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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76481 ***
+
+
+
+
+
+                        _ILLUSTRATED BIOGRAPHIES OF
+                            THE GREAT ARTISTS._
+
+                             ANDREA MANTEGNA.
+
+                           FRANCESCO RAIBOLINI,
+                                  CALLED
+                                 FRANCIA.
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATED BIOGRAPHIES OF THE GREAT ARTISTS.
+
+
+_The following volumes, each illustrated with from 14 to 20 Engravings,
+are now ready, price 3s. 6d._:—
+
+_ITALIAN, &c._
+
+    GIOTTO. By HARRY QUILTER, M.A., Trinity College, Cambridge.
+    FRA ANGELICO. By CATHERINE MARY PHILLIMORE.
+    FRA BARTOLOMMEO. By LEADER SCOTT.
+    MANTEGNA AND FRANCIA. By JULIA CARTWRIGHT.
+    LEONARDO DA VINCI. By Dr. J. PAUL RICHTER.
+    MICHELANGELO. By CHARLES CLEMENT.
+    RAPHAEL. From J. D. PASSAVANT. By N. D’ANVERS.
+    TITIAN. By RICHARD FORD HEATH, M.A., Oxford.
+    TINTORETTO. By W. ROSCOE OSLER. From researches at Venice.
+    VELAZQUEZ. By EDWIN STOWE, B.A., Oxford.
+    VERNET AND DELAROCHE. By J. RUNTZ REES.
+
+_TEUTONIC._
+
+    ALBRECHT DÜRER. By RICHARD FORD HEATH, M.A., Oxford.
+    HOLBEIN. From Dr. A. WOLTMANN. By JOSEPH CUNDALL.
+    THE LITTLE MASTERS OF GERMANY.* By W. B. SCOTT.
+    REMBRANDT. From CHARLES VOSMAER. By J. W. MOLLETT, B.A.
+    RUBENS. By C. W. KETT, M.A., Oxford.
+    VAN DYCK AND HALS. By PERCY R. HEAD, Lincoln College, Oxford.
+    FIGURE PAINTERS OF HOLLAND. By LORD RONALD GOWER, F.S.A.
+
+_ENGLISH._
+
+    HOGARTH. By AUSTIN DOBSON.
+    REYNOLDS. By F. S. PULLING, M.A., Oxford.
+    GAINSBOROUGH. By G. M. BROCK-ARNOLD, M.A., Oxford.
+    TURNER. By W. COSMO MONKHOUSE.
+    WILKIE. By J. W. MOLLETT, B.A., Brasenose College, Oxford.
+    LANDSEER. By FREDERIC G. STEPHENS.
+
+_The following volumes are in preparation_:—
+
+    CORREGGIO. By M. COMPTON HEATON.
+    CORNELIUS AND OVERBECK. By J. BEAVINGTON ATKINSON.
+
+* An _Edition de luxe_, containing 14 extra plates from rare engravings
+in the British Museum, and bound in Roxburgh style, may be had, price
+10_s._ 6_d._
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: ANDREA MANTEGNA.
+
+_From the bronze bust, attributed to Sperandio, in Sant’ Andrea, Mantua._]
+
+
+
+
+      “_The whole world without Art would be one great wilderness._”
+
+                                 MANTEGNA
+                                    AND
+                                  FRANCIA
+
+                            BY JULIA CARTWRIGHT
+                 AUTHOR OF “VARALLO AND HER PAINTER,” ETC.
+
+                              [Illustration]
+
+                                 NEW YORK
+                           SCRIBNER AND WELFORD
+             LONDON: SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE, & RIVINGTON
+                                   1881
+
+                         (_All rights reserved._)
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+Although no separate biography of Mantegna has been published in England,
+his life and works have been the subject of much study in other countries
+during recent years. The thanks of the writer are especially due to
+Dr. Woltmann, the author of the biography of the painter in Dr. Robert
+Dohme’s “Kunst und Künstler,” to M. Armand Baschet, Canonico Willelmo
+Braghirolli, and Dr. Karl Brun. It is to be hoped that before long the
+last-named of these scholars will give the result of his researches to
+the public in a complete work on this remarkable man, who was both one of
+the greatest artists and one of the most striking personalities of the
+Renaissance.
+
+With regard to Francia, materials for the history of his life are far
+less plentiful, and are to be found almost exclusively in the works of
+Bolognese writers, of whom Malvasia and Calvi are the fullest and most
+trustworthy. In offering this little work as a guide for the use of
+those who have not the opportunity of studying the master’s works for
+themselves the author has only to add that the pictures mentioned have
+been carefully examined, and their descriptions written on the spot.
+
+                                                                  J. M. C.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+                                                                      PAGE
+
+                                MANTEGNA.
+
+                                CHAPTER I.
+
+    EARLY YEARS AND WORK AT PADUA. A.D. 1431-1457                        1
+
+                               CHAPTER II.
+
+    WORK AT VERONA AND MANTUA. A.D. 1457-1470                           12
+
+                               CHAPTER III.
+
+    THE CAMERA DEGLI SPOSI. A.D. 1470-1474                              21
+
+                               CHAPTER IV.
+
+    WORK AT MANTUA AND ROME. ENGRAVINGS, A.D. 1474-1490                 29
+
+                                CHAPTER V.
+
+    THE TRIUMPHS OF JULIUS CÆSAR. DRAWINGS, A.D. 1490-1500              38
+
+                               CHAPTER VI.
+
+    LAST WORKS AND DEATH—HIS INFLUENCE ON ART. A.D. 1500-1506           50
+
+                                 FRANCIA.
+
+                                CHAPTER I.
+
+    EARLY ART IN BOLOGNA. A.D. 1300-1450                                65
+
+                               CHAPTER II.
+
+    EARLY LIFE AND WORKS. A.D. 1450-1500                                75
+
+                               CHAPTER III.
+
+    THE FRIENDSHIP AND INFLUENCE OF RAPHAEL. A.D. 1500-1506             86
+
+                               CHAPTER IV.
+
+    THE FRESCOES OF ST. CECILIA’S CHAPEL. A.D. 1506-1509                94
+
+                                CHAPTER V.
+
+    LAST WORKS AND DEATH. A.D. 1509-1517                               102
+
+
+    THE PRINCIPAL WORKS OF MANTEGNA                                    109
+
+    THE PRINCIPAL WORKS OF FRANCIA                                     114
+
+    CHRONOLOGY                                                         119
+
+    BIBLIOGRAPHY                                                       121
+
+    INDEX                                                              122
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+                                                                      PAGE
+
+                                MANTEGNA.
+
+    BUST PORTRAIT OF MANTEGNA                                _Frontispiece_
+
+    MEETING OF LODOVICO GONZAGA AND HIS SON, THE CARDINAL FRANCESCO     26
+
+    THE ENTOMBMENT (_engraving_)                                        35
+
+    JUDITH WITH THE HEAD OF HOLOFERNES (_drawing_)                      37
+
+    PART OF THE TRIUMPHS OF JULIUS CÆSAR                                42
+
+    THE MADONNA DELLA VITTORIA                                          46
+
+    VIRGIN AND CHILD WITH ST. JOHN AND THE MAGDALEN                     48
+
+    THE CRUCIFIXION                                                     58
+
+                                 FRANCIA.
+
+    PORTRAIT OF FRANCIA                                      _Frontispiece_
+
+    THE VIRGIN ENTHRONED WITH SAINTS                                    80
+
+    MADONNA AND CHILD WITH THE BIRD                                     85
+
+    DEPOSITION FROM THE CROSS                                           89
+
+    A PIETÀ                                                             91
+
+    THE MADONNA OF THE ROSE-GARDEN                                     101
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+ANDREA MANTEGNA.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+EARLY YEARS AND WORK AT PADUA, A.D. 1431-1457.
+
+
+Among the different schools of painting which flourished on the mainland
+of North Italy during the fifteenth century, that of Padua was the only
+one which attained more than a merely local importance. Independent of
+Byzantine traditions and strikingly peculiar in its characteristics, it
+rivalled for a time and even surpassed the Venetian school in the vigour
+and individuality of its art.
+
+A Paduan by birth, Andrea Mantegna became the greatest master of his
+day, and left the stamp of his powerful genius not only on the schools
+of neighbouring cities, but on the whole artistic world. By his own
+achievements, and still more by the greatness of his aims, he stands
+foremost among the men of his generation who carried on the work of the
+Renaissance and prepared the way for the splendid age that was to follow.
+
+This development was the more remarkable, because until the fifteenth
+century we do not hear of a single Paduan artist of note. Giotto had left
+the frescoes of the Arena Chapel within the walls of the “learned city,”
+and Umbrian influences had later reached her students through Gentile
+da Fabriano, but these seeds were slow in bearing fruit. The men who
+painted in the famous basilica of Sant’ Antonio were mostly foreigners.
+Jacopo d’Avanzo and Altichieri of Verona, Giusto of Florence, belonged to
+other Italian cities, and although a Paduan guild existed and increased
+steadily in numbers the results were poor, and the few works which
+its members produced were feeble imitations of Giottesque or Umbrian
+originals.
+
+The first to raise Paduan art out of obscurity was Francesco Squarcione,
+who, although “not the best of artists himself,” undoubtedly gave a new
+direction to painting in his native city, and in a measure earned the
+title of founder of the school, which has been liberally bestowed upon
+him. Born in 1394, and by profession a tailor and embroiderer, Squarcione
+early devoted himself to art, and having inherited some fortune from
+his father, spent his youth in travelling both in Italy and Greece.[1]
+During his travels he collected a considerable number of pictures, and
+made drawings and took casts of ancient marbles, which on his return to
+Padua he exhibited for the teaching of young artists. By these means he
+soon obtained great reputation as a master, and as many as a hundred and
+thirty-seven pupils, he himself tells us, were trained in his school.
+
+A man of excellent judgment in art, but of slender powers of execution,
+who knew how to attract talented pupils to his studio, and who
+employed them in the production of works which bore his name, is the
+universal verdict passed upon Squarcione by early writers. The truth
+of this testimony is tolerably well proved by the curious difference
+of style visible in the only two authentic works of his that remain,
+an altar-piece in the gallery of Padua, and a Madonna painted for the
+Lazzara family. The former is a coarse and unpleasant work, with the
+hardness of line and heavy colouring that mark Zoppo and the inferior
+Squarcionesques, while the latter in the dignity of its pose and careful
+modelling bears evident traces of Mantegna’s hand. Squarcione no doubt
+possessed a quick eye for discerning talent, and it is his lasting claim
+on the gratitude of posterity that he at once saw and appreciated the
+rising genius of the young Mantegna.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Andrea Mantegna, the greatest of Lombard masters, was born in the
+neighbourhood of Padua in the year 1431. His father, Biagio, is supposed
+to have been a small farmer, and Vasari tells us that in his childhood
+Andrea herded cattle until Squarcione, struck by the boy’s talent for
+drawing, adopted him as his own son.
+
+In November, 1441, Mantegna’s name is entered on the registers of the
+Paduan guild as Squarcione’s foster-child, and seven years later he
+painted an altar-piece for the ancient church of Santa Sofia. Of this
+youthful work contemporaries speak with high praise as bearing marks
+of a practised hand, but it had already disappeared in the seventeenth
+century, and the earliest painting of Mantegna that now exists is the
+fresco above the portal of Sant’ Antonio. In this lunette, which bears
+the date of 1452, the two saints Anthony and Bernardino are represented
+supporting the sacred monogram; but the figures are too much damaged
+to be a fair test of the young artist’s style, and the work is chiefly
+interesting as a proof of the high reputation in which he was already
+held by his fellow-citizens.
+
+It is to the frescoes of St. Cristoforo’s chapel in the church of the
+Eremitani friars that we must turn in order to form a correct idea
+of Mantegna’s powers during this time. Here we see him carrying the
+principles which he had learnt in Squarcione’s workshop to their furthest
+limits, and with the boldness of genius venturing on new and untried
+paths. Here too we find him painting side by side with the best of
+Squarcione’s other pupils, and we have an opportunity of comparing his
+work with that of artists who had been formed on the same models.
+
+This chapel, which stands to the right of the high altar, at the east
+end of the great Eremitani Church, belonged to the Ovetari family, whose
+last representative, dying in 1443, had left a sum of seven hundred gold
+ducats to be spent in decorating its walls with frescoes illustrating
+the history of St. James and St. Christopher. Squarcione received the
+commission from the dead man’s heir, and between the years 1448 and 1458,
+the walls, apse, and ceiling were covered with frescoes by his different
+pupils.
+
+Thus, only a few steps from the garden which encloses Giotto’s Chapel,
+another great series was painted, to become for the schools of North
+Italy what the Brancacci Chapel had been for Florence.
+
+Less fortunate than the celebrated frescoes of the Carmine, these
+paintings have suffered much from the damp of the walls, and a great
+part of the subjects in the apse, as well as several figures in the
+martyrdom and burial of St. Christopher, are completely destroyed. Other
+portions are still in good preservation, and afford excellent examples
+of the peculiarities of the Paduan school and the studies which laid the
+foundation of Mantegna’s subsequent greatness.
+
+The leading feature which marks the work of all Squarcione’s scholars,
+and was to attain its highest artistic development in Mantegna’s later
+conceptions, is the sculptural treatment of form, which was a direct
+result of an exclusive study of ancient statues. Painting in their hands
+becomes more plastic than pictorial, the forms are sharply defined,
+the drapery falls in the small folds of ancient bas-relief, while the
+severity of the whole is relieved by rich decorations in the shape of
+festoons of fruit and foliage, which, when unskilfully managed, give a
+heavy and over-loaded effect. This plastic tendency sprang from the
+discovery, then first dawning upon the men of the Renaissance, that the
+principles of the highest art are to be found in the antique, and was
+so far as it went true and laudable in its aim. But in the case of the
+Squarcionesques this study of classic statuary was not combined with
+sufficient knowledge of nature, and, therefore, frequently degenerated
+into a lifeless rigidity and absence of expression, if not into positive
+ugliness and coarseness of form.
+
+This stiffness and want of vitality strike us at once in the four
+Evangelists on the ceiling of the chapel, wrongly ascribed by Vasari to
+Mantegna, and in the upper frescoes of St. Christopher’s life, attributed
+to three different artists—Marco Zoppo, Bono of Ferrara, and Ansuino of
+Forli. These last-named subjects are not without a considerable degree
+of skill in perspective and composition, but are alike marked by the
+same rigidity of form and metallic coldness of colouring. The feeblest
+of the three is Bono’s representation of St. Christopher bearing the
+child through the river, a work which, in awkwardness, incorrect drawing
+and truly painful ugliness, seems to exaggerate the worst faults of the
+Paduan school.
+
+On the other hand there is a decided advance in the frescoes of Niccolo
+Pizzolo, the only one of the Squarcionesques who approached Mantegna’s
+style, and whose improved colouring and greater nobleness of type are
+best explained by the discovery that he had worked with the Florentines,
+Donatello and Filippo Lippi, during their residence in Padua. To him
+Vasari ascribes the figure of the Eternal between St. Peter and St.
+Paul on the dome of the tribune, and later critics have recognised his
+hand in the “Call of St. James and St. John” and “St. James exorcising
+Devils” on the upper part of the left wall. But the finest of all his
+works here is “The Assumption,” in the apse, a fresco which in joyous
+life and freedom of movement so far surpasses the ordinary manner of the
+Paduans that one of the best critics, Dr. Woltmann, pronounces it to be
+by Mantegna’s hand. Against this we have the testimony of the anonymous
+traveller of the sixteenth century, who says decidedly that Andrea
+painted the lower part of the right and the whole of the left wall, but
+that “The Assumption” and cupola are by Pizzolo. Vasari is silent on this
+point, but remarks that Pizzolo’s works in this chapel yielded nothing
+in excellence to those of Andrea, and probably the best solution of the
+question is to accept both “The Assumption” and the upper frescoes of St.
+James’s life as the joint composition of the two artists, or at least to
+allow that they were partly designed by Mantegna.
+
+In the midst of Pizzolo’s labours in the Eremitani Chapel his promising
+career was cut short by a violent end. He had, it appears, an unlucky
+habit of taking part in street brawls and riots, and one evening as
+he was returning home from his work he was attacked and slain by some
+unknown persons whose enmity he had excited.
+
+Mantegna was now left alone to complete the unfinished work, and whatever
+uncertainty rests on his share in the earlier frescoes there is no doubt
+that the six remaining subjects are entirely by his hand. In each of
+these we see some clearer revelation of unfolding powers. Step by step
+some fresh difficulty is overcome, some new knowledge gained, until
+by slow degrees the battle is won, and the mastery over human form is
+complete.
+
+In the fresco of “St. James baptizing Converts” the statuesque air of
+Squarcione’s school is still strongly felt in the principal figures. The
+action is stiff, and the faces are mostly wanting in expression. But
+the spectators of the ceremony are, on the contrary, full of life and
+animation. Nothing can be more natural than the two children who look on
+with wondering eyes—the taller of the two holding a water-melon in his
+hand, while the smaller one presses close to his side—or the youth under
+the colonnade in the act of turning round to speak to a figure whose face
+is concealed by a pillar. If from these we turn to the decorative part of
+the fresco, the winged angels in the upper corners at once remind us of
+the charming groups of children on Donatello’s bronzes in Sant’ Antonio,
+and prove how attentively Mantegna must have studied these recently
+finished works of the Florentine master. The beneficial influence of
+the great sculptor had already appeared in the earlier frescoes of the
+Eremitani, and from his example Andrea now learnt how to combine the
+study of nature with sculptural treatment, and to adopt a more elevated
+type of human form.
+
+The next subject, “St. James before Herod,” reveals a new feature,
+afterwards to become prominent in his career, in the accurate knowledge
+of Roman costumes and classical architecture which is here displayed. One
+of the finest figures is that of a soldier leaning on his lance in the
+left-hand corner of the picture, an ancient Roman, in whom we recognise
+immediately the painter’s own portrait, from the close resemblance
+which his strongly marked features and massive brow bear to the bust on
+Andrea’s tomb at Mantua. Both of these frescoes show considerable skill
+in perspective, but in the next, “St. James blessing a kneeling Disciple
+on his way to Execution,” Mantegna boldly ventures on an experiment
+that is altogether new. For no apparent reason, but purely as a trial
+of skill, he suddenly alters the point of sight to a low level, and
+while the feet of the foremost figures appear to stand on the edge of
+the picture the lower extremities of those in the background vanish
+altogether. The difficulties thus created are on the whole correctly
+solved. Each figure is carefully foreshortened, and the Roman arch under
+which the procession passes is drawn in admirable perspective, but
+freedom of action is impaired, and the whole suffers from an unpleasant
+sense of effort and unnatural constraint. Perspective was in those days
+a favourite branch of learning in the University of Padua, and Mantegna,
+whose vigorous genius took pleasure in the driest studies, seems to have
+derived this strange passion for applying its laws to the human form from
+Paolo Uccelli, a Florentine who had lately visited Padua. In his ardour
+to accomplish his self-imposed task he failed to see the mistake of
+subjecting living figures to the rules of architecture, and of treating
+them as existing solely in order to demonstrate a scientific problem.
+
+But at the time the young painter’s exhibition of skill excited the
+utmost admiration, and both Daniele Barbaro and Lomazzo praise him as the
+first artist who opened men’s eyes to the true principles of perspective.
+
+If we are to believe Vasari, Squarcione, who till now had been as proud
+of his pupil’s growing fame as if it were his own, suddenly altered his
+tone and openly blamed Mantegna for the stony rigidity of his figures,
+declaring that they were mere copies of marble statues, altogether devoid
+of life and expression.
+
+The reproach, although not wholly undeserved, was a curious one in
+Squarcione’s lips, but the real cause of the breach which took place
+between the master and scholar was Andrea’s connection with the rival
+workshop of Jacopo Bellini. The Venetian painter, with his two sons,
+Gentile and Giovanni, had lately taken up his abode at Padua, and a
+strong friendship had sprung up between Mantegna and the members of his
+family which before long led to the marriage of the young Paduan with
+Jacopo’s daughter Niccolosia. Their union took place while Mantegna
+was actually engaged on the Eremitani frescoes—probably about 1454 or
+1455, since in 1458 he had already two or three children—and becomes an
+important fact in art history as strengthening the ties between these
+distinguished artists. The influence each was to exercise on the other
+was destined to prove great and lasting. Jacopo Bellini, who had spent
+some time in Florence, was probably instrumental in leading Mantegna to
+follow Donatello and Uccelli’s models, while from Giovanni, Andrea would
+learn the softer colouring and delicate feeling that impart so pure a
+charm to those well-known Madonnas which fill the churches of Venice.
+Mantegna, on his part, gave back at least as much as he took, and no
+one can doubt that Gian Bellini owed to his brother-in-law in a great
+measure his knowledge of classical architecture and perspective, as well
+as the sculptural cast of drapery, that distinguish his pictures from
+those of earlier Venetian masters. In all probability this new influence,
+rather than Squarcione’s jealous reproaches, was the cause of the marked
+improvement visible in the later frescoes. The principal figures in the
+“Execution of St. James” are more life-like; there is less hardness in
+the modelling and laying on of shadows, while the background, with its
+winding road and rocky terraces crowned with olive-trees, is an exact
+copy of a Lombard hill-side. Nothing, indeed, is more striking in these
+frescoes than the close attention to natural objects, which shows how
+strongly realistic was the bent of our painter’s genius, in spite of his
+Squarcionesque training and love of antique statuary. He not only fills
+his backgrounds with faithful reproductions of Italian landscape and
+streets, with red roofs, arched loggias, or vine-trellised arbours, but
+recalls every detail and renders the furrows and wrinkles of old age, the
+ragged coat or torn shoe, with an accuracy that is almost painful.
+
+The eagerness with which he sought difficulties and his courage in
+grappling with them meet us again in the foreshortened rider who looks
+on at the Saint’s martyrdom, and is still more triumphant in the bold
+action of the men who drag away the dead body of the giant Christopher,
+in itself a masterpiece of perspective which served as a model for Titian
+and other Venetians in dealing with similar subjects in future years.
+
+Unfortunately these two last frescoes, “The Martyrdom” and “Burial of
+St. Christopher,” are much injured, and some of the chief figures are
+completely obliterated. The portions that remain justify the praises of
+former critics who pronounced these to be the finest of the whole series.
+Here at least Squarcione’s reproach is refuted, the stony look of the
+faces has given place to warm flesh-tones and softer modelling, and the
+band of archers assembled under the vine-trellis in the scene where the
+saint is to meet his doom are remarkable for their energetic action and
+expressive faces.
+
+According to Yasari, in this last subject, Mantegna represented
+Squarcione himself in the character of a fat archer, as a proof that he
+knew how to draw from living models, and the same writer mentions several
+other contemporary personages whose portraits are also introduced.
+Especially interesting in our eyes is the group, in the right-hand corner
+of “The Martyrdom,” of an elderly man standing between two younger
+figures, one of whom wears a red cap. The Venetian costume of these three
+spectators, and a certain resemblance of one of the youthful heads to
+a medal bearing the likeness of Gentile Bellini, go far to confirm the
+truth of Crowe and Cavalcaselle’s supposition that here we have portraits
+of Mantegna’s father and brothers-in-law, who were all in Padua at the
+time, and whom he would very naturally introduce among his other friends.
+
+With these frescoes Andrea’s labours in the church of the Eremitani end,
+and the decoration of the chapel, with which Squarcione’s pupils had been
+intrusted some ten years before, was finally completed.
+
+If from details of execution we pass to consider the work as a whole, it
+must be owned that the general impression left upon the spectator’s mind
+is one of coldness and severity. These stern and vigorous figures which
+look down upon us from the walls awe us by the power and reality of their
+presence; they impress us by the accurate science and years of assiduous
+labour which they reveal, but they fail to touch the heart or delight the
+eye; they are wanting in that sense of beauty which, is so conspicuous
+a feature in Mantegna’s later work. If he had painted nothing else he
+would have left behind him the reputation of a master of strong realistic
+tendency, who solved difficult problems and attained a remarkable degree
+of proficiency in drawing and anatomy, but lacked the qualities necessary
+for the highest class of art.
+
+Fortunately for us Mantegna’s activity does not end here. The frescoes
+of the Eremitani were only the first stage in a great career, and as
+we contemplate them we can always reflect with satisfaction that these
+powerful works, in their grimness and austere dignity, in their curious
+display of scientific knowledge and minute attention to detail, were the
+preliminary studies, by means of which he reached the perfection of after
+years, and achieved the ultimate successes that were to make his name
+celebrated.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+WORK AT VERONA AND MANTUA, A.D. 1457-1470.
+
+
+The exact date of the completion of the Eremitani frescoes is uncertain,
+but they were probably finished by 1458, perhaps earlier. Mantegna was
+still a young man, not more than six or seven-and-twenty, but in actual
+power as well as in reputation second to no living painter in North Italy.
+
+We have already noticed the chief influences brought to bear on his early
+training. One by one we have watched him discover and assimilate, with
+the same clearness of intellect and indefatigable energy, the peculiar
+virtue of each successive artist with whom he was brought into contact.
+We have seen him add Florentine principles to Squarcione’s teaching,
+learn from Donatello how to combine the study of nature with the laws of
+sculpture, gain from Uccelli that knowledge of perspective which had for
+him so subtle a fascination, and last of all temper this fiery genius
+under the gentler spell of Gian Bellini’s more genial art.
+
+Another and a very important element in his development was the constant
+intercourse which he maintained with the most learned Paduan scholars,
+and the keen pleasure with which he joined in their antiquarian
+researches in the neighbourhood. He accompanied Felice Feliciano, a
+famous collector of inscriptions, on several excursions in the environs
+of Verona and the Lago di Garda for the express purpose of examining
+classical remains, and in 1463 this same Feliciano dedicated his work on
+ancient epigrams to the painter, whose learning he extols in the highest
+terms. One result of these explorations in the classic ground of Sermione
+appears in the fragments of Latin inscriptions which are repeatedly
+introduced, in the Eremitani frescoes, and on one Roman portico the
+name of Vitruvius Cerdo, a Verona architect of ancient days, is still
+distinctly legible.
+
+This practice was a common one with many of the artists of Squarcione and
+Mantegna’s school, who, in their genuine enthusiasm for classical art,
+copied antique monuments and inscriptions with the minutest accuracy, and
+afterwards used them as accessory portions of their own compositions.
+We have a notable example of this habit in the drawing of a pagan altar
+bearing an inscription to the effect that it was found in a vault of
+the Baths of Caracalla, then known as the Antonine palace at Rome. The
+drawing, evidently by the hand of some Paduan artist, is now preserved at
+Christ Church, Oxford.
