could not -succeed in making him very strong, but when he draws frankly from the -life, you need hardly wish for more telling portraits. - -It would be absurd to claim for him sublime creative power, tactile -values, mastery over form and movement. He has none of these. His -persons rarely stand firmly upon both feet; his pages, his kings and -queens, are too often drawn and even coloured like playing-cards; his -crowds are motley and ill-arranged. The dry and purely scientific -student of the schools of Italy will find it more than easy to -demonstrate Pintoricchio's shortcomings: it is less simple to analyse -the charm that triumphs in spite of them, and which gives keen pleasure -to one side of the artistic nature. - -J. A. Symonds says of him that he is a kind of Umbrian Gozzoli, and in -his clear and fluent presentation of contemporary life brings us into -close relation with the men of his own time. No one loved better than -Gozzoli to assemble contemporary celebrities; and in the feeling for -incidents of everyday life, in the joy of living, in fondness for -garrulous narrative, his frescoes must have been full of suggestion for -the Umbrian master of the next half-century, who, in his love for the -narrative and the picturesque, surpassed all who had gone before. In -Florence, if he had made his trial there, he might have gained more of -strong and true study, he might have learned the laws of grouping, of -aerial perspective, he might have gained a better knowledge of anatomy, -yet in mastering all these, he might have lost something that he -possesses: that freshness of feeling which is the spring and sap of all -art, that young and winning joy that carries him through scenes of -magnificence without losing sense and spirit. - -There is in the art of Pintoricchio a direct simplicity of expression -and gesture that saves him from conventionality and cloying sweetness. -His persons are not above criticism as far as technicalities are -concerned, but they have in them this, that they are occupied and -absorbed in the business in hand. You may fancy at first that they are -artificial, but that is merely their environment; they themselves are -simple, they do not pose or look upwards or out of the picture with an -affected appeal for admiration. This quality gives to Pintoricchio a -truthfulness where he lacks depth. To the last he has a sincerity which -underlies his conventionality, just as his dainty care in detail -counterbalances his want of freedom and rhythm. His forms lack the -nobility of Perugino's, his religious emotion is less deep, but he is -not self-conscious, he has a freshness and raciness which saves him from -fatiguing by monotonous sweetness. He does not make his paintings a -series of excuses for the solution of scientific problems, so that they -are more spontaneous, more the outcome of the man's natural unfettered -inclination, than are the works of some of those who made greater -discoveries in the field of painting. - -In the picturesque qualities of his work he is completely a child of the -Renaissance. Perhaps none harmonises better with the rich and lavish -beauty which haunts us still in every little town of Italy. His feeling, -sumptuous yet exquisite, his treatment, naive yet distinguished, is the -prerogative of that age of fresh perception, and of unspoiled -acquaintance with the beautiful. It is the fairy-tale spirit that so -endears him to us. Like the mediaeval singers of romance, he guides us -through scenes that have a glamour of some day of childhood, when they -may have seemed real and possible. The wistful, wide-eyed youths, the -tender, dainty Madonnas and angels, the grave, richly-dressed saints and -bishops, might all stand for princes, for maidens, and magicians in some -enchanted realm of fairy. He does not take us into the region of the -tragic, but his fancy, his invention, and resource are fertile and -untiring; he leads us on, dazzling, entertaining us with a child-like -amusement, disarming criticism by a lovable quality which enlightens us -as to the natural sensibility of the painter's mind, a sort of -penetrating sweetness with which he can endow his creations. Perhaps the -truest explanation of his charm is to be found in the union of two -incongruous elements. The artificial and mannered grace, the search -after the exquisite and the splendid, joined to the naive and childish -simplicity, the freshness and arcadian fancy of the Umbrian school. It -is such a combination as enchants us in a child masquerading in gorgeous -robes, or in a wild honeysuckle dancing over a richly-carved marble -column. Certain it is, that here we possess the very cream of that -fantastic aspect of the Renaissance in conjunction with the most -distinctive features of purely Umbrian art. - -Mr. Berenson has given us a fine appreciation of Pintoricchio's feeling -for space and for space-decoration. In this, so Umbrian a -characteristic, he was a worthy follower of Fiorenzo, the not unworthy -second to Perugino, and a forerunner of Raphael. The ample and spacious -setting of his groups takes off from their cramped and crowded effect. -Where the action is awkward, or the colour heavy, the whole spirit is -lightened and lifted as you breathe the air of those delicious -landscapes, or wander in imagination under those high-poised arcades, or -look out from a palace chamber at the freedom and sweet breezes of a -mountain distance. It is the more remarkable that Pintoricchio is able -to give us this charm of landscape, as he adheres to his early training, -and finishes the most distant parts in delicate detail. - -It is as a decorator that he holds his own most successfully among his -contemporaries. It soon became apparent that no one could cover the -walls of palace or chapel with an ornamentation so rich and gay, so -advantageous to the position, so homogeneous in character. To find any -_tout ensemble_ to compare as decoration with the Borgia Apartments we -must look at early mosaics, at the opulence of the little church of San -Prassede, or the peacock hues of San Vitale at Ravenna. To estimate his -achievement we must weigh what he has made of those rooms, "si -desesperement carrees," or of the oblong and barn-like space of the -Libreria in Siena. - -He is mainly empirical rather than scientific, even in his most -successful moments, but that his want of drawing was due to insufficient -study of the nude is shown by the fact that his touch is fine and -strong, his faces, hands and feet, always well and firmly drawn, his -outlines delicate and decisive. He individualises his faces, and the -bystanders in his crowded scenes show a most interesting variety and -reality. - -When not painting fresco he is constant to the use of _tempera_. -Unfortunately, he is too much given to sacrifice the transparency and -depth of his colour by a lavish use of retouching _a secco_. In order to -gratify his love for brilliancy, he produces an opaque surface, and is -apt to give us a sort of splendid gaiety in exchange for real depth. His -use of his gorgeous pigments is extremely skilful, especially towards -the middle period. In the Sixtine Chapel frescoes, he has hardly let -himself go, and in the Siena Library he inclines to be gaudy and -glaring; but in many of his scenes the greens and peacock-blues, the -rich, soft rose-pinks, the purples and autumn gold are those of a man -whose nature was keenly alive to the joy of colour. His use of embossed -gold is dictated by the same natural bent towards the gay and -decorative. This small, mean-looking, deaf man was rarely sensitive to -fulness of life, to splendour, and the delight of the eye, and wherever -he has covered a wall with his work, or left a panel or an altar-piece, -we get a glance back at an age which was not afraid of frank -magnificence, guided by a purer taste than we can boast. - -Pintoricchio never shows the ear in his female heads. In the men's it is -large, placed high, with the inner cartilage strongly defined. The hand -has a short metacarpus and long fingers, the thumb well separated, and -the little finger hooked in Fiorenzo's manner. He paints with a full -brush, and has a heavy, liquid touch in fresco, but in working in panel -he shows a beautiful surface quality which oil painting could not -surpass. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -FIRST PERIOD IN ROME - - -A fact that another has once discovered and substantiated seems so -obvious to those who come after, that they can hardly understand how it -could so long have remained unrecognised. To Morelli belongs the credit -of having swept away the tradition that in Signorelli and Perugino were -to be found the authors of the two frescoes, "The Journey of Moses" and -"The Baptism," on either side of the altar-piece in the Sixtine Chapel. -After four hundred years of gathering oblivion came one who looked with -open eyes, disregarding all mere tradition, and who saw the handwriting -of Pintoricchio writ large upon the walls, waiting there, full within -sight, yet overlooked, till, after centuries, the truth is acknowledged, -unmistakable, supported not only by internal evidence but by drawings -and studies--direct testimony affording conclusive proof of their -authorship. - -It is perhaps owing to Melozzo da Forli being court painter to the -Vatican in 1480 that we may attribute the preference shown in the first -instance to Umbrians in the choice of decorators for Sixtus IV.'s new -chapel. To Perugino the direction seems to have been given in the first -place, he and his assistants arriving in Rome in October 1482. Here they -would have had a great deal to prepare, the spaces to plan, the Pope's -directions to consider, the ornamentation of the windows and the niches -for the martyred Popes to decide upon. The scheme of the type and -anti-type which balances the opposite walls, is very probably due to the -Pope and his advisers. Pope Sixtus was a writer on theology, was -esteemed a man of profound scholarship, and had in the years immediately -preceding written several books on important points of doctrine. -Perugino was at that time the undisputed head of the school of Umbria, -and his religious spirit and conventional treatment of sacred subjects -was likely to be much more acceptable to the Holy See than the new -spirit of scientific inquiry. The contract between him and the Pope -makes it probable that at first he and his assistants were to be -entrusted with the entire work. Whether the Pope got impatient and -wished to see his chapel more speedily completed, or for what other -reason, is uncertain; but when Giuliano della Rovere went to Florence in -December, he agreed with a number of Florentines to resort to Rome, and -the whole company of artists was gathered there by the year 1483. -Foremost among these was Sandro Botticelli, and from documents which -have recently come to light we gather that the superintendence of the -entire scheme was finally entrusted to him and not to Perugino. - -Among the assistants brought by Perugino, were "Rocco Zoppo and -Bernardino Betti, called il Pintoricchio." The operations of the first -were limited to certain portraits of the Rovere family in the -altar-piece, which at that time represented the "Assumption," by -Perugino, with the "Finding of Moses" and the "Nativity of Christ" as -the beginning of the two sacred histories. Pintoricchio's place, in his -master's estimation, was a very different one. We have no reason to -doubt that he was Perugino's right-hand man. From the degree to which he -has imbibed his style, he must have been working with him for some time -before, and the drawings in the Venetian sketch-book, as it is generally -called, so long erroneously attributed to Raphael, make it clear that he -supplied Perugino with designs for several of his principal figures, -which the master altered slightly to suit his taste when he came to -transfer them to the plaster. - -Vasari[17] tells us that Pintoricchio worked with Perugino in the Sixtine -Chapel, and took a third of the profits, but this testimony afforded no -clue to former critics, and for some centuries "The Journey of Moses" -was attributed to Luca Signorelli. Burckhardt was the first to dispute -this claim, and to ascribe the fresco with more _vraisemblance_ to -Perugino.[18] Crowe and Cavalcaselle[19] repudiate the attribution to -Signorelli. They see in both this and "The Baptism" the work of -Perugino, but in parts, in the young man stripping, and in the youth by -his side, they recognise a likeness to Pintoricchio, though in the -children of "The Journey" they profess to see plainly the hand of -Bartolommeo della Gatta. - - [17] Manni. _Raccolta Milanese di vari opuscoli_, vol. i. f. 29. - - [18] Vol. iii. - - [19] _History of Painting in Italy_, iii. 1783. - -The attribution of these two great frescoes to the younger master has -made a great difference to his place in art. In some ways they are the -finest and truest works he has left us; it is curious that they are the -first that can with certainty be ascribed to him. - -Morelli,[20] in appealing to the internal testimony of the frescoes in -the Sixtine Chapel, tells us it was their landscape backgrounds which -first opened his eyes. He further cites the overcrowding in the -composition--"a fault which Pintoricchio very often commits, Perugino -hardly ever." Even the falcon in the air is repeated by Pintoricchio in -his frescoes at Siena. The children he compares with those in the chapel -in Ara Coeli. He sees the character of the master plainly stamped on -many of the individual figures, and on the plan of the composition. -Evidence more minute and conclusive is derived from the book of drawings -to which I have already alluded. Towards the middle of the nineteenth -century these, on the authority of Professor Bossi, were assigned to -Raphael. Bossi bought the book at a sale, and deciding that they were -studies by the great Urbinate, was full of elation at the acquisition of -such a priceless treasure. When at Bossi's death they were bought by the -nation, Passavant, Count Cicognara, and Marchese Estense, all noted -connoisseurs, unhesitatingly pronounced them to be by Raphael, and for -his work they still pass in the Accademia in Venice. - - [20] _Italian Masters in German Galleries_, pp. 264-284. - -It would take far too much space to go with Morelli through all the -fifty-three drawings, with a circumstantial criticism which leaves only -three (detached and on different paper) to the younger master. We must -content ourselves with examining those which Pintoricchio used for -figures in frescoes which remain to us. A number of these examples -occur in "The Journey of Moses." On one sheet is a sketch for the woman -kneeling with outstretched arms, who performs the rite upon the little -son of Moses. On another page is a study for the drapery of the seated -woman. Again, the heads of four women are drawn on one sheet; no less -than three of these are introduced in the fresco. One of the two upper -heads is used for the woman bearing a jar, the position being very -slightly altered; while of the two lower heads, that on the left is a -study for Zipporah leading her child, the other for the head of the -woman with the child upon her knee. The quaint head-dresses are -reproduced to a nicety: one with outstanding bows on either side, and -the loose, flying scarf, knotted in front, the other with the scrolled -cornucopia-like ornament curling round the ear. For "The Baptism" we -have a study of the seated woman in the background, and for two of the -nude figures of youths. For Perugino's fresco, "The Giving of the Keys," -Pintoricchio has left two drawings for St. John, standing with his hand -upon his breast; one of the two is ruled in squares for transferring to -the wall, and this is the one adopted by Perugino. From two other -studies figures have been introduced; the cloaked man, third from the -left, and two just above, in the background. There is also an elaborate -drawing for the Madonna in the altar-piece in Santa Maria del Popolo, -and a drawing for the lion in a scene from the life of St. Jerome in the -same church. We thus have no fewer than thirteen heads and figures, -clearly recognisable as studies for frescoes painted before Raphael was -six years old. - - [Illustration: - _Private photo_] [_Venice_ - - STUDY OF HEADS FOR THE "JOURNEY OF MOSES"] - -The drawings, fine and delicate as they are, have the stiffness, the -careful, square-crossed hatching which is found in others by -Pintoricchio, also his shape of hand and foot, and the narrow, elongated -forms and in-bent knees. - -Pintoricchio was now twenty-eight. He must already have produced a great -deal of work, but not only have we no trace of it, but what is left is -almost all known to be of later date. However obscure his life before he -came to Rome, his proceedings after that are well known, and there is -hardly a year unaccounted for, or which cannot be almost certainly -filled up from inference. - -Rome had no cinque-cento painters of her own; but none the less, the -great traditions of the past, which that century was fast reviving, made -her the Mecca of the artists of Italy. That the two frescoes in the -Sixtine Chapel were Pintoricchio's first great commission is probable, -and it must have been with exultation that he set to work to give free -play to his decorative instincts on the large bare walls. Though the -whole is imbued with Perugino's spirit, and full of _motifs_ copied from -him, the composition is not the least like his calm, glowing landscapes -and well-ordered, symmetrical groups. The background is all reminiscent -of Fiorenzo--the toppling rocks, the little bushy trees, the joyous air -of the little figures frolicking on the hillside, the palms and -cypresses, the beautifully shaped hollow of the valley, the falcon in -the air pursuing smaller birds. The crowded groups are in Pintoricchio's -style; the want of concentration of interest, the narrative spirit -running through the whole are just what were most dear to his genius. -There has been much discussion as to whether his master helped him. Did -Perugino paint the figure of the woman busied with the rite of -Circumcision, and of Moses looking on? Or did he execute the heads of -any of the Florentine colony who are brought in, and who might have -preferred to have their portraits from the hand of the master rather -than from that of the pupil? I can find very little trace of Perugino's -own hand, unless it be in the head of Moses on the right, in which the -execution of the hair is more in his manner, though not nearly as fine -and rippling as he paints it in the frescoes of the keys. The action of -the angel in the centre is quite in the manner of Pintoricchio, and -Perugino never would have placed the hand of Moses in such an awkward -attitude of expostulation. The children are like his in the Buffalini -Chapel in the Libreria and Borgia apartments, and contrast favourably -with Perugino's fat, unshapely babes. As a whole, it would be difficult -to find a more attractive piece of decorative painting than this. The -various scenes, the shepherds dancing at the marriage feast, Jethro and -his household taking leave of Moses, the departure of the leader of -Israel with his family, and the rite of Circumcision are pressed into -one harmonious scene. The background melts naturally into the foreground -without appearing confused, and the vigorous white-robed messenger of -God, with shimmering hair and wings, drawn sword and outstretched arm, -divides the two foreground groups in a manner as original as it is -sufficient. Moses, clad in the traditional yellow robe and green -mantle, stopping at the angel's command, is a fine, grave figure of -marked personality. The two women occupied with the child on the right, -Zipporah leading the little boy, the damsel on the left balancing her -jar, are some of the most beautiful and graceful forms that Pintoricchio -has given us. The draperies are less voluminous than in later pictures, -and fall in straighter, simpler folds, resembling the more statuesque -drapery such as we find in the "St. Thomas and the Saviour" of Or San -Michele, and which Perugino, on his return from Florence, imparted to -his pupil in place of Fiorenzo's sharply-cut-up folds. Here, too, -Pintoricchio proves himself to be, what he was evidently considered in -Rome, a landscape-painter of the first rank; and it is especially by the -landscape that Morelli tells us he made out the identity of the painter -of this fresco. Nothing up to this time had been seen so lovely as this -background,--on one side, the low purple hills, touched with golden -gleams, running down into the soft distance, on the other, a clear, -grassy space, giving a sense of air and gaiety to the little pastoral. -Both the frescoes in the Sixtine have undergone such repeated cleanings -and restorations that little of the original colour remains, and the -effect is somewhat faded and grimy; but we are still able to see with -what skill white robes are made use of--an art in which Pintoricchio -excels in many of his paintings. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Sixtine Chapel, Rome_ - - THE JOURNEY OF MOSES] - -The scene on the opposite wall of the "Baptism of Christ" is much fuller -of figures than the "Journey of Moses." Separated incidents are more -largely made use of, in the archaic mode which the artists of the -Renaissance soon after this abandoned. That the central figures are a -copy of Perugino's "Baptism" at Rouen need be no argument that the -latter had an active share in it himself. The angels overhead are the -same that Perugino and all his school have reproduced many times, and -this interchange or imitation was merely a proper compliment between -master and pupil. Pintoricchio here owes no more to Perugino than the -latter does to Verrocchio, of whose "Baptism," in Florence, with the -angels kneeling by, we are strongly reminded. St. John is a type of -great freshness and individuality: the long lean form has simplicity and -directness of action, the shape of hand and foot, the blacker and more -angular draperies, are all unlike the master and like the pupil. St. -John pours the water with a painstaking, literal intention. In the -frescoes by Perugino at Foligno and at Rouen, his eyes are raised, his -body thrown gracefully on one side, and the little cup is raised aloft -with a sort of symbolical wave, while the contemplative angels kneeling -around are very unlike Pintoricchio's prim little attendants. - -In the groups in the background on either hand, listening to the -preaching of the Baptist and the Saviour, only one, the St. John on the -left, with head raised and inclined and hand on breast, reminds us at -all of Perugino. We have a great many of the figures the younger master -is so fond of, turning their backs and enveloped in the voluminous folds -of great cloaks--a _motif_ which is not common with Perugino, but which -Pintoricchio makes lavish use of in the Libreria, and which he derives -from Fiorenzo, who often brings it in. Here we find the seated woman, -for which he has left the drawing, who, with the children clinging to -her, looks up and listens to the Baptist on the right, and who, in her -gracefully swathed garments, is beautiful enough for the pencil of -Botticelli or Agostino di Duccio. We also find a study for the nude -figure at the back with outstretched hand. These nudes are among -Bernardino's few attempts at anatomical drawing, to which he never takes -kindly. We cannot say that they show much real acquaintance with form, -though it is evident that they are from the living model, which at this -time he was faithfully seeking to render. Many of the portraits are -admirable. It would be difficult to find stronger, more satisfactory -heads, more solid in drawing and more full and interesting in -expression, than three or four of the heads in the group standing a -little way behind Christ, or the old man grasping his napkin on the -opposite side, in whom Dr. Steinmann suggests we see the Pope's -brother-in-law, Giovanni Basso della Rovere, who died this year, and -whose shrewd features and close shut mouth we recognise again in his -tomb in Santa Maria del Popolo. The deepest interest of the picture -centres in these fine portraits of men of the time, and in the landscape -which, though this fresco is the most injured of all, is still beautiful -in its varied light and shade, and in the lie of the ground in hill and -slope and distant vale. