Renaissance in Italy Volume III Part 13

[211] This is the conjecture of Signor Luzi (_Il Duomo di Orvieto_, p.

168). He bases it upon the Dantesque subjects ill.u.s.trated, and quotes from the "Inferno":--

"Omero poeta sovrano; L' altro e Orazio satiro che viene, Ovidio e il terzo, e l' ultimo Lucano."

Nothing is more marked or more deeply interesting than the influence exercised by Dante over Signorelli, an influence he shared with Giotto, Orcagna, Botticelli, Michael Angelo, the greatest imaginative painters of Central Italy.

[212] The background to the circular "Madonna" in the Uffizzi, the "Flagellation of Christ" in the Academy at Florence and in the Brera at Milan, and the "Adam" at Cortona, belong to this grade.

[213] We may add the pages in a predella representing the "Adoration of the Magi" in the Uffizzi.

[214] Vasari mentions the portraits of Nicolo, Paolo, and Vitellozzo Vitelli, Gian Paolo, and Orazio Baglioni, among others, in the frescoes at Orvieto.

[215] Painted for Lorenzo de' Medici. It is now in the Berlin Museum through the neglect of the National Gallery authorities to purchase it for England.

[216] I must not omit to qualify Vasari's praise of Luca Signorelli, by reference to a letter recently published from the _Archivio Buonarroti, Lettere a Diversi_, p. 391. Michael Angelo there addresses the Captain of Cortona, and complains that in the first year of Leo's pontificate Luca came to him and by various representations obtained from him the sum of eighty Giulios, which he never repaid, although he made profession to have done so. Michael Angelo was ill at the time, and working with much difficulty on a statue of a bound captive for the tomb of Julius. Luca gave a specimen of his renowned courtesy by comforting the sculptor in these rather sanctimonious phrases: "Doubt not that angels will come from heaven, to support your arms and help you."

[217] Pietro, known as Perugino from the city of his adoption, was the son of Cristoforo Vannucci, of Citta della Pieve. He was born in 1446, and died at Fontignano in 1522.

[218] The triptych in the National Gallery.

[219] They have been published by the Arundel Society.

[220] These frescoes were begun in 1499. It may be mentioned that in this year, on the refusal of Perugino to decorate the Cappella di S. Brizio, the Orvietans entrusted that work to Signorelli.

[221] Uffizzi and Sala del Cambio.

[222] "Fu Pietro persona di a.s.sai poca religione, e non se gli pote mai far credere l'immortalita dell' anima: anzi, con parole, accomodate al suo cervello di porfido, ostinatissimamente ricus ogni buona vita. Aveva ogni sua speranza ne' beni della fortuna, e per danari arebbe fatto ogni male contratto." Vasari, vol. vi. p. 50. The local tradition alluded to above relates to the difficulties raised by the Church against the Christian burial of Perugino: but if he died of plague, as it is believed (see C. and C., vol. iii. p. 244), these difficulties were probably caused by panic rather than belief in his impiety. For Gasparo Celio's note on Perugino's refusal to confess upon his death-bed, saying that he preferred to see how an impenitent soul would fare in the other world, the reader may consult Rio's _L'Art Chretien_, vol. ii. p. 269. The record of Perugino's arming himself in Dec. 1486, together with a notorious a.s.sa.s.sin, Aulista di Angelo of Perugia, in order to waylay and beat a private enemy of his near S. Pietro Maggiore at Florence is quoted by Crowe and Cavalcaselle, vol. iii. p. 183.

[223] "Guadagn molte ricchezze; e in Fiorenza mur e compr case; ed in Perugia ed a Castello della Pieve acquist molti beni stahili." Vasari, vol. vi. p. 50.

[224] "Goffo nell arte." See Vasari, vol. vi. p. 46. See too above, p.

196.

[225] I select these for comment rather than the frescoes at Spello, beautiful as these are, because they have more interest in relation to the style of the Renaissance.

[226] The "a.s.sumption" in S. Frediano at Lucca should also be mentioned as one of Francia's masterpieces.

[227] His father was a muleteer of Suffignano, who settled at Florence, in a house and garden near the gate of S. Piero Gattolino. He was born in 1475, and he died in 1517.