+
+Besides Feliciano, Andrea numbered among his intimate friends several
+eminent scholars then studying at the University of Padua, such as Matteo
+Bossi, afterwards Abbot of Fiesole, and the Hungarian bishop Giovanni
+Pannonio, who celebrated the artist’s genius in Latin verse as early as
+1458, and whose portrait Mantegna painted in the same year.
+
+This rare degree of culture which made him the friend of scholars, this
+genuine delight in classical studies and antique art, was destined to
+supply our master with some of his highest inspirations, and ultimately
+render him the foremost representative among painters of that enthusiasm
+for antiquity which was the ruling passion of Italy in the fifteenth
+century.
+
+During the years that Andrea was employed on the Eremitani frescoes we
+hear little else of his private life excepting that he married Niccolosia
+Bellini, and became estranged from his old master Squarcione, while two
+panel pictures, the Brera Altar-piece which he painted in 1454 for Santa
+Giustina, and the “St. Euphemia” now at Naples, are the only other works
+that are left us of this period. In the former, a vigorous but not very
+pleasing work, St. Luke is represented writing at a table between four
+single figures of saints, while above we have a Pietà with the Virgin,
+St. John, and four other saints. Far more graceful in conception is the
+St. Euphemia standing in her garlanded niche with the lily in her hand
+and the lion beside her. This admirably drawn figure in attitude and form
+closely resembles an antique statue, and will bear comparison, with the
+best of the later frescoes.
+
+So far, Andrea’s works had been confined to Padua, but his fame had
+spread far beyond his native city, and before he had finished his labours
+in the Eremitani, pressing invitations to move to Mantua had reached
+him from Lodovico Gonzaga, Marquis of that principality. This prince, a
+generous patron of letters as well as a brave soldier and wise ruler,
+was anxious to make his court a centre of art and learning; and, having
+failed in his efforts to attract the aged Donatello, spared no pains to
+secure the services of the Paduan artist, whose rising genius was already
+eclipsing that of all others. As early as 1456 we find Lodovico entering
+into communication with Andrea, first by letter and then through the
+sculptor Luca Fancelli, a confidential agent of the Marquis. His offers
+were liberal; fifteen ducats a month, lodging, firewood, and sufficient
+wheat to feed the members of his family, who are reckoned as six in
+number; besides, he proposed to assist him on his journey to Mantua by
+sending a boat to meet him.
+
+Mantegna lent a willing ear to these proposals, but his hands were full,
+and flattering as were Lodovico’s entreaties and assurances of good-will,
+he was slow to comply with the request. In his letters he assigns first
+one reason, then another, for delaying his departure. First, he asks
+for time to execute an order given him by Gregorio Corraro, Abbot of
+San Zeno of Verona, and protonotary to the Apostolic See. Then he begs
+for six months more to complete the work, then for another respite in
+order to do a little piece for the Podestà of Padua. The Marquis bore
+all these delays with unalterable patience and courtesy, while he never
+for a moment relaxed his efforts to bring the artist to Mantua, and
+redoubled his assurance of favour. If Andrea will only come, he says
+again and again, and himself prove the truth of the promises made to him,
+he will every day of his life find greater cause to rejoice that he has
+entered the service of the Gonzagas. When the summer of 1459 came and the
+protonotary’s altar-piece was still unfinished, Lodovico suggested as a
+last resource that the panels should be brought to Mantua and completed
+there. To this proposal the abbot was too wise a man to consent, and he
+would not even allow Mantegna to visit Mantua for a day until the picture
+had been safely delivered into his hands.
+
+This altar-piece, of which we hear so much in Lodovico’s correspondence
+with our master, was the “Madonna and Saints” in San Zeno, of Verona,
+taken to Paris in 1797, but now restored (without its predella) to its
+place, and one of the finest religious compositions that Andrea ever
+painted. All the chief characteristics of Andrea’s Paduan time are
+here brought together in a more elevated form, and for the first time
+we realise fully how great was the progress he had made since the days
+when he began to paint in the Eremitani Chapel. Nothing can exceed the
+simple dignity and grace of the youthful virgin, who sits erect under
+a portico decorated with a frieze of children bearing festoons of
+fruit, through which we see a thick growth of trees, and open space
+of blue sky beyond. On the pillars of the portico are medallions in
+which Andrea has after his usual habit introduced reliefs of classical
+subjects, one of which is a horse-tamer, evidently copied from the
+famous “Twins,” of Monte Cavallo, and curious as adopted by a painter
+who had not yet visited Rome. The saints who stand in the groups on
+either side of the Madonna’s throne are still too much treated as
+isolated figures, but each statue-like form has a grandeur of its own,
+and the graceful heads of the young St. John and St. Lawrence contrast
+finely with those of the aged apostles and fathers of the Church, while
+in the boy-angels who play on the steps of the throne, or sing with
+wide-parted lips, we have the first of those child-faces whose laughing
+eyes look down from many of Mantegna’s pictures and seem to give us a
+foretaste of Raphael’s sweetness. Unfortunately, the different parts of
+the predella that belonged to this beautiful altar-piece are scattered
+in different galleries, the “Gethsemane” and “Ascension” are at Tours,
+the “Crucifixion,” in the dramatic action of its varied group by far the
+finest of the three, is in the Louvre.
+
+According to Vasari, Mantegna painted several other pictures in Verona,
+but the only other traces of his work now remaining in that city are some
+equestrian figures and chiaroscuro decorations on the façade of a house
+near San Fermo Maggiore, and we have no proof of his ever having resided
+there.
+
+The “little piece” which Andrea executed for Giacomo Marcello, Podestà
+of Padua, has been identified in the “Christ on the Mount of Olives” of
+the Baring collection, a work in which we feel the same union of plastic
+tendency of form and strong realism that strikes us in the frescoes. In
+the background, a wild and savage landscape, the desolate aspect of which
+is heightened by the presence of cranes and birds of prey, we recognise
+the city of Padua with the Eremitani Church.
+
+If we compare this picture with the well-known rendering of the same
+subject by Giovanni Bellini in the National Gallery, we shall see how
+much of the original conception and drawing the Venetian artist borrowed
+from his brother-in-law, and at the same time how well he knew how to
+modify Andrea’s severer style by his own more delicate grace and feeling
+for colour.
+
+These altar-pieces were Mantegna’s last works in his native city. The
+patience of the Marquis was at length rewarded, and towards the close of
+the year 1459, Andrea moved to Mantua with his family. Soon afterwards
+Jacopo Bellini died, his sons moved to Venice, and the Paduan school of
+painting, left in the hands of inferior followers of Squarcione, came to
+a practical end.
+
+But Paduan art lived on in the work of her greatest son, and the new
+influences and surroundings of Mantegna’s adopted city gave fresh impulse
+to his creative energy.
+
+That he settled at Mantua before the end of 1459 is proved by a letter
+of his written to the Marquis in May, 1478, in which he speaks of having
+been almost nineteen years in Lodovico’s service, but it is not till the
+spring of 1463 that we hear of him as engaged in painting at Goïto, one
+of the summer villas belonging to the Gonzagas. Both this palace and
+the neighbouring Castle of Cavriana, where he also painted, have been
+destroyed, and a few panel pictures now dispersed throughout Europe are
+the only productions that remain of his first ten years’ residence at the
+Court of Mantua.
+
+Chief among these is the Uffizi triptych, which originally belonged to
+a chapel of the Gonzagas, and may be the very picture to which Andrea
+alludes in a letter of 1464 as destined for the little chapel, and which
+Vasari tells us contained many small but most beautiful figures.
+
+The “Adoration of the Magi” forms the subject of the central panel, while
+the “Ascension” and the “Presentation in the Temple” are represented
+on the wings. All three are marked by the miniature-like finish which
+reveals the thoroughly practised hand and loving zeal of one who took
+delight in carrying his work to the highest possible perfection.
+
+In the seated Virgin, of the strong type of womanhood which Andrea
+seems to prefer, with the flight of cherubs encircling her head, and
+the patches of rough herbage starting out of the rocks behind her, we
+recognise the original of his own unfinished engraving, the “Virgin of
+the Grotto.” The red cherub-heads, which remind us of the similar wreath
+with which Giovanni Bellini surrounds one of his Madonnas in the Academy
+of Venice, are again introduced in “The Ascension.” Here the group of
+apostles, who gaze upwards, have more of the slender form used by Pizzolo
+in the Eremitani frescoes, and the panel is inferior as a whole to “The
+Presentation.”
+
+This is in Mantegna’s best manner, the principal figures full of grace
+and dignity, the heads excellent in expression, especially that of the
+child sucking his finger as he leans against his mother, while Andrea’s
+historic feeling appears in the typical reliefs of “Moses breaking
+the Tables” and “Abraham sacrificing Isaac,” which adorn the altar.
+Another fine rendering of this subject by Mantegna is now in the Berlin
+Gallery, which also possesses two other works belonging to this period, a
+half-length “Madonna holding the Child on a Parapet,” and a portrait of
+an old ecclesiastic.
+
+Probably this Madonna was the very one of which Vasari speaks as painted
+by Mantegna, for his old friend, the famous orator, Matteo Bossi, Abbot
+of Fiesole, since the frame decorated with angels and instruments
+of the Passion exactly corresponds with his description, and the
+strikingly-truthful portrait may well be that of the Abbot himself,
+whose friendship for the painter neither time nor distance seems to have
+impaired.
+
+A “Death of the Virgin,” with a view of Mantua and its lake seen through
+a colonnade, now at Madrid, and chiaroscuro figures known as “Summer” and
+“Autumn,” now at Hamilton Palace, may be mentioned as painted about 1470,
+when Andrea was engaged in works at the Castle of Mantua.
+
+More interesting in the eyes of most of us are the two small pictures
+of the Saints Sebastian and George, two youthful figures intended to
+show the contrast of suffering and repose. In the “St. Sebastian” now at
+Vienna, Mantegna has deliberately set himself the task of representing
+the human form wrung by physical agony, and the divine strength of a
+will that can conquer pain by the power of its endurance. His success
+was complete, and among the countless representations of martyrdom that
+exist, there is scarcely a finer example than this St. Sebastian bound to
+the ruined column and pierced with arrows, lifting his eyes heavenwards
+in his mortal agony. At his feet lie broken statues and marbles,
+shattered fragments of the old world that was crumbling to ruins around,
+and which by the delicate grace of their shapes and mouldings help to
+associate ideas of beauty with this scene of suffering and death.
+
+The opposite of this picture meets us in the armed “St. George” of the
+Venice Academy, who stands under an archway garlanded with flowers,
+leaning on his lance in satisfied repose of victory, with the dragon dead
+at his feet. His classical head is not unlike the youthful saints of the
+Verona altar-piece, while the highly finished character of the execution
+approaches the style of the Uffizi triptych, evidently painted about the
+same time.
+
+To these we may add the wonderful “Dead Christ” of the Brera, a work
+almost terrible in its realism, and exaggerated foreshortening, but
+which reveals in a surprising degree Mantegna’s mastery both in drawing
+and management of light and shade. This _Cristo in Scurto_ was one of
+those daring trials of skill which he loved to attempt, not to please
+the eye or gratify the taste of his employers, but simply in order to
+overcome some difficulty or solve some problem from which a less powerful
+mind would have shrunk.
+
+The satisfaction which he felt in the success of this experiment is
+proved by his unwillingness to part with this work, which never left his
+studio until his death, when it is mentioned by his son in the list of
+paintings that were sold to pay his debts.
+
+In the same style as this “Pietà,” but with more attempt at decorative
+effect, is the picture exhibited by Sir William Abdy, in the last winter
+exhibition at Burlington House (1880-81). Here the dead Christ lies on
+a carved throne of coloured marbles, the back of which is formed by the
+broken tables of the law. On either side are two grandly defined forms of
+Isaiah and Jerome, as representatives of the old and new dispensations,
+between whom Christ stands. The background is more elaborate than
+usual. On one side is a wild tract of mountainous country, on the other
+a river and fertile valley, along the slopes of which we see rows of
+smiling villages, church-towers, and fields enclosed with hedges.
+In the foreground skulls and bones are scattered at the feet of the
+prophets, and beasts and birds of gay plumage enliven the scene. A stag
+and panther and a red parrot are prominent figures, but all these minor
+details are subdued to the leading idea in the painter’s mind. Doubts
+have been entertained as to the authorship of the picture, but both its
+general style and colouring and the presence of that weird grandeur of
+imagination peculiar to Mantegna are strong proofs of its genuineness.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE CAMERA DEGLI SPOSI, A.D. 1470-1474.
+
+
+Recent research has brought to light a series of valuable letters between
+the Gonzagas and Mantegna, which tell us little indeed about his existing
+works, but much that is of the deepest interest concerning his private
+life, and especially his relations with Lodovico and his family.
+
+The Marquis had kept his word and proved himself a true friend and
+generous patron to the Paduan artist. _Carissmé noster_, _dilecte
+noster_, are the terms in which he always addresses him, and the
+thoughtful consideration and patience with which he treated Andrea in
+what must frequently have been very trying circumstances, are beyond all
+praise.
+
+The first letter of the series is a complaint which the painter, writing
+from Goïto, addresses to Lodovico, saying that his stipend is irregularly
+paid, a wrong which the Marquis promptly redressed. Three years later we
+find him in the same liberal spirit advancing one hundred ducats which
+Mantegna begged in order to decorate and improve his house in Mantua.
+
+There our painter spent the winter with his wife and three
+children—_tutto la mia brigatela_ he calls them in a letter to the
+Marquis—and each year, when the summer heats returned, he moved to a
+country-house at Buscoldo, where he afterwards received a grant of land
+from his patron.
+
+In 1466 he paid a visit to Florence, where he had at least one friend in
+the learned Abbot of Fiesole, and a letter from Giovanni Aldobrandini,
+an agent of Lodovico, describes the great respect with which he was
+received, and the admiration excited by his varied accomplishments.
+“Not only in painting but in other ways he showed remarkable knowledge
+and most excellent understanding” is Aldobrandini’s testimony, and we
+learn from other sources that he took much pleasure in poetry, and even
+wrote verses himself. A sonnet of his composition addressed to a lady
+whose name is unknown, and written in the fashionable Platonic style of
+the day, has been discovered in the Mantuan archives and is given by
+Moschini. As a collector of antiquities he had acquired considerable
+reputation, and in 1472 we find the young Cardinal Francesco Gonzaga,
+then at Bologna, begging his father that Mantegna may be sent to him that
+he may have the pleasure of showing him his cameos, bronzes, and other
+antiques.
+
+Unfortunately the culture and refined taste which made Mantegna so
+agreeable a companion were accompanied by an irritable temper, and a
+readiness to take offence, which rendered him the reverse of a pleasant
+neighbour. The most trifling contradictions were sufficient to excite
+furious outbursts of anger on his part, and his letters to Lodovico are
+full of the pettiest grievances. The Marquis, it must be said, treated
+him with the utmost forbearance, and spared no pains to inquire into the
+grounds of his complaints, however small. On one occasion he implores
+Lodovico to punish a tailor who has spoilt a piece of his cloth, on
+another he has quarrelled with a gardener and his wife who live in the
+same street, and complains that neither he nor his wife can leave the
+house without being attacked by insulting words. More serious was the
+lawsuit in which he found himself involved with the engraver, Zoan
+Andrea, whom he suspected of purloining his plates, and to whom he
+administered a sound thrashing. Upon this Zoan Andrea had recourse to
+legal measures, in which Mantegna seems to have fared badly, since he was
+again compelled to seek the help of his powerful patron.
+
+But of all Andrea’s quarrels, that which excited his greatest wrath
+was his breach with his Buscoldo neighbour, Francesco Aliprandi, whom
+he publicly accused of stealing five hundred quinces from a tree which
+grew in his garden. There is a singular combination of the pathetic and
+ludicrous in Mantegna’s description of the beauty of his fruit tree, with
+its branches so heavily laden that they touched the ground. Each day he
+looked upon it with fresh delight, until one September morning he found
+all the quinces gone, and the tree stripped and bare. His anger knew no
+bounds, and he did not hesitate to charge his nearest neighbours, the
+Aliprandi, who he was convinced bore him secret ill-will with the theft.
+Upon this Francesco Aliprandi, who seems to have been a citizen of good
+birth, denied the charge indignantly, saying that during the two hundred
+years his family had lived in Mantua, they had never been insulted by
+so vile an epithet as that of thief, and complaining of Mantegna’s
+disagreeable character as the real cause of all this disturbance. “No
+one,” Aliprandi continues, “can live near him in peace, and at the
+present moment he is engaged in lawsuits with no less than five of his
+neighbours.” Even the Marquis was forced to admit this time that Andrea
+was in the wrong, and, after carefully investigating the case, arrived at
+the conclusion that the quinces had been stolen by some unknown thief.
+
+This ruggedness of disposition and exaggerated susceptibility which,
+by attaching excessive importance to the trifling cares of daily life,
+proved a constant torment to Mantegna and those around him, remind
+us curiously of Michelangelo, whom in more ways than one our master
+resembled.
+
+Like the great Florentine in this also, he never stooped to flattery or
+servile expressions in addressing his patron. On the contrary, there is
+from the first an independent spirit and proud consciousness of his own
+merit which never deserts him, and he tells the Marquis repeatedly that
+his coming to Mantua was a great favour on his part, and that no other
+prince in Italy has so industrious an artist in his service.
+
+The boast may not have sounded well in Mantegna’s lips, but it was a
+true one. His activity was indefatigable, and whether he painted in
+chapels and palaces, or made studies for tapestry or designs from the
+turkey-cocks and hens which strutted in the court poultry-yard, his time
+and powers were unreservedly placed at Lodovico’s disposal. What we have
+to regret is that so little of all his splendid work is left, although
+when we consider the subsequent history of Mantua, it is rather to be
+wondered that anything has been saved from the general wreck.
+
+In 1630, little more than a hundred years after Mantegna’s time, the city
+was besieged during three months by the Imperialists, and ultimately
+taken and sacked for three whole days. In 1797 it was again twice
+besieged and bombarded by the French and Austrians, and during the wars
+of the present century the ducal palace has been alternately occupied by
+French and German soldiers. This once sumptuous pile is now the dreariest
+and most desolate of palaces. The little life that still lingers in the
+old town clusters round the market-place on the Piazza delle Erbe, and
+grass grows on the deserted square which was once the centre of “Mantova
+la Gloriosa.”
+
+[Illustration: MEETING OF LODOVICO GONZAGA AND HIS SON, THE CARDINAL
+FRANCESCO. BY MANTEGNA.
+
+_In the Camera degli Sposi, at Mantua._]
+
+We pass through endless suites of spacious halls paved with marble and
+adorned with decaying frescoes and other remnants of faded splendour,
+till we reach the older part of the palace known in the days of the
+Gonzagas as the Castello di Corte. From its windows we look down on
+the sleepy waters of the vast lagoon, which seems to divide Mantua
+from the outer world, and over miles of swampy marshes, through which
+“smooth-sliding Mincius” winds its way.
+
+Here the Gonzagas hold their splendid court, here the banqueting-halls
+where they feasted, the ball-rooms—the scenes of their revels and
+masquerades—the suite of tiny apartments expressly built for the use of
+the dwarfs, the courtyards where the dogs were kept, are still shown.
+Here Mantegna painted, and here the walls of a room, now used to contain
+the archives, were entirely covered with frescoes by himself.
+
+This was the famous Camera degli Sposi, on which Andrea was engaged
+between 1470 and 1474, and where he represented Lodovico Gonzaga and his
+wife, Barbara of Brandenburg, surrounded by the different members of
+their family.
+
+All the frescoes have been much damaged, and those on two of the walls
+completely obliterated; but the groups which remain and the decorations
+of the ceiling are of the highest interest, and, if we except the
+Hampton Court Triumphs, form the most important series that we have from
+Mantegna’s hand.
+
+On the east wall above the mantel-piece is the central group. Lodovico
+and his wife, clad in rich brocaded robes, are seated in a garden
+surrounded by their children, and dwarfs in the act of receiving a
+messenger, who hands the Marquis a letter. Neither Lodovico nor any of
+his family seem to have been remarkable for personal beauty, and Mantegna
+has not made any attempt to embellish them. He paints them exactly as
+they were, in the stiff costumes of the day. Barbara wears the same
+veiled horn-shaped head-dress as in Andrea’s portrait-engraving in
+the British Museum; the children and courtiers are in short jackets
+and tight-fitting caps. Nothing is omitted that could complete the
+picture, which is like a page torn out of the court life of those times;
+a favourite greyhound lies asleep under Lodovico’s chair, and several
+dwarfs positively repulsive in their ugliness are introduced. They
+formed, we know, an important part of the household, since the Marquis
+kept a particular race, bred at Mantua, and reserved a whole wing of his
+palace, with staircases, halls, and bedrooms adapted to their stature,
+for their exclusive use.
+
+Beyond the fine figure of the courtier on the right, evidently the
+painter’s own portrait, we have another compartment where the Marquis
+stands at the head of the stairs welcoming his guests, or, as Selvatico
+suggests, opening his arms to his son Federico, who had been in disgrace
+for refusing to consent to a marriage which Lodovico had arranged for
+him. This subject is much damaged, but on the entrance-wall is another
+group, the best preserved of the three, in which the Marquis meets his
+younger son, the boy-cardinal Francesco, on his return from Rome. The
+composition is stiff and the dresses awkward, but nothing can surpass
+the life-like character of the heads, whether we fix our eyes on the
+baby-faces and demure air of the children who advance to welcome their
+brother, or on the vigorous profiles of Lodovico and his courtiers. A
+tame lion crouches at the feet of the Marquis, and a view of hills and
+classical temples, intended to represent Rome, fills in the background.
+On the opposite side of the doorway the servants and pages in attendance
+are introduced holding their master’s horse, and several dogs in leash,
+all admirably drawn; while above the door itself a charming group of
+seven winged boys, in every possible attitude, support a tablet with the
+following inscription:—
+
+    Ill Lodovico II. M.M.
+    Principi optimo ac
+    Fide invictissimo
+    Et Ill Barbaræ eius
+    Conjugi Mulierum Glor
+      Incomparabili
+    Suus Andreas Mantinia
+    Patavus opus hoc tenue
+    Ad eorum Decus absolvit.
+      Ann. MCCCCLXXIIII.
+
+The grace and freshness of these boy-angels form a striking contrast to
+the stiff figures on the walls, and both here and in the decorations of
+the ceiling our painter, released from the obligations of portraiture,
+allowed his fancy free play. Medallions of the Cæsars wreathed in laurel,
+grisaille scenes from the myths of Hercules and Antæus, Orpheus, Apollo,
+and the Tritons, occupy the vaulting of the ceiling; while in the centre
+a circular opening is painted to represent a blue sky, across which white
+clouds are floating by, as we see in actual reality in the Pantheon of
+Rome. Round this open space runs a balustrade, upon which a peacock is
+perched and a basket of fruit rests. Two women, a girl with a jewelled
+head-dress and a negress, look down from above with laughing faces, while
+a band of winged boys play on the edge of the stone-work.
+
+These are the famous figures, _che scortano di sotto in sù_, which Vasari
+says excited general admiration when Mantegna first painted them in the
+Castle of Mantua.
+
+Instead of treating the ceiling in the usual fashion, as another flat
+surface on a level with the spectator’s eye, he endeavoured to represent
+the figures he painted there as seen from below, and in reality looking
+down over the balustrade. The optical illusion is effected in a
+masterly way, and the playful boys, who push their heads through the
+open stone-work of the parapet or balance themselves on its edge, are
+admirably foreshortened.
+
+Curiously enough, this new principle of ceiling decoration, which
+in Corregio’s days was to become universal, and which Mantegna here
+attempted for the first time, was employed at almost the same moment by
+another painter, Melozzo da Forli, in his fresco of the “Glory of Heaven”
+in the tribune of the Church of the SS. Apostoli at Rome. Whether the
+two masters had ever been brought into personal contact we do not learn,
+but we know that Giovanni Santi, the father of Raphael, in his rhyming
+chronicle, gives Mantegna’s perspective the highest praise, and we may
+infer from this that the great Lombard’s influence had penetrated far
+enough south to reach the Umbrian artists.
+
+The frescoes of the Camera degli Sposi were finished in 1474, and ten
+years later it is recorded that Mantegna painted in another part of the
+palace, known as the Scalcheria; but a ruined ceiling, with the same
+circular opening and sportive Loves, is all that is left of his work
+there.
+
+Traces of his hand are also visible in another hall in some of the groups
+of a large, much-injured fresco, where the first Gonzaga is represented
+taking the oath as _Capitano del popolo_, and more especially in the
+children holding a tablet which once bore a now-effaced inscription.
+
+All else has perished. The lapse of time and the more cruel ravages of
+man have swept away whatever other paintings once adorned these walls,
+and the precious fragments of the Camera degli Sposi are absolutely the
+only works of Mantegna that are still to be seen in this his adopted
+city, where he spent well-nigh fifty years of his life.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+WORK AT MANTUA AND ROME: ENGRAVINGS, A.D. 1474-1490.
+
+
+The painting of the Camera degli Sposi gave the Marquis an opportunity
+for the bestowal of new favours on his chosen artist, “suus Andreas,” as
+Mantegna proudly terms himself on the tablet where he has recorded the
+completion of the work. Lodovico now granted him a piece of land near the
+Church of St. Sebastian, in Mantua, where Andrea built a house with the
+help of the architect Giovanni di Padova, and decorated it with frescoes
+which were the admiration of his contemporaries, but which perished in
+the sack of Mantua.
+
+Unfortunately his love of splendid undertakings led him into
+extravagance; he had already incurred heavy debts by purchasing a
+property at Buscoldo, and the expenses of his new house involved him in
+further difficulties. According to his usual habit he had recourse to
+the Marquis, and addressed him on the 13th of May, 1478, in a querulous
+letter, complaining that he is growing old, and has several sons and
+one daughter of a marriageable age, and yet that while others think he
+is basking in the sunshine of his Excellency’s favour he is in reality
+poorer than when he first came to Mantua. He ended by asking him to pay
+the eight hundred ducats required to satisfy his Buscoldo creditors, and
+to give him six hundred more in order to defray the cost of his new house.
+
+Lodovico was at that time in great difficulties himself, for he had
+been defeated by his enemies, and even compelled to pawn his jewels.
+None the less his reply was frank and generous. He fully recognised
+his obligations, and assured him that all his last pledges should be
+redeemed, but reminded him that of late fortune had been unfavourable
+to his arms, and that it was impossible for him to give what he did not
+possess. This letter, written in the same kindly spirit which we have
+often before had occasion to notice, was the last which Andrea ever
+received from his noble patron. Before another month had elapsed the good
+Marquis was dead, and had been succeeded by his son Federico.