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Sixtine Chapel, Rome_ - - THE BAPTISM OF CHRIST] - -The old Pope died before the paint was dry upon the walls of the chapel -by which his name is best remembered; but long before his companions had -got down to the west end, Pintoricchio must have done his share, though -he may still have worked at draperies and minor details in his master's -allotment. What he had achieved had established his reputation, and when -he went forth it was as an independent artist, himself an employer of -assistants, soon to be the honoured recipient of papal commissions. - -To this time we may assign the panel painting of the "Madonna teaching -the Child to read," which is now at Valencia. Indeed, Dr. Schmarsow -holds it to be his earliest known work. It was formerly at Xativa, and -was sent as a present to his native city by Roderigo Borgia, and was -placed later in a chapel which his brother Francesco built to his -memory. The crest of the Borgias shows that it was painted for that -house, and the donor himself, as a comparatively young man, kneels on -the right, with his mitre on the ground by his side. - -We can trace the likeness to that other kneeling Pope in the Borgia -apartments, though the features are less strongly marked. In this little -panel, both the Mother and Child are standing,--He mounted on a chest, -upon which the crest is painted; she with one hand tenderly placed on -His shoulder, while the other holds the open book. She has the same type -to which Pintoricchio was faithful, the egg-shaped face, arched brows -and close shut mouth. The heavy folds of the mantle are starred and -edged with gold, and the Child's robe is of rich gold brocade. The -picture is full of feeling, but is stiff in drawing and almost Byzantine -in style. The delightful little lunette in Sant' Onofrio in Rome, -painted about 1505 by one of his scholars, is adapted from this picture, -of which the master must have retained a sketch. The same follower was -employed on the apse, where scenes by Peruzzi alternate with several in -Pintoricchio's manner, though they are far too ill-drawn to be from his -hand. - -We have no means of deciding what was the first important commission the -young painter undertook after he left the Sixtine Chapel. The German -critics, however, agree in placing the Buffalini Chapel in Ara Coeli -as his next work. Morelli thinks it was later on account of the -decoration of "grottesques," but it has a simplicity and absence of -ornament more akin to the Sixtine work than to Pintoricchio's later -gorgeous achievements, and he uses much of the same soft grey colour. It -is not unlikely that he would have brought a special commendation from -the Buffalini of Perugia to those members settled in Rome, and it is -easy to see how fresh in his mind were the architectural traditions of -Fiorenzo. The chapel, being painted almost entirely by his own hand, -looks as if he had not yet gathered together so many assistants, and a -little later, loaded with papal commissions, he would hardly have had -time to devote to a private citizen. - -It seems to me that we have scarcely any work of his for which we can -feel such unalloyed admiration as that in this little chapel in the dim -old church upon the Capitoline Hill, where from the midst of classic -marbles and pre-historic legends, you pass into the quiet side aisle, -and the level rays of the golden evening sunshine that pour through a -little west window, light up the story of the mediaeval saint as -illustrated by his Umbrian name-child. - -Hardly any saint could have been more dear and familiar to the sons of -mid-Italy than San Bernardino of Siena, the disciple of their beloved -St. Francis, and one who had exercised such a strong and recent -influence over his followers. He died only nine years before -Pintoricchio was born, and as he grew up the little Bernardino must have -heard ardent references to his holy patron from men who had crowded -round the pulpit outside the cathedral in Perugia. His gonfalon, painted -by Bonfigli, hung in the Church of San Bernardino. His thin face, with -its pinched mouth, was familiar to every one, and stories of his wisdom, -his virtue, his miracles, were fresh on men's lips. Pintoricchio must -have been well acquainted with the history of the saint's amicable -arrangement of a deadly feud which had raged between the Buffalini and -the fierce Baglioni of his native town, and both as a _protege_ of San -Bernardino and as a Perugian, the commission to paint a chapel in honour -of the saint and to commemorate the healing of the quarrel must have -made a special appeal to his quick and sensitive fancy. The chapel was -probably the gift of Lodovico Buffalini, advocate to the papal -consistory, who, we find from an inscription on a stone in the pavement, -died in 1506. The painting was for many years almost concealed by a -hideous wooden hatchment, and only re-opened again in the last century, -which accounts for the excellent preservation it is in. - -The little Gothic chapel at the extreme west end of the church lighted -by a small west window, has an arched roof with crossed pieces; the side -walls are divided by painted pilasters. The whole architectural -decoration is in monochrome, in pale brownish grey upon a rich brown -ground. On the pilasters on either side is a beautiful decoration of -fruits and seed-pods in great masses, tied in with ribbons adapted from -the antique, and resembling a framework by Mantegna in the Eremitani -Chapel at Padua. The frescoes on the walls are separated by long slender -candelabra with flaring flames, the stems formed of grotesques, masks -grave and grimacing, climbing stags and gambolling _putti_. The arches -of the roof have been profusely enriched with gold, and culminate in a -blue and gold boss. Below the altar is a long procession, also in -monochrome, captives and warriors, a soldier on horseback dragging a -nude woman, others laden with spoils and torches, a conqueror on a -triumphal car, with a naked captive bound behind; these are painted with -almost impressionist touches, and the horses are much better drawn than -we usually expect from Pintoricchio. - -In the roof, in four triangles, are the "Four Evangelists": St. Matthew -looking up as for inspiration, dipping his pen in the ink held by a -beautiful kneeling angel-figure at his side. Both this figure and that -of St. Luke are very broadly and freely painted. Steinmann points out -that we find them almost repeated, apparently by a scholar, in the -sacristy of Santa Cecilia in Trastevere. This church has been closed for -two years for repairs--I have not been able to see the frescoes. - -On the west, on either side of the tall narrow window, are two simulated -windows. From that nearest the altar the figure of "God the Father," -surrounded by cherubs and golden rays and holding a globe, looks into -the chapel and towards the fresco below on the right. The panel to the -right is filled by a long row of arches in side-long perspective, and -on the top of a pedestal straddles a charming little _putto_, reminding -us of Mino da Fiesole's children on monuments, who bears an axe and -shield with the buffalo head, the crest of the Buffalini. In the -background there is a trace of landscape seen through a ruined arch, and -above, a lunette of the "Madonna and Child," His foot rests on the heads -of two cherubs. In the foreground kneels the small thin figure of "San -Bernardino" receiving the monastic habit of the Franciscan order from a -father, while his cast-off scarlet robes, his money and box of jewels, -lie beside him on the ground. Following the line of the father's gesture -across the wall, we find that it is directed towards St. Francis, who -kneels to receive the stigmata with an expression of deep devotion and -spiritual insight that Pintoricchio has not often repeated. In the -middle, under the window, two monks recount a history to three lay -listeners, two of whom are evidently portraits, while a procession of -horsemen rides across the background. Whether this relates to the -miracle of the stigmata, or has some reference to the feud with the -Baglioni, is uncertain. - -It is on the opposite wall, and on that above the altar, that the -painter has put forth his best efforts, and has produced work which, if -he ever equalled, he never surpassed. - -In the arches above the left hand wall is "San Bernardino" as he arrayed -himself in camel hair and sackcloth and went into the wilderness to -study, leaving his rich home and his gay companions in Siena. The -population of the city comes out to interview him, grave elders with -turbaned heads, young men dressed in the height of fantastic fashion. -The saint, absorbed in the study of his Bible, does not even perceive -them as they gaze on him with wonder mixed with reverence, recalling the -devotion he has already shown during the visit of the plague to Siena. -The grass on which he walks is besprinkled with spring flowers, arums -with their red seed-pods, hyacinths and anemones; a little stream -trickles through the green past mossy tree stumps, and the tall towers -of Siena are seen afar in the valley. Below, the whole breadth of wall -is devoted to the burial procession of the saint. Here is a great -market-place surrounded with airy buildings, such buildings as Fiorenzo -had used in those other legends of San Bernardino, which Pintoricchio -would naturally have thought of as he drew his design; indeed, we have -little difficulty in tracing those which he specially adopted. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Church of Ara Coeli, Rome_ - - THE BURIAL OF SAN BERNARDINO] - -In the fresco of "San Bernardino upon his Bier," the radiating marbles -of the great Piazza stretch away to a Bramante-like temple, arch soaring -above arch; flanking the ancestral dwelling of the donor of the chapel, -with the buffalo's head carved above the doorway, and a quaint little -scene of a buffalo assaulting the populace on the Piazza. In the -foreground stands the bier, upon which, with outstretched feet and -folded hands, lies the emaciated figure of the whilom gay young noble of -Siena who left all to follow Christ. Round him gather the monks of the -order, beggars, women and children. Down from the long _loggia_ on the -left, with the blue and gold decoration copied from Fiorenzo, comes the -stately figure in cap and gown of Messer Avocato Lodovico Buffalini -himself, face keen, precise yet gentle, figure conscious of position, -and the rustle of silken robes, observant too of the young sons, the -youth and the boy, who also in robes and close caps upon flowing hair, -stand on the opposite side of the bier. In the foreground Pintoricchio -has broken the monotony of the rich dark green bier by two of his most -charming little children with rounded limbs and gestures half saintly, -half childish, while by them lies something stuck in as an afterthought, -without meaning, without perspective, a babe in swaddling clothes in a -sort of crib or basket. This is the miraculous _bambino_ of Ara Coeli, -the Byzantine doll preserved in the church, which could by no means be -left out on such an occasion. The effect of aerial space about the whole -composition is very remarkable. The people gather round, life beyond -goes its way, and the whole is set in so peaceful and spirit-lifting an -environment that it does not need the little sky episode of the saint -received into glory to give it spirituality. - -So, too, in the "Apotheosis of San Bernardino," which occupies the altar -wall, the sense of space and largeness is the prevailing quality. -Overhead, the stiff _mandorla_ with cherubic heads frames the Saviour, -who, standing upon clouds, raises His hand in benediction. This figure, -as usual, is not altogether happy in the rendering; but thin and -awkwardly drawn as it is, it is not without force or dignity, and has -something earnest and lovable in its expression. It is the direct -simplicity of Pintoricchio's manner which saves from self-consciousness, -and gives a serious quality that atones for the want of grandeur. The -remaining figures leave hardly anything to be desired. Italian art can -show us few more beautiful single figures than that of St. Louis of -Toulouse.[21] The young bishop in his rich episcopal robes and mitre, -his pastoral staff laid against his shoulder, while with absorbed -earnest look he turns the pages of his great breviary, is one of the -most satisfactory creations, full of dignity, goodness and thought, that -any artist has shown us. The face is well and strongly modelled, and the -outline is simple and large. Sant' Antonio of Padua on the opposite -side, holding his flaring heart in token of burning love, is a feebler -figure, and reminds us of some of Perugino's weaker saints; but San -Bernardino himself, in the midst, is full of striking individuality, and -there is great simplicity and repose in the outlines of all three -figures. Nowhere have more beautiful angels been painted. Pintoricchio -has shaken himself out of the conventional slavery of Perugino. These -figures making music upon the clouds are full of life and vigour, -reminiscent of Melozzo da Forli's energetic inspiration, while the two -who, bearing lilies, kneel and between them raise a golden crown above -the saint's head, are Pintoricchio's own, instinct with his own fresh -and delicate feeling for the beautiful, as lovely in colour as they are -in form. - - [21] Patron Saint of Lodovico Buffalini. - -The grouping in the burial procession is more successful than usual, and -the light and shade more massed. The colouring of all the frescoes is -exceedingly harmonious, the greenish greys of the background are very -delicate, and the foliage in the fresco over the altar must have been -most beautiful. Touches of bright colour are brought in sparingly, and -with good effect. Nothing more satisfactory is to be found in the -Umbrian school up to now, than the _tout ensemble_ of the altar wall. -The unity and balance of the whole, the variety, yet connection of the -subject, the groundwork occupied, yet not crowded, free from spottiness -and harsh transition. The palm tree filling the space on the right, the -cypress on the left, the maintenance of the distances, relieve the -fresco of all stiffness and flatness. The landscape is full of light and -atmosphere. On the right we look away to a valley which has never lost -the freshness of morning, on the left is a fairyland of sea and distant -mountains and little far-away towns, gleaming, blue and mysteriously -radiant. The whole shape and position of the country at the back is -quite excellent, and in happy contrast to the artificial elegance of -colonnades and radiating pavement of its neighbour on the adjoining -wall. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Church of Ara Coeli, Rome_ - - THE GLORIFICATION OF SAN BERNARDINO] - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -LIFE IN ROME--CONTINUED - - -Giuliano della Rovere, though his uncle was dead, was still a powerful -cardinal when Innocent VIII. succeeded in 1484. He inhabited the Colonna -Palace, where Vasari tells us that both Perugino and Pintoricchio worked -in his service. Nearly all the Umbrian decorations were swept away later -to make room for the work of Poussin and Zuccaro, but the ceiling of one -great hall still boasts the design of Pintoricchio. It is a rich and -splendid piece of work. Ornaments in chiaroscuro on a blue or gold -groundwork frame four little medallions of classic fable or sacred -story--"Mucius Scaevola" and "Virginia," the "History of Judith" and of -"David." Hoary river-gods, grasping sheaves of corn and overflowing -cornucopias of fruit, recline on the backs of sphinxes, on either side -of fountains. More fanciful still are monkeys swinging from ribbons, -centaurs prancing, _putti_ riding goats which are led by older boys, -fauns waving banners, owls, garlands and serpents, all set in a rich -plastered and painted framework, finished with gold rosettes. - -Service in the private palace of the cardinal led on to employment by -Pope Innocent, to whom, no doubt, Giuliano recommended Pintoricchio for -this class of work, for in 1486 he was at work in the Belvedere. It was -here that he painted the towns of which Taja speaks. "Not long after," -says Vasari, "about the year 1484, Innocent VIII., a Genoese, made him -paint several halls and _loggie_ in the Palace of the Belvedere, where, -among other things which the Pope wished for, he painted a _loggia_ all -with towns, and you could discern Rome, Milan, Genoa, Florence, Venice -and Naples, all in the Flemish manner, which, being no longer much in -use, pleased very well."[22] No trace of them remains, nor is anything -left of the great Madonna picture which Vasari says was painted over the -principal entrance. The only remains of Umbrian art are to be found on -the walls and ceiling of what is to-day called the Museo Pio Clementino. -A graceful _loggia_ was half obliterated here to give more room to the -sculpture gallery, but above, the arms of Innocent VIII. and the date -1487 are still visible, surrounded by garlands and ornaments resembling -those in the Colonna Palace. Little medallions of classic subjects still -struggle dimly through decay and ochre wash. In the archways, seven -couples of _putti_ hold the papal shield, or play on musical -instruments, and we can trace the proud device of the Cibo, the gleaming -peacock and the motto "Loyaute passe tout." - - [22] Vasari, iii. p. 498. - -In the two little rooms adjoining are prophets and philosophers, and -here may be recognised the somewhat archaic assistant who helped -Pintoricchio in the Borgia Tower. Only these poor scraps remain of the -year's service with the Cibo Pope, and hardly more of what he -accomplished for his cardinals. Domenico della Rovere, the cardinal of -San Clemente, was one of Pintoricchio's earliest patrons in Rome. He -does indeed seem to have been as much friend as patron, and took both -Perugino and Pintoricchio to lodge with him upon their first arrival in -his spacious palace in the Piazza Scossacavalli, outside the entrance of -which Pintoricchio painted a scutcheon supported by _putti_. The -decoration of the interior of the palace then called Sant' Apostoli was -also entrusted to him. To-day it is inhabited by eleven brothers of the -order of the Penitenzieri. It retains something of the fascination of a -princely dwelling of the fourteenth century. In the mouldy courtyard are -traces of almost obliterated paintings. Under the roof are heraldic -devices, armorial bearings, sphinxes and dolphins. In the courtyard, -orange trees grow round a well, which may have been the work of -Bramante. Ivy half covers walls which were once gay with frescoes, but -among the ruin and decay we see repeated countless times in the marble -window frames, the name of the builder--DO. ROVERE, CAR. S. CLEMEN. and -his pious device--SOLI DEO. Outside are faint traces of the shield of -Sixtus IV. supported by two _putti_, the only part of the work which -Vasari deigns to notice. - -Inside, the three great halls on the ground floor, though partly -whitewashed and even built up, keep some remains of past splendour. On a -beam can still be read the date at which the palace was finished, 1490. - -There is still a good deal of the original gilding left on the wooden -ceilings, and where the whitewash has been scraped away, shadowy heads -of apostles are to be seen, and fine and delicate Renaissance ornament. -The whole resembles the designs for the Colonna Palace, and what can -still be made out appears to be by the master himself, elegant and -decisive in touch. All sorts of animals are made use of--a winged stag -drinks from a cornucopia, sea-gods and mermaids are instructing nymphs -to ride on dolphins, a sphinx plays with a dragon, satyrs are placed in -a vintage scene, sirens beguile centaurs with music--all in the fancy of -the Revival, exuberant, yet full of dainty grace. Bits of marble work -strike the eye here and there--the heraldic bearing of Rovere, the eagle -of Alidori; but there is little left to tell us of the glory of the -princely house, of the great churchman who built it, or of the Umbrian -master he employed to decorate it. - -The exultant motto which he placed on a marble tablet to celebrate its -completion, looks down from the decaying wall and speaks to us in words -half sad, half mocking: "This house shall stand till the ant has drunk -up the sea, and till the tortoise has crept round the world." - -This plan of small landscapes and scenes set in a wide framework of -fantastic objects, classic and mythological, musical instruments, -garlands and ribbons, becoming more and more grotesque, was peculiar at -this time to Pintoricchio. He may have taken the idea from walls in old -Roman houses, since destroyed, but of which many were uncovered at this -period. The same sort of decoration is to be seen to-day in the Roman -rooms on the Palatine. Pintoricchio uses this mode of decoration again -in the Borgia Apartments, and from him Raphael borrowed the idea for his -_loggie_. - -The beautiful church of Santa Maria del Popolo, restored by Pope Sixtus -in 1472, and subsequently rendered a very storehouse of art by his -successors and their cardinal kinsmen, would be, if it had been left -with all its original decorations, one of the finest monuments to -Pintoricchio's art in Italy. A great deal still remains, but much has -been swept away. We cannot be quite certain of the exact date of each -chapel, but his work here, with the exception of the choir, was carried -out during the next few years. - -The church was a favourite one with the Rovere family. Pope Sixtus -himself often went to vespers there. In 1480 he instituted his nephew, -Girolamo Riario, as chief warden. Here he came in state to give thanks -after the victory of Campo Morto had delivered Rome from the fear of the -Calabrian invader. Roderigo Borgia, too, as early as 1473, had given a -marble altar to be placed in front of a miracle-working picture of the -Madonna. Vasari speaks of two chapels painted by Pintoricchio in this -church: one with the history of St. Jerome, for Domenico della Rovere, -as a memorial of his brother, Christoforo, who died in 1479; the other -for Cardinal Innocenzio Cibo. The Umbrian frescoes were destroyed, and -the baroque ornamentation we now see, substituted. There is a third -chapel, dedicated to Santa Catarina, in which the painter executed -half-lengths of the four evangelists in an arched ceiling, for a -Portuguese ecclesiastic, Cardinal Costa. - -Finally, a fourth chapel had been the gift of Giovanni Basso della -Rovere, the brother-in-law of Pope Sixtus, whose portrait was already -painted by Pintoricchio in the fresco of the Baptism in the Sixtine -Chapel. Two of the half-lengths of the evangelists--"St. Jerome and Pope -Gregory"--though both spoilt and repainted, remain as Pintoricchio's -work, together with two children supporting a scutcheon. In the chapel -of St. Augustine, the three sons of Giovanni raised a monument to their -father, and some years after his death (to judge by the introduction of -grotesques) it was painted in frescoes, which guide-books still assign -to Pintoricchio. They are in his manner, and were probably executed -while he was working at the choir in 1505, for the papal shield of -Julius II., who succeeded in 1503, appears on the ceiling. The "Pieta" -in the lunette above the monument may possibly have been painted earlier -than the rest of the chapel, and Schmarsow sees in it the hand of -Pintoricchio, influenced by Melozzo da Forli. It is difficult to think -that he can be answerable for it when we compare it with the "Pieta" -over the polyptych at Perugia. The coarse, heavy body of the Christ, the -badly-draped loin cloth, the clumsy attitude of the expressionless -angels, seem rather to be the work of some pupil from North Italy, with -a mingling of the Teutonic, and have nothing in common with the delicate -and devotional Umbrian rendering, so evidently inspired by Perugino. - -In the "Assumption," which fills the opposite wall, the figures are too -ill drawn to allow us to think they can be Pintoricchio's. The arms are -too short, the feet out of drawing, the figure of the Madonna is -unnaturally long, with sloping shoulders. Crowe and Cavalcaselle were -the first to suggest as its author Matteo Balducci, a painter who has -left several panels at Siena, which were for long assigned to -Pintoricchio, under whom he worked in Rome. The "Virgin and Child, with -Saints" over the altar is a very inferior work, entirely repainted. -Round the top of the wall runs a series of scenes from the life of the -Virgin. These have been attributed to the North Italian, Morto da -Feltre. They are certainly not by Pintoricchio. - -There remains, then, only the little chapel of St. Jerome, which, in -spite of some restoration and some destruction, we can attribute to the -master. It has the freshness of early work, and both in colouring and -style is akin to that of San Bernardino in Ara Coeli, while the -influence of Fiorenzo has re-asserted itself. Over the altar is the -"Nativity," which bears so close a resemblance to the older master's -"Adoration" at Perugia. In the finished sketch at Venice, for the tender -figure of the Madonna, the drapery has the stair-like gradations of -folds on both sides, which Morelli points out as characteristic of him, -and the same critic draws attention to the type of hand, with long, bony -fingers, that we find in his later Madonna dei Fossi. The landscape, -which is soft and deep in tone, resembles that of the frescoes in the -Sixtine Chapel. In two, at least, of the little series of the life of -St. Jerome, we recognise Pintoricchio's own hand. In one, the doctors of -the Church come to visit the saint after he has retired to the desert. -The study for the lion in this scene is in his sketch-book. On the other -side of the chapel is the exquisite little panel in which St. Jerome -argues a point of doctrine with an infidel. This is a bit of -genre-painting with all the charm the Umbrian painters understood so -well. The red-robed saint sits in his great arm-chair; opposite him is -placed a stately doctor in blue. Disciples are grouped on either hand, -some have turbaned heads to suggest their unbelieving origin. Behind -stand favourite dogs, and St. Jerome's faithful lion. The scene is lit -up by the painting of a little window in the centre, through which the -company looks out on a sunny landscape, with trees and a lake lying in -mellow light and floating evening shades. A rich cloth hangs across the -broad sill. The idea of the little outlook, throwing air and contrast -into the interior, is one often afterwards elaborated by Pintoricchio, -and apparently was suggested to him by a panel in Fiorenzo's miracles of -San Bernardino. - -In the Capitol is a fresco painting which Mr. Berenson ascribes to our -master. Vasari speaks of his having painted such an altar-piece, but -this, if the same, was entirely repainted in 1834. The colour of the -angels' robes was changed--one from red to yellow, the other from yellow -to white. The Virgin's robe, now blue, was originally green. The face is -painted out of all recognition. The shape is not oval, the mouth is full -with parted lips, and the hair falls on either side of the face. The -angels, with knees bending outward, are not Pintoricchio's type--only -the Child recalls his Infant in the "Nativity" of Santa Maria del Popolo -and the hands are like his in outline. - -In the tribune of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme is a great composition of -the "Finding of the True Cross," which tradition has assigned to him -among others and which has strong traces of Umbrian workmanship. This -is entirely and heavily repainted, and its artistic value is _nil_, -except for the design. We should welcome even such an obscured -reminiscence as this, if it remained to us, of the paintings in Castel -Sant' Angelo. On a blue, starred vault, the Saviour is surrounded by a -_mandorla_ of cherubs. Below, St. Helena stands, holding the cross, with -the donor, Cardinal Carvajal, kneeling at her feet. On either side are -the miracles attending its recovery. On the left, the Emperor Heraclius -rides in triumph, bearing the cross, rescued from infidels, to the city -gates. The groups of women on the extreme left, and some of those -standing behind the Empress-saint, are full of likeness to -Pintoricchio's figures in the "Journey of Moses," and the landscape (the -only part which has not been quite repainted), with its purple tints, -overhanging rocks, and parties of wayfarers, recalls the work of -Fiorenzo. The whole has something of the direct simplicity of -Pintoricchio's narratives, but other figures remind us of -Signorelli--the forms are heavy and lumpy, and it is probably only by a -follower, though one who closely imitated the Umbrian master. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -THE BORGIA APARTMENTS - - -There is perhaps hardly a place in Rome where you feel so transported -into the heart of that old life of the Renaissance, as you do in the -Borgia Apartments. After mid-day it is almost empty of sightseers; and -in the long rooms, where the silence is only broken by the splash of the -fountain in the quiet, grassy court outside, you realise the setting of -the passionate lives that once ran their course here. Here the light -caught Lucrezia's golden hair, here the famous pontiff rustled in his -brocaded robes, and Caesar Borgia strode in gilded armour. Here great -ambitions were matured, and blackest crimes consummated; and here, too, -came and went the little, deaf, beauty-loving painter from the Umbrian -hills, and drew his cartoons, and spaced his decorations, and overlooked -his army of workmen, and left us as splendid a scheme of rich ornament -as the quattro-cento has to show. - -The preservation of these rooms is due to their having been for so long -shut up. Pope Julius, moved partly by reprobation of the crimes of his -predecessor, partly by hatred of the whole house of Borgia, refused to -live in the apartments; but at the end of the sixteenth century the -nephews of Leo XI. used them for a time. For two centuries they seem to -have been uninhabited, and the Abbe Taja in 1750 laments this -abandonment, and deplores their loss to all lovers of the fine arts. -Later, in the eighteenth century, we learn from Chattard[23] that they -were used for the meals of cardinals and officials who assembled during -Holy Week. In 1816, when, in consequence of the peace of Tolentino, the -precious collection of pictures was sent back from Paris, some of them -were collected in the Borgia apartments, and the marble cross-bars of -the windows were replaced by iron ones to give more light. The light -was, however, so bad that the pictures were removed, and a miscellaneous -museum and library took their place. - - [23] _Nuova descrizione del Vaticano_, ii. 58. - -In 1891 the present Pope, Leo XIII., moved the library, and the delicate -task of restoration began. The book-shelves and marbles had cracked and -destroyed the plaster in places, and in the time of Pius VII. some -varnish had been applied to the ceilings, making a sort of crust. The -restoration has been carried out with the greatest care under the -direction of Signor Lodovico Seitz, and has fortunately been restricted -to repairing the plaster and stucco, and to cleaning the frescoes from -dust and damp. Though in some parts of the fifth and sixth halls the -stucco has been taken off, the walls reconstructed, and the surface -refixed, it has been done with such nicety that no mark is perceptible, -and retouching, with one or two trifling exceptions, has been absolutely -tabooed. What repainting there is dates from the time of Pius VII., but -is fortunately slight. This applies to the actual paintings. - -Most of the decorations of the lower walls have been repainted, -following the fragmentary traces that remained, or, where these were -quite obliterated, they have been replaced with harmonious hangings. The -minor decorations of the halls are a study in themselves, and are the -more interesting as it is evident that the artist has superintended the -whole, subordinating the marble work, the painting of the lower panels, -and even the tiled floor to suit his scheme of colour. - -It is extraordinary that no contract for these rooms has been -discovered. No sign of the agreement for them remains in Alexander -Borgia's account book. It is only from incidental mention in letters to -and from Orvieto, and from payments made, that we can find out when the -work was begun, and how long it lasted. - -Messrs. Ehrle and Stevenson, in their monumental work on the Borgia -Apartments, show very clearly that Pintoricchio's part only began with -the second room. The private or living rooms of the Pope at that time -were the second, or the Hall of Mysteries; the third, the Hall of -Saints; and the fourth, or Arts and Sciences, besides the two -withdrawing rooms. Vasari knew this quite well at the end of the -sixteenth century. It is only with Chattard, about 1764, that the whole -of the six rooms were said to have been decorated for Alexander VIII. In -Vasari's life of Pintoricchio, he says the Pope made him paint the rooms -he inhabited, and the Borgia Tower; and, more clearly still, in the life -of Perino del Vaga, he says the latter was painting the vault of the -Sala Pontifici, by which you enter the rooms of Pope Alexander, -_already painted by Pintoricchio_. Taking off this room, there remain -five, to which he assigned three years. - -Our knowledge of contracts of the time enable us to construct pretty -accurately what must have been the conditions of the missing agreement. -The master would have been required to use the best colours, to begin -and end within certain time limits, to design all the cartoons, and to -paint the faces and principal parts with his own hand. We can gather -from the existing work that Pintoricchio performed his share of such a -contract honestly; assistants were evidently and inevitably employed, -but the homogeneous character of the whole is remarkable, and proves, -not only that the painter's supervision must have been incessant, but -also that he had the power of directing and overseeing his pupils' work, -so as to keep their individuality in sufficient abeyance to his own -guiding influence. That he had by this time his own workshop of helpers -and skilled painters working under him we do not doubt, but I do not -think that any critics who have studied the consistent character of the -work, now doubt that he had the supreme direction, and that he was -undisturbed by rivals. The unity of ornament, too, leads us to believe -that he directed and designed all this part himself. Probably the marble -work is by Andrea Bregno, who had been working with him in the Sixtine -Chapel, and Santa Maria del Popolo. - -Something of the beauty which greets us in these halls we owe to the -mellowing hand of time; yet even when new, the effect must have been -rich and glowing, brilliant and deep rather than gaudy, and all is -planned to suit the subdued light of a northern aspect. The square, not -very high rooms are spaced, divided, and slightly vaulted with the most -consummate skill. The rich soft colours, the heavy gold, the airy -outlook of landscape, the glowing background, give an effect, choice, -jewelled, of an exquisite finish, of a sensuous gratification, almost -without parallel. The imagination furnishes the empty chambers with all -the choice objects they once contained. The priceless majolica, the gold -and silver vessels, the brocaded hangings, the ivory carvings--what a -background for the scenes of love and revelry once enacted here! The -thrum of music, the laughter and wit and boisterous merriment, the -muttered conferences, the whispered plotting, the ghastly treacheries, -the dying groans. In one of these rooms, the Hall of Arts, the first -husband of the young Lucrezia was murdered. In the adjoining room the -Pope himself died in agonies. On these and on what other deeds of -darkness and despair and triumphant villainy have these chaste and -innocent conceptions of Pintoricchio looked down. It gives them a -curious attraction, born of incongruity; as a writer says: "They have -all the fascination of 'fleurs du mal.'" - -It was about this time that the grotesque first crept into art. Dr. -Schmarsow thinks that the earliest signs may be detected in the Borgia -Apartments. The early art of the Renaissance had shown a preference for -the classic, inspired by the decorations on antique marbles. The objects -were clear and simple, human beings, animals, keeping true to nature, -ornamented with garlands, ribbons, and other accessories, fanciful, but -not fantastic. The origin of the expression "grottesque," which is first -used in Pintoricchio's contract in Siena in 1502, is explained by -Benvenuto Cellini in 1571. It was taken from the objects found by -students of art who explored antique monuments in caverns or grottoes. -Paintings, ornamented with grotesques, were crowded with objects all -complicated, twisted and adapted, masks, swans with abnormally long -necks, fabulous monsters, unnatural flowers. Exuberantly as Pintoricchio -afterwards uses such objects, the tendency is only seen slightly here -and in the Buffalini chapel. His work in the first hall (the Hall of -Mysteries) of the life of our Lord, has something of a mediaeval -tendency. The scenes are seven in number: "The Annunciation," "The -Nativity," "The Adoration of the Magi," "The Resurrection," "The -Ascension," "The Descent of the Holy Spirit," and "The Assumption of the -Virgin." The composition of all is of the simplest, no strong emotions -are rendered, and the figures are all of that peaceful and primitive -devotion suited to the ruling of the early Church, and recalling -Fiorenzo and Bonfigli. Indeed, the contrast is great between the -simplicity of ornament and more ambitious, scientific spirit in the -Sixtine, and the return here to the conventional composition and the -mediaeval fondness for accessory. Both "The Annunciation" and "The -Adoration of the Magi" are of the Umbro-Perugian type. Pintoricchio -repeats the angel of the first scene again at Spello, with several other -figures. In the radial lines of the pavement we recognise the example of -Perugino in the Sixtine fresco. The whole scene in the stately halls -opening out in a beautiful landscape, is full of soft dignity. The -rose-pink of the angels' robes, the peacock-blues and greens of Mary's -garments, the rose-wreath, the lilies, make a luscious combination of -colour. It is the impassionate character, the childlike and unconscious -spirit of all Pintoricchio's creations that gives them such a piquancy, -in contrast to their splendid setting. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - THE ANNUNCIATION] - -Dr. Auguste Schmarsow, of all the critics, is the one who has given most -careful study to these frescoes and has brought most knowledge and -erudition to bear upon them. He divides a great deal of the execution -among the various schools to which he thinks Pintoricchio's assistants -belonged, and his assignments, if not to be taken as actual facts, are -worth considering--it being allowed that the whole is due to one -designer. All critics concur in giving the figures in the "Annunciation" -to the master. In the next, the "Nativity," the Virgin and Child are -also from Pintoricchio's own hand, and many details recall the -altar-piece in Santa Maria del Popolo. The "Adoration of the Magi" is -attributed to a Lombard, except the boy at the right, who is by a pupil -of Botticelli. We should be sorry to hold Pintoricchio immediately -responsible for the ill-drawn Child and awkward hands in this fresco; -and in the patterns on the dresses and the terra-cotta mouldings of the -buildings we see the Lombard taste. In the "Resurrection" we have the -broken tomb, the risen Saviour, and the guards in armour, set in a -landscape of rocky ground and cypresses. - -The principal figure, upon a gilded glory, set round with cherubs' heads -and tongues of flame and grasping a banner, is far too ill-drawn for the -master, and Schmarsow gives it entirely to a Lombard. The guards are -all of a refined Umbrian type, full of spirit and intelligence, and Dr. -Steinmann suggests that we may have here portraits of Caesar Borgia and -his brother, who at the time would be boys of seventeen and eighteen. It -is, as he argues, difficult to say what other portraits (and that they -are portraits is evident) would be allowed in the same scene with that -of the donor, Pope Alexander himself, who kneels on the left hand, the -most conspicuous figure of the whole group, clothed in a gorgeous -mantle, embossed with gold, his hands raised in prayer. His face has a -strong beaked nose, low forehead, heavy jowl, double chin and crafty -eye, and the tonsure shows the unusual development of the back of the -skull. It is a splendidly realistic portrait, full of strength and -truth, and clever modelling of the heavy fleshy face. This is entirely -by Pintoricchio, who naturally would not leave such an important detail -to any inferior hand. It is in unconscious satire that the Pope raises -his clasped hands and eyes to the figure of the risen Lord, and that the -inscription is to be read--like a sentence from the Judgment Seat--"I -wait for my resurrection." These figures, in contrast to some of the -puppet-like ones in the two preceding frescoes, are full of life, vivid -and solid. In "The Ascension," painted on the archway over the window, -the figure of Christ is the same in attitude if not in drapery. The -whole is feebly drawn, and the gestures of the Apostles show a great -want of unity. In this composition Schmarsow sees an imitation of -Melozzo da Forli, while the heads and drapery are of the school of the -Sienese, Bernardino Fungai, and by the same hand as the prophets on the -roof nearest the window. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - POPE ALEXANDER VI. ADORING THE RISEN CHRIST] - -The "Descent of the Holy Spirit" has suffered more than any of the -frescoes from damp and restoration. The scene is placed in an open -field--an arbitrary action of the painter intended to give unity to the -background by making it a landscape like the other spaces, in -Pintoricchio's special manner. The usual harmony of design is lacking -here, and the lower part of the scene is out of harmony with the upper. -We trace the Lombard style again, particularly on the left hand, while -some figures on the right recall the Sienese. The two inner figures of -prophets on the vault are in the style of Fiorenzo. It is not likely -that Pintoricchio would himself have worked at these, but Perugian -pupils were certainly working with him. - -In the remaining fresco of the "Assumption," the composition is entirely -Umbrian, and may be compared with that in Santa Maria del Popolo, and in -the Vatican. In St. Thomas, and in the angels on the right, Schmarsow -sees the style of Perugino, but that master was a _protege_ of Cardinal -Giuliano della Rovere, and at this time was busied on work for his -patron; in any case, he would not have been likely to take service under -his old pupil. Of course, Pintoricchio must have had designs by him in -his possession. The Madonna in some degree recalls the much more -beautiful one Pintoricchio afterwards painted for the monks of Monte -Oliveto. But the figure which gives its artistic importance to the -fresco is that of the man in black who kneels on the right of the open -tomb, facing St. Thomas. This figure alone, in grandeur and simplicity -of attitude, in intensity of expression, in fine drawing and handling, -and in depth of colour, would vindicate Pintoricchio's claim to be -called a great painter--taken in conjunction with the Pope on the -opposite wall, it carries conviction of the power and the insight of the -man who could produce two such diverse and striking types, though the -art that produced them may be empirical rather than scientific. We do -not know who this last may be. There are no signs of his rank in his -dress, no cardinal's hat by his side; but it is evident that he must -have been a person of importance. It is conjectured that he is Francesco -Borgia, the Pope's brother, who, in 1493 became Bishop of Teano, and -Papal treasurer.[24] - - [24] E. Steinmann, _Pintoricchio_, p. 54. - -A wonderful softness broods over the whole decoration of this room; the -details, elaborate as they are, are subordinated to a quiet and restful -effect. All absence of violent action or emotion contributes to the -impression; the same peaceful types are repeated; the same character of -landscape: all modifies the pictorial to the decorative effect. We may -notice here a feature which Pintoricchio shares very strikingly with -Perugino--it is that feeling for restraint, the instinct to keep all of -small size and well within the picture which gives these painters such a -peculiarly refined character, especially in contrast with those who -followed, copyists of Raphael and Michael Angelo. Everywhere in the -decorative part of the rooms we see the bull's head, the appropriate -device of the savage representative of the House of Borgia, a device -which the House--which was of Spanish extraction--had borne since the -thirteenth century. The decoration is repeated over and over again, and -does not show much resource or ingenuity, but the subdued tone of the -whole is very happy and thoroughly appropriate. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - FIGURE OF THE POPE - (A detail from "Pope Alexander VI. adoring the Risen Christ")] - -A marble doorway surrounded by two _putti_ bearing a shield, leads to -the Hall of Saints. Here Pintoricchio has surpassed himself in beauty. -Here is more varied and more lively action and better effects of -grouping than we find anywhere in his work, except in the Sixtine -Chapel. When these apartments were little known, the Libreria at Siena -was often quoted as the achievement on which the Umbrian master's fame -rested, but to know him at his best we must see him here in Rome. For -technique, colour, decoration, and poetical feeling, these rooms, and -especially the Hall of Saints, rank higher than anything else he has -left, with the exception, perhaps, of the Buffalini and Sixtine Chapels. - -The legends of the saints are varied by a scene from the Old and one -from the New Testament. It does not appear what was the reason of this -conjunction. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - THE KNEELING MAN - (A detail from the "Assumption of the Virgin")] - -Over the door we have "Susanna and the Elders." The middle of the -composition is occupied by a splendid fountain in the style of the -Renaissance. The top part, with the child holding the dolphin, resembles -Verrocchio's work in the courtyard of the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence. -The fountain is placed in a little garden plot set round with palings -and a rose hedge, and the fanciful hand which painted it has filled -it with animals: a hare, a stag lying down by the shoes which Susanna -has just slipped off, a fawn, white rabbits gambolling in all -directions, a monkey attached to a golden chain. These are evidently -painted by a real student-lover of animals. In front of the fountain -stands the saint, in a clinging white robe that reminds us of the -sculpture of Agostino di Duccio; her feet are bare; a heavy necklace and -pendant are round her throat. The two elders, in rich robes and Eastern -turbans, grasp her arms on either side; but her attitude, with her hand -on the shoulder of one, is free from violent emotion, calm and trustful. -Pintoricchio has seldom painted a more exquisite and poetical figure -than this, with fair head and delicately-modelled arms and hands. Its -purity and innocence, and the subject of the legend, make it a strange -choice for the private apartments of a Borgia. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - THE STORY OF SUSANNA] - -In the background on the left, the same white figure is being hurried to -execution by guards in the dress of the fifteenth century, while Daniel, -mounted on a white horse and holding a sceptre, intervenes in her -favour. On the other side, the elders, bound to a tree, are stoned to -death, even a little figure of a child casting stones at them. These -figures show a great deal of animated action and good drawing and -modelling, and are full of life and spirit. Behind is a landscape in the -well-known style of Pintoricchio--the whole strongly recalling the work -of Fiorenzo. Bernardino here is in his most idyllic and fairy-tale vein, -and nowhere is the painting more finished; but the very great care of -detail, carried into the most distant part, gives too great an -importance to accessories, and damages the unity of the whole, showing -him less as a great composer than a decorator. - -In the next fresco, Santa Barbara escapes from the tower in which she -had been imprisoned by her cruel father, and in which she had built -three windows in honour of the Trinity. On the left of the tower we see -the great rent made by a miracle, through which she escaped. The father, -armed with a scimitar, and shielding his eyes with his hand, is -anxiously searching for her in the wrong direction. He is accompanied by -two armed followers, one of whom catches sight of her, and, suddenly -converted, looks longingly after her. In the background the saint -escapes in company with Santa Giulia, and on the right her father is -asking for news from a shepherd, who, for betraying that he has seen -her, is turned into a marble pillar and painted white to convey this -idea. Santa Barbara herself is a naive and charming figure, gracefully -posed, with flying draperies and long fair hair circled with pearls. Her -streaming locks and blowing draperies give the impression of flight and -movement very successfully. The whole effect is gay and fanciful. The -saint, her little fair face turned up, her hands clasped, might be a -fairy princess, escaping from an enchanted castle, over a sward carpeted -with blossoms. She makes a bright figure in effective contrast to the -white-robed Susanna. - -The lunette opposite this is one of the happiest of the series--"The -Visit of St. Anthony to Paul the Hermit." Beneath a rough natural stone -archway in which the hermitage is concealed, its presence indicated by -the bell which the hermit uses to call himself to prayers, the two -saints sit, sharing the loaf of bread which has been brought by the -faithful raven, which flies away on the left. Close to St. Paul two -disciples in white robes contemplate the edifying conversation, behind -St. Anthony are grouped three women, richly dressed. They advance with -half-closed, wanton eyes, and by the little horns on their fashionably -dressed hair, their bats' wings, and the claws peeping out from under -their flowing skirts, their demoniacal character is betrayed. The last -of the group, with head thrown back and hands resting on either side of -her waist, is a very original and beautiful figure. The face and hands -of St. Anthony are strongly drawn and the robes finely draped. In the -hermit, dressed in the legendary garment of palm leaves, and in the very -inferior figures of disciples, the hand of an assistant may be seen. The -latter recall Signorelli, without his force and freshness. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - ST. ANTHONY AND ST. PAUL--HERMITS] - -In "The Visitation," which fills the remaining space on this side, we -have one of those sweet, home-like narrative paintings so dear to -Umbrian art. The Virgin and St. Elizabeth, dressed in the long -conventional blue and green draperies, clasp hands in the foreground, -the Virgin with downcast eyes, the saint with the searching gaze -prescribed by tradition. Behind them, St. Joseph leans on a staff, and a -procession of children and pages follows: a girl with graceful swathings -of scarf and sleeve carries a basket of fruit upon her head, and with a -child at her feet, is distantly reminiscent of certain figures by -Botticelli in the Sixtine Chapel. The smiling landscape, across which -the visitors have journeyed, is seen through a perspective of -elaborately drawn and decorated arches, on which some of those drawings -of grotesque ornamentation can be discerned. On the right, in the -shadows of the arcades, is a delightful group, one of those bits with -which Pintoricchio gives interest and charm to his compositions. -Zacharias, who is as yet unaware of the arrival, leans in an angle, -absorbed in a book. On the ground a group of women, young and old, are -occupied in spinning and embroidery; at the back another graceful figure -twirls a distaff, and a child plays with a dog on the ground in front. -In some of the secondary parts of the execution of this, Schmarsow sees -the hand of Pintoricchio's best scholar. The architecture has nothing of -the Umbrian style, but shows the hand of one to whom the Lombard -decoration, with its terra-cotta work, is familiar. The whole of the -fresco is more broadly painted, the draperies in large, broad folds, the -value of the landscape better kept, more softly modulated than in any we -have yet noticed. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - THE DEMON WOMEN - (Detail from the fresco of "St. Anthony and St. Paul")] - -The light over the windows is so bad that it is almost impossible to get -an adequate view of the frescoes placed there. This is particularly -unfortunate in the Hall of Saints, for no one of the scenes is more -beautiful, more happily grouped or more full of interest than the one of -St. Sebastian's martyrdom. The young Saint who, transfixed with arrows -and bound with cords, stands at the base of a column placed against a -mass of ruined brickwork on Mount Palatine, is a pathetic figure, full -of calm dignity and resignation. It is drawn and modelled with care -and freedom, and has a force and solidity which make us regret that -Pintoricchio did not give himself more chance by oftener painting -studies from the nude. The figure and drapery with some modifications -seem to have been adapted from his fresco of the "Baptism of Christ," -but he has learnt more since then, and it stands firmer and gives a -greater sense of elasticity and poise. The groups of archers on either -hand, shooting at their human mark, under the superintendence of a -Janissary in Eastern dress,[25] are full of movement and variety. One -draws his bow, another is putting the arrow in the string, another has -just let fly, while behind him a fourth in half armour shades his eyes -with his hand and watches the weapon speed to the mark--a quaint, -matter-of-fact rendering of a scene of tragedy, which deprives it of its -serious character and gives it, as Steinmann remarks, a social air, as -of a friendly shooting match. - - [25] In the British Museum is a drawing for this figure, - attributed to Gentile Bellini, about which I shall have - more to say. - -The scene in which the event takes place is more interestingly painted -in some ways than any of the other landscapes. It is easy to see that -studies for it have been made upon the Palatine itself, where tradition -has always held that Sebastian, who was a captain of the Roman Guard, -met his martyrdom. The small old Roman brickwork, overgrown with -exquisitely drawn acanthus and ivy, is rendered with detailed care, and -broken columns stand or lie around. In the background we see the -half-ruined Colosseum, as Sixtus IV. left it when he built the Sixtine -Bridge from its blocks. On the right is a church--it may be San Giovanni -e Paolo, or the one raised in honour of the saint himself. Nowhere up to -this time has the beauty and the melancholy of the Roman landscape been -rendered by any artist, and once more we feel how deeply beauty in all -its forms appealed to the Umbrian painter. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - THE MARTYRDOM OF ST. SEBASTIAN] - -We now turn to the principal wall, facing the window, the most splendid -of all the frescoes which Pintoricchio has left. At the foot of the -great arch of Constantine, which is crowned with a golden bull, St. -Catherine of Alexandria holds a theological dispute with fifty -philosophers at a council convoked by the Emperor Maximian. The only -woman in the great assemblage, the fair little figure stands before the -throne of the Emperor and illustrates the points of her arguments upon -her fingers. The same model has served here as for Santa -Barbara--tradition says it was Lucrezia herself, the dearly-loved -daughter of the Pope--with the small delicate features and long fair -hair, which she is described by Burckhardt as possessing. The scene is -laid in the usual sunny landscape. Old men with high caps and turbans -dispute together, potentates ride upon the scene, pages attend their -masters, bearing their volumes for reference, a greyhound steals forward -at the feet of a squire who bears a halberd on his shoulder. Some are -hastily searching their books as if short of arguments, but the king's -daughter is speaking on without hesitation, as if inspired by an -unerring director. Lucrezia was fifteen the year this was painted, and -was given in marriage to Giovanni Sforza. Full of wit and charm as -she was, the painter may have caught the idea of his composition from -seeing her foremost in lively discussion among the nobles of her -father's court, but the figure and gesture is practically copied from -Masolino's of the same subject in San Clemente. All the evil Lucrezia -witnessed, all the black deeds she took part in, if history says truly, -seem to have swept over that fair head, and when she settled down at -Pesaro with her third husband, we gather that she was glad to leave -intrigue and crime behind and to lead a comparatively peaceable, -respectable existence for the rest of her life. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - THE DISPUTE OF ST. CATHERINE] - -The idea of the splendour of the Pope's court has fascinated the -painter, and round the beautiful girl, who was its centre, he has -grouped other remarkable personages who must have struck him there. The -sad-eyed, bitter-looking man in Greek dress, who stands on the left in -the foreground, is said to be Andrea Paleologos, commonly called the -Despot of Morea, nephew and heir of the unfortunate Emperor Constantine, -under whose rule Constantinople fell into the hands of the Turks. Andrea -had with his father, taken refuge at the Papal court some twenty years -earlier; they had brought with them a precious gift--the bones of St. -Andrew--and the hospitality of successive Popes had been extended to -them. Andrea could never forget his former grandeur or reconcile himself -to his position, though, as he made profit out of his hereditary rights -in many petty ways, he was held in little repute. Certainly the -resentful, brooding expression, the isolated air, accords well with the -descriptions of the disappointed, disinherited man, standing silent and -moody while the gay court of the Renaissance is unheeding of him. This -interesting attribution is now questioned by some authorities. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - ST. CATHERINE - (A detail from the "Dispute of St. Catherine")] - -In the British Museum are drawings of a Turk and a Turkish woman, both -seated cross-legged. The drawing of the man serves for the Janissary in -the "Martyrdom of St. Sebastian," reversed, and the arm slightly -altered. - -At Frankfort is a drawing of an Albanian, and also the one from which -the alleged portrait of the Despot of Morea is taken. - -In the Louvre are two drawings of Turks and one of a Turkish woman. Here -we find the Turk standing on the Emperor's left hand, and supposed to be -the Sultan Djem. - -All these drawings appear to be by the same hand and done at the same -time--alike in size and style. The two in the British Museum have been -ascribed to Gentile Bellini, and are believed to have been sketches made -by him in Constantinople. They have all the appearance of being from -life. There are touches of reality in the under-robe of the Turk, the -wrinkles in his face and the muscles of the neck, which entirely -disappear when the sketch is transferred to the plaster wall. The -question then arises, Did Pintoricchio transfer drawings by Bellini -straight into his fresco, or can we entertain the opinion advanced by -Signor A. Venturi, that the drawings are not by Bellini at all, but by -Pintoricchio himself?[26] - - [26] _L'Arte_, vol. i. p. 32. - -The Sultan Djem no doubt had a suite which included women, and -Pintoricchio would have had no difficulty in finding models. We can -hardly doubt, apart from tradition, that the painter _did_ intend the -very prominent Greek in his fresco to represent Paleologos, who would so -obviously balance the other distinguished refugee at the opposite -corner; but if so, why copy an old drawing of thirteen years earlier, -when it was essential to secure a portrait, and when Paleologos himself -was always about the court? The same remark holds good of the drawing of -the Turks. With so many Turks in Rome in 1493, and all the town wild -about them, is it probable that Pintoricchio should have had recourse -for them to old drawings by Bellini? On the other hand, the style of the -drawings has no resemblance whatever to that of Pintoricchio, though I -cannot see much more to Gentile Bellini. I am inclined to think that the -attribution to this last is an arbitrary one, and arises from his having -been known to have visited the East, but that the drawings were supplied -to Pintoricchio by a third person unknown, probably one of his -assistants, whom he commissioned to procure sketches. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - GROUP OF HEADS - (A detail from the "Dispute of St. Catherine")] - -The figure on the Emperor's left, in Turkish dress, has usually been -taken for Prince Djem, the younger son of the Sultan Mahommed II., but -as it is on record that Djem closely resembled his father, and as we -have an excellent likeness of the latter in Gentile Bellini's famous -portrait (now in Lady Layard's possession), we are able to identify Djem -in the much more striking personage, the fierce and stately prince on -horseback on the extreme right. It was as a hostage that Innocent VIII. -brought him to Rome in 1489. We have plenty of evidence of how "el Gran -Turco" struck the fancy of the Romans. All the Chronicles of the time, -the letters and diaries of Ambassadors, are full of descriptions of his -dress and person, and of the gay hunting parties which the Pope used to -give in his honour. Mantegna has left a graphic description of his -appearance in a letter written from Rome in 1485, in which he speaks of -his fierce aspect, his wonderful seat on a horse, and his turban made of -"thirty thousand ells of fine linen." - -We can guess that the Turks made a great impression on Pintoricchio, for -he brings them in again to his frescoes fifteen years later at Siena. -The Emperor has been said to be a portrait of Caesar Borgia; but as he -was only eighteen or nineteen at the time, this seems impossible. The -young man on horseback on the right, tradition names as Giovanni Sforza, -who was about twenty. - -Here, too, is another portrait, less splendid but as notable as any. In -the corner on our left may be seen the slim form and thin dark face, -sensitive and observant, of the little painter himself, and by his side -a man with a shrewd, firm face, with a grand gold chain round his -shoulders and holding an architect's square in his hand. This is no -doubt one of the sculptors or decorators of the rooms. It may be -Bramante, or the elder San Gallo, or Andrea Bregno, that conjuror in -marble. - -The ceiling in this room is a marvel of richly-gilt and embossed stucco, -mingled with painting. The eight large triangular spaces between the -bars of framework illustrate the myth of Osiris and Isis which, with its -history of the deification of the bull, appropriately symbolises the -exaltation of the House of Borgia. The young King Osiris, having -conquered Egypt, ploughs the land with bulls and teaches the Egyptian to -plant orchards and vineyards. The peace and prosperity of his rule is -crowned by his marriage with Isis. Warriors pile their useless armour -and children play around their knees. In this segment one particularly -delightful _putto_ is riding astride of a swan, the original for which, -in marble, had been among the recent discoveries of antiques. As the -history proceeds, the wicked brother raises the Egyptians in mutiny and -Isis finds the remains of her murdered husband. Isis is a graceful -fantastic figure, with swathing draperies, and the cut-up hands and legs -of the unfortunate Osiris are disposed about the ground with a very -naive effect. Then we have his burial, wrapped in cloth of gold--the -pyramid erected to him, and his apparition deified in the form of the -famous bull Apis, ending with a procession and the bull borne in -triumph. The intervals are lavishly filled in with grotesques, which are -here very marked in character. It is curious to note Pintoricchio's -study of the antique, the classic armour, and the mythical histories in -the small _tondi_ on the wide cross architrave--Mercury soothing Argus -to sleep, and then slaying him at Jove's command. Jove seizing Io, and -obtaining possession of the cow into which her friend was transformed. -The design of the principal subjects is in Pintoricchio's style and full -of fancy and invention, but the execution would seem to have been -entrusted to assistants, apparently to the same hand which worked on the -archers round St. Sebastian and in parts of the Susanna. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -THE BORGIA APARTMENTS--CASTEL SANT' ANGELO - - -As he passed through the doorway which leads into the Hall of the Arts -and Sciences, Pintoricchio found above his head a narrow space to -decorate, and his thoughts must have flown back to the over-door of the -old Council chamber in Perugia and the fresco which years before he had -watched his whilom master, Fiorenzo, place there, and perhaps had helped -him to execute. Some sketch of that group must have been beside him, for -we have it reproduced in this "Madonna and Child." The dress and -attitude of the Mother are almost identical, though the original is -refined upon, and in technique and beauty of expression this is one of -the most satisfactory of all his works. The Mother, holding an open -book, in which the Child reads, is reminiscent of that earlier painting -sent to Xativa, but Mary, gazing out of the picture with wide eyes full -of light, and delicate, half-satirical mouth, has the individuality of a -portrait. The Child is a very real little boy; He stands on a cushion, -dressed in a little tunic, poring with pretty baby wisdom over His task, -so natural and so busy, He adds one more to a long list of triumphs in a -branch of art in which up to this time Pintoricchio had few rivals. This -picture started Vasari on a fable that it was a portrait of Giulia -Farnese and her child, with the Pope kneeling as donor, but there is -no trace of a third person. He may have confused it with the Xativa -panel. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - GENERAL VIEW OF THE HALL OF LIBERAL ARTS AND SCIENCES] - -In this room Pintoricchio bestows great attention upon the children, in -the painting of which some of his greatest successes were scored. -Earlier masters had neglected this feature of art--very few up to this -time had given us any real idea of childish beauty. We have, to be sure, -the sweet little creations of Fra Angelico, and some beautiful children -of Filippino Lippi, Botticelli, and Ghirlandaio, but the art of using -lovely _putti_ with a half-decorative effect in painting belonged -chiefly to North Italy, and was perfected by Carpaccio, Alvise Vivarini, -and Giovanni Bellini. Indeed, when we look at some of the examples in -these rooms of children supporting armorial bearings and drawing back -heavy curtains, we are reminded of the very same _motif_ in a group -painted by Mantegna, thirty years earlier in the Chapel at Padua, where -children stand on each side of a shield, and we recollect that that -master was shortly before this in Rome. Whether Pintoricchio was -indebted to Mantegna for a design or not, in himself he was a true -child-lover, far superior in this respect to Perugino, whose fat, smug -infants are sometimes quite repellent. He painted no inspired, -supernatural beings, but round, healthy babies, full of roguish charm. - -The whole ceiling in this room is soft and restful in character, the -pattern is mechanical, but the form and spacing of the great octagon and -the ingenuity of the divisions of the architraves complete a thoroughly -harmonious effect. The Borgia crest re-appears with inevitable -monotony. The coat-of-arms shines from the centre of radiating sun rays, -and upon a dark blue ground. At either end of the vault great white -bulls approach an altar, where they are received by charming _putti_ -with trumpet blasts of triumph. The whole is so blended and subdued that -though each detail is full of the beauty of nature, it is yet perfect, -looked at as mere decoration. - -In the Spanish Chapel in Florence (which Pintoricchio had never, as far -as we know, seen), in the Castles of Urbino and Bracciano, among other -places, from Giotto down to the followers of Raphael, the arts and -sciences had been a favourite theme treated by his forerunners. Here -they have some slight resemblance to the series painted under the -superintendence of Melozzo for the Duke of Montefeltro, two of which are -now in the National Gallery. They are like enough to make us think that -Pintoricchio had seen them or had their description, and in accepting -and enlarging on the suggestion, he has in this room achieved a -remarkable series. - -In the preceding chambers his task has been one of comparatively little -difficulty. The well-known sacred histories asked no great flight of -fancy, originality was unnecessary and they were naturally rich in -incident and detail. The scenes from the lives of the saints lend -themselves easily to dramatic effect and allow of every sort of -accessory. But in this room, which Steinmann suggests was Pope -Alexander's study, each of the seven spaces has for its prevailing -object of interest the single figure of a woman, and relief from -monotony depends upon the appropriate figures grouped around. Each of -the emblematical forms sits upon a throne, with a stiff, architectural -back,[27] from several of which winged _putti_ are drawing back heavy -curtains, and about the steps are gathered philosophers and disciples of -the art or science. Beyond, a softly-tinted landscape is detached -against a blue and gold embossed firmament. Over the whole broods an -idyllic peace. Calm, serene beings are absorbed in culture and the -pursuit of knowledge, contemplative and thoughtful, almost as far -removed as the saints from the worldly plotting and fierce intrigues -which are carried on under their unimpassioned eyes. Unfortunately this -beautiful hall has suffered more than any other, and several of the -frescoes are almost destroyed by damp and restoration. - - [27] These thrones, each with a single figure, resemble the - ones in the series of Virtues painted by Pollaiuolo and - Botticelli for Lorenzo dei Medici. Pintoricchio may have had - a description of these. - -"Rhetoric" holds a sword to show the power with which she is able to -pierce hearts, and a globe, perhaps to suggest the far-reaching extent -of that power. These emblems are repeated in the hands of the _putti_ on -either side of the steps. On the right of the throne a priest, perhaps a -portrait, though not a highly individual one, holds a purse; an old -philosopher reading on the left may be meant for Cicero, who would not -be left out of such a composition, while grey-bearded teachers argue -with richly-dressed young disciples. On the steps is the name -"PENTORICCHIO," but except the principal figure, the work was probably -divided among scholars. In Rhetoric herself, and in the old man on the -left, in the folds of the mantles, and in the attendant _putti_ there is -some likeness to Perugino, but this master was fully employed at the end -of 1492 by Giuliano della Rovere, and would have been most unlikely to -take service with Giuliano's hated rival, even if he would have -consented to work in a subordinate character. Pintoricchio's -sketch-books must have been full of studies from him, and in beginning a -new essay he would probably have had recourse to these, trusting more as -he went on to his own initiative. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD, WITH ANGELS] - -"Geometry" holds her square and compasses, and the inventor, the -bald-headed Euclid, sits at her feet, engaged in drawing a diagram. On -the left, in the corner, is a youth who has evidently painted his own -portrait in a looking-glass. The cloak of "Geometry" and the red dress -of Euclid show the hand of a pupil of Fiorenzo, but none of the -attendant figures nor the landscape have much trace of Pintoricchio's -own work, though Schmarsow allots to him besides the figure of -"Geometry," the turbaned man on her right, the youth standing by him, -and the one at the edge of the group. None of the seven sisters is so -beautiful as "Arithmetic." Here Pintoricchio trusts in his own -inspiration, and we have a finely-drawn head with all his freshness of -pose and expression. This dreamy face, with its transparent veil half -covering the flowing hair, the gold embossed robe, over-sleeves, mantle -hanging in very softly accentuated folds, and the beautifully -proportioned figures standing by, have a larger share than almost any -other of the lunettes of the master's hand, and here, more than in any, -we have the many coloured garments, rich pinks, harmonious greens, that -Pintoricchio loved. The light and shade in this and the preceding group -is massed with an eye to effect which is quite absent from the rest. - -"Music" is in some respects the most beautiful group of all, though -the principal figure can hardly compare with that of "Arithmetic." This -again is strongly reminiscent of Perugino. With drooped eyelids the -symbolic sister daintily plays a violin; of four beautiful _putti_, two -hold back the splendid dark green curtain, and two play the flute at -"Music's" feet. Two old men are grouped together with Tubal Cain, who, -as in the Spanish Chapel, forges musical instruments and keeps time with -his swinging hammer. On the left is a charming group of boys--one -playing the harp, another singing, a third, in rich dark robe and a -student's cap upon his square out-flowing locks, touches a lute. In the -spontaneity and unity that runs through all these figures, the -suggestion of music and the sense of pleasure in it is rendered as in -few other paintings of the Renaissance. We almost hear the strain, soft, -fresh, heart-stirring, given without exaggeration or self-consciousness, -to which the little _putti_ above seem to lean and listen, and we feel -little doubt that this, the most lovingly painted, the most homogeneous -of all the scenes, was painted entirely, or almost entirely, by -Pintoricchio himself. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - FIGURE REPRESENTING ARITHMETIC] - -"Astrology" is the most damaged of any. The principal figure, which has -been badly restored, must at any time have been entirely unworthy of the -Umbrian master. The four _putti_, holding wands tipped with heavenly -bodies, are much heavier and less dainty than his children. The groups -at the sides, in one of which is a figure intended for Ptolemy, have no -connection with the presiding patroness. That on the left, which is far -the best, has, however, some admirable figures, Umbrian in character, -and due to a pupil of Pintoricchio, who was thoroughly imbued with his -master's spirit, and probably working straight from his -sketches--indeed, a careful comparison of the hair and drapery of the -youth who stands foremost, with extended arm, and holds an astral globe -in the other hand, and the kneeling saint in the "Assumption," of the -Hall of Mysteries, may persuade us that Pintoricchio is himself -responsible for this delightful figure. - -The figures of "Grammar" and "Dialectics" in the following scenes are so -much retouched that we can hardly tell what they were like originally, -but we may feel almost certain that no part of them is by Pintoricchio. -The architecture of the thrones differs too. We surmise that this room, -the last of the series actually occupied by the Pope, was finished -hurriedly, and that this accounts for the very marked falling off in the -quality of the work of the last three scenes. The arch and the five -octagons here are entirely repainted; they refer to the virtue of -"Justice," who holds the sword and balance. The others are sacred or -legendary scenes. The period of their wholesale restoration can be -judged by a dragon at the side of the central octagon, which we take to -be the crest of Buoncompagni, and therefore of the time of Gregory XIII. - -The most beautiful decorative figures in the entire range of rooms are -the three full-length angels who support the Borgia scutcheon surmounted -by the keys and tiara, set in a stucco frame between "Rhetoric" and -"Geometry." In freedom of gesture, grace of flying drapery, and -excellence of drawing, they must be ascribed to Pintoricchio himself, -and may be compared with those he has executed in the Buffalini Chapel. - - [Illustration: - _Anderson photo_] [_Borgia Apartments, Vatican, Rome_ - - FIGURE REPRESENTING MUSIC] - -The two following halls, which were those by which persons who had had -audience of the Pope withdrew, are alike in architecture, and quite -different from the rest. Large, and much more simply decorated, with -high raised window seats; the first has a ceiling painted with patterns -and grotesques (which here become much more decided in style), and has a -frieze of twelve half-length figures of apostles and prophets arranged -in pairs, the apostles holding scrolls bearing a sentence of the Creed, -the prophets' scrolls inscribed with prophetic sayings. According to a -mediaeval legend, each apostle, before proceeding to evangelise the -world, composed a sentence of the Creed, and to each here is assigned -his traditionary verse. - -The painter has used a late book of the sibyls, those interesting, -legendary figures to whose traditionary sayings so much importance was -attached by the early Church, and who were revived in the art of the -Renaissance, with other classic myths. Twelve are given, and all the -prophecies, composed by the early Church, refer to the birth of the -Redeemer. The ribbon upon which the oracle is inscribed was traditionary -with the painters of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and -Pintoricchio, like most of the Umbrian painters, was particularly -attached to this decorative accessory. He uses it freely in the -Belvedere, in Santa Maria del Popolo, and at Spello. - -The figures in these two rooms are much restored, and the whole style is -inferior and has an antiquated and archaic effect, which has been -commented upon by every writer from the time of Taja. At the same time, -there are certain of the sibyls, that of Delphi, and she of Europa, -where we recognise Pintoricchio's special supervision in the -head-dresses, the gestures, and the peculiar tricks of drapery. - -Crowe and Cavalcaselle have attributed some of this work to Peruzzi, -who, however, was only a boy of thirteen at this time, but Vasari speaks -of "a Volterrean named Pietro d'Andrea, who spent most of his time in -Rome, where he was working at some things in the palace of Alexander -Borgia." Messer Pietro d'Andrea of Volterra was the master of Peruzzi, -and there is sufficient likeness to Peruzzi's style to give strong -assurance that we have here the hand of his teacher. Schmarsow sees in -part the hand of a Sienese, but whoever may have been concerned in the -execution, the whole must have been sketched out by Pintoricchio, and is -in harmony with the rest of the suite. In the window recesses of the -"Hall of the Creed," the decorations show no falling off in originality. -Dolphins, masks, satyrs, flying loves, candelabra, and garlands are used -with astonishing resource and variety. On the ceiling of the "Hall of -Sibyls" are emblematical groups of the planets, with gods and goddesses -driving triumphal cars, which remind us of Perugino's rendering some -years later on the ceiling of the Cambio. - -Nowhere can Pintoricchio's special merits and failings be better studied -than in this long and brilliant range of rooms. In detail it is easy to -discern the many shortcomings. He has little feeling for line; he has -never made a study of planes and masses; his personages stand about at -haphazard, and often fail to belong to each other or to the events going -on near them. There is hardly a subservient figure in any one of the -scenes which would be missed if it were blotted out, or which is -essential to the balance of line or colour. The distant objects are -often as full in tone as the foreground; nowhere does the spirit of the -composition rise into the sublime. On the other hand, the painter never -forgets the purpose that has brought him here. With a self-restraint and -a feeling for effect which are unerring, he hits upon the exact size, -and keeps his compositions strictly within the picture and at the right -distance from the eye. Raphael's splendid creations in the stanze suffer -because of their vastness of conception and execution compared to the -narrow and inadequate space from which we view them. We go back from -them as far as we are able, feeling as if their position must be but a -temporary one. We long to see them in a freer air. Their space seems to -annihilate us, their thought is overwhelming and insistent. - -Pintoricchio's frescoes are a rich yet unobtrusive setting, they do not -compel your attention, but only give the impression of a refined -splendour of surrounding and a marvellous insight into beautiful harmony -of colour. The effect of the light has been so nicely calculated that -even when freshly executed, the walls would not have been over-brilliant -for the brilliant scenes to which they formed a background. On the charm -of single groups and figures I have already enlarged, but one other -feature strikes us forcibly--_i.e._ the power possessed by the master to -employ so many assistant hands of varying schools and to so parcel out -the work, keep the individuality of each so subservient and so impress -his own style and purpose, that from end to end, although we can -distinguish the various hands at work, it is only faintly and -doubtfully, never so as to jar upon our sense of unity. We receive no -shock as we pass from room to room, the direction of one mind runs -through the whole, everywhere we are aware of the vigilant and sensitive -grasp of the master's hand upon his tools, and allowing for all the -shortcomings of detail, we cannot but feel that we have here an enviable -monument for a painter to leave behind him. - -Alexander Borgia had no time to enjoy his freshly completed apartments. -Pintoricchio must have been lingering over the last touches when, in the -autumn of 1494, rumours of trouble from foreign foes reached Rome. - -In September 1494 Charles VIII. of France invaded Italy. The Colonna and -the Savelli, whom he had taken into his pay, were threatening the -Eternal City from Frascati. Their intention was to take it by assault, -make the Pope a prisoner, and seize Djem, the Mahometan prince. The Pope -was filled with terror as Ostia surrendered to the allies of France, and -a portion of Charles's fleet appeared at the mouth of the Tiber. Charles -himself was advancing through Tuscany, accompanied by Cardinal Giuliano -della Rovere, and a proposal was discussed to deprive the Pope, whose -crimes had become notorious, of his power. Alexander began to make plans -for the defence of the city. He assembled what troops he could muster, -and garrisoned and provisioned the Castel Sant' Angelo. On December -18th, all the furniture and valuables were packed, and as Charles -continued to advance, meeting with more welcome than resistance, the -treasures of the Vatican were sent to the old Roman fortress. The Pope -presently made a treaty with Charles, allowing him a free passage to -Naples with his army, and permitting his entry into Rome. Charles -entered with a magnificent army, while the Pope with his small force sat -trembling in the Vatican. - -In January 1495, the Pope, terrified by the violence of the French -troops, left his splendid painted suite in the Vatican and shut himself -up in Sant' Angelo, where he remained while the French army sacked the -city. Finally, a treaty was concluded by which Alexander ceded many of -his possessions, and surrendered Prince Djem, while the king promised to -recognise him as Pope, and to defend his rights, thus delivering him -from his most imminent danger. The meeting of the Pope and king was -arranged to take place, as if by accident, in the garden of the -fortress. Charles knelt, and Alexander embraced him. The Pope bestowed -the Cardinal's hat on Briconnet, a favourite of the king. On January -19th a Consistory was held, at which the king kissed the hand and foot -of the Vicar of Christ, and did that formal homage which he had hitherto -refused to render. Alexander celebrated a solemn Mass of reconciliation -in St. Peter's, and the king acted as thurifer. On January 12th, the red -hat was given to another noble of France, and on the 25th, the Pope, -accompanied by Prince Djem, rode with the king in a public procession -through Rome, upon which Charles departed, bent on the conquest of -Naples. Having accomplished this, he was back in Rome in June, upon -which Alexander fled to Orvieto and Perugia, probably taking -Pintoricchio in his train. Charles's policy having taken him to the -north of Italy by the end of June, Alexander returned to Rome, where he -now, hearing of the defeat of the French troops in Lombardy, found -courage to denounce the king. - -In 1497 the rooms of the upper storey of Sant' Angelo, which Alexander -at this time strongly fortified, were destroyed by an explosion of -powder. They were rebuilt as quickly as possible, and the time of danger -being over, Pintoricchio was again called for to immortalise the events -of the last two years. There is no doubt (says Gregorovius) that -Pintoricchio was in Rome at the time of Charles's entry, and was an -eyewitness of that and other stirring scenes.[28] Vasari says[29] that -Pintoricchio painted a number of rooms in the Castel Sant' Angelo, with -grotesques, but the little tower in the garden was adorned with the -history of Pope Alexander, and there could be descried Isabella, the -Catholic Queen, Niccolo Orsino, Count of Pitigliano, Gianiacomo -Trivulzio, and many other relatives and friends of the Pope, and in -particular, Caesar Borgia, with his brother and sister, and many -celebrated persons of the time. The garden tower has been pulled down, -and in the upper rooms only a fragment of decoration remains, a shield -supported by children in Pintoricchio's favourite manner. We are, -however, indebted to Lorenzo Behaim, who for twenty-two years was the -Pope's major-domo, for a list of the subjects painted in the pleasure -house.