+
+The young Gonzaga had known Mantegna from his boyhood, and proved as kind
+and liberal a friend as his father to the wayward artist. He not only
+paid his debts, but exempted the estates which he possessed both at Goïto
+and at Mantua from the land-tax. All his dealings with Andrea are marked
+by the same generous feeling. His letters express much concern on hearing
+of an attack of illness which had interrupted the painter’s work; and
+on another occasion, when one of Andrea’s sons was ill, he sent his own
+doctor from Venice to attend him.
+
+During the six years of this prince’s brief reign Mantegna was chiefly
+employed in painting halls at the villas of Marmirolo and Gonzaga, which
+have long since shared the common ruin of the summer palaces round Mantua.
+
+His fame was now at its height. “The virtue of Andrea,” wrote the Marquis
+Federico, “is known to the whole world;” and in 1483 Lorenzo de’ Medici
+stopped at Mantua to visit our painter’s house and renowned collection
+of antiquities. Other sovereigns sent him pressing invitations, and all
+were desirous of having a work by Mantegna’s hand; but the great man was
+capricious, and refused most of these solicitations. Federico himself
+had to make his painter’s excuses in an elaborate epistle to the Duchess
+of Milan, whose portrait Andrea flatly refused to undertake. There was
+no help for it, and the disappointed lady had to rest satisfied with
+Federico’s explanation, that since these excellent masters were so full
+of fancies we must be content with what they choose to give us.
+
+But when Federico’s early death in 1484 left the rule of his principality
+to a mere child, Andrea, filled with anxiety for the future, and still
+heavily burdened with debt, began to look around him for another patron.
+His thoughts naturally turned to the illustrious patron of the fine arts
+who had recently visited his studio, and he appealed to Lorenzo de’
+Medici in a pathetic letter, bewailing the losses he had sustained in the
+successive deaths of two generous masters, and begging to be employed,
+if perchance he should have any talent likely to please so magnificent a
+prince. What answer Lorenzo returned to this entreaty we do not learn,
+but he probably gave him a commission before long, since we know that it
+was for him Andrea painted the beautiful little Virgin of the Uffizi,
+which, with the master’s habitual slowness, he did not finish until the
+close of his visit to Rome. This little gem remains a precious memorial
+of the intercourse between two of the most interesting personalities
+of the Renaissance, and few of Andrea’s conceptions are sweeter than
+the blue-draped Mother gazing with drooping eyelids on the Child whom
+she rocks to sleep in her arms, while the peasants are seen at work in
+the field beyond and a band of herdsmen drive their flocks up the steep
+hill-side path.
+
+After all, however, the state of affairs at Mantua was more hopeful than
+Andrea had imagined in his first grief for the loss of Federico; and
+before long the contemplated marriage of the boy Marquis Francesco with
+Isabella of Este renewed his connection with the house of Ferrara, whose
+members had been among his earliest patrons. He now painted a Madonna
+for the Duchess Eleanor, which Francesco himself took to Ferrara, where
+his mother-in-law was impatiently awaiting its arrival. Most critics
+agree in identifying this picture with the noble Virgin, formerly in the
+possession of Sir C. Eastlake and now in the Dresden Gallery, a work in
+which the thoughtfulness of the child and tender maternal feeling of Mary
+are peculiarly impressive.
+
+Very soon afterwards, in the year 1485, Mantegna began the greatest
+work of his whole life, the “Triumphs of Julius Cæsar,” now at Hampton
+Court. They were originally destined for the palace of St. Sebastian,
+at Mantua, which the young Marquis was then building; and a letter of
+the 25th of August, 1485, describes how Prince Ercole of Ferrara saw
+Mantegna employed on them in his studio. While engaged on this engrossing
+work he was interrupted in the summer of 1488 by an invitation from Pope
+Innocent VIII., who begged Francesco that the great Lombard artist might
+be allowed to decorate his newly erected chapel in the Vatican. Political
+reasons induced the Marquis to consent; he knighted Andrea and sent him
+to Rome with the most flattering recommendations.
+
+During two years Mantegna painted in the chapel of the Vatican, and it
+is a subject of the deepest regret that a series of frescoes executed
+in his best period should have been ruthlessly destroyed by Pius VI.
+when he enlarged the Vatican Museum. On the entrance wall the Madonna
+sat enthroned, above the altar was the “Baptism,” on the side walls the
+“Birth of Christ” and the “Adoration of the Magi;” while Old Testament
+subjects and the Virtues were represented in grisaille on the ceiling,
+all painted, says Vasari, with the same miniature-like finish.
+
+But Andrea did not find the Pope a liberal patron or Rome a pleasant
+residence. He complains bitterly in his letters to Francesco of the
+irregular payment which he receives, and the difference which he finds
+between the habits of the Vatican and those of the Courts.
+
+Whether he was not treated with the deference to which he was accustomed,
+or whether failing health oppressed his spirits, his tone becomes more
+and more melancholy. A longing for home had seized him, and he implores
+the Marquis to send him a few lines of comfort, since he is now, as
+he always has been, the child of the House of Gonzaga, and will serve
+no other prince. Anxiety for his unfinished “Triumphs” is added to
+the solicitude which he feels for his absent family, and he entreats
+Francesco in the same breath to find his son Lodovico employment, and to
+take care that his “Triumphs” are not injured by rain coming in at the
+windows, since he considers them the best and most perfect of all his
+works.
+
+Francesco replied in the most friendly manner, promising to attend to his
+requests, and begging Andrea to be careful of his health, and to return
+as speedily as possible to complete the “Triumphs,” which he counts the
+greatest glory of Mantua and his own house. But the frescoes of the
+Belvedere Chapel were no small task, and Andrea had, as he complains,
+no assistant to help him in his labours. He found means, however, to
+express his dissatisfaction to the Pope one day by adding another Virtue
+to the figures which he had designed. The Pope, who frequently visited
+him when at work, asked him who the last Virtue might be. “That is
+Discretion,” said the painter; upon which the Pope, not to be outdone,
+returned promptly, “Put her in good company then, and add Patience.”
+Another version of the story, given by Ridolf, is that he added the
+figure of Ingratitude as an eighth to the seven deadly sins, saying that
+this was the blackest of all crimes. In the following June he writes
+more cheerfully, describing a singular visitor he has had in the person
+of Zizim, brother of the Sultan Bajazet, then a captive in the Vatican,
+and sending his portrait for Francesco’s amusement. Another six months
+passed, and the Marquis wrote again, this time in a very urgent strain,
+both to the Pope and Mantegna, saying that his marriage with Isabella
+of Este was to take place in January, and that Andrea’s presence was
+indispensable. The courier who brought the letter found the painter
+ill in bed and unable to move; so the wedding festivities had to be
+celebrated without him, and his return was delayed until the following
+summer, when the Pope at length dismissed him with a complimentary letter
+of thanks to the Marquis. Besides the small “Virgin” of the Uffizi,
+only one other work of Andrea’s Roman time is known to exist, a “Man of
+Sorrows, supported by Angels,” now in the Museum of Copenhagen, and, like
+the Brera Pietà, remarkable for the skill and knowledge displayed both in
+the drawing and distribution of light and shade.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It has often been said that during his visit to Rome, Mantegna first
+learnt the new art of engraving, in the practice of which he spent so
+large a portion of his time and powers. But if we consider, on the one
+hand, the variety both in style and subject of his plates, and on the
+other the great undertakings on which he was engaged during his last
+years, we shall see that this is impossible.
+
+It is true that no fixed date in his earlier career can be assigned with
+certainty, but an attentive study of his engravings will, we think,
+result in the conclusion that his first efforts in this new branch of
+art belong to his Paduan days, and that he pursued it at intervals all
+through his career, but with increased activity during the latter part
+of his life. Two plates especially, the unfinished “Scourging” and
+the “Descent of Christ into Limbo,” bear a strong resemblance to the
+Eremitani frescoes, while others remind us in a similar manner of the
+San Zeno altar-piece and the earlier Mantuan paintings. At first his
+method was imperfect, but we trace a gradual improvement in the plates,
+in proportion as he acquired greater technical knowledge in the new
+art and became acquainted with Maso di Finiguerra, and it may be with
+Schongauer’s engravings. All are marked by the same firmness of outline,
+by the same closely-marked shading drawn in slanting lines from right
+to left, and, above all, by the constant endeavour to give the print
+something of the charm of chiaroscuro and colour. Since, however, a
+whole school of engravers formed themselves on Mantegna’s style, and
+Zoan Andrea, Mocetto, Campagnola and others, all adopted his method
+and confined themselves almost exclusively to the reproduction of his
+works—the task of distinguishing Mantegna’s original plates is by no
+means easy. Of late years they have been subjected to a severe criticism,
+and many formerly attributed to him are now rejected. But, whether we
+accept twenty-four or twenty with M. Duplessis and Bartsch, or limit
+the number to thirteen with M. Wallis, we shall equally acknowledge
+how wonderfully every aspect of his genius is represented in these
+engravings, and how inexhaustible was that wealth of thought and imagery
+which, unable to find its full expression in painting, sought another
+channel in the sister art.
+
+[Illustration: THE ENTOMBMENT.
+
+_From the engraving by Mantegna._]
+
+Small as is the cycle of genuine prints, they embrace a wide range of
+subject; pagan myths, Roman and Christian themes, are all treated in
+turn with the same seriousness of purpose and marvellous variety of
+invention. Sometimes he reproduces his own pictures—the “Virgin of the
+Grotto” from the Uffizi triptych, in later years we have the “Triumphs”
+and the “Dancing Muses of the Parnassus.” The Bacchanalia, and still more
+the “Battle of the Sea-gods,” remain to show us how deeply the spirit
+of classic bas-relief had sunk into his soul. Certain subjects there
+are in which he takes especial delight, which he treats with as great
+freshness and originality as if he had never before approached them.
+Such are the “Hercules and Antæus,” already represented in grisaille on
+the ceiling of the Camera degli Sposi, and the “St. Sebastian,” which
+hardly yields in beauty to the sublime painting of the Belvedere. At
+other times he reveals some altogether new conception, as in the noble
+“Descent from the Cross,” which supplied the motives whence Albrecht
+Dürer, Luca Signorelli, Daniele da Volterra, and Rubens in turn took
+their inspirations. In dramatic power and intensity of feeling this plate
+is only equalled by the well-known “Entombment,” where all the horrors
+of death, all the depths of the wildest despair, seem gathered up and
+concentrated in that one figure of St. John wringing his hands aloft and
+uttering the great and bitter cry which cannot be restrained. The same
+strong feeling shows itself under another form in the seated Madonna,
+whose whole figure is swayed with the foreboding of coming anguish that
+mingles with her love, as she bends forward to press the Child closer to
+her face. But although these figures, animated with rage and despair,
+with a great hatred or a still greater love, are the subjects on which
+Andrea seemed to dwell with preference in his engravings, he returns
+at times to the serene repose of ancient statuary, and designs for us
+a group of perfect majesty in the three grand figures of “St. Andrew,
+St. Longinus, and the Risen Christ,” who stands between them, calm and
+strong, with the awe of that death which he had conquered still upon his
+brow.
+
+Again, in vivid contrast with reeling satyrs and angry Tritons battling
+on the rough sea-waves, we have the quiet portrait heads of Lodovico
+Gonzaga and his wife, Barbara,[2] whose homely faces and earnest eyes
+look out of the same quaint costumes as on their palace walls at Mantua,
+and on whose brocaded robes infinite pains have been bestowed.
+
+This is not the place to enter into further details, or a whole
+volume might with profit be devoted to the consideration of Mantegna’s
+engravings, but enough has been said to show how important a part of his
+works they form, and how extraordinary was the genius of the man who
+could, in his leisure moments during the brief intervals which elapsed
+between his greater tasks, give to the world so rich a treasure of
+profound and varied thought.
+
+[Illustration: JUDITH WITH THE HEAD OF HOLOFERNES.
+
+_From the drawing by Mantegna in the Uffizi._]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE TRIUMPHS OF JULIUS CÆSAR: DRAWINGS, 1490-1500.
+
+
+Mantegna, as we have already mentioned, returned to Mantua in the summer
+of 1490, and during the rest of that year and the whole of the following
+one he devoted himself without interruption to his “Triumphs,” which he
+finally completed in February, 1492.
+
+This famous series consists of nine pieces of fine twilled linen, upon
+which Andrea painted in tempera the triumphal procession of Julius Cæsar
+on his way to the Capitol, after the Conquest of Gaul. The whole formed
+a frieze eighty feet long, and the separate compartments, each nine feet
+high, were originally divided by pilasters adorned with warlike ornaments.
+
+In the first piece, the trumpeters marching at the head of the procession
+open the pageant with a burst of warlike music, closely followed by
+standard-bearers carrying pictures of Cæsar’s victories, smoking censers,
+and a large bust of Roma Victrix. In the second, the gods of the captive
+cities are borne in chariots, a colossal Jupiter and Juno foremost, then
+a fine Cybele, and after these come trophies of armour, battering-rams,
+and other warlike implements, lifted high on men’s shoulders. The
+costlier part of the spoil follows in the third and fourth compartments,
+where strong men bend under the weight of vases filled with gold and
+treasures, and white heifers garlanded with flowers ready for sacrifice,
+are led by veiled priests and beautiful fair-haired youths in their white
+tunics and red girdles. In the fifth picture another band of trumpeters
+heralds the next division, and four large elephants, hung with gold
+chains and draperies, bear on their backs baskets of flowers and young
+children, who fan the flames of lighted candelabra. More trophies follow
+in the sixth compartment; the armour of captive princes is borne aloft
+on poles, and so great is its weight that one old soldier, exhausted by
+the load he bears, sits down to recover breath. In the next picture we
+reach the most interesting part of the procession—a train of captives who
+advance with slow and sorrowful steps, but not without an air of noble
+fortitude on their faces as they meet the jeers of the populace. Men and
+women of all ages are among them, proud chiefs, matrons of royal blood,
+sweet-faced maidens, a young bride with the myrtle wreath on her fair
+brow and a coral necklace round her throat. Close to her we see a mother
+bearing her youngest born in her arms and leading a boy by the hand, who
+cries to be taken up, while the old grandmother bends down to soothe him
+with caresses.
+
+In the eighth picture, immediately following this touching group, come
+the jesters and hideous buffoons, who mock the prisoners with their
+laughter and ape-like grimaces, and a troop of musicians singing and
+dancing to the sound of timbrels. After these we have another company of
+_signiferi_, this time bearing the eagles of the victorious legions and
+the she-wolf of Rome. Their faces are turned backwards, and their eager,
+expectant gaze prepare us for the coming of the conqueror, who appears in
+the last picture seated on a richly sculptured biga with sceptre and palm
+in his hand, and a laurel crown, which a winged Victory is in the act of
+placing on his brow. At his feet children shout for joy, and wave laurel
+boughs in his path; the multitude press round his chariot wheels and a
+gaily-clad youth, with eager enthusiasm in his upturned gaze, lifts aloft
+a banner bearing Cæsar’s well-known motto, _Veni, vidi, vici_, to meet
+the victor’s eyes.
+
+This subject now forms the last of the series but Mantegna’s original
+scheme included a tenth picture which he afterwards abandoned, probably
+because the hall for which the “Triumphs” were intended was not large
+enough to contain more than nine.
+
+An engraving, however, remains in which a body of Roman citizens,
+followed by the first ranks of the advancing legions, are represented
+marching in the conqueror’s progress; and the great procession, after
+reaching its culminating point, is thus brought to a tranquil close.
+Goethe, who knew the “Triumphs,” not indeed in the original, but from
+Andreani’s engravings, and who wrote a masterly criticism on the series,
+was the first to feel the need of a final scene to satisfy the eye, and
+to point out that this must have been the artist’s original design.
+
+Such, then, are the principal parts of this magnificent work, in which
+the love of antiquity, which was the ruling power of Mantegna’s genius,
+found its highest expression. It was a sentiment common to many artists
+in this age of revived learning, but while other men, like Botticelli or
+Piero della Francesca, saw pagan themes through the colouring of their
+own medieval fancies, he alone entered thoroughly into the true spirit of
+ancient art.
+
+A glance at the “Triumphs” is sufficient to show us how profoundly
+Mantegna had studied classical authors and how much freedom he had
+acquired in dealing with his subject.
+
+[Illustration: PART OF THE TRIUMPHS OF JULIUS CÆSAR. BY MANTEGNA.
+
+_At Hampton Court._]
+
+Those ancient Romans are no strangers to him; he has lived among them
+and mingled with them as freely as with men of his own day, the folds
+of their draperies, their very gait and countenance are all familiar
+to him. The same intimate knowledge of Roman times reveals itself in a
+hundred details; in the temples and viaducts of the background, in the
+mythological reliefs which adorn chariots, shields and breast-plates, in
+tablets bearing Latin inscriptions, in the triumphal arch under which
+Cæsar passes as he goes on his way. And here we may notice that Andrea,
+in one of the reliefs of this arch, has again introduced the “Twins” of
+Monte Cavallo, which during his visit to Rome he had doubtless seen with
+his own eyes in their time-honoured place on the Quirinal hill.
+
+In the execution of the “Triumphs” we observe the same high degree of
+finish, as in all his later work; the drapery hangs in the small folds
+of Greek sculpture, but without stiffness or formality; while the light
+and transparent colouring is admirably adapted in its softly-shaded
+tints to the general character of the subject. Evidently in this it was
+Mantegna’s intention to imitate as closely as possible the style of
+ancient painting. Unfortunately most of the pictures have suffered from
+repainting, and at the present day it needs a very minute examination to
+appreciate the delicacy of the fragments that have been left untouched.
+
+Both in the plastic tendency of form and in the principles of perspective
+which Mantegna has here successfully applied, we see the result of his
+earlier studies, modified and restrained by the experience of the thirty
+years which had passed since the days when he painted the Eremitani
+frescoes. Nothing can surpass the manner in which the whole of the
+splendid pageantry of the “Triumphs” is subdued and governed by the laws
+of composition, till every figure moves in perfect rhythm and harmony of
+line. We have only to look at the episode of the “Triumphs” by Rubens (in
+the National Gallery) to see how the subject, released from the severe
+restraint of Mantegna’s art, could degenerate into a Bacchanalian feast
+of wild beasts, revellers, and dancing women. But for all its sculptured
+tendencies and likenesses to a classic frieze, this great series is no
+procession of marble statues, cold and rigid in their antique beauty.
+The forms which pass before us in the long array are animated with life
+and warmth, their faces glow with the fire of human passion in all its
+endless varieties. Tender and youthful, or worn by age and care, exultant
+with the joy of victory, or bowed down to earth by a cruel fate, they
+are men and women like ourselves, and appeal to us by the instincts of
+a common humanity. In the well-known words of Goethe, “The study of the
+antique supplies form, nature gives movement and the last touch of life.”
+
+For more than a century the “Triumphs” of Mantegna remained in the hall
+of the palace for which they had been intended, and were seen there both
+by Vasari and the historian Mario Equicola. On festive occasions they
+were sometimes moved to the Castello di Corte, and in Andrea’s lifetime
+they were used as stage decorations when the comedies of Plautus and
+Terence were performed at the Court of Mantua.
+
+Several separate episodes of the “Triumphs” were engraved by Mantegna
+himself, and the complete series became generally known by the
+publication of the large wood-cuts by Andrea Andreani at the close of the
+sixteenth century.
+
+In 1628, a short time before the sack of Mantua, the pictures themselves
+were sold to Charles I., with several other masterpieces of the Gonzaga
+collection. After that monarch’s death on the scaffold they were again
+sold by the Parliament, but Cromwell bought them for £1,000.[3] Charles
+II. placed them in the palace at Hampton Court. There this precious
+series still remains, irreparably injured by frequent removal and
+repainting, but still in beauty and completeness both of design and
+execution one of the most remarkable works of the Italian Renaissance.
+
+The exact date of the completion of the “Triumphs” is fixed by a fresh
+grant of land which Francesco bestowed upon Mantegna in February, 1492,
+with an express mention of the great work which he had at length brought
+to a happy termination. “If the Marquis had loved him before, he loved
+him still more now,” says Vasari, and in reality Andrea seemed to have
+attained the highest pitch of honour and good fortune. For once his
+affairs were prosperous. In 1492 he sold his small property at Padua,
+and two years later furnished his own beautiful house in the quarter of
+St. Sebastian. At the same time he came to a final settlement with his
+Buscoldo creditors and exchanged land with his old enemy Aliprandi. His
+son, Lodovico, obtained a good appointment as overseer and agent to the
+Marquis at Cavriana, while Francesco, who was the least satisfactory
+of the two and frequently caused Andrea anxiety, embraced the artist’s
+profession and became his father’s assistant. Lastly, his only daughter,
+Taddea, was married, on the 4th of July, 1499, with two hundred and sixty
+ducats as her dowry, to Viano Vianesi, whom he styles “uomo prudente” in
+his letters.
+
+Besides these children by marriage Andrea had one other son, Gian’ Andrea
+by name, born in his old age after the death of his wife Niccolosia, and
+whom in his will of 1504 he mentions as being still a child.
+
+His improved circumstances seem to have softened his temper, and the only
+complaint we find in his letters to the Marquis at this time is that
+the stones which he had prepared for building in his yard are stolen in
+broad daylight, one of the thieves whom his son had caught in the act of
+carrying away his spoil under his mantle being an officer of Francesco’s
+household.
+
+We hear occasionally of his suffering from attacks of illness, but as
+a painter his powers were at their best, and many of his finest works
+belong to the period between his return from Rome and the close of the
+fifteenth century.
+
+Among classical subjects are the two beautiful pictures now in the
+Louvre, originally executed for the Marchioness Isabella’s “studio of
+the grotto,” a room which Andrea, Perugino, and Costa were all employed
+to decorate, and which became a complete museum of both antique and
+Renaissance art. Andrea painted several panels for this apartment at
+Isabella’s command, some we are told in imitation of bronze-reliefs,
+and one in which the prophet Jonah, is represented in the act of being
+cast into the sea; but the “Wisdom Victorious over the Vices” and the
+“Parnassus,” both in the Louvre, are the only works of the series which
+have come down to posterity. Both closely resemble the “Triumphs” in
+style of modelling and in delicacy of finish. One is an allegorical
+composition, such as Botticelli might have painted, in which Minerva
+and Diana, led by Wisdom bearing a torch, are driving out a tribe of
+Vices under the forms of centaurs and satyrs, while Justice, Force, and
+Temperance hover in the air, about to return to earth.
+
+The form of the avenging goddesses is essentially classic in type, and
+the trees of the background show that loving care in each leaf which
+entitles Mantegna to a foremost place among the foliage painters of the
+age. The other, perhaps the most poetic of all Andrea’s conceptions,
+brings before us a pleasant landscape where the Muses dance hand in hand
+to the music of Apollo’s lyre, while Mercury leans on the neck of Pegasus
+hard by, and Mars and Venus pause from their embraces to listen to the
+enchanted sound. Brighter tints than Andrea generally employs enliven
+the scene, and in the light fluttering drapery and measured stop of the
+dancing nine there is a grace and charm of movement which no contemporary
+painter ever surpassed.
+
+These groups of dancing nymphs became a favourite motive with Mantegna,
+and form the subject of one of his engravings as well as of a finished
+drawing, exceedingly graceful and charming in design, now at Munich.
+Classical subjects at this time occupied a great part of his thoughts,
+and some of his finest engravings, the “Battle of the Sea-Gods,”
+“Hercules and Antæus,” and the “Bacchanalia,” belong to this period.
+Closely related to these are the beautiful drawings of the British Museum
+to which Mr. Comyns Carr recently called attention, the “Mars, Diana and
+Venus,” which in ideal beauty of form yields to none of Andrea’s designs,
+and the long frieze-shaped composition of “Calumny,” after the pattern
+of Apelles’s last picture, which these artists of the early Renaissance
+delighted to recall.
+
+Several other precious drawings by Mantegna belong the Christ Church
+collection, Oxford. Chief among them is the original composition for his
+celebrated engraving of the “Entombment,” and a fine example of another
+of his favourite subjects, “Hercules killing the Lion,” inscribed _Divo
+Herculi invicto_. Many more are in the hands of private collectors, and
+a whole volume containing twenty-six sheets of mythological subjects was
+exhibited in the Grosvenor Gallery in 1878, by Miss Hannah de Rothschild
+(now Lady Rosebery).
+
+Among the other drawings of remarkable merit now scattered over Europe,
+we will only mention the “Judgment of Solomon” in the Louvre, the
+“Sagrifizio,” which forms the chief ornament of the Verona Museum, and
+the well-known “Judith” of the Uffizi (see page 37), which once belonged
+to Vasari, and bears the date of February, 1491.
+
+It was not in the nature of Mantegna’s art to cast off a hasty sketch,
+or to leave to the world faces of rare loveliness drawn in a few pencil
+strokes as it were at random on the paper. Whether he was engaged on the
+cartoon of an altar-piece, or on a simple pattern of a cup or fountain,
+all he achieved was marked by the same patient, untiring labour, the
+same minute care, above all by the same feeling for beauty in every
+detail. Many of us remember that exquisite design for a chalice which
+attracted general attention in one of our last winter exhibitions. It is
+true the perspective of the Cup was faulty, but this defect was scarcely
+noticed in the beauty of the work, with which every part of the chalice
+was covered. Scenes from the life of Christ, cherub heads and elaborate
+scroll work adorned the border of the Cup. Apostles and prophets were
+figured on its base, while the stem was studded with rows of lovely
+babies and angel heads, executed with a grace and delicacy which rendered
+the whole a perfect marvel of decorative art. And so it is with his
+larger drawings, whether classical or religious in subject. Each hair in
+the head of his “Judith” is distinctly drawn, there is the same attention
+to form in the folds of her falling drapery, or, to take another
+instance—the fair faces of the youth and maiden in the procession of the
+_Sagrifizio_. Both are designs in the best spirit of classical art, and
+remind us of the finest Greek sculpture.
+
+We have said that pagan themes occupied much of Mantegna’s imagination
+during the years immediately following the conclusion of the “Triumphs,”
+but the three large altar-pieces which also belong to this period
+must not be passed over. In the first place we have the “Madonna
+della Vittoria,” now in the Louvre, perhaps the noblest of all his
+religious pictures. This altar-piece was painted by order of the Marquis
+Francesco to commemorate his pretended victory at Fornovo, where he had
+encountered the French, but, far from being victorious, had lost the
+greater part of his army, and narrowly escaped with his life. A curious
+circumstance characteristic of the manners of the times is connected with
+this painting.
+
+[Illustration: THE MADONNA DELLA VITTORIA. BY MANTEGNA.
+
+_In the Louvre, Paris._]
+
+A Jew of Villafranca, Daniele Norsa by name, in the year 1495 bought
+a house in Mantua which had a Madonna painted over the door, and
+fearing any accidental misfortune to the picture might excite popular
+displeasure, prudently obtained leave from the bishop to remove the
+sacred image. Even this step was turned to his prejudice, and on
+Ascension Day his house was attacked by the mob and narrowly escaped
+destruction. The Jew appealed to the Marquis for protection, and
+ultimately his case was brought before a tribunal, which condemned him,
+by way of reparation for the supposed insult to the Virgin, to place a
+new picture painted by Mantegna in one of the Mantuan churches. In the
+meantime the battle of Fornovo took place, and Francesco, who in the hour
+of danger had vowed to erect a church in Mantua to the Virgin, resolved
+to gratify popular feeling and give greater effect to the fulfilment of
+his vow by placing the building on the spot where the Madonna’s honour
+had been slighted. Accordingly he bought Norsa’s house, and on the
+anniversary of the battle, July 6th, 1496, the votive Madonna painted
+by Mantegna for the occasion was placed above the high altar of the
+newly erected church with great popular rejoicing. Three hundred years
+afterwards the French carried off this picture, which was originally
+intended to celebrate the victory over their nation, in triumph to Paris,
+where it still remains.
+
+Few perhaps of Andrea’s larger works are as generally and deservedly
+popular. The mild Virgin, in blue hood and mantle, sitting under her
+leafy bower hung with fruit and coral and gay with twittering birds, is
+familiar to all visitors to the Louvre. Both mother and child stretch
+out their hands in blessing towards the kneeling Marquis, whose life-like
+portrait excited the universal admiration of contemporaries. Opposite
+him, the venerable form of St. Elizabeth is seen kneeling at the side of
+the young St. John, who stands on the carved pedestal of the Virgin’s
+throne, and in the background are the patron saints of Mantua, Andrew and
+Longinus. More beautiful than either of these are the two warrior saints,
+Michael and George, who stand in full armour on either side, holding the
+hem of the Virgin’s mantle, and who, with their noble features, manly
+forms, and flowing masses of fair locks, are perfect types of Christian
+chivalry—in other words, of that union of strength and tenderness which
+is held to constitute the heroic character.
+
+The “Virgin” of the National Gallery, long in the possession of
+different Milanese families, bears a close resemblance, both in style
+and execution, to the “Madonna della Vittoria,” and was probably painted
+about the same time. Here the Virgin is seated under a red baldacchino
+between St. Mary Magdalen and the Baptist, who stand erect against a
+background of dark green orange-trees and silver-clouded sky. The face
+of the Magdalen is lighted with the glad enthusiasm of her love, and in
+the foliage we notice the same careful finish as in the bowers of the
+“Parnassus” and in the leaf-painting of all Mantegna’s works.
+
+To the same period and class of picture belongs the “Glorified Madonna”
+which Andrea painted for the monks of Santa Maria in Organo of Verona,
+now in the Casa Trivulzi at Milan. Here the Madonna is enthroned on the
+clouds, with four life-sized saints; a landscape of tall lemon-trees is
+behind her. A troop of singing boy-angels hover in the air, after the
+fashion of the Camera degli Sposi frescoes, and one bears a scroll with
+the inscription:—
+
+               “A Mantinia p. an. gracie 1497, 15 Augusti.”
+
+[Illustration: VIRGIN AND CHILD, WITH ST. JOHN AND THE MAGDALEN. BY
+MANTEGNA.
+
+_In the National Gallery, London._]
+
+The small blue-mantled “Madonna” of Bergamo, and a good portrait of a
+Gonzaga in the same collection, may have been painted towards the close
+of the century, to which period the engravings of the “Triumphs” and
+several other subjects are assigned. Finally, among the labours which
+occupied the last months of 1499, was the commission to design a monument
+of Virgil for the chief square of Mantua. The plan originated with the
+Marchioness Isabella, who consulted the learned Latinists, Pontanus and
+Vergerius, at Naples, as to the best mode of carrying her scheme into
+effect. They suggested Mantegna as the natural person to furnish a design
+for the monument, and he entered warmly into a project so well suited to
+the spirit of the age. We can hardly imagine a commission more congenial
+to a painter so imbued with Latin traditions as Mantegna, and the statue
+which he designed was worthy of the occasion, as the drawing recently
+discovered in the collection of M. His de la Salle abundantly proves.
+Virgil is represented crowned with laurel and holding the Æneid in his
+hands, while winged boys on the pedestal at his feet support a tablet
+with the words:—
+
+             “P. Vergilii Maronis a æternæ sui memoriæ imago.”
+
+Unfortunately, Andrea never had the satisfaction of seeing this design
+executed in bronze or marble. Whether Francesco’s treasures were expended
+in wars, or whether Isabella’s intention was only a caprice of the
+moment, the scheme was abandoned, and Mantua remained without a monument
+of her greatest son.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+LAST WORKS AND DEATH: HIS INFLUENCE ON ART, 1500-1506.
+
+
+During more than forty years Andrea had now lived at Mantua in the
+service of the Gonzagas. Both at their court and throughout Italy he
+was held in the highest honour, and enjoyed a degree of favour and
+consideration which, but few artists have known in their lifetime. His
+children were, with the one exception of Gian’ Andrea, grown up and
+well provided for; he had lands and possessions of his own both in
+town and country and what he valued even more—a collection of precious
+antiquities. Behind him lay a whole lifetime of great works, and although
+now in his seventieth year his powers as yet showed no trace of weakness
+or failing. We have seen how rich in works of every branch of art was
+this last decade of the fifteenth century; how untiring was his activity,
+and how fresh and inexhaustible the treasures of his imagination.
+Everything seemed to foretell an old age of honour and prosperity, in
+which the great master should still charm men by the creations of his
+brain and hand, and yet as his bodily powers grew weaker should enjoy
+more of the repose to which he was so well entitled. But this was not
+to be, and the last few years of Mantegna’s lifetime are a weary record
+of sorrows and misfortune. Again we find him involved in pecuniary
+difficulties, brought on by his own extravagance, and very probably
+by that of his son, Francesco; in order to meet his liabilities he was
+compelled to part with the beautiful house which he had decorated with
+his own hand, and to live in lodgings, which he disliked extremely. Yet,
+with the strange recklessness that formed part of his character, we find
+him entering into new and imprudent engagements. In March, 1504, he made
+a will, leaving a sum of money to his son Francesco and the chief part
+of his fortune to Lodovico, together with the charge of bringing up
+the child Gian’ Andrea, in whose favour he afterwards altered certain
+provisions. At the same time he left two hundred ducats for the endowment
+of the chapel of San Giovanni, in Alberti’s large church of Sant’ Andrea,
+as a burial-place for himself and his family. Special mention is made
+of his wife, Niccolosia, who had died some years before; and masses are
+ordered to be said for the repose of her soul. In August of the same
+year (1504) he obtained possession of this chapel by a contract with
+Sigismondo Gonzaga, Bishop of Mantua, and the canons of the church. Its
+decoration now became his favourite scheme, and it was his intention to
+paint the walls in fresco and to erect a family monument there. He bought
+a piece of ground outside to prevent the windows from being blocked up
+by building, and announced his intention of turning it into a garden,
+where he could spend his time in summer, and build a small room, where
+he might keep himself warm in winter, “in order,” he adds touchingly,
+“that I may take a little rest in my old age.” But all this expenditure
+became the cause of fresh difficulties, and added to the burdens under
+which Andrea already groaned. Other trials came to sadden his old age.
+His son Francesco incurred the displeasure of the Marquis by some grave
+misconduct, and neither Andrea’s tears nor the intercession of Isabella
+could prevent his banishment from Mantua in 1505. This disgrace was a
+heavy blow to Andrea, who owned that his son had offended grievously,
+but thought that his fault might have been overlooked in consideration of
+his own services. “Messer Andrea,” wrote Isabella to her husband, “has
+just now been to see me, so full of tears and so altered in countenance
+that he seemed to me more dead than alive.”
+
+But his activity was undiminished, and, heavy as his heart might be,
+brain and hand were still the same as ever. We find him returning to a
+favourite subject of earlier days in the “St. Sebastian,” originally
+ordered by the Bishop of Mantua, but now in possession of the Scarpa
+family at La Motta, in Friuli. The life-sized figure, lean in proportions
+and suffering in expression, has a grandeur of its own. At the feet of
+the saint is a lighted candle, which sends a thin blue smoke upwards, and
+makes us wonder at its meaning, until we read the words on the scroll
+which hangs to the coral string above—_Nil nisi divinum stabile est,
+cætera fumus_.
+
+This, then, was the conclusion to which he had come at the end of that
+long life full of works and honour; this the conviction that old age and
+gathering troubles were forcing upon the mind of the great painter, who
+had seen so clearly and felt so keenly the beauty and the joy of life.
+
+In that same sad year of his son’s banishment he commenced another of
+the classic friezes which he loved to paint. This was the splendid
+composition known as the “Triumph of Scipio,” now in the National
+Gallery, which a wealthy Venetian named Francesco Cornaro ordered and
+paid for in part in 1505, but which, to his great indignation, was still
+in Andrea’s studio at the time of his death, when it was seized upon by
+creditors nearer at hand.
+
+The real subject of this work, executed in chiaroscuro on a background
+painted to imitate red marble, is the reception of Cybele among the
+deities of Rome. A colossal bust of the Phrygian goddess is borne in
+state into the presence of Scipio, who receives the messenger in
+consular array; while Claudia Quinta, a Roman lady, kneeling at his feet,
+welcomes the image with outstretched arms. Every gradation of movement is
+represented here, from the swift tread of the bearers on whose shoulders
+the goddess advances, to the motionless forms of the Roman soldiers who
+stand grouped around Scipio; and nothing is more striking than the skill
+with which the artist brings this rapid action by degrees to a complete
+pause. The general character of the piece, its costumes, figures, and
+draperies, all recall the “Triumphs.” It is, as it were, a last echo of
+the great composition whose harmonies still lingered on in Mantegna’s
+ears.
+
+Before the end of the year Andrea, tired of a wandering life, had again
+bought a house, this time in the Contrada Unicorno, and settled himself
+there for the winter, promising to pay the owner three hundred and forty
+ducats in three instalments. It was an unwise venture, as the issue
+too soon proved. A plague drove the wealthier Mantuans from the city,
+provisions became scarce, and his own health began to give way. Still
+he remained in Mantua and painted on manfully, endeavouring to finish a
+mythological picture of Comus, which Isabella had ordered. But it was in
+vain. He could not work fast enough to satisfy his creditors, and when
+pressed to pay the stipulated sum for his house he was compelled to apply
+to the Marchioness for help.
+
+Isabella was then at a villa near Cavriana, and Andrea wrote to her in
+pathetic terms, telling her of his distress, and offering to her for
+sale the one of all his antiques which he most valued, “_la mia cara
+Faustina_.” Often in brighter days great masters and connoisseurs had
+wished to buy this bust, but he had refused all their offers, and now
+since part from it he must, the Marchioness is the only person to whom he
+can bear to give it up.
+
+Strange as it seems, Isabella did not answer this letter, and with a
+meanness unworthy of her wrote to her servant, Jacopo Calandra, telling
+him to bargain with Andrea and obtain the Faustina at the lowest price
+possible.
+
+This unkindness cut Mantegna to the heart, and when Calandra communicated
+Isabella’s answer to him, he refused angrily to part with the bust for
+less than the hundred ducats which had been offered him in former days.
+Isabella, however, was determined to have it, and on the 1st of August
+Calandra was able to write:—“Your Excellency will be glad to hear that I
+have at last obtained possession of Andrea Mantegna’s Faustina. He gave
+the bust into my hands with great reluctance, recommending it to my care
+with much solicitude, and with such demonstrations of jealous affection
+that if he were not to see it again for six days I feel convinced he
+would die.” The words were to come true sooner than Isabella or Calandra
+had expected. Andrea could bear to part with houses and lands, but the
+marble was dear to him as his own flesh and blood, and the parting with
+it broke his heart.
+
+He was already ill at the time, and six weeks later he died, on Sunday,
+the 13th of September, 1506. To the last the old spirit of loyalty to the
+Gonzagas did not leave him, and his son Francesco, writing to inform the
+Marquis of the sad event, describes how a few minutes before his death he
+asked for his master, and grieved much to think that he should never see
+him again.
+
+Francesco was at that time at Perugia, whither he had gone to meet Pope
+Julius II., and had little time or thought for the great painter who
+had just passed away. Isabella scarcely troubled herself more, and in a
+letter full of joyous congratulations to her husband on his entry into
+Perugia, merely alludes to Mantegna’s death:—“You know Messer Andrea
+died suddenly a few days after your departure.” There were others who
+felt more deeply and judged more rightly of the loss which the world
+had sustained in Mantegna’s death. Albrecht Durer was at that time in
+Venice, on his way to visit the great Lombard artist whose engravings had
+filled him with admiration, and from whom he had learnt perhaps more than
+from any other master. His purpose was frustrated by the news of Andrea’s
+sudden death, and in later years he was often heard to say that he looked
+upon this as the saddest event of his whole life. Another graceful
+tribute to Mantegna’s memory was paid by a certain Lorenzo di Pavia, a
+collector of antiquities and objects of art, who had known Mantegna at
+the court of Mantua, and who, on hearing of his unexpected death, wrote
+to Isabella in these terms:—“I grieve deeply over the loss of our Messer
+Andrea Mantegna, for in truth a most excellent painter, another Apelles,
+I may say, is gone from us. But I believe that God will employ him
+elsewhere on some great and beautiful work. For my part, I know that I
+shall never see again so fine an artist and designer. Farewell.”
+
+The melancholy history of Mantegna’s difficulties did not end with his
+death, and his sons had a hard task to satisfy his creditors. One hundred
+ducats were still owing to the bishop and canons for the mortuary chapel,
+and Cardinal Gonzaga, Bishop of Mantua, laid an embargo on the contents
+of his studio. Francesco Mantegna had to obtain the permission of the
+Marquis to sell the pictures that still remained there, among which he
+names the “Triumph of Scipio,” which Cornaro had never received, the “St.
+Sebastian,” now at La Motta in Friuli, and the famous _Cristo in scurto_.
+
+By this means his debts were paid, and a settlement of his affairs
+concluded. Francesco Gonzaga seems to have behaved kindly, and both
+Andrea’s sons continued in his service, Lodovico as agent, while
+Francesco succeeded to his father’s place, and painted by turns in the
+palaces of Mantua, Gonzaga, and Marmirolo.
+
+The remains of the great master were buried in his own chapel of Sant’
+Andrea, where half a century later his grandson placed a bronze bust,
+supposed to have been the work of the medallist Sperandio, and which,
+after being taken to Paris in 1797, has been restored to its place on
+Mantegna’s tomb.
+
+The chapel itself is bare and dingy, its walls are whitewashed, rubbish
+heaps are allowed to litter the floor, and the general aspect is of the
+most cheerless description. But the gloomy surroundings only serve to
+heighten the imposing grandeur of the bust.
+
+The sculptor has caught the spirit which animated the great master, and
+has represented Mantegna, after the manner of an old Roman, wearing
+a laurel wreath on the thick clusters of hair that shade the deeply
+furrowed brows and massive features with which more than one portrait in
+his own frescoes has made us familiar. We seem to feel the fiery flashes
+of that piercing eye bent upon us, and to realise the iron strength and
+unbending force of the genius which no difficulty could dismay, and no
+labour exhaust.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Sperandio’s bust is almost the only thing in Mantua which still speaks
+of Andrea. The perishing frescoes are still to be seen in the deserted
+palace, and the walls of the house in which he once lived are standing;
+but in this city, where he painted for nearly fifty years, his name
+is forgotten, and while every child in the streets will talk to you
+of Giulio Romano and the Hall of the Giants, scarcely a creature in
+the place has ever heard Mantegna’s name. His Faustina is preserved
+among other antiques in the public museum, where visitors can see for
+themselves the classic outline of the features which he loved so well;
+but the custodian, who unlocks the hall, and has much to say of the many
+statues, passes by this one in silence, or wonders why it is we linger
+before this bust, unmindful of the tragic story which has invested the
+marble with so deep an interest.
+
+[Illustration: THE CRUCIFIXION. BY MANTEGNA.
+
+_In the Louvre, Paris._]
+
+The name of Mantegna, however, is not one that depends on local fame, and
+there can be no difference of opinion as to the important place which
+he holds in the history of the Renaissance. We have only to consider
+how great and widespread was the influence which his works exercised on
+contemporary art both in Italy and Germany. If we examine the different
+schools of North Italy we shall find that there is scarcely one which did
+not receive some new impulse from his powerful genius.
+
+His son Francesco followed in his father’s steps, and worked in the
+same lines without ever rising above the level of mediocrity. The few
+scholars and assistants he had in Mantua imitated his example, and
+whatever remnants of art were still to be found in Padua bore the stamp
+of Andrea’s earliest style.
+
+In Venice we recognise his vigour and precision of outline, and
+the classical tendency of his types, not only in the works of his
+brothers-in-law, the Bellini, but in those also of the rival Murano
+painter, Luigi Vivarini. Montagna and Buonconsiglio at Vicenza, Ercole
+Grandi and Cosimo Tura at Ferrara, alike formed their style upon his,
+while the best Veronese masters were all either his followers or
+imitators.
+
+We know that Caroto and Bonsignori assisted him in the execution of his
+later works, while his influence is even more apparent in the works of
+Liberale, Girolamo dai Libri, and Francesco Morone. The masterpiece of
+the last-named artist, the frescoes on the walls and ceiling of the
+sacristy of Santa Maria in Organo, at Verona, are indeed exact imitations
+of the style of decoration adopted by Mantegna in the Camera degli Sposi.
+We trace the same all-prevailing Mantegnesque in the works of Lorenzo
+Costa, who spent some years of his life in Mantua, and if we are to
+believe Vasari it is to the stimulus of Mantegna’s example that we owe
+the inspiration which made a painter of Francia.
+
+The link which binds Mantegna to the Umbrians is as yet uncertain,
+but even if Melozzo da Forli in his Roman frescoes derived no help or
+suggestion from Andrea, Giovanni Santi’s stanzas remain to show us how
+intimate was his acquaintance with the Paduan master’s works.
+
+If from contemporary art we pass to the culminating period of the
+Renaissance, we find Raphael taking him as his model in more than one
+instance. The likeness of the boy-angels of the Camera degli Sposi to
+the famous cherubs of the “Madonna di San Sisto” has been frequently
+remarked, and in the bearers of the dead Christ, who walk backwards in
+the Borghese “Entombment,” we find a distinct reminiscence of Andrea’s
+great engraving.
+
+Again, in the treatment of antique themes, Raphael often approaches
+Mantegna, and we have little doubt that both he and Leonardo had closely
+studied the works of their illustrious predecessor.
+
+Perhaps the actual connection between Mantegna and Michelangelo is less
+capable of demonstration, but the strength and energy of expression
+which were so remarkable features in the genius of both men, as well as
+a certain resemblance in their characters, form a link which binds them
+together.
+
+A very different artist, Correggio, who married a Mantuan wife, owes his
+knowledge of the laws of perspective and composition in a large measure
+to the study of Mantegna’s works, and, whether or not he visited Mantua
+himself, probably derived the first idea of the dome-painting for which
+he became famous from the ceiling of the Camera degli Sposi.
+
+But this is not all. The engravings of Mantegna spread his influence
+beyond the limits of Italy into countries north of the Alps. There was
+a robustness, vigour, and grave earnestness of purpose, as well as a
+fantastic element in his art, which attracted the Teutonic mind, and it
+is perhaps not too much to say that he influenced German art more than
+any other Italian painter.
+
+We have already alluded to Albrecht Dürer’s admiration for his works and
+anxiety to become personally acquainted with him. A further proof of the
+fascination which drew him to Mantegna appears in the highly-finished
+copies of the “Bacchanalia” and “Battle of the Sea Gods,” which Dürer
+executed with his own hand, and in the St. John of “The Entombment”
+which, unable to forget, he introduced in his own “Crucifixion” of 1508.
+Professor Colvin has pointed out how much he learnt from the Italian
+master in the delineation of passionate movement, and how close is the
+affinity between the avenging angels of Dürer’s “Apocalypse” and the
+angry Tritons of Mantegna’s engraving.
+
+Nor is Dürer alone among northern painters in his adoption of
+Mantegnesque motives. Holbein repeatedly availed himself of those
+episodes of the “Triumphs” which he knew from Andrea’s own engravings in
+his works at Busle and Lucerne; and a portfolio of Mantegna’s works was
+numbered among the treasures of art in Rembrandt’s possession.
+
+More singular is the admiration which Rubens conceived for an artist
+with whom he can have had few points in common, yet we find him visiting
+Mantua in order to study Andrea’s works, and reproducing a scene from the
+“Triumphs” after his own fashion.
+
+We have already seen the great honour in which Andrea was held during
+his lifetime. That he was equally esteemed by the succeeding generation
+we learn from the verses of Ariosto, who places him next to Leonardo in
+his “Orlando.” High as the praise is, we cannot think it excessive, for
+Mantegna stands half-way between those men who first brought art to life
+again, and those who carried it to the highest degree of perfection, and
+he occupies the foremost place among the artists of the mid-Renaissance,
+who saw how much was wanting before farther progress could be attained,
+and allowed no difficulties to stop them in their endeavour to acquire
+knowledge.
+
+With this end in view no research was dull, no toil wearisome. He
+embraced the driest studios with the passionate ardour of his nature, and
+gave life to the scientific problems which he attempted to solve by the
+very force of his great zeal.
+
+At the same time he brought to the task a degree of culture rare
+among the men of his class, and both his friendship with scholars and
+antiquarians and his own classical studies were productive of the most
+important results for Italian painting. He is the chief representative
+in art of that revival of learning which was the leading intellectual
+impulse of the age; and, by bringing this influence to bear upon
+painting, he won a great step in the History of its development. First
+among the artists of the Renaissance, he saw with unerring instinct the
+path by which art would attain her final triumphs. Early in his career
+the conviction had forced itself upon his soul that the most perfect
+models of beauty are to be sought in antique art, but that this very
+perfection can only be reached by a minute and faithful study of nature.
+To reconcile anew these two principles, to combine in his work classic
+grace and human action, became the aim of his life, the task which he
+most nearly achieved in the “Triumphs”—although even there he is not
+always successful.
+
+“We are conscious,” wrote Goethe, “of a sense of conflict, but this
+conflict is surely the highest in which ever artist was engaged.” The
+perfect union of the two principles was to be effected by artists of the
+next generation, and where Mantegna had sown Raphael and Leonardo were to
+reap.
+
+It is this sense of conflicting elements, this occasional antagonism
+between the ideal form after which he strove and the actual fact present
+before his eyes, which has given rise to so much mistaken criticism of
+Mantegna’s work. By some critics of the very first rank he is called a
+mere realist, while on the other hand the old reproach that he neglected
+the study of real life to copy statues has been repeated till it has
+grown wearisome.
+
+Although it is easy to trace their origin, both charges are equally
+unjust. No man had ever a more thorough knowledge of nature, or was
+more keenly alive to the minutest details of everyday life around him.
+But something he felt was needed to lift this changeful scene, with its
+seething throng of human thought and action, into the atmosphere of
+perfect art.
+
+It is just that touch of grace, that power to ennoble and refine which
+the Greeks understood so well, that Mantegna felt and sought after in
+days of long and arduous toil. If at times a certain rigidity of form, a
+carelessness of desire to please, is visible in his work, it is because
+in his anxiety to obtain his end he occasionally omitted these minor
+matters. But to say that Mantegna was alike destitute of feeling for
+beauty and of spiritual perception appears to us simple blindness.
+
+In knowledge and mastery of the human form, in skill and finish of
+workmanship, in wealth of imagery and creative thought, few have ever
+surpassed him.
+
+In dramatic energy and intensity of expression he stands unrivalled by
+any but Michelangelo. Every variety of emotion, every passion that can
+swell the breast of man is included within the range of his experience.
+He knew where to seek the purest springs of joy, and in darker hours
+his strong soul had fathomed the lowest depths of the most unutterable
+anguish. The sportive dances of laughing cherubs and nymphs, the
+pleasures and pains of such mythical creatures as Tritons and Nereids,
+satyrs and sea-monsters, the sublime and rapt devotion of a Magdalen,
+the heroism of a Sebastian, were all familiar to him. He enters in the
+fullest manner into the exultant joy of the victors returning with their
+long array of spoils and captives from the fight, and yet in the midst of
+the mighty triumphal procession he pauses to show us the innocent child
+stretching out its little arms to its mother.
+
+But more than all he loved to paint the rage of violent passion, the wild
+gestures of uncontrollable grief. There are certain figures into which he
+seems to have concentrated either the tempest of the most ungovernable
+fury or the agony of the bitterest despair. Once seen, these creations of
+his brain refuse to loose their hold on our imaginations, and remain to
+haunt us with their terrible forms, just as the wailing St. John of “The
+Entombment” was ever present to Albrecht Dürer’s mind.
+
+The very greatness of Mantegna’s genius, its immense strength and power,
+may in itself be the cause that he is not strictly speaking a popular
+artist. His works have never been, perhaps they will never become, the
+enthusiastic object of general worship. But within the last few years the
+number of his admirers has increased steadily, and his high merit has
+received the fullest recognition from some of our most cultured writers.
+
+That this circle will widen year by year, as a larger number of students
+are drawn to examine for themselves those works of Mantegna which are
+fortunately within the reach of us all, we feel confident. It is scarcely
+necessary to add the expression of our conviction that to those who
+attentively consider them, no works yield a more genuine and lasting
+pleasure, while assuredly there are none that better repay the devotion
+of a life-long study.
+
+
+
+
+FRANCESCO RAIBOLINI
+
+CALLED
+
+FRANCIA
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+FRANCIA.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+EARLY ART IN BOLOGNA, A.D. 1300-1450.
+
+
+From the earliest days of the revival of Italian painting the city of
+Bologna was distinguished for the cultivation of art, and could boast a
+regular succession of native painters. The names of several of these men
+have been preserved by old writers, and we hear of a Guido, a Ventura,
+and Ursone, who flourished in the thirteenth century. But the honour of
+having been the real founder of the school is ascribed by the historian
+Malvasia to a miniaturist known by the name of Franco Bolognese, who
+lived in the time of Dante and Giotto. Since, however, none of his works
+have come down to the present day, we have no opportunity of studying his
+style, and all that we know is that he was a pupil of the miniaturist
+Oderisio da Gubbio, and is said by Dante to have eclipsed his master in
+the same way that Giotto surpassed Cimabue.