[30] - - [28] Gregorovius, vol. viii. part ii. p. 725. - - [29] Vasari, vol. iii. p. 500. - - [30] Gregorovius. _Lucrezia Borgia_, pp. 127, 128. - -The whole story of the French king's entry into the capital was made to -redound to the glory of the Pope. Charles was represented kneeling at -his feet, taking the oath, serving at Mass. The Pope was shown investing -the French ecclesiastics with the Cardinal's hat. In a procession to San -Paolo, the king stood at the Pope's bridle rein, and the final scene -showed the departure for Naples, accompanied by the Sultan Djem. - -In comparing these in our mind with the frescoes in the Library of -Siena, painted a few years later, it is possible to imagine what -Pintoricchio would have made of these very similar themes. Here, as -there, there is an endowment of the red hat, a Consistory, an act of -homage to the enthroned Pope, and a gay procession. In the Louvre is a -drawing of Pintoricchio's of three pages leaning on halberds, which may -be part of the design for one of these frescoes. Djem he would have -brought in again, as he depicted him in the Borgia Apartments. The -number of contemporary portraits would have made this second great piece -of work executed for the Borgia Pope of surpassing interest to -historians. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -SPELLO - - -In the beginning of 1501 Pintoricchio left Perugia and went off to -Spello, the little town eighteen miles to the south of it. Here the -prior of the chapel of the college, Troilo Baglioni, a son of the -proudest house in Perugia, had lately been created a bishop; and, -naturally enough, when he wished to decorate his cathedral, he sent for -the painter of his native city, who had by now made himself so famous a -name. This little chapel in Santa Maria Maggiore at Spello is dark and -damp enough, but in its decay it is still possible to divine something -of its whilom beauty. As Pintoricchio planned his designs for it, we can -see that his mind was still running on the rich work he had left in Rome -two years before, and again and again he has adapted ideas from the -Borgia Apartments, suiting them, with his own delicate judgment, to the -smaller position and to the provincial situation. So cleverly has he -managed, that the narrow chapel gains air and space and outlook, and -even in its dim ruin we have an instant sense of life going on all round -us. He has here used the airy architectural surroundings which he had so -happily dwelt upon in the Buffalini Chapel, with the result that his -work gains greatly in aerial space, it acquires a freshness and a -refinement which is well adapted to the country district in which it is -placed, and we lose that sense, which almost oppresses us amid all the -fascination of the Borgia rooms, of being shut into a succession of -gorgeously-jewelled caskets. - -In triangles, formed in the roof by heavy borders of grotesques, -Pintoricchio has placed four sibyls, Erythrean, European, Tiburtine, and -Samian. Each sits in a carved niche, on a throne with raised steps; the -same thrones, on a smaller scale, as those in the chamber of the Arts -and Sciences in Rome. Books, open or clasped, lie about the steps; at -each end of the thrones are erected altars, inscribed with the mystic -sayings of the inspired women. The sibyls themselves, as they read or -write or look upwards in an ecstasy, are much more elaborate in dress -and fashion of hair than the symbolical figures in the Vatican. In -style, they approach more nearly to the sibyls afterwards painted in the -choir of Santa Maria del Popolo, or to the personages in the Library at -Siena. - -The three walls of the little side chapel are filled by paintings of the -"Annunciation," the "Nativity," and "Christ disputing with the Doctors." -From the inscription on the "Annunciation," recording the finishing of -the chapel, we gather that the painter began at the opposite side, with -the "Dispute." He places this scene in the courtyard of the temple, a -Bramante-like building of rather clumsy proportions, which fills the -background, and has a niche on either side, with statues of Flora and -Minerva. The group in the foreground suggests that Pintoricchio is still -full of recollections of the "Dispute of St. Catherine," and is -dwelling on the contrast he there emphasised between the fragile -champion and the old philosophers. The Child is checking His arguments -on His fingers in the same way, the doctors press around him in Eastern -caps and turbans. On the extreme left an austere dignitary in dark robe -and biretta can be no other than the bishop, Troilo Baglioni himself. -The books of the learned men are thrown upon the ground, as they listen -to the Child's wisdom. Raphael has used the same incident in his -"Disputa." On the right, Joseph and Mary hurry forward, but she checks -her husband's impatience with her hand upon his girdle; behind Mary are -several women, in whose heads we recognise models used in the "Burial of -St. Bernardino," strong profiles, of which he must have had the sketches -by him. - -In the "Nativity," which occupies the inner wall, and which is sadly -ruined by the damp and decay, Pintoricchio shakes off his Roman manner, -and returns to the purely Umbrian style and to the influence of Fiorenzo -di Lorenzo. This must have been one of the most charming of all his -frescoes. The distance stretches away, soft and harmonious, the towers -and spires of the little town of Spello nestle into the blue hillside, a -choir of angels which seems to have been transplanted from a panel of -Fiorenzo's stands upon the clouds above, and at the angels' feet rise -the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Life, with their branches touching -the sky. The stable is represented by a lofty, classic porch, on the -roof of which sits a peacock, Juno's bird, which Christian tradition had -transferred to Mary, as the Queen of Heaven. Two beams have fallen in -front of it, into the form of a cross. Midway advances the procession of -the kings, winding down a mountain path, and grouped about its foot. All -these serve as background to the sacred group with the shepherds, which -is placed very low down, quite at the edge of the picture. Pintoricchio -has shown a want of proportion between the different figures of his -principal group, but otherwise they are excellent. The Virgin's is one -of his most lovely and delicate faces. Fortunately it is uninjured, and -no print can give adequately its tender beauty, above the rose and blue -and deep green of the gold embroidered draperies. Joseph stands behind, -raising his hands in adoring wonder; behind him, on the ground, lies -such a packsaddle as is still used in Italy. The shepherds--peasants -from the Umbrian hills--kneel in deep devotion, one holds his humble -offering of a basket of eggs. The Child and Mother and the general -arrangement of the landscape recall the little altar-piece in Santa -Maria del Popolo, but the whole effect is much more beautiful, since the -painter has awakened to the realisation of far-reaching space. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Sta. Maria Maggiore, Spello_ - - THE ADORATION OF THE SHEPHERDS] - -The "Annunciation" has the same advantage over the otherwise not -dissimilar one in the Borgia Hall of Mysteries. The angel is almost -identical; the Virgin, standing at her reading-desk and shrinking -backwards, has all the naive charm of the school of Fiorenzo. The great -Renaissance hall stretches far behind, and beyond the perspective of -stately columns we see a gay little view set in the archway: a scene at -the city gates, wayfarers arriving at the inn outside the walls, a table -with a white cloth spread, a dog jumping up,--Pintoricchio's favourite -greyhound,--horsemen riding on through the gateway, a well, and a woman -coming to draw water. The grotesques upon the pilasters are carefully -drawn, but roughly painted, and the shadows hatched in. It is in this -fresco, under the little _prie-dieu_ at the side, that Pintoricchio has -drawn his own portrait, which almost startles us as we catch the -life-like blink of its eyes, as it looks out from among the -conventionalised saints. A coral rosary and the painter's brushes are -painted below, and the label, BERNARDINO PICTORICUS PERUSINUS. Perugino, -a few miles off, was working at the Hall of Exchange, and one of the -artists evidently took the idea from the other of painting the head in -this way instead of introducing himself after the more usual fashion as -a spectator. - -A short distance from the town lies the little church of San Girolamo, -where one is shown as Pintoricchio's a "Sposalizio" and a "Nativity." -The first cannot be his. It is a very poor little fresco, without any -indications even of his influence, and more probably by some obscure -follower of Perugino or Lo Spagna. The arrangement of heads of the group -of maidens standing behind Mary has either been taken from, or suggested -by, that in Raphael's "Sposalizio." In the "Presepio," which is on the -wall of the cloister chapel (which has since been used as an outhouse), -ruined as it is, we are better able to trace the master's hand. The -Madonna's head is adorned with a twisted veil, and a light scarf is -drawn across the breast and arranged in the same way as in the fresco -over the door of the Borgia room (No. III.). The heads are all drawn -with delicacy and decision, and even now we can trace original, sharp, -precise touches. The man behind with the lamb on his shoulders is in -Pintoricchio's simpler and earlier manner--a good sketch straight from -the model. The angels on the clouds kneel stiffly, and the whole gives -the impression of a very early work, which has been copied in some -details for the later "Adoration of the Shepherds" in the Baglioni -Chapel. The landscape, though much destroyed, still retains his -characteristics. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Sta. Maria Maggiore, Spello_ - - THE ANNUNCIATION: WITH PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST] - -The frescoes at Spoleto have been covered up for some years, as the -chapel of the Duomo in which they are is undergoing restoration. They -are described as ruined representations of a "Madonna and Saints," "God -the Father," and a "Dead Christ." Vasari does not speak of any of the -frescoes at Spello, nor are they noticed by Pascoli and his -contemporaries, while Mariotti and Orsini, in the eighteenth century, -say very little about them--Vermiglioli and Adamo Rossi first give a -full account of them. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Sta. Maria Maggiore, Spello_ - - PORTRAIT OF PINTORICCHIO] - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -SIENA AND THE LAST OF ROME - - -Few painters of the fifteenth century had received so great a share of -Roman patronage as Pintoricchio, and the favour now shown him, which -changed the whole of his life, came from a Cardinal who had doubtless -become familiar with his Roman work. - -Nearly fifty years earlier, Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, son of a noble -but impoverished house of Siena, had been created Pope by the title of -Pius II. Before his elevation he had led a life full of stirring -events--in his rise to greatness he had reinstated his exiled family and -restored it to wealth and honour. Aeneas was a man of unbounded ambition, -and not always scrupulous in the means by which he obtained advancement, -but he seems to have been a man of affectionate character and charming -personality, his learning was deep and his taste highly cultivated; on -the whole, he was honest and upright, while he was truly enthusiastic in -his efforts to uphold the liberties of Christendom in the East against -the dreaded advances of the Moslem. It is no wonder that his own family -regarded him as a saint and hero. His nephew, Francesco Piccolomini, -whom he had made Cardinal, and who eventually became Pope Pius III., -decided, some forty-eight years after his uncle's death, to erect a -great family memorial to him. In 1495 he had built the rich chapel of -St. John in the nave of Siena Cathedral, and soon after set to work on a -Library, into which he moved all the collections of books and MSS. left -him by his kinsman. Lorenzo di Mariano, a Sienese sculptor, was -entrusted with the marble work. The interior wood-carving was by Antonio -Barili, and Antonio Ormanni designed the bronze doors. The interior was -to be richly frescoed, and the Cardinal, recollecting the achievements -of Pintoricchio in the service of three Popes, passed over the painters -of Siena and summoned Messer Bernardino of Perugia to undertake the -great piece of work at Siena. - -The contract made between the Cardinal and the painter, and dated June -29th, 1502, was discovered about twenty years ago in the Sienese -archives by Sig. Milanesi. It offers many points of interest; the chief -conditions are that during the time the painting is in progress he shall -not undertake any other work of painting of any kind or in any place. He -is to work the vaulting with fantasies and colours "which he shall judge -most handsome, beautiful, and lively," to paint designs "nowadays styled -the 'Grottesque.'" To draw a coat-of-arms of the Cardinal in the centre -of the vaulting, "to gild it and make it fine," to make in fresco ten -Histories, for which the life of the Pope shall be given him as guide, -with other minute details as to the gold, ultramarine, enamel blue, -azure, and greens to be used,--and the framework and gilding to be -added. He is bound to draw all the designs with his own hand, both in -cartoon and on the wall, and to paint, retouch, and finish all the heads -himself, and the epitaphs are to be placed in an oblong space between -each pilaster, with the indication of the history painted above. - -In return for "the vaulting of required perfection, and the ten pictures -of such richness and excellence as is fitting," the Cardinal promises -him one thousand golden ducats, to be paid in instalments, the first for -buying gold and colours "in Venice," and the rest from time to time as -the work progresses. A dwelling in Siena is to be provided, "a house -hard by the Cathedral," with scaffoldings and the materials. Such wine, -grain, and oil as he needs he shall be bound to take on account and in -part payment from the factor of the Cardinal. His goods, movables, and -fixtures are to be pledged as security for the due performance of the -contract. - -During the autumn and winter of 1502 Pintoricchio was making his -preparations for an undertaking which must occupy him for some years. We -have no indication of any visit to Venice to buy colours; but he -returned to Perugia, probably finished up certain panel paintings at -this time, gathered his workmen and assistants, his _garzoni_, together, -and moved his household goods to Siena. - -In the spring of 1503 he was hard at work at the ceiling. In the middle -we see the coat-of-arms of the Piccolomini family, as provided by the -contract, surmounted by the Cardinal's hat. Francesco became Pope on -September 21st, 1503, so that evidently this part of the work was then -already finished, otherwise the tiara would have replaced the Cardinal's -hat. Only three weeks later Pius III. died, so that though he may just -have seen the splendour of the ceiling, and no doubt had inspected the -cartoons, the frescoes would hardly have been begun in his lifetime. - -The work was stopped for a time, but fortunately for Pintoricchio and -for posterity the contract had contained a clause binding the Cardinal -"in his goods and heirs," as well as personally, to carry out the -agreement. The Pontiff had also ratified this in his will, and his two -brothers, acting as his executors, prepared to carry out his wishes. -Some unavoidable delay there was, and during this time Pintoricchio, -being absolved for the time being from the promise to take no other -commissions, applied himself to various works for rather more than a -year. - -The chief among these was the decoration of the beautiful little chapel -dedicated to St. John the Baptist in the cathedral at Siena. Its -frescoes were the gift of Alberto Aringhieri, a Knight of Rhodes, who -has had his portrait as a young man painted on one side of the door and -in advancing years on the other. The other frescoes have been entirely -repainted, excepting the one of the "Birth of St. John," and on this, -which has been much retouched, it is so evident that two hands have -worked that I do not believe Pintoricchio himself painted any part -except the maid, and possibly the Infant. The maid is drawn with a much -stronger and more precise touch than any of the rest, and instead of the -veil or drapery with which he usually covers the heads of his sacred -personages, she has an Italian dress and headgear, with loops and bows. -The same model has served for her face and head as for the "St. -Catherine" in the National Gallery, and apparently both are from life. -The interest of the chapel centres in the two portraits of the donor, -and both these go to increase the painter's reputation. The young knight -keeping his vigil, in full panoply, his plumed helm and steel gauntlets -lying by his side, the great white cross of St. John of Jerusalem upon -his crimson surcoat, is a creation full of chivalrous fancy. The old -knight, kneeling opposite, in a dress of a dignitary of the cathedral, -and a black skull cap, is a strong, well-drawn figure, well felt under -the robes. Both are small in size and reserved in treatment. The -backgrounds are full of detail, with buildings, meant to be Eastern, and -palm trees. The colour of the figures is very harmonious--the soft greys -of the armour, and the dull red of the scarf against it; all the links -of the chain mail executed with the dainty care of a miniature. In both -frescoes the light and dark are massed with unusual judgment. This was -paid for September 8th, 1504. - -Another piece of work with which these months were occupied was the -design of "Fortune," for one of the spaces on the pavement of Siena -Cathedral. The pavement of Siena is a remarkable production differing -from any other work of art in existence; a mixture of _intaglio_ or -engraving on stone, varied by _intarsia_ or inlay of marbles. The work -had been long in progress, and designs for the various scenes had been -furnished by artists from 1369 onwards. One painter of Umbrian -extraction, Matteo di Giovanni, had already supplied his favourite -subject of the "Murder of the Innocents." Pintoricchio's design is -reproduced in the fourth space as we walk up the nave. It is an -allegory of the excellence of Wisdom and the folly of Pleasure. The sky -is of pure black marble, the island of grey, the fields, the sea, and -the figures of pale marble, engraved with dark lines and inlaying. In -the middle sits Wisdom, crowned with flowers, and bearing a palm branch -and a book. On one hand Socrates receives from her the palm; on the -other a philosopher casts a collection of trinkets and baubles into the -sea. On a lower plane, a company of pilgrims, the foremost of whom is -presumably a portrait, climbs a path set with stones and thistles, and -beset with serpents, lizards, a tortoise, and a snail. One sits down and -falls asleep, another turns to shake his fist at Pleasure, a fair, naked -woman, holding a cornucopia of flowers, and spreading a sail to catch -the passing breeze. One foot rests on the ball of Fortune, as she steps -off the shore on to a rudderless boat, and a young man, the last in the -procession, casts back a wistful glance in her direction. This design is -significant as showing what the painter could do when colour was denied -him. The balance of the groups is kept with great art, and the outline -of Pleasure is full of grace and daring. The general shape of the -reliefs, in light against dark and as furnishing a pattern, is treated -with perfect success. - - [Illustration: - _Lombardi photo_] [_Duomo, Siena_ - - THE KNIGHT OF ARINGHIERI] - -In this same September an altar in the chapel of San Francesco at Siena -was unveiled, but this chapel was destroyed by fire, with other works of -art, in 1655. - -With the spring Pintoricchio again began the painting of the Library -frescoes, but he had not proceeded far when Andrea Piccolomini, one of -the late Pope's executors, died. That this must have necessitated a -further re-adjustment, and meant another period of delay, we may gather -from finding that, in June 1505, Pintoricchio was once more in Rome. The -ten months that followed must have been very busy ones, and no doubt the -master, after the repeated hitches under his new patrons, was relieved -to find himself once more working for those earlier ones in whose -service he had always had good fortune. - -He was again installed in Santa Maria del Popolo, that church which had -been such a favourite place of devotion of Sixtus IV. and other -churchmen of the House of Rovere. - -The choir, which now absorbed him for some months, and which is the most -perfectly preserved and the most untouched of all his works, is a -wonderful piece of ceiling painting, in the style in which he had lately -adorned the Library ceiling at Siena. In the middle a "Coronation of the -Virgin" recalls Fiorenzo and, still more, Bernardino Mariotto, the -Umbrian with whom Pintoricchio is so constantly confused. Round this -middle octagon the four Evangelists alternate with four sibyls, and at -each corner the four Fathers of the Church sit on thrones. The sibyls -are graceful types of young Italian women of the Renaissance--full of -sweetness and refinement--the women Messer Bernardino knew in the -mannered and highly-cultured palaces: no beings of a weird and wild -prophetic race. They half recline in the mapped-out divisions; each -perfectly fills the space without crowding, and assists the geometrical -_coup d'oeil_ which is the first impression of the ceiling in its -entirety, yet the pose of each is extremely easy and unconstrained, -and the lines soft and flowing. Of the Evangelists, each painted in a -_tondo_, St. Matthew with a beautiful angel holding the ink, and St. -Luke painting the portrait of the Virgin, are both singularly clear and -excellent figures. The stately Fathers of the Church sit on throned -seats like those of the Arts and Sciences, or the Sibyls at Spello. -Their robes ring the changes on beautiful dashes of colour--white, rich -green and rose, scarlet and dark blue. The whole is set in a bold -pattern of grotesques in gold and vivid colours, scrolls mounted by -women's busts, quaint birds growing out of acanthus branches, _putti_ -riding on griffins, and a score of other fantastic devices. The -impression is at once gay, graceful, and distinguished, excellent in -decorative effect, and delicate in detail. - - [Illustration: - [_Pavement, Siena Cathedral_ - - SYMBOLICAL SCENE] - -This was Pintoricchio's last work in Rome. Here he laid down the brush -which he had first taken up in the Sixtine Chapel twenty-three years -before. Even now there is more of his art there than that of any painter -except Raphael, and at that day how proudly he could pass through the -long series of great halls and chapels, which owed their beauty in -greatest part to his brush and to his fancy. - -Pintoricchio's last frescoes were three, painted for the palace of -Pandolfo Petrucci, in succession to a series nearly completed by -Signorelli and Girolamo Genga. They represented classical subjects, and -of them there only remains "The Return of Ulysses," in the National -Gallery. The fresco painting in this is rough and slight, the figures -have little modelling, but are almost like patterns upon the background, -the limbs of the suitors are unstructural even for Pintoricchio, yet -the whole effect is charming. The head of the principal suitor is fine -and expressive, and is very probably a portrait from life--perhaps one -of the sons of the house. Penelope, bending over her web, is natural and -life-like--a careful study of a girl in the costume of the day. The -scene is drawn in clever perspective, and there is much conscious humour -in the accessories; the cat playing with a ball; the sirens grasping -their two tails in their hands, as they warble round the galley, to the -mast of which Ulysses is bound; the young man in another boat diving -headlong into the water, unable to resist their fascination; and the -island where the wanderer is interviewing Circe and her swine. Here -Pintoricchio is once more fresh and unconventional, fertile in fancy. -The bold manner in which the lines of the loom are placed right across -the picture is as daring as it is successful. The attitudes and -relations of the figures are full of originality, and the uncompromising -square of the window lets a flood of light and space into the -foreground, so full of action and movement. - - [Illustration: - _Hanfstangl photo_] [_National Gallery, London_ - - THE RETURN OF ULYSSES TO PENELOPE] - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -THE LIBRARY AT SIENA - - -Dr. Steinmann suggests, with great probability, that we may fix March as -the month of Pintoricchio's return to Siena in 1506, for in that month -he took into his employ the Perugian painter, Eusebio di San Giorgio. -This, no doubt, marks a fresh start, and the master now worked steadily -on until the Library was completed. - -There is little that is devotional in character about the Libreria in -Siena. As the visitor passes the bronze doors, past the marble columns -of pagan sculpture and Renaissance copy, he loses all sense of being in -part of a sacred building. The chamber itself is singularly destitute of -the ordinary objects of religious art. No Divine Persons, no -evangelists, saints, or fathers--not an angel in the whole range of -subjects. We have here one of those examples of historic fresco which -were a feature common to fifteenth-century art, a popular way of -decorating the living-halls of great seigneurs, such as the Palaces at -Urbino and Mantua, or the Palazzo Schifanoia at Ferrara. - -We are expressly told that Pintoricchio was given the life of Aeneas -Sylvius by his secretary Campana, as a guide to his choice of events, -but careful examination has shown certain variations and deviations from -this life, pointing to some other authority in use; and on comparison -we find that he certainly also had recourse to the Pope's own memoirs, -which supplied certain details and particulars not included in Campana's -work. - -Dr. Schmarsow has made a long and exhaustive study of these frescoes -with special reference to Pintoricchio's relations with Raphael.[31] It -is impossible to go as minutely into the question as this talented -German has done, but it is one of great interest in artistic history, -and no life of Pintoricchio would be complete without some reference to -it. - - [31] _Raphael und Pinturicchio in Siena._ - -The possibility of Raphael having supplied drawings and designs has been -a matter of heated controversy. Morelli casts scorn on the supposition; -Crowe and Cavalcaselle stand aghast and declare that, believing it, the -life of Raphael would have to be re-written. Bode says it is audacious -to contend that the great master and _entrepreneur_ would adopt the -designs of a young, untried painter. Vasari asks how we can suspect that -the master of fifty would follow a twenty-year-old assistant: this is -the general tendency of objections. While, naturally, regretting any -conviction that tends to detract from the painter whose fascination I -feel, and upon whose life I am engaged, having to the best of my power -weighed all the rival criticisms, I cannot avoid the conviction that -Schmarsow is right, and that Raphael did help with two or three at least -of the frescoes, and perhaps, as he suggests, with others. The evidence -that ascribes the drawings left for them to the young Urbinate appears -to me too strong to resist. Raphael, to begin with, though only twenty -when these drawings were executed, cannot be called unknown. He had -already produced several noticeable works. Only three years later, in a -contract of 1505, he is styled the best master in Perugia. The nuns of -Monte Luce, wanting an altar-piece, "fere trovare el maestro el -migliore, si posse consiglialo ... lo quale si chiamava Maestro -Raphaello da Urbino." Pintoricchio would have had the wit to see what a -gift he was dealing with; and, as for taking the designs of an -assistant, had not he himself supplied several of the figures for -Perugino's great work in the Sixtine? - -The great probability of Raphael's being in Siena in 1502, when the -designs for the cartoons would be making, is proved by his picture of -the "Three Graces"--two of which are copied from the mutilated Greek -group, one of the best specimens of the antique then known. This group -was brought from Rome by the Cardinal, to place in his costly Library. -Vasari speaks of the _Cardinal_ (not the Pope) as having brought it to -the not quite finished Library, which would put the transit before -September 1503. In the summer of 1502 the Cardinal made his last journey -from Rome, and it was very likely then that he brought it back. An -elaborate pencil sketch of it exists: opinions are divided as to which -of the painters this was the work of, but Raphael's own picture is -guarantee that he must have seen and been struck by the original. It has -been argued that it is not absolutely necessary that the author of the -drawings should have been in Siena, but their adaptability and -suitability to the walls makes this most unlikely. Four drawings for -the Library exist--one each in Florence and Perugia, one at Milan, and -one at Chatsworth. They are drawn with Indian ink, and the two first -touched with bistre and heightened with white. - -The first, which deals with the "Journey to the Council of Basel," has a -long inscription at the top. The handwriting of this, if compared with -Raphael's letter to Domenico Alfani, or that to his uncle Simone Ciarla, -is no doubt Raphael's own, and the same hand has made notes in other -parts of the drawing. It is possible, but not very probable, that the -assistant should have annotated the master's design; but the connection -between the inscription and the drawing, the various small changes made -and accounted for as it progresses, make us almost certain that the -designer of this cartoon was also the writer of the notes upon it. As -each drawing has been transferred to the wall and worked out, we see -gradual alterations, evidently made to add importance to the hero of the -series. In the sketch Aeneas wears a tight doublet and close cap. He -looks, what he was, a young man going forth to seek his fortune. In the -fresco he is dressed in a mantle and broad hat, to make the future Pope -more imposing. The letter which he carried to Capranica has been placed -in his hand. The storm from which Aeneas escaped has been merely -indicated in the drawing. In the fresco, lowering clouds and a rainbow -are added. A dog, the greyhound of which Pintoricchio was so fond, has -been introduced, standing perfectly still though in the leash of a -galloping rider. - - [Illustration: - _Private photo_] [_Gallery, Venice_ - - STUDY FOR FRESCO I. - (By Raphael)] - -We gather from all these changes that the drawing did not exactly -satisfy the painter who worked on it after it was transferred to the -wall. It is, however, in the spirit and bearing of the whole that we see -the greatest difference. In the drawing the artist has shaken off the -stiff Perugian manner, has got at nature, and has found new ways of -handling. The riders are strong and elastic; the page to the right is -supple and natural, but in the fresco is twisted round into an ungainly -attitude. The cavalcade has a life and movement that we hardly expect to -find in Pintoricchio. The horses, if anything, bear witness more -remarkably than the men. Up to this time very few masters could draw -horses with any success. Uccello and Donatello, Verrocchio and his pupil -Leonardo, all Florentines, were almost the sole exceptions. To decide if -Raphael could draw horses we have only to glance at such early works of -his as the two little "St. Georges" in the Louvre. It was in 1502 that -Raphael first came to Florence, just at the time that Leonardo's great -cartoon of the battle of the standard was exposed to the public. We are -told that Raphael spent much time in copying Leonardo. Indeed, among the -so-called Venetian sketches is one, now called the "Battle of the -Standard," which is unanimously ascribed to Raphael, and which is -believed to be a sketch from Leonardo's cartoon. If we compare the horse -in the drawing for the "Journey to Basel" with that horse, and if we -further compare with both the horse in the sketch for the "St. George" -(at St. Petersburg) we shall see numerous points of resemblance--in the -broad head and tapering muzzle, the round, accentuated haunches, the -shape of the foot, and the very curves of the flowing tail. The horses -in the fresco look very wooden beside them, with their long, woolly -tails. What we feel forcibly--what anyone must feel who is, not -necessarily an artist, but a judge of a horse, is that the man who drew -the sketch knew indisputably what were the points of a good horse, while -if the painter of the fresco had known as much he could never have -painted the horses on the wall. - -There is, moreover, another point, which I do not think has been noticed -before. On looking again at Raphael's undoubted sketch of the "Battle -for the Standard," we perceive that the splendid figure of the nude man -who snatches at the horse's head has served for the model of the -standard-bearer in the drawing of the "Journey to Basel"; every line is -the same, the plant of the feet, the turn of the head, the uplifted arm. -Now we know that if Raphael was in Siena, he came straight from -Florence, while we have no indication that Pintoricchio was ever in -Florence at all, and what would be more likely than that Raphael, full -of his studies of Leonardo, should take the opportunity of bringing in -the horses and men he had just been copying, and which we know to have -made so deep an impression upon him? - -The drawing at Perugia for the fresco of the "Meeting of Frederick III. -and Eleanora of Portugal" has the words, "questa e la quinta della -(storia) del Papa" (this is the fifth of the story of the Pope), written -on it, in the same fine handwriting that we see on the "Journey to -Basel." We see here the clear rules of composition learnt from -Perugino--the middle point and radiation from it--with the figures -placed in pairs, as in the "Giving of the Keys"--an arrangement which -had great influence over Raphael's compositions, though it never took -much hold of Pintoricchio. In the fresco, the lines of the radius are -quite lost sight of; the spectators are brought in in the usual -indistinct masses. It has been suggested that, as the spot on which the -meeting took place is much more like in the fresco than in the -drawing,--the column being evidently copied in the first and not in the -last,--Raphael may have drawn the design away from Siena, and sent it -marked with the inscription. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Library, Siena_ - - AENEAS PICCOLOMINI ON HIS WAY TO THE COUNCIL AT BASEL] - -Schmarsow sees a resemblance to Raphael's style in the sketch for the -"Conference" (IV.)--in the lines of composition, and in the more -graceful and life-like action of the Pope's head and some of the groups -at the side;--the two fine figures in front in the fresco, which are -unmistakably by Pintoricchio, do not exist in the drawing. - -The drawing at Milan, of fresco III., the "Poet Crowned," is now known -to be a sketch from the finished fresco, and though it is under -Raphael's name, is not worthy of notice. There are, however, at Oxford -two studies of four pages, the style and technique of which point to -Raphael. These appear in the fresco. They are the pike-bearer and -standard-bearer, with legs apart, in the background of the company, and -the page in front of them leaning on a stick. The _loggia_ in the -background accords well with the style of Raphael's buildings. His taste -for architectural backgrounds was quite as keen as that of Pintoricchio, -and he had been in intimate relation with Bramante and with Luciano -Lauranna, the architect, who was his kinsman, when he came to Perugia. -Certain details in this remind us of the _loggia_ of the Castle of -Urbino, with which, of course, Raphael was well acquainted. What is most -unlike Pintoricchio, and very characteristic of Raphael, in this fresco, -is the concentration of interest, the way in which the attention is -insensibly attracted to the principal figure; the poetic moment is -caught in a way which points to Raphael's quality of composition. Here -and there are figures of a freshness and grace which speak to us of the -freer hand of the youthful artist pressing forward and casting aside old -methods. Such is the young prince in the second fresco, with plumed hat, -who stands at the left of the King of Scotland. - -Peculiarities of Pintoricchio's own are repeated over and over again. -The hand with outstretched finger we find no less than thirteen times. -The same heads are used. The head of the greybeard on the left, in -fresco I., is repeated nine times; the man with pointed beard, in front -on the left of fresco II., comes in as the emperor in fresco III., and -in the foreground, as a spectator, in the sixth tableau. We admire again -the way in which Pintoricchio is able to divide his assistants, to use -their various hands so that monotony is avoided, while imposing his own -style sufficiently to produce a strikingly homogeneous impression. -Instead of fighting against the amalgamated proof that Raphael had some -share in the work, we may picture to ourselves the friendship that we -have reason to think existed between the older man and the versatile and -tactful youth, whose talent for making friends with his elders never -failed him. We can imagine the deep consultation with which they must -have paced these floors, and pored over sketches and designs; and if we -wanted an assurance of Raphael's presence and of his employer's -affection, surely the number of times that a youth is painted, for whom -Raphael, to all appearance, stood as model, would supply one--not only -in the careful portrait in the scene of "St. Catherine's Canonisation," -but in one of the bearers to the old Pope, fresco VIII., and in the -young man stepping forward, hand on hip, in fresco X., not to single out -others less conspicuously like. - -In the first, third, and fifth, then, Schmarsow sees the design of -Raphael, and he thinks he also had some hand in numbers two and four. No -doubt, after these, the composition of the remaining ones is less -excellent, and there is a falling off in life and spirit. - -Some of the helpers seem to come direct from Perugino's workshop. We -find the prototypes of the greybeards in the Cambio--Socrates, Pericles, -and the rest. In the execution of the "Betrothal," Steinmann sees signs -of a Lombard's hand, in the dress and hair of the maids-of-honour, and -the groups massed in the background. Sodoma was possibly working with -Pintoricchio; he was in Siena this year, and Rumohr thinks he sees his -hand in the distant figures of the crowning of the poet. Eusebio di San -Giorgio, the Raffaelesque Perugian, was helping, and possibly also -Pacchiarotto. - -Born in 1405, at the little village of Corsignano, afterwards re-named -Pienza, Aeneas Piccolomini early showed a keenness of intellect and an -aptitude for classic learning which induced his tutor, the great -scholar Fidelfo, to send the needy young scion of a great house out -into the world to seek his fortune, with introductions which carried him -into the service of Domenico Capranica, Bishop of Fermo, that Cardinal -whose tomb may be seen in Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome. Domenico -made him his secretary, and, as he was on his way to the Council at -Basel, he took Aeneas in his suite. The story told by the frescoes begins -here. - -The cavalcade, having narrowly escaped shipwreck on the Libyan strand -and landed at Genoa, are setting forth on their "Journey across the -Apennines to Basel." Behind them is the sea; in the sky the great -storm-clouds are passing away, and the rainbow shines out. Above the bay -we discern the town, the point where now stands the Doria Palace and its -gardens; the solemn churchmen journeying forward on their sedate mules. -In the foreground rides Aeneas and a youthful follower. The whole of the -attention centres in the bright handsome figure of Aeneas; our interest -is at once bespoken on behalf of the gallant young adventurer going -forth on his spirited white horse to seek his fortune. The young man on -the bay horse beyond him, another layman among the throng of clerics and -dignitaries, may be intended for his brother-secretary, Piero da Noceto. -This is one of the most charming of the frescoes, full of movement and -gaiety. Pintoricchio does not give much prominence to the "Conference at -Basel," which was one of anti-Papal tendencies. - -In the next fresco we find the young Piccolomini on a "Mission to James -I. of Scotland," to whom he was despatched by the Cardinal of Santa -Croce, an able and influential man, into whose service he had entered in -1440, and who sent him to persuade the King of Scotland to cross the -Border and to menace the King of England. His interview with James I. -forms the subject of the second fresco. The King, in yellow robes, and -the two supporters on either hand, in blue and green, are the most -prominent figures, and form between them a sort of triangle, a -symmetrical manner of composition which was just coming into favour. We -have to look for the beautiful and graceful figure of Aeneas as, full of -dignity, he comes forward to the side of the King's throne--his gesture -in telling the points of his message upon his fingers is that which -Pintoricchio makes use of in "St. Catherine before the Philosophers"; -but this is a much more natural and easy attitude. His dark red robe and -violet mantle hang in simple and voluminous folds. With his flowing hair -he might be a young St. John taken out of one of Perugino's pictures. -The background here is very beautiful, seen through the airy row of -cinque-cento arches, with the sunny little town in the distance -reflected in the lake. In his memoirs, the young secretary has left us a -most graphic description of his impressions of Scotland, of his journey -north from Dover, of the comely blue-eyed women and scantily-clothed -men, and comments on the singular kind of sulphurous stone which they -burn instead of wood. He gives a vivid picture of these islands in the -first half of the fifteenth century; but the painter had no knowledge to -enable him to grasp it. He has apparently heard that Scotland was a land -of lakes and mountains; but though the interview took place in -mid-winter, he has made the trees in full leaf. - -Aeneas spent much time in study of the classics and on verse composition, -after the manner of Cicero. He had achieved a poem of two thousand -lines, entitled "Nymphilexis," which was received with acclamations by -his friends. Modern critics hold its merit to be as low as its easy -morality, and in fact it was a true index of the discreditable life he -was at this time leading at the German Court. In 1442 he was at Basel -with the German Ambassador, and was commended to the service of the King -of the Romans, afterwards the Emperor, Frederick III. Frederick proposed -to make him one of his Imperial secretaries, and to appoint him his -Court poet. It was an honour which had hitherto been in use only in the -more refined Italian courts, where it had been conferred on Petrarch, -Dante, and others, and was esteemed an extraordinary mark of excellence -in arts and literature. Only one person in the kingdom could hold it at -a time, and after receiving it Aeneas Silvius signed himself "_poeta_" in -all his letters, so that we need not wonder that this event was chosen -as one of the most remarkable of his life. Aeneas, in his flowing robes, -kneels at the King's feet; the throne with its ample steps is set in a -splendid, open _piazza_, with the noble flight of steps leading up to -the _loggia_ and out into the blue landscape; little groups enliven the -background; a man stabs at a woman on the balcony; handsome pages and -courtiers stand about. It has been pointed out that, as if to mark the -neutrality of Germany on the question of the Papacy, not a single -ecclesiastic appears in the crowd. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Library, Siena_ - - FREDERICK III. CROWNING AENEAS PICCOLOMINI AS POET LAUREATE] - -The memoirs at this time show Aeneas as a clever waiter on the favour of -princes, not over-scrupulous in striving for advancement, watching the -signs of the times, and chafing under his dependence and poverty. In -1445 he was sent by Frederick III. on an important mission to Pope -Eugenius (fresco IV.), and from this time he becomes a figure in -European history. He begins himself to plan definitely for the unity of -the Church, and to desire to stem the forward movements of the Turks. -His journey from Germany to Italy in the depths of winter was an arduous -one. He encountered swollen torrents and broken bridges, and guided by -peasants had "to scale most high and trackless ways, and precipitous, -snow-clad mountains. On the road he visited his parents at Siena, and -when they tried to dissuade him from approaching the fierce and -unforgiving Pope Eugenius, declared that he would carry out his embassy -to a prosperous end, or perish in the attempt." - -He was eminently successful in his negotiations, and effected a -reconciliation between Rome and Germany, and the fresco represents him -kneeling humbly before the Pope and kissing his foot. On either side -sits the long row of cardinals; outside we see the busy life of the -Papal Court. Here Pintoricchio has brought in a rather (for him) unusual -harmony in greens on the carpeting, the baldacchino, and the Pope's -robes. The two figures in the foreground are said to be portraits of the -Cardinals of Como and Amiens, who were both powerful friends of Aeneas. -The little scene through the arches on the right of the Pope brings in -another episode, where the envoy receives (fresco V.) investiture as -Cardinal. - -After this successful mission the Secretary for the first time turned -his mind to the ecclesiastical life, and began to reckon on all the -bright prospects it was likely to open to him. He had hitherto had the -honesty to regard the license of his life as a barrier to religious -orders; but his passions were growing more controllable with advancing -years, and his dislike to the idea of the priesthood had passed away. He -writes that he has passed from the worship of Venus to that of Bacchus, -and appears to think nothing more could be required of anyone. In 1446 -he received the tonsure, and was speedily named Bishop of Trieste; and -three years later was appointed to the See of Siena. It was in this -capacity that he was chosen to welcome to Italy Leonora of Portugal -(fresco VI.), the bride of his late patron. Frederick III. was to come -to Siena to meet her, and to proceed to Rome for the wedding. After some -delays, Aeneas received the princess on her landing at Leghorn; and on -her arrival at Siena she was met by Frederick, accompanied by a splendid -retinue, which included a hundred citizens "in scarlet and samite," a -thousand knights under Duke Albert of Austria, the young King of -Hungary, the precious relics of the city and clergy innumerable. The -royal pair met outside the Camollia gate, and memoirs tell us that when -the bride came in sight Frederick leapt from his horse and hastened to -meet her, and that "he was rejoiced to see her so young and fair." - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Library, Siena_ - - AENEAS PICCOLOMINI SENT BY FREDERICK III. TO POPE EUGENIUS IV.] - -This is the moment chosen for the fifth fresco, and gives the artist -every scope for lively action and gay and brilliant colouring. Aeneas, -standing between the King and his young bride, is still the most -prominent figure. The ladies of her train are grouped around the -Infanta, as the attendant maidens round Mary in many a version of the -"Sposalizio." Behind the Bishop stands a dignitary with a white cross on -his breast, who we identify from Pintoricchio's lately finished portrait -in the Baptistry, as Alberto Aringhieri, the Knight of Rhodes. The man -on the left, with heavily-draped mantle and looped-up hat, is Hans -Leubin, the King's Court poet, who had been appointed to deliver an -address of welcome, which he is represented as just beginning to recite. -Behind the group is set up, by a pardonable anachronism, the marble -column which was afterwards placed there as a memorial of the -meeting-place. On either side is a tall, stately plane-tree and a -fruit-bearing palm, typical of the bridal pair. The road winds up to the -Camollia gate, beyond which we espy the tall towers of the city, "Siena -of the rosy walls and rosy towers," the cathedral with its dome and -campanile, and the ground falling away into the ravine which lies -between it and San Domenico. - -Whether Raphael's inspiration really was withdrawn at this period, or -whether Pintoricchio's own fancy flagged, it is undeniable that the -remaining frescoes show a falling off, and are less satisfactory than -the earlier ones. The next scene shows us "Aeneas Silvius receiving the -Cardinal's hat." On the ride to Rome with the bridal pair, Frederick had -drawn rein as they came to the brow of the hill, from which they first -looked down on the valley of the Tiber, and said to Aeneas, "Look now--we -go up to Rome; methinks I see thee a Cardinal, and in truth thy fortunes -will not tarry there, thou shalt climb yet higher; St. Peter's chair -awaits thee; look not down on me when thou shalt have reached that -pinnacle of honour." And though Aeneas modestly disclaimed such a -prospect, he confessed afterwards how great were his efforts to enter -the Sacred College. His hopes were frustrated by the reigning Pope -Nicolas, who was notoriously unfriendly to him, and it was not till the -election of Alonso da Borgia as Calixtus II. that he saw his way to -further advancement. Calixtus, who was an old man and almost bedridden, -appointed, among others, his kinsman, Roderigo Borgia (after Alexander -VI.), as Cardinal. To this ambitious and intriguing man Aeneas attached -himself, and bade farewell to Germany and his royal patron. - -It was shortly before this that he began to devote all his energy and -eloquence to preaching a new crusade against the Turks, whose conquest -of Constantinople and succeeding inroads into Europe began seriously to -alarm the civilised world. It was the only question which roused the old -Pope to eagerness and determined him to invest the eloquent advocate as -Cardinal in spite of bitter opposition from the Sacred College, who -dreaded his keen intelligence. Though the architectural drawing, as -usual, is good, the flat wall with two white windows has a bad effect. -The altar is loaded with heavily embossed gilding; the groups behind are -confused, and the figure of Aeneas himself is lacking in dignity and -distinction. In the foreground stand two Greek patriarchs, whose -presence is intended to convey their satisfaction at the elevation of -their champion and that of the cause of Christendom. - -We now find the Cardinal of Siena working his way to the Papal throne. -He had a powerful friend in Cardinal Borgia, with whom he was engaged in -anything but reputable transactions in benefices, by which he contrived -to amass sufficient wealth; but besides this he really worked hard in -the cause of the Church, and his courtly manners and attractive -personality, as well as his real kindliness, won him many friends. When -the old Calixtus died, in August 1458, he was ready to come forward, and -has left us a striking account of the incidents of the election. His -only rival was the Cardinal Archbishop of Rouen, a Bourbon, rich and -ambitious. - -All the night before the election the principal of each party and his -immediate supporters were holding secret meetings, passing from cell to -cell with arguments and persuasion. When at length all met, pale and -trembling with excitement, to deposit their votes in the chalice, Aeneas -was found to have nine votes and the Cardinal of Rouen six. Three -Cardinals who had voted for another candidate were now to give casting -votes. "Long the whole conclave sat in silence; the slightest rustle of -a robe, the turn of a head, the movement of a foot, sent a thrill of -anxiety round the whole circle. At last the fine figure of Roderigo -Borgia was seen to rise. Amidst breathless stillness, he in the usual -form declared that he acceded to the Cardinal of Siena." After a short -delay the two others followed, and thus, at the age of fifty-three, -Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini became Pope, by the title of Pius II. - -The fresco seizes the moment when the Pope, borne through the aisles of -St. Peter's, is stopped, according to ancient usage, by the Master of -the Ceremonies, who kindles a piece of tow dipped in spirit, and, as the -light dies away, delivers the solemn warning, "Sancte Pater, Sic transit -gloria mundi." The Pope, under the baldacchino, heavy with armorial -bearings, and wearing the dark-blue mantle which accorded with the -colours of his house, lifts his gloved fingers solemnly in blessing. He -is painted here as an older man, already worn with anxiety. In the -foreground two figures in Oriental dress remind us that assistance -against the Turk was the mission to which the newly-made Pope had -specially pledged himself. St. Peter's is, of course, the old basilica -which was destroyed by Julius II. - -Fresco VIII. "Congress at Mantua." In pursuance of his proposed crusade, -Pius II., in 1459, summoned the powers of Christendom to hold a congress -at Mantua to consider the necessary measures. It lingered on for eight -months, when war against the Sultan was formally declared, but gave -occasion for more intrigues and self-seeking on the part of those -assembled than for any real sacrifices for the cause. Pius II. is here -represented directing the deliberations of the Congress. The person of -distinction pleading with the Pope is said to be the Greek Patriarch, -the envoys of the persecuted Eastern Christians are grouped in the -foreground, Cardinals sit on the Pope's right hand, and others--princes, -ecclesiastics, and suppliants--form a crowd behind. The arrangement of -this scene is not happy. The figures are cut up in an awkward way and -the perspective is questionable. It is redeemed by the airy arches and -the charming landscape beneath them. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Library, Siena_ - - A GROUP OF MEN - (A detail from Fresco IX.)] - -"A Sienese filling the Chair of St. Peter may well be the instrument to -call a Sienese to sainthood, and that we do with holy joy." So spoke -Pius II. in pronouncing between the claims of three holy Virgins, Rosa -of Viterbo, Francesca of Rome, and Catherine of Siena. The superior -claims of St. Catherine have been fully acknowledged by history: her -influence in healing the great schism of the Urbanists and the -Clementists, her saintly life, her magnetic personality, are sufficient -reasons without adding the miracles with which she was credited. - -In fresco IX. the Pope is seated on the "high and well-appointed -balcony," which he had ordered should be erected in St. Peter's, whence, -after a discourse on her virtues, he might proceed to her solemn -canonisation. The Cardinals are gathered round, the corpse of the saint -lies at his feet, clad in the black and white of the Dominican order, -her book upon her breast, and the lilies, which are her attribute, in -her folded hands. Below stand a crowd of spectators bearing candles. In -front is a long row of persons, said to be portraits. The first on the -left we should guess to be Raphael, even without the traditional -confirmation. Next him is Pintoricchio himself. The others have been -variously named Andrea del Sarto, Fra Bartolommeo, etc. Steinmann -suggests, with more probability, that one is intended for Eusebio di San -Giorgio and another for Bembo Romano, who were both working as -assistants, especially as the initials of the last are to be discerned -on several of the pilasters among the decorations. The composition in -this scene is rather disjointed. The two halves do not seem to belong to -each other, and it is curious to note the difference between the -conventional arrangement of the groups in the background and the -characteristic forms and much more structural figures which the painter -has evidently drawn from the life. The effigy of St. Catherine is taken -from her monument in Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome. The Dominicans -and Augustinians are prominent, as it was of their order that the saint -was so great an ornament. - -Pope Pius was one of the few Italians of that day in whom a great love -for nature declared itself. Campana tells us of his visits to beautiful -places, of his landscape gardening and planting, of his fondness for -distant views, and for taking his food under the trees on some -hill-side. It pleased him to chat with the peasants, to joke with his -friends with "free and festive converse passing into moderate jest." He -loved to build and adorn in his native city, and for a time he seemed to -be only a man of cultivated and artistic life and busy pleasures. But he -had not forgotten his crusading enthusiasm, and as the news travelled to -Rome of the repeated victories of the Turks, of the loss of Morea, -Rhodes, Cyprus, and of the Moslem advance on every side, he laid before -his Cardinals his resolve to take up a holy war, counting upon the -Christian princes of Europe rallying to his support. He mediated between -the different quarrelsome Powers, and signed a league by which he was -to meet the Venetians and an army of the Duke of Burgundy at Ancona; -but the powers were half-hearted, only a small part of the promised -forces arrived, and Ancona seems to have been a scene of rioting and -mismanagement. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Library, Siena_ - - AENEAS PICCOLOMINI ELECTED POPE UNDER THE NAME OF PIUS II.] - -On June 18, 1464, the Pope, "an aged man with head of snow and trembling -limbs," raised aloft the Cross at the altar of St. Peter's, and vowing -himself to the service of Christendom, set forth for Ancona. "Farewell, -Rome," he cried, as his barge passed down the Tiber, "living thou shalt -never see me more." He was very ill with fever, but the high spirit that -had helped him all through life, did not forsake him. The weather was -broiling hot, and the Pope suffered greatly on the journey. He was a -month reaching Ancona, and had the added discouragement of meeting bands -of deserting crusaders on the way. No ships had arrived from Venice, and -when at last they appeared, the soldiers they were to embark had nearly -all melted away. Pius realised at length that the undertaking had come -to naught. Ill, disappointed, heartsick, he remained at Ancona, and when -the Venetian fleet appeared, after long delay, he could just bear to be -lifted to a window to see the long-watched-for sails. - -The Doge, who accompanied the fleet, would not at first believe in the -reality of the Pope's illness, and sent his physician to see if he were -not feigning in order to escape the necessity of setting forth, but the -end was near. It was at sunset on the 12th of August that the Venetian -ships entered the harbour; at sunset on the 14th the Pope passed away. -By his death he escaped the misery of failure; the attempt came to a -natural end, and Pius was surrounded with a halo of martyrdom and -heroism--not all undeserved, for, unsuccessful as he was, he yet was the -only potentate who made any effort to stem the power of the infidel, and -his unsupported struggle and baffled aspirations form a pathetic close -to his active and successful life. - -In the fresco there is no hint of the sad and wasted moments. -Pintoricchio's part was to glorify and dignify the memory of the Pope, -and to please the house of Piccolomini. The Pope is raised on high and -borne forward by his followers. In front, dressed in gold brocade, -kneels Christoforo Morea, the Doge of Venice. On the opposite side -kneels a Turk, and another fierce-looking Oriental stands behind him. -These may be recollections of Djem and his followers, whom Pintoricchio -had already painted in the Borgia rooms. Behind lie the town and harbour -of Ancona, with the Venetian fleet anchored in the bay. - -There only remained for Pintoricchio to leave a memorial of the -coronation of the second Pope of the House of Piccolomini, and this is -placed over the door of the Library. It is something like the -"Canonisation of St. Catherine," in the way in which it is divided into -two parts. The perspective is not well managed. The Pope and the two -Cardinals who assist him to place the mitre on his head, have the effect -of a picture background to the busy scene below, and the long rows of -white-mitred bishops give a very inartistic impression. Below them is a -crowd of spectators, of all ages and both sexes--the whole confused and -not well drawn, and there is an unfortunate lack of proportion between -the different figures. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Library, Siena_ - - POPE PIUS II. AT ANCONA] - -The frescoes have been much retouched, though, on the whole, they are in -wonderful preservation. Where the yellows and blues have been most -repainted the effect is hard and glaring; but where the same colours are -not meddled with, as in the Pope's blue robe, and that of the Doge of -No. X., Elizabeth's robe, and the King's mantle in the meeting of the -bridal pair, and in most of the pinks and rose-reds, the tones are much -softer and more pleasing. Only in the hall itself can we appreciate the -way in which the open-air and indoor scenes are arranged and balanced -and the architectural setting worked in so as to give lightness and -distinction. The line of sight is high, about two-thirds of the way up -the picture; this to some extent places the spectator in a wrong -position, but the whole goes back, so that, far from being oppressed -with a feeling of covered walls, a sense of space and withdrawal is -conveyed that enlarges the room in a marvellous manner. - -The repose of the hall in its entirety is very striking; hardly a figure -is in anything like violent action, all move and stand with quiet -dignity, all the movement takes place well within the picture, and the -extraordinarily clever use made of the sky, ceiling, floor, and wide -retreating background, give us breath and air, and a sense of delight -and freedom. In as many as eight of these frescoes we have an enthroned -figure, yet treated with what variety and absence of monotony. The first -scene shows us a joyous youth setting out on a stormy journey; the last, -an old man, pale and careworn, carried by loving friends, and behind -him, an untroubled sea and the calm of sunset. The ceiling is a curious -mixture of sacred subjects and mythological ones, after the manner of -that in the Colonna Palace, but not very appropriate to the Pope's -Chapel; sporting of fauns and nymphs, Cupid riding on a green dolphin, -grotesques, recalling the choir of Santa Maria del Popolo, but richer in -colour and more delicately harmonised. The dark oak, the blue and -white-tiled floor, with the yellow crescent of the Piccolomini, and the -pilasters repeating the blue and white, are all part of the design, in -which there is one guiding hand. It is all well adapted to give -brightness to the long room, so slightly arched, and lighted only from -one end. The room is so beautiful that it is hard to say that it is -mechanical--yet assuredly there is something stiff and academic about -it, some loss of grace and the joyous sense of creation, a feeling that -the painter was growing old and tired, and that the childlike enjoyment -of beauty was less keen. In the first fresco, whether we owe it to the -young Raphael's help or to the natural interest at starting, we -recognise buoyancy and the love of experiment; and we have something of -it again in the fairy-tale tableau, where the prince and the lady meet, -but the colour has become gaudier and cheaper, the _naivete_, the -enchantment, the unconsciousness, have in some measure passed away, the -tide of fancy is running lower, and it is now that we chiefly feel the -lack of that well of science from which the artist can drink ever deeper -as the years go by. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -PANEL PAINTINGS - - -It is difficult to arrange Pintoricchio's pictures into distinct groups. -He wandered backwards and forwards between Rome and Umbria for so many -years, and his art, during the whole time, though showing variations, -never undergoes any radical change or development. He arrived early at a -point which satisfied his employers, and there he remained. He did not -attempt to try experiments, or to unravel new problems. He was almost -always engrossed by great undertakings, and had little time to think of -anything beyond getting them creditably executed in a given time. - -"La preoccupation d'etre original n'empechait pas de dormir, encore -moins de travailler, les artistes d'alors. Leur personalite ne -s'elaborait que sur le tard, quand ils reussissent sans le chercher -beaucoup a le faire eclore."[32] - - [32] Broussolle, _Pelerinages ombriens_. - -This constant employment on fresco accounts for the small number of -panel paintings he has left, nor do we hear of more than one or two, -other than those which have come down to us. I have already noticed the -"St. Christopher" and the "Madonna" in the Gallery at Valencia. His -finest work in _tempera_ is the great polyptych or ancona, painted in -1498 for the monks of Santa Maria dei Fossi, and which is an -extraordinarily dainty piece of work. The heavily-gilt framework is -divided into compartments. In the central one the Madonna is enthroned, -the Child sits upon a little cushion on her knee, half-draped in a -striped and brocaded mantle. With one hand He offers the mystic -pomegranate to His mother, with the other grasps a jewelled cross, held -by the little St. John Baptist, who, with his cloak clasped upon the -breast, sandals on his feet, his eyes uplifted in devotion, strides -forward, with the air of one starting on a pilgrimage. This attractive -little figure is borrowed from the Bernardino Mariotto, with whom -Pintoricchio was so often confused. The Virgin's eyes are cast down, and -both her face and that of the Child are rather expressionless. - -The upper part of the framework is filled by a Pieta, which nearly -equals the middle panel in size and importance. The half-length of the -dead Christ is draped with a striped cloth, above the open tomb. It is -reminiscent of Perugino's beautiful Pieta in the same Gallery. The hands -have the backs turned outwards, displaying the palms instead of the -backs, as the northern painters usually represent them. The arms are -supported by angels, who are adapted from the over-door by Fiorenzo in -the Sala del Censo. The pathetic figure of the Saviour is the most -satisfactory rendering of the nude that Pintoricchio produced. The -muscles are carefully modelled, the flesh is firmly painted, and the -touch of the angels convincing, the group is full of repose, sad -dignity, and refinement. The Angel and Virgin of the "Annunciation" on -either side are a reduced _replica_ of those in the Borgia Apartments -and at Spello. Though painted in _tempera_, this work is extremely full -and vivid in colour, almost resembling oils, and is executed throughout -with minute delicacy. - - [Illustration: - _Alinari photo_] [_Picture Gallery, Perugia_ - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD, WITH ST. JOHN - (From the Large Ancona)] - -The contract is dated February 14, from the house of Diamantis Alphani -de Alphanis. "Messer Bernardino de Benedecto of Perugia--il -Pintoricchio, for himself and his heirs, promises and agrees with -Brother Jerome of Francesco, Venice, Sindico and Procurator of the Frate -Capitulo and Convent of Santa Maria dei Fossi, de Porta San Pietro, to -paint an altar-piece over the high altar of the said church with the -here inscribed figures. The picture divided into parts: in the major -part the image of our most glorious Lady with the Child. On the right -side of our Lady, the figure of the glorious San Agostino in pontifical -habit, and in the left place, San Girolamo in cardinal's habit. Above -the middle shall be a Pieta, and on either side the Angel and Our Lady -of the Annunciation. Above, and in front, the transmission of the Holy -Spirit to the Annunciation. In the predella of this picture shall be -painted eighteen figures. In the first place, on one side, San Baldo, -San Bernardino, in canonicals. In a row the Pope and five cardinals in -state, with five brothers at their feet. All ornamented--to taste--with -gold and colours, at the charge of Messer Bernardino, who also promises, -in the background of these pictures, to paint a landscape, etc." - -Though the contract was drawn up, the master, strong in the sense of -his value to the Papal Court, postponed its execution to his own -convenience. With his fame at its height, he was called upon in all -directions. The Council of Orvieto saw the moment was come for securing -the finishing of the fresco for which they had been waiting for four -years. On his way back from Perugia, Pintoricchio once more took up his -work in their cathedral, under a fresh contract to add the two doctors -to the two evangelists. There thus to-day remain traces of a St. Mark -and a St. Gregory on the right hand of the choir, and traces of one or -two angels so restored as to have lost all character, but for which the -work of the Umbrian master has doubtless served as foundation. The sum -he agreed to take in payment in March was fifty ducats, and the convent -books record November 1496 as the date of the last payment. - -In the obscure little town of San Severino in the Marches, we find -another altar-piece which was probably produced about the same time. No -record of its acquisition is to be found in the archives of the -cathedral, though an accurate account is kept of commissions executed -about this period by Bernardino Mariotto, and others. It is remarkable -that, considering Pintoricchio's fame in his lifetime, such a possession -as an altar-piece from his hand should have remained unchronicled. It -seems most likely that it was produced at Perugia, and found its way -later to its present position in the sacristy. However this may be, we -must rejoice over this unmistakable and charming example of his art, -well preserved and not very much retouched. It is the least known of -all his pictures; it has only recently been photographed, and, from the -position of San Severino, far off the beaten track, is not easily -visited. - - [Illustration: - _Private photo_] [_Duomo, San Severino_ - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD, WITH ANGELS AND A DONOR] - -The "Madonna della Pace" wears a blue mantle lined with a rich shade of -green, and a rose-red dress. She bends over the Child, who, clad in -white with a grey and gold drapery, stands on a little cushion on her -knee. He holds a transparent glass ball in His left hand, and with the -other blesses the donor, who kneels on the right, dressed in a scarlet -robe. An angel with hands crossed on the breast bends towards the Child, -while another stands with folded hands behind the Mother. Behind is a -spring landscape, a town, and the usual rocky archway with a cavalcade -passing under it. - -The face of the Madonna in this painting is indescribably soft, young, -and tender (even a good photograph does not do it justice). The face and -figure of the Child are full of expression; the angels are exquisite -types, reminding us of Lorenzo di Credi. The Cardinal-donor is a man in -the prime of life, with a firmly-drawn face, brown complexion, and -strongly-marked features. The face is rendered with great care, the vein -in the temple, every mark and wrinkle, the neck of one past youth, are -observed, and as a portrait the head compares well with the painter's -best efforts. The colour of the panel is gay yet tender. The faces have -an exquisite transparency, with melting shadows. The face of the angel -in the background is entirely in luminous shade. The little landscape is -delicately finished. The fine, decisive drawing, and the feeling, simple -and unstrained, show Pintoricchio at his best. In retouching, the face -of the donor has been thrown out against a dark ground, which somewhat -impairs the effect. - -The "Madonna" in the Museum at Naples is a full-length figure standing -on the clouds, surrounded by a mandorla of cherubs, flanked by six -angels playing musical instruments, who recall those in the Buffalini -Chapel. The group below of the apostles, St. Thomas kneeling in front, -clasping the sacred girdle, is strongly reminiscent of Perugino, as in -the background, where the favourite features of Fiorenzo have for once -been abandoned. - -The "Head of a Boy" at Dresden must, I think, be an early work, when -Perugino's manner was felt in all its freshness. Though the hair is hard -and wiry, and not worthy of the rest, the _morbidezza_ and elastic -plumpness of youthful flesh are given by very subtle modelling, and the -moody, young face is treated with most delicate tonality. The landscape -and receding distance and tall slender trees are in Perugino's style. - -The "Madonna and Child," in the National Gallery, I take to be a very -early work. It is dry and thin, with a hard black line outlining the -flesh, a peculiarity of which Pintoricchio is not often guilty. The -landscape is hard and dull in treatment, and the expression of both -Mother and Child is formal and precise. The figures and the Virgin's -hands are stiff. It cannot stand comparison with the beautiful group in -the Borgia Hall of Arts and Sciences, and hardly with the much more -freely handled "St. Catherine of Alexandria, with a Donor," which hangs -beside it. This last, probably painted during the early part of his -stay at Siena, judging by the glimpses of scenery and the likeness of -the St. Catherine to the maid in the fresco of the Baptistery, is good -in colour, painted with a fuller brush and more viscous medium. - -Away from the sumptuous surroundings of the capital, back among the -plains and mountains of Umbria and Tuscany, he returns to a simpler -manner. The little altar-pieces at Spello are suitable to small parish -churches. They have something homely in their character. The "Madonna" -in the little panel in Santa Maria Maggiore has a gentle, rustic -countenance, and no embroidery on her mantle. The Child is quite -undraped. The Madonna in the larger panel is very beautiful, and is more -akin in face and the whole treatment to the figures personating the Arts -and Sciences in the Vatican, but has none of the painter's usual -richness of ornament. In San Andrea, the neighbouring church of the -ex-Minorites, hangs the large altar-piece which Pintoricchio was -painting in 1508 when Gentile Baglioni summoned him to return to Siena. -The Madonna is raised on a throne which recalls the niches in which the -Arts in the Borgia Apartments and the sibyls in the Baglioni Chapel are -placed. The Child stands on her knee, clasping her neck. St. Andrew, -with his cross, stands by St. Louis of Toulouse; opposite are St. -Francis and St. Laurence grasping his gridiron; a little St. John sits -on the step on the middle. On a carelessly-drawn wooden stool in the -foreground lies the letter of Cardinal Baglioni, legibly copied; other -small objects lie about--a knife and scissors, an ivory seal, a bottle -of ink and a pencase--on the step by St. John. It is the only "Santa -Conversazione" Pintoricchio ever painted. The figures are weak and -unstructural, and we recognise the repetition of old types in the saints -and angels. The little St. John is bright and attractive. The idea of -his figure is borrowed from Mariotto, who, though poor in colouring and -draftsmanship, was original in finding _motifs_, and supplied Raphael -with many, as well as his immediate contemporaries. - -The "Coronation" in the Vatican was painted about 1505 for the nuns of -La Fratta (Umbertide). Only the upper part is believed to be by the -master's hand. Among the most beautiful of the Madonna paintings is the -"Assumption," executed during the later years at Siena for the monks of -Monte Oliveto, and now at San Gemignano. The Madonna in this is an -exquisite creation. She sits on high, surrounded by cherubs, with a -lovely smiling landscape behind her, and is in Fiorenzo's style. Her -face is sweet and expressive, and the colour of the whole is soft, with -rosy pinks and delicate greens of spring. Below kneels a Pope with his -tiara on the ground, and a bishop in a white robe clasping his pastoral -staff. The foreground is dark and rich, and contrasts with the clear and -lovely tones beyond. - -Another thoroughly satisfactory work is the little panel painted for the -nuns of Campansi, and now in the Accademia at Siena. It is a small -_tondo_, in the painter's most naive and charming manner. Joseph and -Mary sit side by side, in a flowery meadow. He holds a barrel of wine -and a loaf. She has a book on her knee, but is turning to speak to the -two children--St. John in his little camel-hair garment, and the -Christ-Child dressed in a white dress falling to the feet. The two -children are represented arm-in-arm, carrying books and a pitcher, and -are wandering away from the side of their elders. So poetic and innocent -is their aspect, they recall the old legend of the little St. Teresa and -her brother going out into the world to seek martyrdom. The figure of -the Divine Child, with long fair hair falling round the face, and -exquisitely drawn baby hands and feet, is one of the sweetest -imaginable. Mary's head is uncovered--a very rare variation with -Pintoricchio. The folds of the draperies are unusually large and simple. -The composition, the delicate restraint of gesture, combined with -natural feeling, are very striking in this delightful little painting. -Dr. Steinmann reminds us that Raphael may have seen it when he visited -Siena, and it may be remotely responsible for his Madonna groups, seated -in the fields, the idyllic feeling of which it certainly foreshadows. - - [Illustration: - _Hanfstangl photo_] [_National Gallery, London_ - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD] - -In the "Reliquary" at Berlin, the figures of the saints are too short. -The heads are of a type which had become rather hackneyed, but the -angels are lightly and crisply drawn, and it is a solid little work. The -other panel at Berlin, a "Madonna and Child," is not ascribed without -dispute to Pintoricchio. Neither the face of the Mother nor the figure -of the Child recall his manner, and while it is most unusual for him to -paint the Virgin's head without the shading veil, the hair here is -dressed in the Italian fashion of the time, as nowhere else in his -works. The Child's feet and the Mother's hands, however, essentially -remind us of Pintoricchio; the draperies have his lines, and the -gouged-out folds we find in some of his later panels, and we see the -peculiar, dainty touch of fingers, holding Child and globe as if they -were eggshells. - -The "Madonna and Saints" of the Louvre, which Mr. Berenson assigns to -Pintoricchio, Dr. Steinmann believes to be by the same painter who -helped him with the "Descent of the Spirit" in the Vatican. The heads -certainly differ widely from Pintoricchio's type, but if we apply -Morelli's test, the very peculiar left hand is reproduced line for line, -in the Penelope of the Petrucci fresco. Notwithstanding, it is difficult -to believe this to be a genuine work of the master. The little panel in -the Pitti (the "Adoration of the Magi") is much too feeble to be -anything but an imitation, and the Virgin and Child are entirely unlike -his type. The others of his works which are not questioned are a -"Madonna and Cherubs" at Buda-Pesth; "St. Michael," Leipzig; a "Madonna -and a Crucifix" at Milan; "St. Augustine and two Saints" at Perugia. Mr. -Berenson gives him a "God the Father" at Santa Maria degli Angeli, near -Assisi, and (doubtfully), the "Portrait of a Boy" at Oxford. - - [Illustration: - _Hanfstangl photo_] [_Berlin Gallery_ - - ST. AUGUSTINE, ST. BENEDICT, AND ST. BERNARD - (From the Reliquary)] - -His last known work is the very beautiful little panel in the Palazzo -Borromeo at Milan. This was painted at Siena in the last year of his -life, and is full of force and colour, glowing like a jewel. The -background has an interesting effect of distant sunset behind trees and -mountains; all the notice is concentrated on the red-robed figure and -white cross of the Christ. The greens of the ground and the -lengthening shadows give a more than usual depth and harmony. The group -behind is confused and less well-drawn, but the peasant leading the way -is evidently a study from life. On the arabesque in which the painting -is set is a cartel inscribed with name and date. - - [Illustration: - _Private photo_] [_Picture Gallery, Siena_ - - THE CHRIST-CHILD AND ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST - (From the Holy Family)] - - * * * * * - -Although Pintoricchio's art was so much admired during his lifetime, it -is difficult to show that it exercised much after-influence. Fascinating -as it is in some ways, it represents the last survival of a dying -school. The world to which he belonged, the taste which delighted in his -creations, disappeared with him, and was replaced by an age of conscious -modernism which was eager to sweep aside all that seemed archaic in the -immediate past. The thirst for knowledge and for scientific research was -waxing intense, and the craze for the display of knowledge with its -hidden seeds of decay soon followed. Among his pupils, Matteo Balducci, -who we know from Vasari worked with him in Rome, has left several -pictures at Siena. These are all Umbrian in treatment, and show the -influence of Pintoricchio, but they lack his delicate drawing; the forms -are long and weak, and the colour dim and washy. Pietro di Domenico, a -Sienese, has panels in imitation of him; but the most notable example of -his influence is to be found in that series of the "Story of Griselda," -in the National Gallery, painted by an unknown artist, who, as Miss -Cruttwell points out, was also influenced by Signorelli, and in whom -sense of form and feeling for originality are more developed than in -other followers of the Umbrian master. Gerino da Pistoia is mentioned -by Vasari as a friend of Pintoricchio, who worked much with him and -Perugino, and an altar-piece by him at Pistoia has traces of both -masters. Crowe and Cavalcaselle see his co-operation in the "Last -Supper" in Sant' Onofrio in Florence, and account thus for the signs it -shows of Pintoricchio's influence. Giovanni Bertucci of Faenza is -another Umbrian whose pictures have often been attributed to -Pintoricchio. The Mother and Child in the "Glorification" by him in the -National Gallery are not unlike our master's in Sant' Andrea at Spello. -We can trace many suggestions afforded to Raphael. The "Dispute" in the -Borgia Apartments in all probability bent Raphael's mind to the -conception of the "Disputa" in the Stanze, and inspired the idea of his -beautiful classic and sacred medallions set in decorative framework, and -of the enthroned figures of Music, Theology, and the rest; and the use -made by Pintoricchio of architectural interiors may have first inspired -the supreme setting of the "School of Athens." - - [Illustration: - _Marcozzi photo_] [_Palazzo Borromeo, Milan_ - - CHRIST BEARING THE CROSS] - -Down to recent years Pintoricchio was quite overlooked or treated with -contempt, and for the purely scientific school he has still little -merit. He certainly is not able to inspire that sort of interest that we -feel in painters who worked, looking backward to see what had been done, -and forward to discover what yet remained to do. We do not strive with -him and triumph with him over defeated difficulties. He was a craftsman, -as were all artists worthy of the name at that day, and his work is -always painstaking and adequate, with nothing sloppy or careless in -its execution; but painting as a craft, with its secrets and its -possibilities, was not his first object, so that, without being able to -divide his work into any distinct periods, we find that his earlier -life, when he was still learning, was on the whole the time when he was -most successful in the artistic sense; and in such frescoes as the -"Journey of Moses" and the "Life of San Bernardino" he gives promise of -an excellence which is not afterwards adequately realised. He was an -illustrator, and as such, perhaps, never touched the highest side of -painting. We find in him the natural tendency of a decorator who -undertakes large commissions as a matter of business, to repeat forms -and situations; yet, with every temptation to mechanical treatment and -repetition, it is the true artist in Pintoricchio which saves him from -becoming monotonous. To the very last, as in the "Return of Ulysses," or -the "Holy Family" at Siena, his invention and fancy are alert, varying -every accessory, displaying a freshness and an enjoyment in his -creations which are irresistibly attractive. In all his illustration the -lyric faculty is his. He follows the lives, the history, the fashions of -his time with minute persistence, but always with some charm added to -prosaic actuality. He is to painting what the ballad-singer is to -poetry: slight, garrulous, naive, infectious, he has a haunting melody -of his own, and through his eyes we watch the widening of one aspect of -that golden day. - -Ruskin speaks of the value to us of the impression made by a scene upon -the mind of the artist; it is the impression stamped by the strange and -enchanting grace of that world of the Renaissance upon one man, and -handed on by him with spontaneity and undoubting delight, which is so -precious to us in his work. - - - - -CATALOGUE OF THE WORKS OF - -PINTORICCHIO - -ARRANGED ACCORDING TO THE GALLERIES IN WHICH THEY ARE CONTAINED - - -NOTE - -Where numbers are given thus [No. 6], they are the numbers of the -Catalogue of the Gallery. These cannot, of course, be guaranteed, as -alterations are not infrequently made in the arrangement of the -pictures. - -No pictures have been included, other than those which the author -accepts, save in two well-known cases on pages 160 and 161. - - - - -CATALOGUE OF WORKS - -Except when in fresco, the paintings are all in tempera on wood. - - -AUSTRIA-HUNGARY - - -BUDA-PESTH. - - MADONNA AND CHILD AND ANGEL. [No. 62.] 