+
+[Illustration: FRANCESCO RAIBOLINI.]
+
+When Virgil and Dante meet Oderisio expiating the sin of pride in
+purgatory, he tells them mournfully that the pictures which Franco now
+paints are fairer than his own, and that the honour once his now belongs
+to his scholar. So it has been in Dante’s own city of Florence, where
+once Cimabue held undisputed possession of the field, and now the fame is
+all Giotto’s. For what after all is the voice of earthly fame? Nothing
+but an idle breath of wind that blows first from one quarter, then from
+another, ever fitful and inconstant.
+
+But if Franco Bolognese’s only hope of immortality rests on Dante’s
+noble lines, the works of his pupils are still to be seen in Bologna,
+and afford us some idea of native art in these early times. Chief among
+them was Vitale, who painted in the first half of the fourteenth century,
+and whose few remaining pictures are marked by a softness and delicacy
+of workmanship which reveal the Umbrian origin of the school of Gubbio.
+A “Madonna and Angels,” painted by him in the year 1320 for the ancient
+church of the Madonna del Monte, and now preserved in the Gallery of
+Bologna, has a sweetness and humility of expression which approaches
+contemporary Sienese art, and the faces of his virgins are not unworthy
+precursors of Francia’s Madonna. The same manner was further developed in
+the paintings of his best scholar, Lippo Dalmasii, whose virgins acquired
+so wide a reputation as to win for him the surname of “Lippo delle
+Madonne.”
+
+This artist, who lived at the close of the fourteenth century, and
+painted between 1376 and 1410, was held in universal respect for the
+holiness of his life and character. His devout habits are recorded by
+Malvasia, who tells us that, before commencing a picture of the Virgin,
+he invariably spent the night in prayer and fasting, and received
+communion on the morning of the day itself. In his lifetime he was the
+most popular artist of Bologna, and his pictures were so much in request
+that he could scarcely paint fast enough to supply the demand. “No family
+was considered rich in Bologna,” says Malvasia, “which did not possess
+one of his Madonnas.”
+
+After Lippo’s death his Madonnas were revered as sacred images, and were
+only uncovered on festivals dedicated to the Virgin. Several are still to
+be seen in the ancient churches of Bologna, and a lunetto of the “Virgin
+between St. Sixtus and St. Benedict” over the portal of San Procolo, is
+pointed out as the very picture which excited the admiration of Pope
+Clement VIII. On returning from the conquest of Ferrara, he is said to
+have paused before Lippo’s “Virgin,” and, saluting it with the utmost
+devotion, to have exclaimed that no other images ever touched him as
+deeply as those painted by the old Bologna master. In later days, Guido
+professed an extraordinary veneration for Lippo’s Madonnas, and often
+declared that some supernatural influence must have guided the artist’s
+pencil, since no modern painter could ever succeed in designing a figure
+of so much purity and holiness.
+
+In spite of these enthusiastic expressions it is impossible to give Lippo
+a high place among his contemporaries, and this Fra Angelico of Bologna
+is as far below the friar of St. Marco as the school of his native city
+is inferior to that of Florence.
+
+One of Lippo’s pictures, originally in the Ercolani Palace at Bologna, is
+now in the National Gallery, and may be taken as a fair specimen of his
+style. The Virgin, embracing her child, appears in mid-air surrounded by
+a circular glory, angels hover above, and a flowery meadow lies below.
+There is a good deal of religious feeling and maternal tenderness in the
+Madonna’s face, and some attempt at rendering natural movement, without
+either beauty of type or skill of workmanship.
+
+Side by side with the mystic traditions of the Madonna painter we trace a
+more vigorous vein in the early school of Bologna, and see decided proofs
+of the Giottesque influences which had already reached its artists.
+This Florentine tendency is prominent in the works of both Simone dai
+Crocifissi and Jacopo degli Avanzi, the only two other Bolognese
+painters of this period who deserve mention.
+
+According to Malvasia, Simone executed nothing but crucifixes, and
+although other paintings at Bologna are attributed to him, this was no
+doubt the chief branch of art in which he was engaged. The best of his
+crucifixes are those in San Giacomo Maggiore, and in the fourth of the
+seven churches belonging to the ancient pile of San Stefano, in both of
+which he to a great extent follows Giotto’s example, but retains much of
+the bad taste of Byzantine art in the emaciation of the figure and the
+grimace of the attendant saints.
+
+Much of the same ugliness of type, accompanied by greater truth and
+character, is visible in the curious “Crucifixion” on gold ground,
+ascribed to Jacopo degli Avanzi, in the Colonna Gallery at Rome, and in
+the other altar-pieces which bear his name at Bologna. The personality of
+this artist has been a cause of endless controversy, but at least it has
+been shown that Vasari is clearly wrong in confusing him with d’Avanzo
+of Verona, who assisted Altichieri in painting the chapel of St. George
+at Padua. Whether Avanzi of Bologna is identical with the Jacobus Pauli
+who painted the “Coronation of the Virgin” in San Giacomo Maggiore, is
+a matter of small importance; but what we know for certain is, that a
+Bolognese painter by name Jacopo, whom Vasari probably rightly calls
+Avanzo, was the best of all the different artists who painted in that
+most interesting of all Bologna churches, the Madonna della Mezzaratta.
+This small chapel, called by Lanzi the Campo-Santo of Bologna, was built
+in the twelfth century outside the Porta San Mammolo, and decorated with
+frescoes in the fourteenth by a succession of native painters. Vasari
+alludes to it more than once in his “Lives” as the _Casa di Mezzo_,
+and speaks of the series painted there by Jacopo d’Avanzo, Cristofano,
+Simone, and at a later period by Galassi of Ferrara.
+
+The frescoes of the Mezzaratta were no doubt the most important works of
+art achieved by early Bolognese painters, and—although their execution
+is too rude, and their present condition too imperfect to allow of
+comparison with the productions of Giotto and his scholars at Padua and
+Assisi—the scanty fragments that remain are still of the deepest interest
+to the student.
+
+The most celebrated artists of later ages who had the advantage of seeing
+these frescoes in a comparatively good state of preservation are said
+to have held them in the highest esteem. Michelangelo himself visited
+the chapel and praised its paintings in the warmest terms, while the
+Carracci exerted themselves strenuously to save them from destruction.
+Unfortunately, later generations have been less mindful of their
+condition. The roof of the church was taken off some years ago and the
+upper part used as a granary, while most of the frescoes were whitewashed
+and many entirely obliterated.
+
+At the present moment the chapel of Mezzaratta is attached to a villa,
+which was for many years the property of the Italian Minister, Cavaliere
+Minghetti. This accomplished statesman took every possible means to
+save these relics of early art from further destruction, and by his
+care several frescoes were recovered from the coat of whitewash which
+concealed them.
+
+The site of the chapel itself is so picturesque, and the views from
+the hill of Mezzaratta are so full of beauty, that no traveller should
+leave Bologna without making a pilgrimage to this shrine. A steep ascent
+along a path lined with acacias leads from the gate of San Mammolo to
+the garden of Villa Minghetti, and on a summer’s day, when nightingales
+are singing in the acacia thicket and the air is sweet with myrtle
+and orange-blossom, there is not a pleasanter spot in all Bologna.
+Below, the domes and spires of the ancient city rise above its arcaded
+streets, and the eye is at once arrested by the quaint forms of the
+twin leaning towers, Garisenda and Asinelli, which were already old in
+Dante’s lifetime. All around the plains stretch their vast expanse,
+softly shadowed by passing clouds, far away towards Ferrara and Modena,
+excepting where some rocky spur descends from the Apennines, and looking
+up an opening valley we catch a glimpse of a jagged peak crowned with
+snow. Mezzaratta itself has an additional claim on our interest from
+having been the favourite resort of the Franciscan monk, Bernardino da
+Siena, whose religious revival at Bologna was one of the most important
+events in the early part of the fourteenth century, and who frequently
+preached in this humble sanctuary, which could scarcely hold the crowds
+that flocked to hear him.
+
+Bernardino’s preaching and his affection for the spot may have been one
+cause of the celebrity which the church of Mezzaratta acquired in those
+days, but the oldest painting on the walls takes us back a whole century
+before his time. It is a large “Nativity” painted over the door by
+Vitale and signed with his name. The composition chiefly adheres to the
+Byzantine type, with a few variations, as in the action of Joseph, who is
+represented pouring water into the bowl for the washing of the Child. Its
+execution is feeble, as is the case with most early Bolognese paintings,
+but in the graceful type of the Virgin’s head and in the kneeling angels
+we recognise Vitale’s striving after a more ideal form.
+
+On the southern wall an artist named Cristofano, whose style as far as it
+is possible to judge more resembles that of the Ferrara school, painted
+scenes from the book of Genesis. Below these we have a series of subjects
+from the history of Joseph, Moses, and the Life of Christ, all painted
+by the same hand, and bearing in one corner the name of Jacobus, and the
+date 1404.
+
+Of these the two most striking are the “Miracle of the Pool of Bethesda”
+and the “Healing of the Paralytic.” In the former, a sick man stands
+in the middle of the pool lifting his hands in prayer, and the cripple
+who sits up in bed by the side of the healing waters looks towards
+Christ with an air of helpless entreaty. In the latter, the roof of the
+house in which the Saviour is teaching his disciples is uncovered, and
+the sick of the palsy is being let down by cords. To the right he is
+seen, walking away healed, bearing a mattress on his shoulders. In both
+of these scenes—indeed all through the series—the head of Christ is
+strikingly noble and dignified, while not even the artist’s ignorance
+of the simplest elements of drawing and colouring can detract from the
+originality and life of the representations. Each head is individual in
+expression and character, and the whole composition is marked by the
+pleasing naïveté of very early art, and an evident anxiety to shake off
+the fetters of conventional types.
+
+Simone is said by Vasari to have painted the later scenes of the Passion
+below Jacopo’s frescoes, and may have been the artist of the “Last
+Supper,” which is still visible, but most of his work has perished,
+and whatever else has escaped destruction belongs to the middle of the
+fifteenth century, and owes its existence to Galasso Galassi, or other
+Ferrarese painters.
+
+The most remarkable point in the frescoes of Mezzaratta, and the real
+cause of their value, is that, in spite of all the injury they have
+sustained, they are decidedly superior in merit to the contemporary
+panel-pictures in the Gallery and churches of Bologna, and thus enable
+us to form a better judgment of early Bolognese art. Here we see it
+inferior, it is true, in every respect to the schools then flourishing at
+Florence and Siena, but still possessing a force and individual character
+which inspires interest and promises well for the future.
+
+During the greater part of the fourteenth century no native painter of
+any genius arose, and the pictures of this date in the Bologna Gallery
+are principally by unknown followers of Lippo Dalmasii. The only names
+preserved there are those of Pietro Lianori and Michele di Matteo
+Lambertini, who painted between 1450 and 1470, and in whose work we trace
+some likeness to the contemporary Siena school, as well as a marked
+difference from Avanzi’s manner. The same may be said of the picture of
+“St. Ursula and her Companions,” a weak but not unpleasing work, painted
+by Santa Caterina Vigri, a Bolognese nun, chiefly remarkable as the only
+woman-artist who over attained the honours of canonization.
+
+Towards the middle of the fifteenth century a new element was introduced
+into Bolognese art by the Ferrarese masters, whom the patronage of the
+Bentivoglio family attracted from the neighbouring city. The court of
+the Este princes was already one of the most brilliant in Italy, and had
+become a favourite centre for artists, who were employed to decorate the
+different palaces of the ducal house in the same way that Mantegna was
+engaged on the castles of the Gonzagas at Mantua.
+
+Piero della Francesca had himself painted in Duke Borso’s Schifanoia
+(Sans-Souci) palace, and both his presence and the all-pervading
+influence of Mantegna, who had known several of the best Ferrarese
+artists, had contributed in a large measure to mould the school of
+native artists. These different elements were now imported to Bologna by
+the Ferrara painters who migrated there. One of the first was Galasso
+Galassi, who painted the later scenes from the Passion in the church of
+Mezzaratta about the year 1450, and who may have been the painter of
+the graceful “Sposalizio,” which is one of the best-preserved frescoes
+still to be seen there. About the same time an artist of greater merit,
+Francesco Cossa, was commanded by Giovanni Bentivoglio to restore an
+ancient picture of Lippo known as the “Madonna del Baraccano,” and Ercole
+Grandi was employed on the frescoes of the Garganelli chapel in the
+church of San Pietro.
+
+With these Ferrara masters came a Paduan artist, also one of the painters
+of the Schifanoia, who had been trained in the school of Squarcione
+and had worked with Mantegna in the Eremitani. This was Marco Zoppo,
+who moved to Bologna in 1471, and remained there twenty years, during
+which period he painted many of his principal works, and probably became
+acquainted with the goldsmith, Francia, whose first master he is said, by
+some, to have been.[4]
+
+But the most important of all the painters who came to Bologna from
+Ferrara was Lorenzo Costa, whose friendship with Francia was productive
+of rich results, and with whom he lived for many years in a constant
+interchange of artistic ideas. Born at Ferrara in 1460, Costa came as
+a young man to Bologna and entered the service of Giovanni Bentivoglio
+II., who employed him to decorate his palace with scenes from the Iliad.
+During the next twenty years Costa was actively engaged in Bologna. In
+1488 he finished an altar-piece for the chapel of the Bentivogli in
+the church of San Giacomo Maggiore, and a few years later painted the
+allegorical compositions representing “The Triumph of Life and Death,”
+and various other works in the great Basilica of San Petronio.
+
+In many of those we already see signs of new and higher qualities which
+were the direct fruit of Francia’s influence, although in technical
+acquirements the Bologna master was at that time still inferior to Costa.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+We have so far traced the rise of early Bolognese art throughout the
+fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and watched the gradual development
+of a school of painters who remained far behind their contemporaries in
+Florence and Siena, and at the best never rose above mediocrity. But in
+Francia, Bologna was for the first time to have an artist of the highest
+order, and who would take his place among the best Florentines of the
+day, rivalling even Perugino’s genius, and winning the praise of Raphael;
+an artist not indeed of great inventive faculty or wide range of powers,
+but who, in pure and tender feeling, in elevation of aim and thought, in
+the expression of the deepest religious emotion, was to find few equals
+in the history of art.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+EARLY LIFE AND WORKS, A.D. 1450-1500.
+
+
+Francesco di Marco Raibolini, commonly called Il Francia, was born at
+Bologna in the year 1450. His father was a carpenter, but although
+belonging to the artisan class his family was highly respected and
+owned lands in the neighbourhood. After the practice of many Florentine
+painters, Francia began life in the goldsmith’s shop, but unlike
+Botticelli and Pollaiuolo, did not turn his attention to art until he had
+reached middle age and had acquired considerable reputation in his own
+trade.
+
+Several writers have asserted that he took his surname from the goldsmith
+under whom he served his apprenticeship, but it seems more probable
+that Francia was merely the popular abbreviation of Francesco, and the
+supposition is confirmed by documents recently found in the archives of
+Bologna.
+
+His talents soon attracted attention and before long he became skilled in
+cutting dies, designing medals, working in _niello_ and every department
+of the goldsmith’s art. At the same time the charms of his person and
+character won general favour and greatly contributed to the success of
+his career. Contemporary writers describe him as strikingly handsome in
+appearance, and gifted with a sweetness of disposition and rare eloquence
+which could not fail to captivate his hearers. The wit and liveliness
+of his conversation had the power to drive away the saddest moods and
+brighten the darkest hours. In this manner he became a general favourite,
+and he numbered members of the noblest families of Bologna among his
+intimate friends.
+
+At the time Francia grew up the power of the Bentivogli family was
+supreme in Bologna. This proud house claimed descent from King Enzio,
+the unfortunate son of the Emperor Frederico II., whose long captivity,
+vain attempts at escape, and loves with the fair Lucia di Viadogolo have
+thrown a romantic charm over the grim walls of the Palazzo del Podestà.
+Nothing less than the attainment of sovereign power could content the
+Bentivogli in the fifteenth century, and after a long struggle with the
+Popes, who claimed the supremacy of Bologna, they finally succeeded
+in accomplishing their object. The reigning prince was now Giovanni
+Bentivoglio II., who had assumed the reins of government in 1463, and
+was undisputed master of the city. Although his tyranny became hateful
+to the people, and ultimately proved the cause of his ruin, he was a
+liberal and munificent patron of Francia, and rivalled the princes
+of the house of Este by the encouragement which he gave to the fine
+arts. He soon discovered the rising genius of the young goldsmith, and
+appointed him Master of the Mint, an office which, in spite of many
+vicissitudes in public affairs, Francia retained to the end of his life.
+Other distinctions fell to his share. In 1483, and again in the year
+1489, he was elected steward of the goldsmiths’ guild, a further proof
+of the esteem and honour with which his countrymen regarded him. By this
+time he was already married, since his sons Giacomo and Giulio were
+born, the former before, and the latter in, 1487; but we hear no further
+particulars and know nothing of his wife excepting that her name was
+Caterina.
+
+Besides coining money and designing medals for Giovanni Bentivoglio,
+Francia showed his fine taste and artistic powers in many works both in
+gold and silver enamels, and especially in _niello_, “often introducing
+as many as twenty figures of excellent proportion and graceful design
+into a space scarcely two fingers high.” Most of these precious works of
+art perished in the destruction of the Bentivogli’s palace at the time
+of their expulsion, and the famous silver _pax_, which Francia executed
+at immense cost for the wedding of Giovanni Sforza and Lucrezia Borgia,
+has disappeared, but two smaller ones are still preserved in the Gallery
+of Bologna, and are interesting specimens of their kind. One bearing a
+representation of the Resurrection, surrounded by a wreath of delicate
+foliage, was executed on the occasion of the marriage of Bartolommeo
+Felicini and Dorotea Ringhieri, as we learn by the arms of these families
+which are engraved upon the work. The other is engraved with the Sforza
+and Bentivogli arms and the letters M. Z., _Messer Zoane_, and was
+probably a wedding gift from Giovanni Bentivoglio to his bride Ginevra
+Sforza. The Crucifixion is worked in niello on this pax, and both in
+the sorrowing angels hovering round the cross and in the saints below
+we recognise the type of head which Francia’s Madonnas have rendered
+familiar, while the landscape in the background shows the pictorial bent
+of the goldsmith’s mind.
+
+Andrea Mantegna’s visit to Bologna in 1472 is said to have first inspired
+Francia with the wish to become a painter, but Vasari tells us in the
+same breath that our master’s first painting was not executed until 1490,
+when he was forty years old.
+
+The actual honour of having first given Francia instruction in oil
+painting has been assigned to different artists, principally to Marco
+Zoppo and Lorenzo Costa, both of whom, we have seen, were living at
+Bologna about 1480. Little affinity exists between the Squarcionesque
+master’s style and that of Francia, but it is very possible that he may
+have been acquainted with the goldsmith and have given him his first
+lessons. Francia’s connection with Lorenzo Costa was of a much closer
+kind, and Ferrarese models had a large share in his future development.
+But his first essays in painting are so purely original in character and
+so free from foreign influences that we need not seek for any cause to
+explain the reason of their existence, or ask what master had a share in
+their production. He probably acquired the rudiments of tempera and oil
+painting from either Zoppo or another of the humbler men who frequented
+his workshop, and immediately tried his hand on small panels before
+venturing on the larger pictures in which his adoption of Costa’s method
+is apparent. These early works are very rare, but one excellent instance
+is to be seen in the “St. Stephen” of the Borghese Gallery, Rome. This
+interesting little piece was evidently one of his first efforts executed
+at a time when he was unskilled in the rules of composition and technical
+knowledge. The hand of the worker in metal is plainly seen in the sharp
+outline and polished surface of the panel, in the cold, hard brightness
+of the deacon’s red dalmatic which St. Stephen wears, and in the
+elaborate ornament of its embroideries. There is no attempt at rendering
+physical agony in the form of the kneeling martyr quietly raising his
+clasped hands as the stones fall heavily to the ground beside him. Even
+St. Stephen’s countenance is marked by a certain absence of expression,
+and is without the rapt devotion of Perugino’s faces, or the yearning
+gentleness of Francia’s own Madonnas. Yet there is a calm devoutness in
+the martyr’s bowed head, which seems to reflect the earnestness of the
+prayer which the parted lips have just breathed, and which in its very
+simplicity is full of touching beauty. Already we feel the presence of
+that strong religious sentiment which had first animated the creations of
+earlier masters, and of which Francia was to be almost the last exponent
+in the art of Italy.
+
+Another work belonging to this early period is the portrait of
+Bartolommeo Bianchini, formerly in the Northwick collection, under the
+name of Raphael. This personage was a Bolognese senator of considerable
+culture, whose poetry earned some reputation in his days, and who wrote
+flattering verses in praise of Francia’s genius. We have a further proof
+of the friendship that existed between them in the small “Holy Family” at
+Berlin, inscribed with the words, _Bartholomei sum(ptu) Bianchini maxima
+matrom hic vivit manibus Francia picta tuis_. “Here—painted by thy hands,
+O Francia, at the cost of Bartolommeo Bianchini—lives the greatest of
+mothers.”
+
+The Madonna holds the child erect on a parapet, while St. Joseph stands
+behind, much in the same style of composition as countless Holy Families,
+by Giovanni Bellini, a painter with whom Francia had more than one
+feature in common. Here again we notice the same sharpness of outline,
+high polish, and want of shadow that recall the goldsmith’s art, but the
+general method of laying on colour and the red glow of the flesh-tints
+which marks all Ferrarese work, point unmistakably to the influence of
+Lorenzo Costa’s example. During the next twenty years these two men
+worked side by side in Bologna, and profited by a mutual exchange of
+ideas which has few counterparts in art history. While Costa gave Francia
+the benefit of his wider experience and greater knowledge, he received
+more than he could impart from the nobler aims and more refined feeling
+of the Bologna artist. Before long the pupil was to surpass the master,
+but we never hear of the intimacy between the two being marred by any
+jealousy or ill-feeling, and the unbroken harmony in which they lived
+reflects credit on both.
+
+A great advance on the early works to which we have alluded is visible in
+the large altar-piece of the “Madonna and Saints” which Francia painted
+in 1490. The commission was given him by a wealthy Bolognese citizen,
+Bartolommeo Felicini, who destined the picture for a chapel in the church
+of the Misericordia, a confraternity of nobles for the assistance of
+hospitals and other works of mercy. In this work, which Vasari calls his
+first, Francia represented the Virgin seated on a marble throne with
+six saints in the foreground, and a child-angel in a light blue robe
+playing the violin at her feet. The architectural background and general
+style of colouring are plainly the results of Costa’s teaching, but side
+by side with these Ferrarese features we find another influence which
+is altogether new. This is the Umbrian tendency, which appears here in
+so marked a manner as to make us ask what was the link which brought
+Perugino into connection with the great master of Bologna. Unfortunately
+no historical evidence exists to satisfy our curiosity, and there is no
+authority for the probable supposition that Francia visited Florence,
+and thus became acquainted with the Umbrian painter. But there is every
+reason to believe that works by Perugino had by this time found their
+way to Bologna, and among them probably the beautiful altar-piece which
+he painted for the church of San Giovanni in Monte, and which now hangs
+in the Pinacoteca, almost side by side with Francia’s Madonna of the
+Misericordia. It is worthy of mention that the same Umbrian character
+appears in a small Madonna[5] at Berlin, the sole remaining work of
+Antonio Crevalcore, a Bolognese artist chiefly known as a fruit and
+flower painter, between 1480 and 1500, and whose name is preserved in
+an epitaph by Francia’s friend, Girolamo Casio. Evidently Perugino’s
+influence had in some form or other reached Bologna, and had touched a
+responsive chord in Francia’s breast. For nowhere is this Peruginesque
+vein more strongly present than in the fine head of the St. Sebastian, in
+the Misericordia altar-piece, who is lifting his eyes to heaven with an
+intensity of expression to which Perugino himself has rarely attained.
+Henceforth this feature is constantly recurring in all Francia’s panels,
+animating his less ideal types, his fresher and more vigorous conceptions
+with a tender devotional feeling, and appealing to us in the peculiar
+half-timid, half-reproachful gaze of those Madonnas which we know so well.
+
+[Illustration: THE VIRGIN ENTHRONED, WITH SAINTS. BY FRANCIA.
+
+_In the Pinacoteca, Bologna._]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The revelation of Francia’s powers as a painter was the cause of much
+enthusiasm among his fellow-countrymen, who were never slow to applaud
+the efforts of native artists, and Giovanni Bentivoglio immediately
+commissioned him to paint an altar-piece for his family chapel in San
+Giacomo Maggiore. All the religious communities of Bologna now pressed
+Francia to decorate their altars, and Vasari says that by the end of
+a few years there was scarcely a church in the city that could not
+boast the possession of one of his paintings. The “Annunciation” of
+the Brera, the “Madonna and Angels,” at Munich, the Pietà, still at
+Bologna, in the Pinacoteca, followed each other in close succession.
+For his goldsmith friend, Jacopo Gambaro, who is recorded to have stood
+godfather with him to the child of a mutual friend, he painted the small
+“Holy Family,” at Dudley House, and for the church of San Giobbe, in
+Bologna, the “Crucifixion” of the Louvre. In this singular composition
+the patriarch Job is represented wearing a crown and lying at the foot
+of the cross, pointing upwards to a scroll on which we read the words:
+_Maiora sustinuit ipse_. This fine and original conception is marred by
+a hardness of drawing and colouring, which is a sufficient proof that it
+was executed at an early period; its surface has suffered considerable
+injuries which increase this unpleasant effect.