1 ft. 9 in. x 1 ft. 6 in. - - -BRITISH ISLES - - -LONDON, THE NATIONAL GALLERY. - - ST. CATHERINE OF ALEXANDRIA. [No. 693.] On wood, 1 ft. 9 in. x 1 ft. - 3 in. - - A monk kneeling in adoration. Landscape background. - _Bequeathed by Lieut.-Gen. Sir W. Moore in 1862._ - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD. [No. 703.] In tempera, on poplar, 1 ft. 10 - in. x 1 ft. 3 in. - - The Infant stands on a carpeted parapet in front of its - Mother, only half of whose figure is seen: a rocky landscape - in the background. - - _Formerly in the Wallerstein Collection._ Presented in 1863 - by Her Majesty the Queen, in fulfilment of the wishes of His - Royal Highness the Prince Consort. - - THE RETURN OF ULYSSES TO PENELOPE. [No. 911.] A fresco, transferred - to canvas, 4 ft. 1 in. x 4 ft. 9 in. - - Penelope is seated at her loom; on the floor at her right is - a damsel winding thread on shuttles from a ball of yarn - which a cat is playing with. Four suitors in gay costume - have entered the room; in the background Ulysses himself is - seen in the doorway, just entering; his bow and quiver of - arrows are hanging up above the head of Penelope. - - From the open window is seen the ship of Ulysses, with the - hero bound to the mast; sirens are disporting themselves in - the sea; the palace of Circe is on an island near, with - swine and other animals in its vicinity. - - Painted about 1509. _Formerly in the Pandolfo Petrucci - Palace at Siena; transferred from the wall for M. Joly de - Bammeville, in 1844, by Pellegrino Succi. Subsequently in - Mr. Barker's Collection, at whose sale it was purchased in - 1874._ - -OXFORD, TAYLORIAN MUSEUM. - - PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG MAN (?). [No. 22.] - - -FRANCE - -PARIS, THE LOUVRE, MUSEE NAPOLEON III. - - MADONNA WITH ST. GREGORY AND ST. JOHN BAPTIST. [No. 1417.] 1 ft. 11 - in. x 1 ft. 4 in. (?) - - -GERMANY - -BERLIN GALLERY. - - MADONNA AND CHILD. (?) - -BERLIN, PYRKER COLLECTION. - - RELIQUARY, ST. AUGUSTINE AND TWO SAINTS. [No. 132A.] 1 ft. 5 in. - x 9 in. - -DRESDEN, THE GALLERY. - - PORTRAIT OF A BOY, WITH A LANDSCAPE BACKGROUND. [No. 41.] 1 ft. 8 - in. x 1 ft. 2 in. - -LEIPZIG, THE GALLERY. - - ST. MICHAEL (?). [No. 480.] - - -ITALY - -ASSISI, CHURCH OF SANTA MARIA DEGLI ANGELI (CHAPEL OF ST. BONAVENTURA). - - GOD THE FATHER. - -MILAN, THE PALAZZO BORROMEO, SALA CIMBALLO. - - CHRIST BEARING THE CROSS. [No. 36.] 1513. - - See page 148. - -MILAN, PRINCE PIO DI SAVOIA. - - MADONNA. 1497. - -MILAN, MARCHESE VISCONTI-VENOSTA. - - A SMALL PAINTED CRUCIFIX. - -NAPLES, THE PICTURE GALLERY. - - THE MADONNA IN GLORY. - -PERUGIA, THE GALLERY, SALA XI. - - POLYPTYCH. [No. 10.] 1498. - - The Madonna and Child with St. John. Pieta. Christ with two - Angels. Angel of the Annunciation. Virgin. St. Augustine. - St. Jerome. - - _Predella._--St. Mark. St. Luke. Scene in the life of St. - Augustine. St. Matthew. St. John. St. Jerome in the Desert. - - Painted for the high altar of the church of Santa Maria dei - Fossi. After the inroad of the French in 1810, was preserved - in small panels in the Academy. - - See page 139. - - ST. AUGUSTINE AND FOUR MEMBERS OF THE CONFRATERNITY, with their - escutcheons below. [No. 12.] 1500. - - Presented by Cav. Silvestro Baldrini (_d._ 1870), President - of the Academy of Arts in Perugia. - -ROME, THE BORGHESE GALLERY. - - CHRIST ON THE CROSS, WITH ST. CHRISTOPHER AND ST. JEROME (?). - [No. 377.] 1 ft. 11 in. x 1 ft. 4 in. - -ROME, CASTEL ST. ANGELO. - - FRAGMENTS OF FRESCOES. 1497. - -ROME, THE BORGIA APARTMENTS OF THE VATICAN. - - FRESCOES. In great part by his own hand. All done from his - designs and under his superintendence. 1492-1495. - - First Room--Hall of Mysteries. - - Assumption. Annunciation. Nativity. Adoration of Magi. - Resurrection. Ascension. Coming of the Holy Ghost. - _Ceiling_--Evangelists and Fathers. - - Second Room--Hall of Saints. - - The Madonna and Child. Scenes from lives of St. Susanna, St. - Barbara, St. Antony Abbot, and St. Paul the Hermit. St. - Catherine disputing with the Philosophers. _Ceiling - Decoration_--Story of Osiris and Isis. - - Third Room--Hall of Arts and Sciences. - - Over door--Madonna and Child. - Geometry. Arithmetic. Music. Rhetoric. Grammar. - - Fourth Room--Hall of Creeds. - - The Prophets. - - Fifth Room--Hall of Sibyls. - - The Sibyls. - - See page 93. - -ROME, THE SIXTINE CHAPEL OF THE VATICAN. - - JOURNEY OF MOSES, AND BAPTISM OF CHRIST. Frescoes. 1482-1483. - - See page 41. - -ROME, THE BELVEDERE, GALLERIA DELLE STATERE. - - FRAGMENTS OF DECORATIVE FRESCOES. - -ROME, THE COLONNA PALACE, GREAT HALL. - - DECORATIVE FRESCOES IN SPANDRELS. - -ROME, THE PALAZZO DEI PENITENZIERI. - - FRAGMENTS OF FRESCOES. - -ROME, CHURCH OF ARA COELI, BUFFALINI CHAPEL. - - Frescoes of the LIFE AND DEATH OF ST. BERNARDINO. - - See page 50. - -ROME, SANTA MARIA DEL POPOLO. - - Fourth Chapel, R. Frescoes--THE NATIVITY. Five Lunettes with - scenes from the LIFE OF ST. JEROME. - - Choir--CEILING FRESCOES. 1505. - - See page 59. - -ROME, THE VATICAN GALLERY. - - THE CORONATION OF THE VIRGIN. 11 ft. x 6 ft. 8 in. 1505. - - Painted for the nuns of La Fratta (now Umbertide). - - See page 146. - -SAN GEMIGNANO, THE MUNICIPIO. - - THE MADONNA IN GLORY, WITH SAINTS. - - Painted for the monks of Monte Oliveto. - -SAN SEVERINO, SACRISTY OF THE DUOMO. - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD, WITH THE DONOR AND TWO ANGELS. - - See page 142. - -SAN SEVERINO, THE PINACOTECA, SALA IX. - - THE NATIVITY. [No. 26.] 9 ft. 2 in. x 6 ft. - - From the convent of Campansi in Siena. - - MADONNA AND CHILD WITH AN ANGEL. [No. 28.] 2 ft. 1 in. x - 1 ft. 8 in. - - From the convent of Santa Maria Maddalena. - [These are attributed by some writers to Pintoricchio, but - not accepted by the author.] - -SIENA, THE ACCADEMIA, SALA XI. - - HOLY FAMILY. [No. 45.] Tondo. Diameter, 2 ft. 9 in. - - From the convent of Campansi. - - See page 146. - -SIENA, THE DUOMO, THE LIBRERIA. - - Frescoes--Ten frescoes, illustrating LIFE OF PIUS II. 1503-1508. - - Lunette over door--Fresco, THE CORONATION OF PIUS III. - -SIENA, THE CAPPELLA DI SAN GIOVANNI. - - Frescoes--THE BIRTH OF ST. JOHN. - - PORTRAITS OF ALBERTO ARINGHIERI in youth and old age. - -SIENA, THE DUOMO. - - PAVEMENT--WISDOM AND FORTUNE. 1504. - - See page 110. - -SPELLO, THE CHURCH OF THE COLLEGIATA, SECOND ALTAR, R. - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD. - -SPELLO, THE BAGLIONI CHAPEL, CHURCH OF THE COLLEGIATA. - - Frescoes--ANNUNCIATION. ADORATION OF MAGI. CHRIST AMONG THE - DOCTORS. 1501. - -SPELLO, THE SACRISTY OF THE CHURCH OF THE COLLEGIATA. - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD. 1501. - -SPELLO, THE OLD SACRISTY OF THE CHURCH OF THE COLLEGIATA. - - Fresco of AN ANGEL. - -SPELLO, THE CHURCH OF SANT' ANDREA, R. TRANSEPT. - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD ENTHRONED. - - ST. LOUIS OF TOULOUSE, ST. ANDREW, ST. LAURENCE AND ST. FRANCIS - OF ASSISI, WITH ANGELS. 1508. - -SPELLO, SAN GIROLAMO, CLOISTER CHAPEL. - - ADORATION OF SHEPHERDS. - - Fresco--Remains of a NATIVITY. - - Behind the Altar--Fresco of THE MARRIAGE OF THE VIRGIN. - [This is attributed by many critics to Pintoricchio, but not - accepted by the author.] - -SPOLETO, THE DUOMO, FIRST CHAPEL, R. - - Ruined frescoes--THE MADONNA AND SAINTS. GOD THE - FATHER AND ANGELS. THE DEAD CHRIST. - - See page 105. - - -SPAIN - -VALENCIA. - - THE MADONNA AND CHILD, WITH DONOR. - - Sent to Xativa by Cardinal Borja. - - See page 87. - - - - -CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE - - - 1454 (_circa_). Date of birth. - - 1482. Goes to Rome. - - 1487. Paints the Palazzo di SS. Apostoli. - - 1492. June. Recommended to the Chapter at Orvieto, by one Messer - Cristoforo. - - 1492. Receives 50 ducats for work done at Orvieto. - - 1492. Protest from the Cathedral authorities on the too lavish - use of gold and ultramarine. - - 1492. November 17. In a legally drawn-up paper frees himself - from any responsibility for not fulfilling his contract - within the stipulated time. - - 1492. December. Begins work in the Borgia Apartments. - - 1492. December 14. Order placed on minutes of Orvieto Cathedral - for raising funds to buy more blue and gold for ceiling. - - 1493. March 29. Brief from Pope Alexander asking the Orvietans - to await Pintoricchio's return till the work in the Vatican - is finished. - - 1494. March 9. Brief from Pope Alexander to Orvietans asking - that Pintoricchio be allowed to return to finish work in the - Vatican. - - 1495. January 17. The Papal Court leaves the Vatican on the - entry into Italy of Charles VIII. - - 1495. June. The Pope flies to Orvieto and Perugia. - - 1495. Obtains a grant from the Pope of two pieces of land at - Chiugi, near Perugia, for an annual payment of thirty - baskets of grain. - - 1496. February 14. Signs a contract with the monks of Santa - Maria degli Angeli, to supply an altar-piece. - - 1496. March 15. Contracts with the Chapter at Orvieto to paint - two figures of doctors for 50 ducats. - - 1496. November 15. Last payment made for this fresco. - - 1497. July. The rooms in Castel Sant' Angelo being restored, he - went back to Rome and painted the frescoes there. - - 1497. July 28. Letter from the Cardinal di San Giorgio, in - answer to a petition from Pintoricchio, reducing the annual - tax on land to two pounds of wax for three years. 1497. Tax - again enforced by the authorities of Chiugi. - - 1497. First Sunday in August. Restitution made by the - authorities of the money extorted. - - 1498. May. The exemption from taxation extended from three years - to end of lease. - - 1498. In Perugia. Painted altar-piece for Santa Maria dei Fossi. - - 1498. October. A brief from Alexander VI. confirms possession of - the lands at Chiugi to him and his descendants, even though - he should omit the yearly payment of wax. - - 1500. October 14. Visits Caesar Borgia's camp at Deruta. An order - from the Duke requests the Vice-Chancellor to get permission - for Pintoricchio to sink a cistern in his house in Perugia. - - 1501. April. Elected Decemvir of Perugia in place of Perugino. - - 1501. Contract in archives of Spello for work undertaken for - Troilo Baglioni. - - 1501-1502. May. Painting at Spello. - - 1502. June 29. Contract signed with Cardinal Piccolomini for - decorating the Library at Siena. - - 1503. Spring. Painting Library at Siena. - - 1503. October. Pope Pius III. dies. - - 1504. August 23. Paid 700 ducats for painting eight frescoes in - St. John's Chapel in the Cathedral at Siena. - - 1504. September 8. An altar-piece unveiled in the Piccolomini - Chapel in the church of San Francesco at Siena. - - 1504. Buys land to the value of 200 florins from Lucrezia - Paltoni, widow of the painter Neroccio. - - 1504. End of. Continues Library for six months. - - 1505. March 13. Is paid for the cartoon of Fortune for the - pavement of Siena Cathedral. - - 1505. June. Cardinal Andrea Piccolomini dies; work again - stopped. - - 1505. June. Leaves for Rome. Paints choir of Santa Maria del - Popolo. - - 1506. February. Back in Siena. - - 1506. Matriculates at the College of Painters, Perugia. - - 1506. March. Recommences work in Library. - - 1506. March 24. Acknowledges a debt of 100 ducats to Eusebio di - San Giorgio of Perugia. - - 1506. August 18. A further grant of land at Chiugi by Julius II. - - 1506. November 30. A son born in Siena, named Giulio Cesare. - - 1506. December 15. The magistracy of Siena approves the donation - of 20 _moggie_ of land. - - 1507. March. Appeal to the Council to remit all taxes upon it. - - 1507. March 26. A favourable answer from the Council, omitting - all but the gate-tax. - - 1508. April 24. Letter from Gentile Baglioni to him at Spello, - begging him to return to Siena. - - 1508. Autumn. Short visit to Rome. - - 1509. January 7. A son born at Siena: Camillo Giuliano. - - 1509. January 18. Receives of heirs of Pius III., 15-1/2 ducats, - being the last payment for the Piccolomini frescoes. - - 1509. Siena. Painting for Pandolfo Petrucci. - - 1509. October 8. Sells to Pandolfo Petrucci and Paolo di - Vannoccio Biringucci, a house in the third ward of the city - of Siena, for 420 florins. - - 1509. Record of his inhabiting in the ward of San Vincenzo in - Siena. - - 1509. November 1. Makes first will. - - 1510. January 27. A daughter born in Siena: Faustina Girolama. - - 1511. September 20. Sells land at Chiugi to a lawyer named - Giulio Cesare, godfather to his son. - - 1511. November 21. Buys of Antonio Primaticci, of Siena, a piece - of land called the Cloister, at Pernina. - - 1513. May 7. Being _in corpore languens_, makes his last will. - - 1513. September 13. A codicil. - - 1513. October 14. A second codicil. - - 1513. December 11. Dies in Siena, and is buried in the church of - SS. Vincenzo and Anastasia, now the oratory of the ward of - the Ostrich. - - 1514. Sigismondo Tizio gives an account of his last illness and - death. - - 1516. Grania, his widow, sells to Sigismondo Chigi two-thirds of - sundry pieces of land. - - 1516. Grania petitions to sell part of the land forming the - portion of her daughter Faustina. - - 1518. May 22. Grania makes her will. - - A daughter, Egidia (year not known), marries Girolamo di Paolo, - a soldier of the Piazza of Siena. - - A daughter, Faustina, marries Filippo of Deruta. - - 1519. A daughter, Adriana, dies. Had married Guiseppe da - Giovanni of Perugia. - - - - -INDEX - - - _Adoration of the Magi, The_ (Borgia Apartments), 69, 70, 158 - - _Adoration of the Shepherds, The_ (Spello). See _Nativity_ - - Alberti, Leo Battista, 24 - - Alexander VI., Pope, 6, 17, 66; - portrait of, 71, _ill._ 70, 72; - shuts himself in Castel Sant' Angelo, 96, 97 - - Angelis, Abbe de, 15 - - _Annunciation, The_ (Borgia Apartments), 69, 70, 158, _ill._ 68; - (Spello), 101, 103, 161, _ill._ 104; - (Perugia), 141, 157 - - Aringhieri, Alberto, Pintoricchio's work for, 10, 109; - portraits of, 109, 110, 160, _ill._ 110 - - _Arithmetic_ (Borgia Apartments), 90, 158, _ill._ 90 - - _Ascension, The_ (Borgia Apartments), 69, 71, 158 - - _Assumption, The_ (Borgia Apartments), 69, 72, 92, 158, _ill._ 74; - (Naples), 16 _note_, 144, 157; - (San Gemignano), 146, 160 - - _Astrology_ (Borgia Apartments), 91 - - - Baglioni, Cardinal, 17, 18, 145 - - Baglioni, Troilo, 100; - portrait of, 102 - - Balducci, Matteo, _Assumption, The_, in S. M. del Popolo attributed - to, 61; - pictures by, at Siena, 149 - - _Baptism of Christ, The_ (Sixtine Chapel), 29, 36, 43, 79, 159, - _ill._ 42 - - Barili, Antonio, 107 - - _Basel, Journey to the Council of_, 124, _ill._ 120; - (sketch for), 118, 119, 120 - - _Basel, Conference at_, 124; - (sketch for), 121 - - Behaim, Lorenzo, 98 - - Bellini, Gentile, Drawings attributed to, 79, 82 - - Bembo Romano, 134 - - Benedetto, father of Pintoricchio, 2 - - Berlin, Reliquary at, 147, 156, _ill._ 148 - - Bertucci, Giovanni, 150 - - Boccatis da Camerino, 25 - - Bonfigli, Benedetto, 4, 22, 25, 48, 69 - - Borgia, Device of the House of, 73, 74, 87 - - Borgia, Caesar, 9, 64, 71, 84 - - Borgia, Francesco, 73 - - Borgia, Lucrezia, 80, 81 - - Borgia, Roderigo, 46, 59 - - Botticelli, Sandro, 37, 77 - - Bregno, Andrea, 67 - - Buffalini, Ludovico, 48; - portrait of, 51 - - - Camerlengo, Cardinal, 8, 18 - - Carvajal, Cardinal, 63 - - Charles VIII., Invasion of Italy by, 96-99 - - _Christ bearing the Cross_ (Milan), 14, 148, 157, _ill._ 150 - - _Christ disputing with the Doctors_ (Spello), 101, 102, 161 - - _Christ, The Dead_ (Spoleto), 105, 162 - - Cibo, Cardinal Innocenzio, 59 - - _Coronation of the Virgin, The_ (S. M. del Popolo), 112; - (Vatican), 146, 159 - - Costa, Cardinal, 59 - - _Cross, Finding of the True_ (S. Croce in Gerusalemme), 62 - - _Crucifixion, The_ (Borghese Gallery), 26, 28, 158 - - - _Descent of the Holy Spirit, The_ (Borgia Apartments), 69, 72, 158 - - _Dialectics_ (Borgia Apartments), 92 - - Djem, Prince, 83, 96, 97 - - Donatello, 119 - - Duccio, Agostino di, 25 - - - Eusebio di San Giorgio, 115, 123, 133 - - - Farnese, Giulia, 86 - - Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, his _Miracle of San Bernardino_, 25, 62, - _ill._ 24; - his influence on Pintoricchio, 4, 17, 22-29, 41, 61, 69, - 72, 75, 86, 90, 102, 103, 112, 140, 146 - - Francesca, Piero della, influence of, 21; - his _Flagellation_, 24 - - _Frederick III. and Eleanora of Portugal, Meeting of_, 128, 129; - (sketch for), 120 - - _Frederick III. crowning Aeneas Piccolomini as Poet-Laureate_, 126, - _ill._ 126; - (sketch for), 121 - - _Frederick III. sending Aeneas Piccolomini to Pope Eugenius IV._, - 127, _ill._ 128 - - Fungai, Bernardino, 72 - - - Gatta, Bartolommeo della, 38 - - Genga, Girolamo, 113 - - Gentile da Fabriano, 20 - - _Geometry_ (Borgia Apartments), 90, 158 - - Gerino da Pistoia, 150 - - _God the Father_ (Assisi), 148, 157; - (Spoleto), 105, 162 - - Gozzoli, Benozzo, 21, 30 - - _Grammar_ (Borgia Apartments), 92, 158 - - Grotesque, The, first appearance of, in art, 68 - - - _Holy Family, The_ (Siena), 146, 151, 160 - - - Innocent VIII., Pope, 5, 55, 56, 83 - - - Julius II., Pope, 13, 64 - - _Justice_ (Borgia Apartments), 92, 158 - - - Leonardo, 119, 120 - - Leubin, Hans, 129 - - Lorenzo di Credi, 143 - - Lorenzo di Mariano, 107 - - - _Madonna and Child_ (Valencia), 46, 139, 162; - (Borgia Apartments), 86, 158, _ill._ 88; - (Perugia), 139-142, 157, _ill._ 140; - (National Gallery), 144, 155, _ill._ 146; - (S. M. Maggiore, Spello), 145, 161; - (San Andrea, Spello), 145, 161; - (Berlin), 147, 156; - (Buda-Pesth), 148, 155; - (Milan), 148, 157 - - _Madonna and Saints_ (Spoleto), 105, 162; - (Louvre), 148, 156 - - _Madonna in Glory, The_ (Naples), 144, 157; - (San Gemignano), 146, 160 - - _Madonna della Pace_ (San Severino), 143, 160, _ill._ 142 - - Mantegna, his description of Prince Djem, 84; - painting of children at Padua by, 87 - - Mariotto, Bernardino, Pintoricchio confused with, 4, 112, 140, - 142, 146 - - Masolino, 81 - - Matteo di Giovanni, 110 - - Melozzo da Forli, court painter to the Vatican, 36; - influence of on Pintoricchio, 53, 60, 71, 88 - - Morea, Christoforo, portrait of, 136 - - Morto da Feltre, 61 - - _Moses, The Journey of_ (Sixtine Chapel), 36, 38, 41, 42, 151, - 159, _ill._ 42 - - _Music_ (Borgia Apartments), 90, 158, _ill._ 92 - - - _Nativity, The_ (S. M. del Popolo), compared with Fiorenzo's - _Adoration of the Child_, 23, 61, 159; - (Borgia Apartments), 69, 70, 158; - (Spello, Baglioni Chapel), 101, 102, 161, _ill._ 102; - (San Girolamo, Spello), 104, 161 - - Niccolo da Foligno, 12 - - Nelli, Ottaviano, 21 - - - Ormanni, Antonio, 107 - - Orvieto, Pintoricchio's work at, 5, 6, 7 - - _Osiris and Isis, The Story of_ (Borgia Apartments), 84 - - - Pacchiarotto, 123 - - Paleologos, Andrea, 81, 83 - - Perino del Vaga, 66 - - Perugia, Polyptych at, 139-142, 157, _ill._ 140 - - Perugino, 13; - assisted by Pintoricchio, 17, 27, 36-40; - influence of on Pintoricchio, 42, 43, 44, 69, 72, 73, 91, 104, - 120, 125, 144; - his painting of children, 87 - - Peruzzi, 94 - - Petrucci, Pandolfo, Pintoricchio's paintings for, 14, 113 - - Piccolomini, Aeneas Sylvius, 106, 115; - scenes from the life of, 115, 123-138, _ill._ 120, 126, 128, - 132, 134, 136 - - Piccolomini, Cardinal Andrea, 10, 111 - - Piccolomini, Cardinal Francesco, summons Pintoricchio to Siena, - 9, 10, 106, 107; - death of, 108 - - Pietro d'Andrea, 94 - - Pietro di Domenico, 149 - - Pintoricchio, meagre history of his early life, 2; - his work in Rome, 4, 5; - at Orvieto, 5, 6, 7; - entrusted with the decoration of the Borgia Apartments, 6; - commutation of tax on his land, 7, 8; - his marriage, 8, 11; - in the service of Caesar Borgia, 9; - elected a Decemvir of Perugia, 9; - called to Siena, 10; - his wife and children, 11, 16; - at Spello, 13; - last visit to Rome, 13; - his death, 14, 15; - reported neglect of his wife, 15; - portraits of himself, 16, 84, 104, _ill._ 104; - writing of his name, 18; - derivation of his art, 22; - influence of Fiorenzo di Lorenzo on, 23 _et seq._; - influence of Perugino on, 27; - character of his art, 30-34; - his technique, 34; - his frescoes in the Sixtine Chapel, 36; - his greatness as a landscape painter, 43; - his decoration of the Buffalini Chapel in Ara Coeli, 47; - his work for Giuliano and Domenico della Rovere, 55, 57; - his decorations in S. M. del Popolo, 59, 112; - other work in Rome by, 62; - his decoration of the Borgia Apartments, 64-96; - drawings of Turks by, 82, 83; - his study of the antique, 85; - his painting of children, 87; - his merits and failings, 94, 95; - his painting in the Castel Sant' Angelo, 98, 99; - his work at Spello, 100-105; - his frescoes at Spoleto, 105; - summoned to Siena by Francesco Piccolomini, 107, 108; - work in the Cathedral at Siena by, 109, 110; - his frescoes in the Library at Siena, 115-138; - evidence as to Raphael's assistance of, 116-123; - his panel paintings, 139; - his polyptych at Perugia, 139-142; - other paintings by, 142-148; - his influence, 149 - - Pius II., Pope, _see_ Piccolomini, Aeneas Sylvius - - Pius III., Pope, _see_ Piccolomini, Francesco - - _Poet Crowned, The_, 126, _ill._ 126; - (sketch for), 121 - - Pollaiuolo, influence of on Pintoricchio, 24 - - _Portrait of a Boy_ (Dresden), 28, 156, _ill._ _Front._; - (Oxford), 148, 156 - - - Raphael, 13; - friendship of with Pintoricchio, 17; - helped Pintoricchio with the frescoes in the Siena - Library, 116-123; - his _Three Graces_, 117; - his drawing of horses, 119; - the _Battle of the Standard_, 119, 120; - influenced by Pintoricchio, 150 - - _Resurrection, The_ (Borgia Apartments), 69, 70 - - _Rhetoric_ (Borgia Apartments), 89, 158 - - Rome, - Pintoricchio's work in, 4, 5, 158, 159; - in the Borgia Apartments, 6, 64-96; - in the Sixtine Chapel, 36-45; - in the Chapel of Ara Coeli, 39, 47-54; - in the Belvedere, 56; - in the Colonna Palace, 55; - in the Palazzo dei Penitenzieri, 57; - in Santa Maria del Popolo, 59, 60, 112; - in Castel Sant' Angelo, 98, 99 - - Rome, The _bambino_ of Ara Coeli at, 52 - - Rovere, Domenico della, 5, 57, 59 - - Rovere, Giovanni Basso della, 45, 59, 60 - - Rovere, Giuliano della, 37, 55, 72, 89, 90, 96 - - - _St. Anthony, Visit of, to St. Paul the Hermit_ (Borgia Apartments), - 76, 77, 158, _ill._ 76, 78 - - _St. Augustine_ (Perugia), 148, 157 - - San Bernardino, 2, 48; - frescoes of the life of, by Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, 25, _ill._ 24; - frescoes of the life of, by Pintoricchio, 50-53, 102, 151, - _ill._ 50, 54 - - _Santa Barbara, Scenes from the Life of_ (Borgia Apartments), 76, 80, - 102, 158 - - _St. Catherine_ (National Gallery), 109, 144, 155 - - _St. Catherine, The Canonisation of_ (Siena, Library), 16, 123, 136 - - _St. Catherine, The Dispute of_ (Borgia Apartments), 16, 80, 125, 158, - _ill._ 80, 82 - - _St. Christopher_ (Borghese Gallery), 26, 27, 139, 158 - - San Gemignano, Madonna at, 146, 160 - - _St. Jerome, Scenes from the Life of_ (S. M. del Popolo), 61 - - _St. John, Birth of_, 109 - - _St. Louis of Toulouse_, 53 - - _St. Michael_ (Leipzig), 148, 156 - - _St. Sebastian_ (Borgia Apartments), 78, 79, 82, _ill._ 78 - - San Severino, Altar-piece at, 142, 160, _ill._ 142 - - Seitz, Signor Lodovico, 65 - - Sforza, Giovanni, 80, 84 - - Sibyls, Paintings of (Borgia Apartments), 93, 94, 158; - (Spello), 101, 113 - - Siena, Pintoricchio at, 10, 13; - frescoes in the Chapel of St. John, 109, 160; - pavement of the Cathedral, 110, 161, _ill._ 110; - frescoes in the Library at, 107, 108, 111, 115-138, 160; - drawings for, 118; - study by Raphael for, _ill._ 118; - _Holy Family_ at, 146, _ill._ 148 - - Signorelli, Luca, with Pintoricchio at Siena, 13, 14, 113; - sponsor to Pintoricchio's child, 17; - influence of, on Fiorenzo, 29; - and on Pintoricchio, 30, 77; - the _Journey of Moses_, formerly attributed to, 38 - - Sixtus, Pope, 37, 45, 59 - - Sodoma, possibly helped Pintoricchio with the Siena frescoes, 123 - - Spello, Cardinal of, 9 - - Spello, Pintoricchio's work at, 100-105, 161; - altar-pieces at, 145, 161 - - Spoleto, Frescoes at, 105, 162 - - _Susanna and the Elders_ (Borgia Apartments), 74, 158, _ill._ 74 - - Symonds, J. A., on Pintoricchio, 30 - - - Turks, Drawings of, 82 - - - _Ulysses, The Return of_, 14, 113, 151, 155, _ill._ 114 - - Umbrian Art, 19, 20; - influenced by its scenery, 25 - - - Venetian Sketch-Book, previously attributed to Raphael, 38, 39; - _illustration from_, 40 - - Verrocchio, influence of, on Fiorenzo, 24; - his _Baptism_, 44; - influence of on Pintoricchio, 74; - his drawing of horses, 119 - - _Visitation, The_ (Borgia Apartments), 77 - - - - -NOTICE - - -Photographs of most of the works mentioned in this volume are to be -obtained in various sizes from - - W. A. MANSELL & Co. - - Art Photograph - Publishers and - Dealers, - - 405, OXFORD STREET, - LONDON, W. - - - - -16. 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Catalogues, One Shilling. - - - - -Transcriber's Note: - - Page 52 - which saves from self-consciouness _changed to_ - which saves from self-consciousness - - Page 125 - much more natural and easy atitude _changed to_ - much more natural and easy attitude - - Page 168 - Funga, Bernardino, 72 _changed to_ - Fungai, Bernardino, 72 - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Pintoricchio, by Evelyn March Phillipps - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PINTORICCHIO *** - -***** This file should be named 41743.txt or 41743.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/4/1/7/4/41743/ - -Produced by Thierry Alberto, Lam Hiu-yin and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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