+
+A great step in advance is marked by the Bentivoglio altar-piece
+completed in 1499, and still occupying its original place in a chapel
+of San Giacomo Maggiore. Here the metallic harshness of the tints has
+given place to more harmonious tones and softer shadows, and the rich,
+glowing colours show that the artist had by this time acquired complete
+mastery of the means at his disposal. The saints are more vigorous and
+manly in type, and the heads are distinguished by more actual beauty than
+in any other of Francia’s pictures. St. Sebastian is again a prominent
+figure, and was used as a model a century later by the Carracci, who
+declared it to be one of the finest studies of human form in Renaissance
+painting. The two angels crowned with roses and standing on the steps
+of the Virgin’s throne are said to be portraits of children of the
+Bentivogli family. Others hover about the Virgin, and one, the loveliest
+of all, leans his head thoughtfully against a pillar and stretches out
+his little arms in wistful yearning to the child-Christ. In the same year
+Francia painted another Enthroned Madonna,[6] very similar to this one
+in style and grouping, by desire of a lady of the Manzuoli family, for
+the church of the Misericordia. Here the attendant saints are St. George
+and the Baptist, who point upwards to the child, whilst St. Stephen gazes
+mournfully at the stones of his martyrdom, which, rest on a book that
+he holds before him, and another of Francia’s sweet child-angels clasps
+a tall white lily between its folded hands, “with so much grace that it
+seems to belong to Paradise.” [_Vasari._]
+
+For the same church of the Misericordia, Giovanni Bentivoglio’s son,
+Archdeacon of Bologna and papal protonotary, ordered the “Nativity,”
+now removed to the Gallery,[7] where most of Francia’s masterpieces
+are collected. In this picture the “Nativity” is treated not as an
+historical event but as a Christian mystery, that is to say, the Virgin
+and attendant saints are represented in the act of adoring the new-born
+child, and celebrating his advent on earth. This class of composition,
+always a favourite with religious painters, and much used both by
+Perugino and Lorenzo di Credi, was especially adapted to Francia’s
+genius. He never possessed the faculty of describing a scene in a vivid
+and dramatic manner, or of rendering in quick succession all the varied
+emotions of the human breast, but no one has excelled him in these groups
+of rapt saints, without a thought beyond the object of their silent
+adoration. And so we find him constantly moulding his subjects into
+this form. The Annunciation, Pietà, Assumption, and Coronation of the
+Virgin by turns took this shape in his hands. He conceived “these supreme
+events as mysteries at which the successive ages were spectators, and
+in relation to which the great souls of all periods became as it were
+contemporaries.” [_George Eliot._]
+
+In this instance Francia has introduced several portraits among the
+worshippers. His masterly profile of Bartolommeo felicini in the first
+Misericordia altar-piece had already proved his skill as a portrait
+painter, and he now represented Antonio Galeazzo Bentivoglio, who had
+lately returned from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, in the mantle of
+a knight of the Red Cross kneeling under a ruined arch to adore the
+infant Christ. The youthful shepherd who stands opposite, wearing a
+laurel wreath on his flowing locks, is a portrait of Francia’s intimate
+friend, the poet jeweller, Girolamo di Casio, on whom the laurel crown
+was bestowed by Clement VIII. This accomplished man had the greatest
+admiration for Francia, whose epitaph he lived to compose, and whom he
+addressed during his lifetime in a sonnet beginning:—
+
+    “Felice Italia che in se chiude,
+    Si sublime ingegno e si bella effigie
+    Che fanno al cielo e a natura guerra.”
+
+    “Happy Italy, which contains a genius so lofty and forms so
+    fair that they challenge heaven and nature.”
+
+Lastly, in the regular features of the St. Francis in the background, we
+have Francia’s own likeness (which he has here introduced in the form
+of his patron saint), whose expressive face and refined air correspond
+exactly with contemporary descriptions. Two angels kneel in lowly
+adoration on either side of the child, who lifts his head and raises
+his tiny hand in benediction, while a bullfinch perched on a twig at
+his feet looks reverently towards him and almost seems to join in the
+act of worship. As a rule Francia’s landscapes are simple in character,
+generally consisting of a rocky foreground and broad valley opening
+beyond, such as we often see in the Apennines near Bologna; sometimes
+in his later works they are more distinctly Umbrian, but the background
+of this “Nativity” is remarkable for an unusual degree of beauty and
+variety. The rocky steep with its solitary pine-tree is still on our
+right, but in the centre of the picture, above the heads of the kneeling
+saints, a lovely expanse of park-like scenery unfolds itself before us.
+There we see a broad sunny river winding its way between grassy glades
+and forest avenues, cattle are feeding, and human life is stirring
+on its banks, a church tower and cottage roofs peep out from among
+the trees, and far away in the distance a line of blue hills rises in
+soft undulating lines. The whole of this pastoral scene is charmingly
+conceived and painted, and forms a poetic background to one of Francia’s
+most graceful compositions. It was for this picture that Costa painted
+his predella of the “Adoration of the Magi,” now in the Brera, one of the
+many tokens of the friendship which continued to exist between the two
+artists.
+
+[Illustration: MADONNA AND CHILD WITH A BIRD. BY FRANCIA.
+
+_In the Dresden Gallery._]
+
+Besides these works for the Misericordia, Francia executed several
+altar-pieces for other churches in Bologna—about 1500. The “Madonna and
+Saints,” now at St. Petersburg, was originally painted for San Lorenzo,
+and a similar subject resembling the Bentivoglio altar-piece is still
+to be seen in San Martino of Bologna. With these larger subjects we may
+mention the charming group of boy-angels playing on musical instruments
+round an old picture of the Madonna in San Vitale, although their
+Raphaelesque grace would seem to indicate a later date of production. The
+Franciscan church of the Annunziata, outside the gate of San Mammolo,
+also possessed two pictures, a “Madonna” and “Annunciation,” which have
+been removed to the Gallery since that sanctuary has been used as a
+barrack by the Italian Government. Both have been much damaged, but the
+“Annunciation,” in spite of its bad state of preservation and unpleasant
+rawness of colour, is singularly interesting. All three persons of the
+Trinity assist at the celebration of the great mystery: the Father looks
+down from heaven, the dove is seen descending to rest on the brows of
+her who was blessed among women, and a vision of the Child appears
+above in glory. The Angel of the Annunciation hovers in mid-air, and
+on earth the lowly Virgin kneels with clasped hands and bent head, her
+whole soul going forth in unutterable love and yearning as she listens
+to his message. On either side, a little below this central figure,
+stands a noble group of saints reverently pondering over the mystery
+before our eyes; and foremost among them we recognise Bernardino, the
+favourite saint of Bologna, whose memory was still fresh in the hearts
+of the people, holding an open book, on the pages of which, the sacred
+monogram and his motto, _In Nomine Gesu_, are inscribed. The birds
+sing in the branches beside him, and a lizard crawls along the ground
+bearing a scroll, on which are the arms of the Franciscans, a skull and
+cross-bones, the date MCCCCC., and _Francia Aurifex pinxit_, a form of
+signature which the goldsmith painter retained to the end of his life.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE FRIENDSHIP AND INFLUENCE OF RAPHAEL, 1500-1506.
+
+
+Ten or twelve years had now elapsed since Francia had devoted himself to
+painting, and in this comparatively short space of time he had produced
+many important works and obtained a wide reputation. More than this,
+his pictures during this period bear signs of a steady progress both in
+technical skill and power of expression; the old hardness and want of
+harmony had in a great measure disappeared, and his colouring had gained
+that force and richness which give him so high a place among oil-painters.
+
+But in the first years of the sixteenth century we see him develop a
+new style, and paint in a manner altogether freer and grander than ever
+before. This marked improvement is especially visible in the composition
+of his pictures which, instead of depending on the expression of single
+heads, now acquire a grace of line and completeness that bring them near
+to the best Florentine works of the period.
+
+The cause of this advance can only be ascribed to one influence—the
+friendship which Francia had formed with Raphael. It is evident from
+many of our master’s works at this time that he had studied Raphael’s
+pictures; but beyond this, both the presence of this new element and
+certain expressions which Raphael uses in his letter of September, 1508,
+seem to imply the existence of a personal acquaintance between the two
+masters.
+
+He had formed, we know, the highest opinion of Francia’s merit, and gives
+expression in emphatic terms to his conviction that no Madonnas are so
+beautiful or so well calculated to inspire devotion as the creations of
+the Bolognese master. And on receiving Francia’s portrait he declares it
+to be so life-like that as he stands before it he feels himself in his
+friend’s presence and seems to hear his voice.
+
+Everything points to more than a mere intercourse by letter, and there
+can be no reason to doubt the generally assumed fact that Raphael paid
+a visit to Bologna on his way from Florence to Urbino in 1506. But long
+before this they had a mutual object of interest in Timoteo Viti, a young
+painter of Urbino, who became one of Francia’s favourite pupils and was
+the first link between him and Raphael.
+
+In July, 1490, Timoteo came to Bologna to perfect himself in the
+goldsmith’s art in Francia’s workshop. The date is recorded in a register
+kept by Francia, where we read the following entry:—
+
+“Timoteo Viti da Urbino was taken into our shop. He will receive no
+salary during the first year, and sixty-six florins for three months in
+the second.”
+
+In 1491 another entry records the settlement of accounts with Timoteo,
+and mentions that as he is desirous to become a painter he will now pass
+into the hall where the other artists work.
+
+Four years later we find one more entry, which is as follows:—
+
+“On the 4th day of April, 1495, my beloved Timoteo left us. God grant
+that all blessing and good fortune may be with him.”
+
+Timoteo returned to Urbino, where he became Raphael’s assistant, and
+carried with him the fame of the master who remembered him so kindly.
+Soon Francia received commissions from the Duke of Urbino, for whom he
+painted a Lucrezia in the act of plunging the dagger into her breast, and
+a marvellous set of horse trappings decorated with gaily-coloured birds
+and foliage.
+
+From Timoteo’s lips Raphael also heard of Francia’s paintings, and
+was perhaps first introduced by him to those Madonnas which inspired
+so unfeigned an admiration in his breast. Afterwards we hear of an
+exchange of pictures which passed between the two great masters, and at
+Francia’s recommendation Giovanni Bentivoglio employed Raphael to paint
+a “Nativity,” which has unfortunately perished. The Bolognese master
+was of too generous and loyal a nature to entertain the least feeling
+of envy towards the young painter, who had already surpassed all his
+contemporaries, and showed his warm appreciation of Raphael’s genius
+in the following sonnet, which he addressed to him in an outburst of
+enthusiasm:—
+
+        “Non son Zeusi nè Apelle, e non son tale,
+            Che di tanti tal nome a me convegna;
+            Nè mio talento, nè vertudo è degna
+             Haver da un Raffael lodo immortale.
+
+         Tu sol, cui fece il ciel dono fatale,
+            Che ogn’ altro excede, e sora ogn’ altro regna,
+            L’excellente artificio à noi insegna
+            Con cui sei reso ad ogn’ antico uguale.
+
+        Fortunato garxon, che nei primi anni
+            Tant’ oltre passi; e che sarà poi quando
+            In più provecta etade opre migliori?
+
+        Vinta sarà natura; e, da’ tuoi inganni
+            Resa eloquente, dirà, te lodando,
+            Che tu solo il pictor sei de’ pictori.”
+
+    “I am not Zeuxis nor Apelles, neither do I deserve that fame
+    so great shall be mine, nor is my talent worthy to receive
+    immortal praise from a Raffael.
+
+    “Thou alone, on whom heaven has bestowed the fatal gift that
+    thou shouldest excel all others and reign over all, teachest
+    us the admirable art by which thou art become equal to the
+    ancients.
+
+    “Fortunate boy, who in thy earliest years hast already advanced
+    so far, what wilt thou not be when in maturer age thou shalt
+    achieve yet greater things? Then nature shall own herself
+    conquered, and rendered eloquent by thy charms, shall exclaim
+    in thy praise, that thou alone art the painter of painters.”
+
+[Illustration: DEPOSITION FROM THE CROSS. BY FRANCIA.
+
+_In the Accademia, Parma._]
+
+The original manuscript of this sonnet was first published by the
+historian Malvasia, who discovered it among the papers of a member of
+the Lambertini family, and gave the accompanying inscription, which
+proves Francia to have been its author. _All’excellente pictore Raffaello
+Sanxio, Zeusi del nostro secolo. Di me Francesco Raibolini decto il
+Francia._ Even without these convincing proofs of Raphael’s friendship
+with Francia, it would have been difficult not to assume the existence
+of some similar connection from the strong marks of the great painter’s
+influence that meet us in Francia’s later works.
+
+In the “Deposition,” painted soon after 1500 for the Benedictines of
+Parma, his style is already powerfully affected by this contact with
+Raphael, which can alone account for a vigorous action and dramatic
+character here displayed. A deep emotion is visible on the faces of the
+St. John, who supports the head, the Magdalen, who embraces the feet, and
+the Virgin, who gazes at the dead face of her son with the grief-stricken
+look which the “Pietà” of the National Gallery has stamped upon our
+minds. Salome, who stands behind, flings aloft her arms in an energy of
+despair unlike anything else that Francia ever conceived, while in the
+background the cross lifts its gaunt form against the glowing tints of an
+evening sky and a soft distance of cypress-grown rocks and far-away hills.
+
+Not many years afterwards Francia was asked by a noble of Lucca to
+supply an altar-piece for the church of San Frediano in that city, and
+after painting a “Madonna and Saints” as the principal subject, took the
+Pietà as the motive of the lunette below. This time he returned partly
+to his former conception, and represented the Dead Christ laid in his
+mother’s arms in the same attitude as in the larger Deposition at Parma,
+but with two angels instead of attendant saints at the head and feet.
+
+In later years the altar-piece passed into the Duke of Lucca’s hands, and
+coming to England in 1840 with the rest of the collection, became one of
+the chief ornaments of the National Gallery.
+
+It is difficult to approach this Pietà in a critical spirit. We have
+known it all our lives, every form, almost every line of the well-known
+group is familiar. To many of us it is associated with memories of days
+long ago when it formed a part of our earliest religious ideas; and when
+much of the faith of childhood has undergone change, it still recalls all
+that was purest and best in those first impressions.
+
+[Illustration: THE VIRGIN AND TWO ANGELS WEEPING OVER THE DEAD BODY OF
+CHRIST. A PIETÀ. BY FRANCIA.
+
+_In the National Gallery._]
+
+What is it, we ask, which touches us in this “Pietà,” that has appealed
+to thousands in a way which no other picture has ever done? Surely,
+not only the grace of its composition, the tender brightness of its
+colouring, but more than all of these the deep human pathos which we
+find there blended with a real and living hope. It is the contrast
+between the mother mourning over her dead son with a grief that cannot
+be comforted and the angels who fold their hands in lowly adoration,
+and by their presence transform the saddest of all scenes into a divine
+mystery full of hope and love. Mary, in the bitterness of her sorrow, is
+unconscious of these heavenly attendants, her eyes, fixed on the dead
+face of her son, are closed to that vision of angels, but we see them and
+realise what Francia meant us to feel, all the promise of that horizon
+which was opening beyond, all the great future that was to grow out of
+the suffering and death which she mourned.
+
+    “The wave
+    Of love which set so deep and strong
+    By Christ’s yet open grave.”
+                        [_Matthew Arnold._]
+
+Unlike Mantegna and Gian Bellini, Francia has not attempted to give any
+impression of the physical agony which has passed over the corpse, but
+has concentrated all his force in the endeavour to give the deep repose
+and peace of death without sacrificing anything of majesty of form.
+There are other points in the drawing which might be criticised, and
+a degree of stiffness in the position of the right arm has been often
+observed, but no minor defects can prevent Francia’s Pietà from being,
+in refinement of conception and tenderness of feeling, the highest ideal
+representation of the subject in the whole range of art.
+
+The other portion of this altar-piece, a Virgin enthroned with the
+Child, St. Anna at her side between two arches, and the Saints Sebastian,
+Paul, Lawrence and Romualdo below, hangs next to Perugino’s Certosa
+altar-piece in the National Gallery. An excellent opportunity is thus
+afforded of comparing the styles of the two painters, and Francia’s work
+does not show to disadvantage even by the side of Perugino’s masterpiece.
+In depth and richness of colour he is at least his equal, and although
+his types are less ideal they are fresher and more natural, and there is
+less affectation in the attitude of his figures.
+
+For the same church of San Frediano at Lucca, Francia painted another
+large altar-piece the “Coronation of the Virgin,” which is still to be
+seen there. Here again he gives the subject a mystical character and
+introduces the patriarchal ancestors of Mary and the chief advocates of
+the dogma of the Immaculate Conception among the figures who stand below
+in devout contemplation. Each bears a scroll in his hand: David points to
+a verse of Psalm xxvii, “_In the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide
+me_;” Solomon, a noble, kingly profile, gazes earnestly upwards, showing
+us a text from his song, “_Thou art all fair, my love_;” while Anselm and
+Augustine bear scrolls on which we read passages from their own writings
+relating to the Virgin, and Antony of Padua kneels at the empty tomb
+where lilies and roses have blossomed. This altar-piece, although less
+known than Francia’s other masterpieces, yields to none of his works
+in grandeur and finish. The kneeling Madonna who, robed in purple and
+gold, receives her crown from the hands of the Eternal, retains the same
+expression of sweet humility touched with sadness which marks all his
+Virgins, and the scenes from the History of the Augustinian order on the
+predella are painted with exquisite taste and delicacy.
+
+Another large Coronation, commonly called the altar-piece of All the
+Saints from the multitude of figures grouped below, is still in the Duomo
+of Ferrara; while Cesena retains the “Presentation” mentioned by Vasari,
+although the beauty of colouring to which he alludes has lost much of its
+freshness.
+
+A “Nativity,” painted for his intimate friend Paolo Zambeccaro at
+Bologna, is now in the Picture Gallery of Forli, but the frescoes with
+which he adorned Zambeccaro’s villa have all perished. The same fate has
+been shared by the other frescoes which he painted in different palaces
+of Bologna, and what is most of all to be regretted, the “Judith” and
+“Dispute of Philosophers” which he executed for Giovanni Bentivoglio were
+destroyed in the sack of the tyrant’s palace by the mob, on his expulsion
+in 1507. Vasari, speaking from the testimony of eyewitnesses, declares
+the Judith to have been the finest work which Francia ever painted, and
+describes minutely the splendour of the surroundings introduced, the
+horses, banners, and armed guards brought on the scene as belonging to
+the camp of Holofernes. The fame of this fresco had also reached the ears
+of Raphael, who begged for a sketch of the work, but unfortunately not
+even a drawing remains to give us an idea of the manner in which Francia
+treated a theme so unlike his usual objects.
+
+A “Lucrezia” by his hand, perhaps the very panel which he painted for
+Guido Baldo, Duke of Urbino, is now in England,[8] but has nothing
+classical in character. The Roman matron raising her eyes to heaven as
+she plunges the dagger into her breast is in feature and expression the
+exact counterpart of Francia’s saints, and but for the uplifted hand
+might be a St. Catharine or St. Agnes with perfect propriety. On the
+other hand drawings in the style of ancient bas-reliefs by Francia, which
+in type and character admit no doubt as to their genuineness, meet us
+occasionally both in foreign galleries and London exhibitions, and show
+a much truer appreciation of classical art. Such are the “Judgment of
+Paris” in the Albertina collection, Vienna, and that beautiful group
+of Greek youths before an altar exhibited by Mr. J. O. Robinson in
+the Grosvenor Gallery of 1879, in which, the grace of antique art is
+delicately blended with the yearning expression of Christian devotion.
+These and others that resemble them were designs for engravings probably
+intended for the use of Marc Antonio Raimondi, who served his first
+apprenticeship in Francia’s workshop, and engraved several of his
+master’s pictures before he left for Venice in 1509.
+
+More than one of this celebrated artist’s engravings bear marks of this
+early training in the school of Francia, an influence soon to be effaced
+by the very different associations and examples of the Roman world, in
+the midst of which his later years were spent.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE FRESCOES OF ST. CECILIA’S CHAPEL, 1506-1509.
+
+
+The only series of frescoes painted by Francia in Bologna of which some
+traces still remain, are those in the Oratory of St. Cecilia, attached
+to the church of San Giacomo Maggiore. This chapel, founded by Giovanni
+Bentivoglio and erected by the architect Gasparo Nadi in 1481, was
+decorated entirely by the hands of Francia and his scholars in the early
+part of the sixteenth century. Costa’s fresco, which alone bears a date,
+was executed in 1506, and the whole series was probably completed before
+the exile of the Bentivogli in 1507.
+
+Unfortunately this chapel, which is for the Bolognese school what the
+chapels of the Carmine and Eremitani are for Florentine and Paduan art,
+has been frequently turned to other uses, and during its occupation
+by French soldiers the frescoes suffered great injury. All are much
+damaged, and some mutilated in such a manner that the principal figures
+are scarcely visible. But even in their present melancholy condition
+Francia’s frescoes are full of interest, and it is easy to see how
+superior they are in merit to any other works of the school. Of the
+four remaining artists employed in the chapel—Lorenzo Costa, Giovanni
+Chiodarolo, Amico Aspertini, and Giacomo Raibolini (or Tamaroccio)—the
+Ferrarese master is the only one who approaches him in the excellence of
+his style, and even Costa’s heads cannot compare with those of Francia
+for beauty and expression. The subjects of the ten frescoes are all taken
+from the history of St. Cecilia.
+
+On the right of the altar:—
+
+  1. Marriage of Cecilia and Valerian. _Francia._
+
+  2. Valerian instructed in the Christian faith by Pope Urban. _Costa._
+
+  3. Baptism of Valerian. _Cesare Tamaroccio._[9]
+
+  4. Valerian and Cecilia crowned with roses by an Angel. _Chiodarolo._
+
+  5. Martyrdom of Valerian and his brother Tiburtius. _Aspertini._
+
+On the left of the altar:—
+
+  6. The Burial of the Brothers. _Aspertini._
+
+  7. Cecilia before the Prefect. _Aspertini._
+
+  8. Cecilia condemned to the boiling bath. _Cesare Tamaroccio._[9]
+
+  9. Cecilia distributing her riches to the poor. _Costa._
+
+  10. Burial of Cecilia. _Francia._
+
+The two frescoes by Francia are placed nearest to the altar, exactly
+opposite each other, and are on the whole the best-preserved of the
+series. Here Raphael’s influence is more apparent than in any of
+Francia’s works, and it is highly probable that he visited Bologna while
+the chapel was being painted. The fresco of the Marriage at once recalls
+Raphael’s “Sposalizio” in the grouping of the figures, and is remarkable
+for its grace of composition. The officiating priest stands between the
+bride and bride-groom under the portal of a chapel which opens on to a
+wooded valley. The bride shrinks timidly back and turns her face away as
+one of her maidens holds her hand on which Valerian places the ring. On
+either side are groups of youths and maidens who, by their intent gaze
+and animated gesture, show their interest in the marriage that is being
+celebrated. The action is simple, the heads noble and refined; those of
+the maidens are especially remarkable for their beauty, while the grace
+of line that marks the grouping is happily continued in the landscape
+beyond, which harmonizes well with the scene before us. Evidently the
+subject was exactly suited to Francia’s genius, and he has succeeded
+admirably.
+
+The same praise can scarcely be given as fully to the “Burial of St.
+Cecilia,” wonderful as is the power of its simple pathos. There is a want
+of dramatic action in the spectators, and at the same time a formality
+in the arrangement of the groups on either side of the picture, which
+gives the whole an air of stiffness and renders it inferior in point of
+composition to the Marriage. But these defects are atoned for by the
+beauty of the central portion, where four young men hold the lifeless
+form of the martyred saint suspended in a winding-sheet above the
+opening of the vault. A wreath of white roses crowns her gentle brows,
+and the bystanders press forward to take a last look at the sleeping
+face that is still so fair in death. As in the Christ of the Pietà all
+trace of suffering has passed away, the hands are folded with exquisite
+tenderness, and the sweet maiden seems to lie there wrapt once more in
+the deep unconscious sleep of childhood. For a moment we wonder if this
+happy slumber can be death, but—if we look a little further, beyond the
+pale light just breaking into the valley, above the tall cliffs and the
+topmost branches of the waving palm-trees—we shall see the dim form of an
+angel who wings his flight upwards, bearing the soul of the martyr back
+to God.
+
+The frescoes of St. Cecilia were the last works which Francia painted for
+his patron Giovanni Bentivoglio. In 1507, perhaps even before the chapel
+was completed, the Bentivogli were driven out of Bologna by a popular
+rising and forced to flee for their lives. Not only did Francia lose
+their patronage and friendship, but he had the grief of seeing some of
+his best works destroyed by an infuriated mob in the sack of their palace
+in the Strada Donato.
+
+The universal respect in which he was held by his countrymen saved him
+from sharing in the ruin of his patrons, and he retained his office
+at the head of the Mint under Pope Julius II. In this capacity he was
+required to coin the money which the Pope threw to the populace on his
+triumphal entry and which bore the inscription:—“Bononia per Julium a
+tyranno liberata.” But although he was forced to lend his talents, as
+Michelangelo did on another occasion, to the service of the victor, he
+could not conceal the bitterness of his grief, and for a whole year after
+the flight of the Bentivogli still lamented the loss he had suffered.
+
+It was then that Raphael addressed his well-known letter to Francia,
+begging him to take heart, and assuring him of his sympathy. The two
+painters had, it appears, agreed to exchange portraits, and in this
+letter Raphael thanks Francia for having sent him his likeness painted
+by his own hand. We give a translation of this interesting document,
+which was first discovered with Francia’s sonnet in the papers of the
+Lambertini family, and brought to light by Malvasia:—
+
+    “My dear Messor Francesco,—
+
+    “I have this moment received your portrait, which Bazotto
+    brought me safely, without injury of any kind, and for which I
+    thank you exceedingly. It is very beautiful, and so life-like
+    that at times it deceives me. I seem to be with you and to
+    hear your voice. I pray you, pardon my delays, which arise
+    from the tasks in which I am incessantly engaged, and which
+    have been the cause why I have not yet painted the portrait
+    with my own hand, according to our agreement. Nor would I
+    allow it to be painted by one of my pupils and retouched by
+    myself, since this would not have been seemly, although I have
+    no hope of ever equalling your work. Have compassion on me, I
+    say, since you know by experience what it is to be deprived of
+    liberty and bound to patrons. I am sending you by this same
+    messenger, who returns in six days, another drawing, that of
+    ‘The Nativity,’ somewhat different from the original, which you
+    were good enough to praise so highly, with the same kindness
+    with which you speak of my other works in a manner that causes
+    me to blush. I hope that you will accept this trifle, more
+    as a token of love and obedience than for any other reason,
+    and if in exchange I may receive a drawing of your ‘History
+    of Judith’ I will place it among my dearest and most precious
+    treasures. Monsignore il Datario awaits his ‘Madonella’ with
+    much impatience, and Cardinal Riario his large one, all of
+    which you will hear more particularly from the said Bazotto.
+    I, for my part, shall behold them with the same delight and
+    satisfaction with which I see and praise all your other works,
+    never having seen any images that are fairer or more devout and
+    well painted. In the meantime take courage, summon up all your
+    habitual wisdom, and be sure that I feel your afflictions as
+    keenly as if they were my own. Continue to love me as I love
+    you, with my whole heart.
+
+                  “Ever your most obliged and devoted,
+
+                                                   “RAFAELLE SANZIO.
+
+    “Roma, the fifth day of September, 1508.”
+
+Few documents in art history are more interesting than this letter, which
+breathes all the sunny gladness of Raphael’s nature, and proves how
+sincerely he admired Francia as an artist and felt for him as a friend.
+
+It is uncertain whether the portrait which he praises so warmly still
+exists, but at the end of last century a half-length figure of Francia
+holding a diamond ring, by his own hand, was in the Boschi collection at
+Bologna, and a few years ago a similar work belonged to a private gallery
+at Turin.[10]
+
+As a portrait-painter Francia ranks high, and all the works of this class
+by him which remain are marked by the same exquisite finish and life-like
+fidelity. The Tribune of the Uffizi has a fine specimen in the head of
+Evangelista Scappi, whose pleasant open face and bushy locks modern
+copyists have rendered familiar. The Umbrian character of the landscape
+and general style of the work resemble Perugino’s heads, while other of
+Francia’s portraits are painted more in his Raphaelesque manner.
+
+Such is the noble portrait of the Liechtenstein Gallery at Vienna long
+ascribed to Raphael, but rightfully restored to Francia by Crowe and
+Cavalcaselle, and probably the likeness of some Bolognese noble, since it
+originally belonged to an old family of that city.
+
+The poet Girolamo di Casio also alludes in one of his sonnets to two
+female portraits by Francia remarkable for their beauty, but these have
+perished, it is to be feared, since no portraits of women by his hand are
+known to exist.
+
+The expulsion of the Bentivogli, although a severe shock to Francia, does
+not appear to have diminished his powers of activity, and many of his
+best works belong to the years immediately following this event, which he
+deplored so deeply. In 1509 he painted the “Baptism of Christ,” now at
+Dresden, which still retains its rich glow of colour in spite of injuries
+received from the splinters of a shell during the bombardment of that
+city in 1760. Christ is represented standing on the waters of Jordan
+while the Baptist bends forward from one of the banks, and two angels
+with wistful faces wait on the other. A good replica of the subject, with
+the same hilly landscape but some variations, is at Hampton Court, and
+originally belonged to the Mantuan collection purchased by Charles I. The
+Dresden Gallery possesses two other fine works of Francia, an “Adoration
+of the Magi,” with a lake and mountain background, which bears strong
+marks of Raphael’s influence, and a “Madonna” from the Quandt collection.
+This last is one of the half-length figures of the Virgin with the child,
+and one or more attendant saints, which became so popular a subject in
+Francia’s school, and of which so many repetitions are to be seen. The
+example in the National Gallery, acquired from the Beaucousin collection,
+has unfortunately lost much of its original clearness, owing to the wash
+of burnt sienna which has been laid on the surface.
+
+Another finely conceived work, which has been ruined by repainting, is
+the “Madonna and Saints” of the Belvedere at Vienna, while the same fate
+has attended the Berlin altar-piece, originally painted for the Friars of
+the Osservanza at Modena.
+
+[Illustration: THE MADONNA OF THE ROSE-GARDEN. BY FRANCIA.
+
+_In the Pinakothek, Munich._]
+
+Two other panels, which, in type and execution, bear a marked resemblance
+to the frescoes of St. Cecilia’s chapel, and were evidently painted
+soon afterwards, are in a better state of preservation. The first, an
+“Annunciation,” with St. Jerome and the Baptist, in the Bologna Gallery,
+is a picture of the same class as the earlier Annunziata altar-piece,
+and is distinguished by the refinement and gentleness of the Virgin’s
+face. The other is the beautiful “Madonna of the Rose Garden,” originally
+painted for the Gonzagas, into whose service Francia’s old friend,
+Lorenzo Costa, had passed after the exile of the Bentivogli. It remained
+in the Mantua collection till 1786, and after experiencing many changes
+of hands, became the property of the Empress Josephine, until in 1815
+it passed from Malmaison into the Pinakothek of Munich. The child lies
+on a bed of flowery grass, stretching out its little arms with a smile
+of delight to its mother, who is in the act of sinking upon her knees
+in a rapture of loving adoration. A trellis of tall roses, which might
+have been painted by a Botticelli or Filippino, fences the garden round,
+and, in the pleasant meadows beyond, horses are feeding on the banks of
+a winding stream, and church-towers rise in the distance. Nowhere is the
+transparent delicacy of Francia’s colouring more pleasing than in the
+silver-grey tones of the Virgin’s robe, while her countenance wears the
+same gentle air of tender melancholy which haunts his conceptions in the
+same way as the smile on Leonardo’s faces, and the deeper sadness of
+Botticelli’s Madonnas.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+LAST WORKS AND DEATH, A.D. 1509-1517.
+
+
+We have few details of the last years of Francia’s life, but the dates
+that mark some of his pictures show us that his powers were not impaired,
+nor his activity diminished with advancing age.
+
+It would be interesting to know how he was affected by the return of
+his friends, the Bentivogli, who in 1511 entered Bologna again, on the
+retreat of the Papal troops before the French army under Gaston de Foix.
+The fickle Bolognese were as glad to be rid of the Pope as they had ever
+been to expel their former tyrant, and destroyed the statue which Julius
+II. had erected of himself on the principal square. But the Bentivogli
+only enjoyed their return to power during a very brief space. In a few
+months the conquering advance of the French army was checked by the death
+of Gaston de Foix in the battle of Ravenna; the Pope’s troops again
+entered Bologna, the Bentivogli fled once more, and the city was heavily
+fined and deprived of many of its former privileges.
+
+All we hear of Francia in these stormy times is that in 1511 he was
+elected one of the sixteen Gonfalioneri of the people, which proves
+that he still retained the popular favour, and that his changeable
+fellow-countrymen had not wavered in their affection and regard for
+him. In 1512 he was once more elected master of the Goldsmiths’ Guild,
+and in 1514 he attained the dignity of Master of the four arts. “He
+was reverenced as a god in Bologna,” says Vasari, “and not even his
+friendship for Raphael, and his desire to see the larger works of the
+great painter, could tear him away from his native city.”
+
+The fame of his works had spread over all Italy and had attracted a large
+number of scholars, as many, it is said, as two hundred. Several of the
+best of these passed into the school of Raphael, as Timoteo Viti had
+already done, and adopted a style which has little in common with that
+of Francia. Such were Innocenza da Imola and Bartolommeo Ramenghi, of
+Bagnacavallo, whose influence became prominent in the Bolognese school
+after Francia’s death, and who have left many of their works in the
+churches and Gallery of Bologna.
+
+Others followed more closely in Francia’s steps, and contented themselves
+for the most part with weak and conventional repetitions of those Saints
+and Madonnas which his genius had rendered popular. Chief among these was
+Francia’s own son, Giacomo Raibolini, an active and careful artist who
+never aspired to originality, and whose conceptions are generally wanting
+in life and freedom. Three of his best panels are in the Berlin Museum,
+and we often find them in other collections under his father’s name.
+
+There is a fine portrait of him in the Pitti Palace, Florence, and as an
+engraver he rose to the first rank, some of his prints being equal in
+delicacy and finish to those of Marc Antonio himself.
+
+Francia’s second son, Giulio by name, also became a painter, and was
+associated with Giacomo in the execution of several panels, which are
+distinguished by the signature J. J. Francia. Giacomo died in 1557;
+Giulio at some time after 1543.
+
+Another of Francia’s assistants whom he employed, as he did Giacomo, in
+the frescoes of Cecilia, was Amico Aspertini, a wayward and eccentric
+artist, who travelled in many parts of Italy, and received the surname
+“dai due pennelle,” from his habit of working with both hands, holding
+one brush for dark, and the other for pale tints. His numerous paintings
+in Bologna have mostly perished, and the best works by him which remain
+are the frescoes of the Volto Santo in San Frediano at Lucca, painted by
+him about the same time that Francia executed his two altar-pieces for
+that church.
+
+Besides these, Francia’s influence left its mark on several of the
+Ferrarese, especially on Costa’s pupil, Ercole Grandi II., and on the
+Ravenna artists, one of whom, Girolamo Marchesi da Cotignola, painted
+several works at Bologna, and was summoned to take the portrait of Gaston
+de Foix as he lay dead on the battle-field.
+
+Thus the latter part of Francia’s life was partly spent in directing the
+efforts of this large number of scholars, all engaged in the production
+of the numerous works in his style, and often bearing his name, which are
+scattered throughout Europe. A few genuine panels of his last years are
+still, however, to be seen. A Madonna dated 1511 is in Casa Pertusati
+at Milan, and a small God the Father in the Ercolani collection at
+Bologna bears Francia’s signature and the date 1514. Two larger and
+more important works belong to the following year, 1515. One of these
+is the “Madonna and Saints” in the Gallery of Parma, formerly in the
+possession of the Sanvitale family, and resembling his earlier creations
+in most points; it is remarkable for the fine profile of St. Justina,
+who kneels on the pedestal of the Virgin’s throne, looking upward with
+ardent devotion. The other is the Pietà of the Turin Gallery, a work
+which has lost the richness of its colouring from subsequent restoration,
+but still retains much of its former excellence. The leading features
+are the same as those of the larger Parma “Deposition.” The dead Christ
+lies in the Virgin’s arms supported by the Magdalen and St. John. Behind
+them Nicodemus raises his hands with a sorrowing gesture, and a monk
+stands with a lily in his hand, while tall palm-trees in the background
+spread their fan-like branches against the western skies. There is the
+same majesty of repose in the dead Christ, the same expression of piteous
+sorrow on the Virgin’s face, which we expect in a Pietà by Francia. It
+was the old conception of earlier days, which had lost none of its force
+in declining years, but was still present as vividly as ever to his mind.
+
+The following year is rendered memorable by a last communication which
+took place between Raphael and Francia. The great painter had finished
+his famous altar-piece of St. Cecilia for the chapel, which a noble
+Bolognese lady, the Beata Elena Duglioli, had erected in the church of
+San Giovanni del Monte, and wrote to Francia, begging him as a friend
+whom he trusted implicitly, to repair any accident the picture might have
+suffered on the journey, and to make any correction which might appear to
+him advisable. The picture reached Bologna safely early in the year 1516.
+Francia, in accordance with his friend’s directions, placed it above the
+altar in the chapel for which it was destined. The Bolognese hailed the
+appearance of Raphael’s masterpiece with enthusiastic acclamations, and
+we may well believe that Francia shared in their delight with the same
+generous appreciation which he had always shown for his friend’s genius.
+On the strength of these simple facts, the voice of slander founded the
+ridiculous story, which Vasari repeats, of Francia having died from
+the transport of jealous rage with which he was filled at the sight of
+Raphael’s masterpiece. The absurdity of the fabrication is evident when
+we remember the pictures which had been exchanged and the letters which
+had passed between the two masters, and is contrary to all we know of
+Francia’s character and natural disposition. Vasari himself seems to
+have felt some misgivings as to the truth of the story, for he proceeds
+to qualify his statement with the words “_come alcuni credono_” (as some
+believe), and adds that others say Francia died of poison.
+
+Malvasia, in his zeal to vindicate the memory of Francia, endeavours to
+prove that the Bolognese master lived till 1522, but the real date of his
+death has been finally proved by the discovery of three separate notices
+in contemporary chronicles, which all record the fact that Francesco
+Francia, that most excellent goldsmith and painter, died on the 5th of
+January, 1517 (new style 1518). The illness which ended his life, and the
+grave where he lies, are both unknown, but it seems probable that he was
+buried in the cloister of the large church of San Francesco, a favourite
+place of sepulchre in his days, and which contains the tomb of his son
+Giacomo.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+During the next thirty years his pupils continued to paint in Bologna,
+and maintained in some measure the honour of his name, but before the
+end of the century a new school, utterly different in aim and style,
+sprang up, and—in the sudden blaze of fame which encircled the names
+of the Carracci, Domenichino, and Guido—the works of the older masters
+were forgotten. Travellers who visited Bologna in the seventeenth and
+eighteenth centuries were attracted solely by the creations of the
+Eclectic school, and returned home without being even aware of Francia’s
+existence. M. Rio points out a striking proof of the neglect into which
+his works had fallen, in the curious fact that among all the pictures
+which the French invaders carried back to Paris not a single piece was by
+Francia.
+
+With the revival of a better taste the great master of the old school of
+Bologna soon received just recognition, and his purity and gentleness
+will always appeal to a large class of sympathetic natures who are
+attracted by the charm of an art which is apparent to all.
+
+If we consider the place which he holds in contemporary art we shall see
+how little he had in common with the spirit of his age, and how much of
+his aspirations and sympathies belonged to the old world of the earlier
+religious painters. Living as he did in the days of Raphael, at a moment
+when the Renaissance was fast hastening to its culminating point, Francia
+took no share in the great movement that was swaying forward at every
+point, but stood apart in a sphere of his own. In an age when revived
+Paganism had penetrated into every part of society, and the love of the
+antique was the ruling impulse of intellectual thought, he scarcely shows
+a trace of this influence, and derives his inspiration exclusively from
+Christian sources. He paints Lucrezia dying with the ecstatic smile of a
+martyred saint on her lips, and designs classical figures only to give
+them the yearning expression of religious emotion.
+
+But in this realm of mystic art it must be owned that he takes the
+highest place. That fine saying of Raphael, when he declared that no
+other Madonnas were as beautiful or as religious as those which Francia
+painted, was no empty compliment. Since those days many have felt
+the truth of his words, and have confirmed his judgment. For to the
+earnestness and purity of Fra Angelico’s conceptions Francia brought a
+mastery of resources which had been lacking to those older painters. His
+creations are animated with a warmer humanity and a more vigorous life,
+they have all the charm of glowing colours and strongly contrasted light
+and shadow, while secular influences are allowed a larger part in the
+rich ornament and noble architecture which surround them.
+
+Thus Francia shares with Perugino the praise of having combined the
+technical perfection of a later age with the Christian motives which
+had so largely influenced the first efforts of Italian art. But, unlike
+Perugino, the religious feeling which formed the secret of Francia’s
+inspiration remained fresh and strong within his breast to the end of his
+life, and was with him still a real and living power, when it had sunk
+into conventionalism and affectation in the later works of the Umbrian
+master, and was rapidly yielding to the growing influences of a worldly
+age in the creations of Raphael.
+
+Slowly but surely men’s thoughts and their ideals of life had undergone
+a complete change, and the art of Italy was entering on a new phase in
+which there was no longer room for the rapture of Fra Angelico’s faces,
+or the sweet gentleness of the Madonnas who haunted Francia’s dreams.
+
+    “The old order changeth, yielding place to new,
+    And God fulfils himself in many ways.”
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+THE PRINCIPAL WORKS OF MANTEGNA.
+
+
+BERGAMO.
+
+  _Lochis-Carrara Gallery._
+
+      Madonna and Child.
+
+      Portrait of man in red dress (Francesco Gonzaga?).
+
+BERLIN.
+
+  _Museum._
+
+      Portrait of an Ecclesiastic. (Matteo Bossi, Abbot of Fiesole.)
+
+      Madonna and Child. (_Painted about 1464._)
+
+      Presentation in the Temple. (_Painted about 1464._)
+
+COPENHAGEN.
+
+  _Museum._
+
+      Man of Sorrow supported by Angels. (ANDREAS MANTINEA. _Painted
+      about 1489._)
+
+DRESDEN.
+
+  _Gallery._
+
+      Holy Family (_formerly in the possession of Sir Charles
+      Eastlake_).
+
+FLORENCE.
+
+  _Uffizi._
+
+      Madonna and Child, in a rocky landscape. (_Painted in 1488-90._)
+
+      Adoration of the Magi; Presentation; and Ascension. (_A
+    triptych, painted about 1464._)
+
+FRANKFORT.
+
+  _Städel._
+
+      St. Mark (_doubtful_.)
+
+GLASGOW.
+
+  _Hamilton Collection._
+
+      Woman carrying a basin. (_Painted about 1470._)
+
+      Woman drinking. (_Painted about 1470._)
+
+HAMPTON COURT.
+
+      The Triumphs of Julius Cæsar, 1492. (_Nine cartoons._)
+
+LA MOTTA.
+
+  _Scarpa Collection._
+
+      St. Sebastian.
+
+LONDON.
+
+  _National Gallery._
+
+      The Virgin and Child enthroned; St. John the Baptist and the
+      Magdalen. _With the annexed signature (C.P.F. = Civis Patavinus
+      fecit.)_
+
+               [Illustration: Andreas Mantinia C.P.F.]
+
+      The Triumph of Scipio (_in monochrome: painted in 1505_).
+
+MADRID.
+
+  _Museum._
+
+      Death of the Virgin (_formerly in the collection of Charles I.;
+      painted about 1470_).
+
+MANTUA.
+
+  _Castello_ [_frescoes in the Camera degli Sposi, 1470-74_].
+
+      Lodovico Gonzaga and Barbara of Brandenburg surrounded by their
+      family and Court (_on the walls_).
+
+      Lodovico meeting his son, Cardinal Francesco, on his return
+      from Rome (_on the walls_).
+
+      Scenes from the fables of Hercules, Orpheus, Apollo, &c.;
+      Medallions of Cæsars, Cupids, and other figures (_in
+      monochrome, on the ceiling_).
+
+MILAN.
+
+  _Brera._
+
+      St. Luke and other saints (_altar-piece in twelve parts:
+      painted for Santa Giustina, Padua, in 1454_).
+
+      The dead Christ bewailed by the Maries.
+
+_Casa Trivulzi._
+
+      Virgin and Child in glory, with SS. John the Baptist, Romualdo,
+      and Jerome, a bishop and three angels. A MANTINIA P. AN.
+      GRACIE, 1497, 15 AUGUSTI.
+
+MUNICH.
+
+  _Pinakothek._
+
+      Madonna enthroned with Saints.
+
+NAPLES.
+
+  _Museum._
+
+      St. Euphemia, OPUS ANDREÆ MANTEGNÆ, MCCCCLIII.
+
+PADUA.
+
+  _Church of the Eremitani._
+
+      St. James baptizing Hermogenes.
+
+      St. James before Herod.
+
+      St. James blessing a convert on his way to execution.
+
+      Martyrdom of St. James.
+
+      Martyrdom of St. Christopher.
+
+      Burial of St. Christopher. _Six frescoes_, 1453-1459.
+
+  _Basilica of Sant’ Antonio._
+
+      St. Bernardino and St. Anthony, 1452 (_fresco in a lunette over
+      the portal_).
+
+PARIS.
+
+  _Louvre._
+
+      The Crucifixion (_part of the predella of the altar-piece of
+      San Zeno in Verona_).
+
+      Madonna della Vittoria (_painted in 1495-96 for Santa Maria
+      della Vittoria, Mantua_).
+
+      Parnassus.
+
+      Wisdom victorious over the Vices (_from Isabella Gonzaga’s
+      “Grotto”_).
+
+PARMA.
+
+  _Pinacoteca._
+
+      Copies in oil of the frescoes in the church of the Eremitani at
+      Padua (_doubtful_).
+
+TOURS.
+
+  _Museum._
+
+      Christ on the Mount of Olives (_part of the predella of the
+      altar-piece of San Zeno in Verona_).
+
+      The Ascension (_part of the predella of the altar-piece of San
+      Zeno in Verona_).
+
+TURIN.
+
+  _Gallery._
+
+      Madonna and five saints.
+
+VENICE.
+
+  _Academy._
+
+      St. George. (_Painted about 1464_).
+
+VERONA.
+
+  _San Zeno._
+
+      Madonna and eight Saints. (_Painted about 1459; altar-piece:
+      the predella, a copy of which is in San Zeno, is part in the
+      Louvre and part in the Tours Museum._)
+
+VIENNA.
+
+  _Belvedere._
+
+      St. Sebastian. (_Painted about 1464._)
+
+      Studies for the Triumphs of Julius Cæsar (_doubtful_).
+
+
+
+
+PAINTINGS BY MANTEGNA IN PRIVATE COLLECTIONS IN ENGLAND EXHIBITED AT
+VARIOUS TIMES.[11]
+
+
+AT THE BRITISH INSTITUTION (1816-1852).
+
+  Date.            Subject.                        Owner.
+
+  1835. Triumph of Scipio                   George Vivian, Esq.
+  1861. The Children of Medea rescued by
+          the Nurse                         J. C. Robinson, Esq.
+
+AT THE MANCHESTER ART TREASURES EXHIBITION, 1857.
+
+  Cat. No.         Subject.                        Owner.
+
+    91. Pietà, with the Crucifixion in
+          the Distance                      Liverpool Royal Institution.
+    96. Judith                              Earl of Pembroke.
+    97. Christ bearing the Cross            Christ Church, Oxford.
+    98. Christ on the Mount of Olives       Thomas Baring, Esq.
+   102. The Triumph of Scipio               George Vivian, Esq.
+
+AT THE LEEDS ART TREASURES EXHIBITION, 1868.
+
+  Cat. No.         Subject.                        Owner.
+
+    54. Saint                               Colonel Markham.
+    55. A Triumphal Procession              H. D. Owen, Esq.
+    57. Judith with the Head of Holofernes  Colonel Markham.
+    59. Virgin and Child, surrounded by
+          scenes in the Life of the Virgin  J. W. Faulkner, Esq.
+
+AT THE “EXHIBITION OF THE WORKS OF THE OLD MASTERS.”
+
+  Date.            Subject.                        Owner.
+
+  1870. Virgin and Child and St. John with
+          SS. Joachim and Anna              Lady Eastlake.
+        Christ on the Mount of Olives       Thomas Baring, Esq., M.P.
+        Angel at the Tomb                   Lady Taunton
+  1871. The Triumph of Scipio               George Vivian, Esq.
+        The Wise Men’s Offerings            Louisa, Lady Ashburton.
+        Subjects (four) from the Life of
+          Christ                            Earl of Dudley.
+  1872. Two Figures; a Study                Duke of Buccleuch.
+  1875. The Flight into Egypt               W. Graham, Esq.
+  1876. Judith with the Head of Holofernes  Colonel Markham.
+        Dido                                      ”
+  1878. A Triumphal Procession              Hugh Owen, Esq.
+  1880. The Virgin and Child                Charles Butler, Esq.
+  1881. A Pietà                             Sir William N. Abdy, Bart.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+THE PRINCIPAL WORKS OF FRANCIA.
+
+
+BERLIN.
+
+  _Museum._
+
+      Madonna and Child, with SS. Geminiano, Bernard, Dorothea,
+      Catharine, Jerome, and Louis of France. FRANCIA AURIFABER
+      BONON̅, 1502 (_painted for Santa Cecilia, Modena_).
+
+      Holy Family (_early work_) BARTHOLEMEI SUM(PTU) BIANCHINI
+      MAXIMA MATROM HIC VIVIT MANIBUS FRANCIA PICTA TUIS.
+
+BOLOGNA.
+
+  _Pinacoteca._
+
+      78. Madonna and Child, with SS. John the Baptist, Monica,
+      Augustin, Francis, Proculus and Sebastian and an Angel (_with
+      portrait of Bartolommeo Felicini, for whom it was painted_,
+      OPUS FRANCIÆ AURIFICIS, MCCCCLXXXX (IV?).)
+
+      80. Madonna and Child, with SS. John the Baptist, Augustin,
+      Jerome, and Stephen, and an angel (_painted for the Manzuoli_).
+
+      81. The Infant Christ adored by the Virgin, SS. Joseph,
+      Augustin, and Francis, the donor and two angels. (_Painted for
+      Antonio Galeazzo Bentivoglio in 1499._)
+
+      82. Birth; Infancy; Death of Christ. (_A predella._)
+
+      83. Pietà.
+
+          [_These five were formerly in Santa Maria della
+          Misericordia, Bologna._]
+
+      371. Annunciation, with SS. George, Bernardino of Siena,
+      Francis of Assisi, and John the Evangelist. FRANCIA AURIFEX
+      PINXIT, MCCCCC.
+
+      372. Madonna and Child, with SS. John the Baptist, Paul, and
+      Francis of Assisi.
+
+      373. Crucifixion, with the Madonna, the Magdalen, St. Jerome,
+      and St. John the Evangelist. OPUS FRANCIÆ AURIF.
+
+          [_These three were formerly in the SS. Annunziata,
+          Bologna._]
+
+      79. Annunciation, with SS. John the Baptist and Jerome.
+
+          [_Formerly in the Oratorio of San Girolamo di Miramonte
+          Bologna._]
+
+  _San Giacomo Maggiore._
+
+      Madonna, with Saints and Angels. JOHANNI BENTIVOGLIO II.
+      FRANCIA AURIFEX PINXIT. (_in 1499_). [_In the Bentivoglio
+      Chapel._]
+
+      Marriage; and Burial of St. Cecilia, _fresco 1509_. [_In the
+      Oratory of Santa Cecilia._]
+
+  _San Martino Maggiore._
+
+      Madonna and Child, with SS. Roch, Sebastian, Bernardino, and
+      Anthony of Padua. FRANCIA AURIFEX P.
+
+  _SS. Vitale ed Agricola._
+
+      Angels playing musical instruments (_round an older picture of
+      the Madonna_).
+
+  _Casa Ercolani._
+
+      God the Father, 1514.
+
+CESENA.
+
+  _Pinacoteca._
+
+      Presentation. FRANCIA AURIFEX.
+
+DRESDEN.
+
+  _Gallery._
+
+      Adoration of the Kings (_a predella_).
+
+      Madonna and Child, with the bird, and St. John the Baptist.
+
+      Baptism of Christ. FRANCIA AURIFEX BON. F. M. V. VIIII. (1509).
+
+FERRARA.
+
+  _Cathedral._
+
+      Coronation of the Virgin, with SS. George, Stephen,
+      Bartholomew, John the Baptist, Peter, Augustin and Paul,
+      Catherine, and another female Saint. (_The altar-piece “of all
+      the Saints.”_)
+
+FLORENCE.
+
+  _Uffizi._
+
+      Portrait of Evangelista Scappi. SO. VANGELISTA SCARPI.
+
+FORLI.
+
+  _Pinacoteca._
+
+      Adoration of the Child (_from the Palazzo Zambeccari, Bologna_).
+
+FRANKFORT.
+
+  _Städel._
+
+      Portrait of a young man.
+
+HAMPTON COURT.
+
+      Baptism of Christ. FRANCIA AURIFEX BON. (_replica of the
+      Dresden Gallery picture_).
+
+LONDON.
+
+  _National Gallery._
+
+      The Virgin with the Infant Christ and St. Anne, enthroned,
+      surrounded by SS. John the Baptist, Sebastian, Paul, Lawrence
+      and Romualdo (_with the annexed signature_).
+
+          [Illustration: FRANCIA · AVRIFEX · BONONIE̅S̅IS · P.]
+
+      The Virgin and two angels weeping over the dead body of Christ
+      (_lunette of the above_).
+
+          [_These two pictures, formerly an altar-piece, were
+          originally in the Buonvisi Chapel in San Frediano, at
+          Lucca._]
+
+      The Virgin and Child with two Saints.
+
+  _Dudley House._
+
+      Virgin and Child with St. Joseph. JACOBUS CAMBARUS BONON. PER
+      FRANCIAM AURIFABRUM HOC OPUS FIERI CURAVIT, 1495.
+
+      Virgin and Child.
+
+LUCCA.
+
+  _San Frediano._
+
+      The Virgin in glory blessed by Christ, with SS. Anselm,
+      Augustin, Anthony, and David and Solomon.
+
+      Scenes from the History of the Augustine order (_predella_).
+
+  _Galleria Mansi da San Pellegrino._
+
+      Madonna and Child.
+
+MADRID.
+
+  _Duke of Fernan Nunez._
+
+      St. Sebastian.
+
+MILAN.
+
+  _Brera._
+
+      Annunciation.
+
+  _Casa Pertusati._
+
+      Madonna and Saints. 1511.
+
+MUNICH.
+
+  _Pinakothek._
+
+      Madonna of the Rose-garden. FRANCIA AURIFEX BONO. (_A copy is
+      in the Berlin Museum, and another in the Pinacoteca, Bologna._)
+
+      Madonna and Child (who holds a bird), with two angels.
+
+PARIS.
+
+  _Louvre._
+
+      The Nativity.
+
+      Christ on the Cross, with Job, the Virgin, and St. John.
+      FRANCIA AURIFABER (_formerly in San Giobbe, Bologna_).
+
+PARMA.
+
+  _Accademia._
+
+      Deposition. FRANCIA AURIFEX BONON. F.
+
+      Madonna and Child, St. John the Baptist, and SS. Joseph,
+      Benedict, Scolastica, and Placida. FRANCIA AURIFEX BONONIENSIS,
+      F. MDXV.
+
+      Madonna with the little St. John.
+
+ROME.
+
+  _Palazzo Borghese._
+
+      St. Stephen. VINCENTII DESIDERII VOTUM FRA̅CIÆ EXPRESSUM MANU
+      (_early work_).
+
+      Madonna and Child.
+
+ST. PETERSBURG.
+
+  _Hermitage._
+
+      Madonna and Child (_in the background the “Resurrection” and
+      “Transfiguration”_). F. FRANCIA.
+
+      Madonna and Child, with St. Jerome, St. Lawrence, and two
+      angels. D.S. LUDOVICUS DE CALCINA. DECRETORU̅ DOCTOR CANONICUS.
+      S.P BON REDIFICATOR AUCTORQ. DOMUS ET RESTAURATOR HUIUS ECLESIÆ
+      FECIT FIERI. P. ME FRANCIAM AURIFICE̅ BONON. ANO. MCCCCC.
+
+TURIN.
+
+  _Museum._
+
+      Pietà, with the Virgin, the Magdalen, the Evangelist, and a
+      Saint. F. FRANCIA AURIFEX BONONIENSIS F. MDXV.
+
+VIENNA.
+
+  _Belvedere._
+
+      Madonna and Child, with SS. John the Baptist, Francis, and
+      Catherine (_repainted_).
+
+  _Academy._
+
+      Madonna and Child, with Saints (_repainted, and doubtful_).
+
+  _Liechtenstein Gallery._
+
+      Portrait of a Bolognese nobleman (_formerly ascribed to
+      Raphael_).
+
+
+
+
+PAINTINGS BY FRANCIA IN PRIVATE COLLECTIONS IN ENGLAND EXHIBITED AT
+VARIOUS TIMES.
+
+
+AT THE BRITISH INSTITUTION (1816-1852).
+
+  Date.            Subject.                        Owner.
+
+  1843. Madonna and Child, with St.
+          Jerome and St. Francis            Hon. T. Frankland Lewis.
+  1852. Baptism of our Saviour              Right Hon. H. Labouchere, M.P.
+  1853. A Man’s Head                        John Freeborn, Esq.
+  1861. Virgin and Child with Angels        W. F. Maitland, Esq.
+  1863. Portrait of a Young Man             J. C. Robinson, Esq.
+
+AT THE MANCHESTER ART TREASURES EXHIBITION, 1857.
+
+  Cat. No.         Subject.                        Owner.
+
+    81. The Baptism of Christ               Right Hon. H. Labouchere.
+   108. The Madonna and Child, with St.
+          Joseph                            Lord Ward.
+   124. Madonna and Child                   Daniel Lee, Esq.
+   127. Virgin and Child                    Lord Northwick.
+   132. The Baptism                         The Queen (Hampton Court).
+   146. St. Roch                            Sir W. R. Farquhar, Bart.
+
+AT THE LEEDS ART TREASURES EXHIBITION, 1868.
+
+  Cat. No.         Subject.                        Owner.
+
+    60. Virgin and Child. Triptych          J. W. Faulkner, Esq.
+    80. Head of a Saint                     Alexander Barker, Esq.
+    83. Virgin and Child, with Saints
+          Sixtus and Laurence               Wolsey Moreau, Esq.
+    86. Saint                               Alexander Barker, Esq.
+   248. Holy Family                         The Right Hon. the Speaker.
+
+AT THE “EXHIBITION OF THE WORKS OF THE OLD MASTERS.”
+
+  Date.            Subject.                        Owner.
+
+  1871. The Virgin and Child                Earl of Dudley.
+  1873. The Virgin and Child                J. F. Jesse, Esq.
+  1876. The Virgin and Child—rocky
+          landscape in distance             Thomas Sheffield, Esq.
+  1879. St. Francis                         William Graham, Esq.
+  1881. Portrait of the Painter             Sir William N. Abdy, Bart.
+        Portrait of Giovanni Bentivoglio,
+          of Bologna                                ”      ”
+
+
+
+
+CHRONOLOGY
+
+
+OF MANTEGNA.
+
+  1431. Born in the neighbourhood of Padua.                    (_Page_ 3.)
+
+  1441. Entered on the register of Paduan painters as the
+          adopted son of his master Squarcione.                  (_P._ 3.)
+
+  1448. Painted the altar-piece for Santa Sofia of Padua.        (_P._ 3.)
+
+  1452. Painted the fresco over the portal of Sant’ Antonio.     (_P._ 3.)
+
+  1452-58. Painted the frescoes of the Eremitani Church, and
+          married Niccolosia Bellini.                        (_Pp._ 3-11.)
+
+  1454. Painted the altar-piece for Santa Giustina, Padua.      (_P._ 14.)
+
+  1456. Entered into correspondence with Lodovico Gonzaga.      (_P._ 14.)
+
+  1457-59. Painted the altar-piece of San Zeno at Verona.       (_P._ 15.)
+
+  1459. Settled at Mantua with his family.                      (_P._ 17.)
+
+  1466. Visited Florence.                                       (_P._ 22.)
+
+  1472. Visited Cardinal Francesco Gonzaga at Bologna.          (_P._ 22.)
+
+    ”   Received a grant of land at Buscoldo.                   (_P._ 22.)
+
+  1470-1474. Painted the frescoes of the Camera degli
+          Sposi.                                            (_Pp._ 25-28.)
+
+  1473. Received a grant of land in Mantua upon which he
+          built his house.                                      (_P._ 29.)
+
+  1481. Painted at Marmirolo.                                   (_P._ 30.)
+
+  1483. Received a visit from Lorenzo de’ Medici.               (_P._ 30.)
+
+  1485. Painted a Madonna for the Duchess of Ferrara.           (_P._ 32.)
+
+  1485-1488. Painted the first pieces of the “Triumphs.”        (_P._ 32.)
+
+  1488-1490. Painted the frescoes of the Belvedere Chapel
+          of the Vatican for Innocent VIII.                     (_P._ 32.)
+
+    ”   Painted the Madonna and Child of the Uffizi for
+          Lorenzo de’ Medici.                                   (_P._ 34.)
+
+  1490. Left Rome and returned to Mantua, Sept. 6.              (_P._ 34.)
+
+  1490-92. Worked at the “Triumphs of Julius Cæsar” and
+          completed the series.                                 (_P._ 39.)
+
+  1492. Received a fresh grant of land from Francesco Gonzaga,
+          Feb. 4.                                               (_P._ 43.)
+
+  1494. Furnished his house in the parish of S. Sebastian.      (_P._ 43.)
+
+  1495-96. Painted the Madonna della Vittoria.                  (_P._ 47.)
+
+  1496-97. Painted an altar-piece for Santa Maria in Organo
+          at Verona, now in Casa Trivulzi, Milan.               (_P._ 48.)
+
+  1499. Designed a monument to Virgil.                          (_P._ 49.)
+
+  1499. Marriage of his daughter Taddea to Viano Vianesi.       (_P._ 43.)
+
+  1504. Made his first will, March 1.                           (_P._ 51.)
+
+    ”   Entered into a contract with the Canons of Sant’
+          Andrea by which he obtained possession of a chapel
+          in that church, Aug. 11.                              (_P._ 51.)
+
+    ”   Sold his house in Mantua.                               (_P._ 51.)
+
+  1505. Disgrace and banishment of his son Francesco.           (_P._ 51.)
+
+    ”   Painted the St. Sebastian of the Scarpa gallery,
+          and the Triumph of Scipio for Francesco Cornaro.      (_P._ 52.)
+
+    ”   Bought a house in the Contrada Unicorno.                (_P._ 53.)
+
+  1506. Altered his will in favour of Gian’ Andrea, his
+          illegitimate son, Jan. 24.                            (_P._ 51.)
+
+    ”   Painted the Masque of Comus for Isabella Gonzaga.       (_P._ 53.)
+
+    ”   Sold his bust of Faustina to Isabella’s agent, Aug. 1.  (_P._ 54.)
+
+    ”   Died at Mantua, Sept. 13.                               (_P._ 54.)
+
+
+OF FRANCIA.
+
+  1450. Born at Bologna.                                        (_P._ 75.)
+
+  1482. Entered the Goldsmiths’ Guild.                          (_P._ 76.)
+
+  1483. Elected steward of the Guild.                           (_P._ 70.)
+
+  1485. Birth of his son Giacomo.                               (_P._ 76.)
+
+  1487. Birth of his son Giulio.                                (_P._ 76.)
+
+  1489. Elected steward of the Goldsmiths’ Guild a second time. (_P._ 76.)
+
+  1490. Painted his first altar-piece for Bartolommeo Felicini. (_P._ 79.)
+
+  1495. Painted a Madonna and Child for Jacopo Gambaro.         (_P._ 81.)
+
+  1499. Painted altar-pieces for the Bentivoglio Chapel and
+          Church of the Misericordia.                           (_P._ 81.)
+
+  1500. Painted altar-pieces for the Church of the
+          Annunziata, and for San Lorenzo.                 (_Pp._ 84, 85.)
+
+  1502. Painted Madonna and Saints for the Friars dell’
+          Osservanza at Modena.                                (_P._ 100.)
+
+  1505-1506. Painted frescoes of the Chapel of St. Cecilia.     (_P._ 94.)
+
+  1507. Expulsion of the Bentivogli.                            (_P._ 97.)
+
+  1508. Coined money for Pope Julius II.                        (_P._ 97.)
+
+    ”   Sent his portrait to Raphael in Rome, Sept.             (_P._ 97.)
+
+  1509. Painted the Baptism of Christ (now in the Dresden
+          Gallery).                                             (_P._ 99.)
+
+  1511. Elected one of the six Gonfalonieri of the People.     (_P._ 102.)
+
+  1512. Elected steward of the Guild.                          (_P._ 103.)
+
+  1514. Elected steward of the four Guilds.                    (_P._ 103.)
+
+  1515. Painted Sanvitale altar-piece at Parma, and Pietà
+          at Turin.                                            (_P._ 104.)
+
+  1516. Raphael sent his St. Cecilia to Bologna.               (_P._ 105.)
+
+  1517. (New style, 1518). Died, Jan. 5.                       (_P._ 106.)
+
+
+
+
+FOOTNOTES
+
+
+[1] Crowe and Cavalcaselle doubt that he went to Greece.
+
+[2] We have Professor Colvin’s authority for assigning this print to
+Mantegna, as well as the strong inference drawn from the likeness of the
+engravings to the frescoes of the Castello di Corte. (Portfolio, vol. 8.)
+
+[3] The Raphael Cartoons only realised £300.
+
+[4] Crowe and Cavalcaselle doubt that Francia studied under Zoppo.
+
+[5] See Crowe and Cavalcaselle. “A History of Painting in North Italy,”
+Vol. I., p. 294. Crevalcore’s name, however, does not occur in the Berlin
+official catalogue.
+
+[6] No. 80, in the Pinacoteoa, Bologna.
+
+[7] No. 81.
+
+[8] At Tew Park, Oxfordshire.
+
+[9] These two frescoes are usually ascribed to Giacomo Raibolini;
+but Frizzoni and Milanese after him attribute them to Tamaroccio, who
+assisted his master Francia in the chapel.
+
+[10] The picture exhibited by Sir William Abdy at Burlington House last
+winter (1881) as the painter’s own likeness has too little in common with
+Francia’s style to be accepted as genuine with any certainty, although a
+print of it, bearing the date 1763 and the name of the goldsmith painter,
+is said to exist.
+
+[11] In the lists of Mantegna’s and Francia’s works exhibited at the
+British Institution, Manchester, Leeds, and the “Old Masters” at
+Burlington House, the official catalogues have been strictly adhered
+to; it must not be supposed that _every_ picture classed as the work
+of Mantegna or of Francia is recognised as genuine by the critics; for
+example, the Royal Academy merely catalogues the works “under the names
+given to them by the contributors,” and “can accept no responsibility as
+to their authenticity.”
+
+
+
+
+BIBLIOGRAPHY.
+
+
+CROWE AND CAVALCASELLE. A history of painting in North Italy. London,
+1871.
+
+MILANESI, GAETANO. Le opere di Giorgio Vasari; con nuove annotazioni e
+Commenti di Milanesi. Firenze, 1879.
+
+
+MANTEGNA.
+
+GOETHE, J. W. VON. Triumphzug von Mantegna. Werke, XXXIX.
+
+ARCO, CARLO D’. Delle Arti e degli Artifici di Mantova, notizie raccolte
+ed illustrate con disegni e con documenti. Mantova, 1859.
+
+BASCHET, ARMAND. Documents sur Mantegna. In the “Gazette des Beaux Arts.”
+Paris, 1866.
+
+BRAGHIROLLI, WILLELMO. Alcuni documenti inedite relative ad Andrea
+Mantegna: in the “Giornale d’Erudizione Artistica.” Perugia, 1872.
+
+BRUN, KARL. Neue Documente über Andrea Mantegna: in the “Zeitschrift für
+Bildende Kunst,” vol. xi. Leipzig, 1875-6.
+
+WOLTMANN, DR. ALFRED. Biography of ANDREA MANTEGNA in the “Kunst und
+Künstler des Mittelalters und der Neuzeit.” Edited by DR. ROBERT DOHME.
+Leipzig, 1876.
+
+
+FRANCIA.
+
+CALVI, JACOPO ALESSANDRO. Memorie della vita ed opere di Francesco
+Raibolini. Bologna, 1812.
+
+MALVASIA, CARLO CESARE. Felsina Pittrice. Vite de Pittori Bolognesi.
+Bologna, 1841.
+
+GIORDANI, GAETANO. Catalogo dei Quadri della Pinacoteca. Bologna, 1841.
+
+AMORINI, ANTONIO BOLOGNINI, Marchese, Vite dei Pittori ed Artefici
+Bolognesi. Bologna, 1841-43.
+
+FRIZZONI, GUSTAVO. Gli Affreschi di Santa Cecilia in Bologna. Bologna,
+1876.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX.
+
+
+TO MANTEGNA.
+
+  Aldobrandini, 22
+
+  Aliprandi, quarrel with, 23
+    exchanged land with, 43
+
+  Altichieri of Verona, 2
+
+  Andrea, Zoan, 23, 35
+
+  Ansuino of Forli, 5
+
+  Ariosto, 59
+
+  Avanzo, Jacopo d’, 2
+
+
+  Barbaro, Daniele, 8
+
+  Bellini, the, 8, 9, 10, 12, 17
+
+  Bono of Ferrara, 5
+
+  Bossi, Matteo, 13, 18
+
+  Bust of Mantegna, 7
+
+
+  Calandra, 54
+
+  Camera degli Sposi, 25-28
+
+  Campagnola, 35
+
+  Caracalla, Baths of, 13
+
+  Cerdo, Vitruvius, 13
+
+  Donatello, 9, 12, 14
+
+  Drawings—
+    _Calumny of Apelles_, 45
+    _Chalice, Design for_, 46
+    _Entombment_, 45
+    _Hercules killing the Lion_, 45
+    _Judgment of Solomon_, 45
+    _Judith_, 45, 46
+    _Mars, Diana and Venus_, 45
+    _Sagrifizio_, 45, 46
+
+  Dürer, 36, 55
+
+  Dwarfs at Mantua, 26
+
+
+  Engravings—
+    _Battle of the Sea-Gods_, 35, 45, 59
+    _Dancing Muses of the Parnassus_, 35
+    _Descent from the Cross_, 36
+    _Entombment_, 36, 59, 62
+    _Hercules and Antæus_, 36, 45
+    _Portraits of Lodovico and Barbara Gonzaga_, 36
+    _St. Andrew, St. Longinus and the Risen Christ_, 36
+    _St. Sebastian_, 36
+    _Scourging of Christ_, 4
+    _Triumphs_, 35, 40
+    _Virgin of the Grotto_, 18, 35
+
+  Eremitani Frescoes, 4-11
+
+  Este, Isabella d’, 31, 34
+
+
+  Fancelli, 14
+
+  Faustina, Mantegna’s, 53, 54, 56
+
+  Feliciano, 13
+
+  Finiguerra, 35
+
+
+  Gian’ Andrea, 43, 50, 51
+
+  Giotto, 1
+
+  Giusto of Florence, 2
+
+  Gonzaga, Federico, 30, 31
+
+  Gonzaga, Francesco, 22
+
+  Gonzaga, Francesco II., 32, 33, 43
+
+  Gonzaga, Lodovico, 14, 15, 17, 21, 25, 26, 29, 30
+
+  Gonzaga, Sigismondo, 51
+
+
+  Influence of Mantegna on—
+    Bellini, the, 57
+    Bonsignori, 57
+    Buonconsiglio, 57
+    Caroto, 57
+    Correggio, 58
+    Costa, 57
+    Dürer, 59
+    Forli, Melozzo da, 58
+    Francia, 58
+    Holbein, 59
+    Libri, Girolamo dai, 57
+    Grandi, Ercole, 57
+    Leonardo, 58, 60
+    Liberale, 57
+    Michelangelo, 58, 61
+    Montagna, 57
+    Morone, 57
+    Raphael, 58, 60
+    Rubens, 59
+    Tura, Cosimo, 57
+    Vivarini, Luigi, 57
+
+  Innocent VIII., 32, 33
+
+
+  Julius II., 54
+
+
+  Lomazzo, 8
+
+  Lorenzo di Pavia, 55
+
+
+  Mantegna, Andrea (_See_ Chronology p. 119)
+
+  Mantegna, Francesco, 51, 57
+
+  Mantegna, Lodovico, 32, 43, 51
+
+  Mantegna, Niccolosia, 43, 51
+
+  Mantegna, Taddea, 43
+
+  Mantua, sack of, 24
+
+  Medici, Lorenzo de’, visits Mantegna, 30
+
+  Melozzo da Forli, 28
+
+  Mocetto, 35
+
+
+  Niccolosia, 43, 51
+
+  Norsa, 47
+
+
+  Paintings—
+    _Adoration of the Magi_, of the Uffizi, 18
+      of the Vatican, 32
+    _Autumn_, 19
+    _Baptism of Christ_, 32
+    _Birth of Christ_, 32
+    _Burial of St. Christopher_, 10
+    _Christ on the Mount of Olives_, 16
+    _Cristo in Scurto_, 55
+    _Comus_, 53
+    _Dead Christ_, 19
+    _Death of the Virgin_, 19
+    _Descent of Christ into Limbo_, 34
+    _Execution of St. James_, 9
+    _Glorified Madonna_, of Milan, 48
+    _History of St. James and St. Christopher_, 4-11
+    _Lodovico Gonzaga and his son, Francesco_, 26
+    _Lodovico Gonzaga and his wife_, 25
+    _Madonna_, of Bergamo, 49
+      _holding the child on a parapet_, 18
+    _Madonna_, of the Dresden Gallery, 32
+      of San Zeno, 15, 16
+    _Madonna della Vittoria_, 46, 47, 48
+    _Man of Sorrows_, 34
+    _Martyrdom of St. Christopher_, 10
+    _Parnassus_, 44, 48
+    _Pietà_, 20
+    _Portrait of an Ecclesiastic_, 18
+    _Rubens’s copy of the Triumphs_, 41
+    _SS. Anthony and Bernardino_, 3
+    _St. Euphemia_, 14
+    _St. George_, 19
+    _St. James baptizing Converts_, 6
+      _before Herod_, 7
+      _blessing a kneeling disciple_, 7
+    _St. Luke_, 14
+    _St. Sebastian_, 19
+      of La Motta, 52, 55
+    _Summer_, 19
+    _Triumphs of Julius Cæsar_, 32, 33, 38, 43, 46, 60
+    _Triumph of Scipio_, 52, 55
+    _Virgin_, of the National Gallery, 48
+      of the Uffizi, 31, 34
+    _Wisdom Victorious over the Vices_, 44
+
+  Pannonio, 13
+
+  Pizzolo, Niccolo, 5, 6, 18
+
+
+  Santa Sofia, altar-piece for, 3
+
+  Santi, Giovanni, 28
+
+  Sperandio’s Bust of Mantegna, 56
+
+  Squarcione, 2, 8, 14
+
+
+  Uccelli, 8, 9, 12
+
+
+  Vianesi, 43
+
+  Virgil, Monument to, 49
+
+
+  Zizim, 33
+
+  Zoppo, Marco, 5
+
+
+TO FRANCIA.
+
+  Angelico, Fra, 107, 108
+
+  Aspertini, 94, 95, 104
+
+  Avanzi, Jacopo degli, 67, 68
+
+  Avanzo, Jacopo d’, 68
+
+
+  Bagnacavallo, 103
+
+  Bentivoglio, Antonio Galeazzo Giovanni II., 73, 76, 81
+
+  Bentivogli driven from Bologna, 97
+
+  Bentivogli return to Bologna, 102
+
+  Bernardino da Siena, 70
+
+
+  Carracci, the, 69, 82, 106
+
+  Casio, 80, 83
+
+  Caterina, 76
+
+  Chiodarolo, 94, 95
+
+  Clement VIII., 67
+
+  Cossa, Francesco, 73
+
+  Costa, 73, 77, 78, 79, 94, 95
+
+  Credi, Lorenzo di, 83
+
+  Crevalcore, 80
+
+  Cristofano, 70
+
+
+  Dalmasii, Lippo, 66
+
+  Domenichino, 106
+
+  Drawings—
+    _Greek Youths_, 93
+    _Judgment of Paris_, 93
+
+
+  Franco Bolognese, 65
+
+  Felicini, 80, 83
+
+  Francia (_See_ Chronology p. 120)
+
+
+  Galassi, 68, 71, 72
+
+  Gambaro, 81
+
+  Gaston de Foix, 102
+
+  Grandi, Ercole, 73
+    Ercole II, 104
+
+  Gubbio, Oderisio da, 65
+
+  Guido of Bologna, 66
+
+  Guido Reni, 106
+
+
+  Imola, Innocenza da, 103
+
+
+  Julius II, 97
+
+
+  Lambertini, 72
+
+  Landscape, 84
+
+  Lianori, 72
+
+
+  Mantegna, 72, 77
+
+  Marchesi, 104
+
+  Mezzaratta, Frescoes of the, 68, 69
+
+  Michelangelo, 69
+
+
+  Nadi, 94
+
+  Niello work, 77
+
+
+  Paintings—
+    _Adoration of the Magi_, of the Brera, 84
+      at Dresden, 100
+    _Annunciation_, of the Annunziata, 85
+      Bologna Gallery, 100
+      of the Brera, 81
+    _Baptism of Christ_, Dresden, 99
+      Hampton Court, 100
+    _Burial of St. Cecilia_, 95, 96
+    _Coronation of the Virgin_, at Lucca, 91
+      at Ferrara, 92
+    _Crucifixion_, of the Louvre, 81
+    _Deposition_, Parma, 89, 104
+    _Dispute of Philosophers_, 92
+    _God the Father_, 104
+    _Holy Family_, of Berlin, 79
+      of Dudley House, 81
+    _Judith_, 92
+    _Lucrezia_, 88, 98
+    _Madonna_, of the Annunziata, 85
+      Bentivoglio, 82
+      Manzuoli, 82
+      Parma Gallery, 100
+      Dresden, 100
+      National Gallery, 100
+      Vienna, 100
+      Berlin, 100
+      St. Petersburg, 84
+      San Martino, 84
+      Munich, 81
+      of 1490, 79
+      of 1511, 104
+    _Madonna of the Rose Garden_, 100
+    _Marriage of Cecilia and Valerian_, 95
+    _Nativity_, of Bologna, 82
+      of Forli, 92
+    _Pietà_, at Bologna, 81
+      of the National Gallery, 89, 90
+      Turin Gallery, 104
+    _Portrait of Bartolommeo Bianchini_, 79
+      _Evangelista Scappi_, 99
+      _a Bolognese Noble_, 99
+    _Presentation_, of Cesena, 92
+    _St. Stephen_, 78
+    _Virgin enthroned with Saints_, of National Gallery, 91
+
+  Paxes, by Francia, 77
+
+  Perugino, 80, 83
+
+  Pietro della Francesca, 72
+
+
+  Raibolini, Francesco (_See_ Chronology p. 120)
+
+  Raibolini, Giacomo, 94, 95, 76, 103
+    Giulio, 76, 103
+
+  Raimondi, 93
+
+  Raphael, Francia’s friendship for, 86
+
+  Raphael visits Bologna, 87
+    and Francia exchange pictures, 88
+    Sonnet to, 88
+    influence of, 95
+    letter of, 97
+    sends his altar-piece to Francia, 105
+
+
+  St. Cecilia, Frescoes in Oratory of, 94, 95
+
+  Simone dai Crocifissi, 67, 68, 71
+
+
+  Tamaroccio, 94, 95
+
+
+  Ursone, 65
+
+
+  Ventura, 65
+
+  Vigri, Santa Caterina, 72
+
+  Vitale, 66, 70
+
+  Viti, Timoteo, 87
+
+
+  Zoppo, Marco, 73, 77, 78
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76481 ***