[228] In S. Domenico at Prato in 1500. He afterwards resided in S. Marco at Florence.

[229] May 23, 1498.

[230] In addition to the pictures mentioned above, I may call attention to the adoring figure of S. Catherine of Siena, in three large paintings--now severally in the Pitti, at Lucca, and in the Louvre.

[231] In the Uffizzi. As a composition, it is the Frate's masterpiece.

[232] See Vol. I., _Age of the Despots_, p. 487, for this consequence of the sack of Prato.

[233] _L'Art Chretien_, vol. ii. p. 515.

[234] Two of our best portraits of Savonarola, the earlier inscribed "Hieronymi Ferrariensis a Deo Missi Prophetae Effigies," the later treated to represent S. Peter Martyr, are from the hand of Fra Bartolommeo. See Crowe and Cavalcaselle, vol. iii. p. 433.

[235] See below, chapter vii.

[236] This sonnet I have translated into English with such closeness to the original words as I found possible:--

He who can do not what he wills, should try To will what he can do; for since 'tis vain To will what can't be compa.s.sed, to abstain From idle wishing is philosophy.

Lo, all our happiness and grief imply Knowledge or not of will's ability: They therefore can, who will what ought to be.

Nor wrest true reason from her seat awry.

Nor what a man can, should he always will: Oft seemeth sweet what after is not so; And what I wished, when had, hath cost a tear.

Then, reader of these lines, if thou wouldst still Be helpful to thyself, to others dear, Will to can alway what thou ought to do.

[237] See the letter addressed by Lionardo to Lodovico Sforza enumerating his claims as a mechanician, military and civil engineer, architect, &c.

It need scarcely be mentioned that he served Cesare Borgia and the Florentine Republic as an engineer, and that much of his time at Milan was spent in hydraulic works upon the Adda. It should be added here that Lionardo committed the results of his discoveries to writing; but he published very little, and that by no means the most precious portion of his thoughts. He founded at Milan an Academy of Arts and Sciences, if this name may be given to a reunion of artists, scholars, and men of the world, to whom it is probable that he communicated his researches in anatomy. The _Treatise on Painting_, which bears his name, is a compilation from notes and MSS. first printed in 1651.

[238] The folio volume of sketches in the Ambrosian Library at Milan contains designs for all these works. The collection in the Royal Library at Windsor is no less rich. Among Lionardo's scientific drawings in the latter place may be mentioned a series of maps ill.u.s.trating the river system of Central Italy, with plans for improved drainage.

[239] Sh.e.l.ley says of the poet:--

He will watch from dawn to gloom The lake-reflected sun illume The yellow bees in the ivy bloom; Nor heed nor see what things they be, But from these create he can Forms more real than living man, Nurslings of immortality.

[240] See De Stendhal, _Histoire de la Peinture en Italie_, p. 143, for this story.

[241] In the _Treatise on Painting_, da Vinci argues strongly against isolating man. He regarded the human being as in truth a microcosm to be only understood in relation to the world around him, expressing, as a painter, the same thought as Pico. (See Vol. II., _Revival of Learning,_ p. 35.) Therefore he urges the claims of landscape on the attention of artists.

[242] I might refer in detail to four studies of bramble branches, leaves, and flowers and fruit, in the royal collection at Windsor, most wonderful for patient accuracy and delicate execution: also to drawings of oak leaves, wild guelder-rose, broom, columbine, asphodel, bull-rush, and wood-spurge in the same collection. These careful studies are as valuable for the botanist as for the artist. To render the specific character of each plant with greater precision would be impossible.

[243] See the series of anatomical studies of the horse in the Royal Collection.

[244] Engraved by Edelinck. The drawing has obvious Lionardesque qualities; but how far it may be from the character of the original we can guess by Rubens' transcript from Mantegna. (See above, Chapter VI, Mantegna's Biography.) De Stendhal says wittily of this work, "C'est Virgile traduit par Madame de Stael," op. cit. p. 162.

[245] In the Royal Collection at Windsor there are anatomical drawings for the construction of an imaginary quadruped with gigantic claws. The bony, muscular, and venous structure of its legs and feet is accurately indicated.

[246] See the drawings engraved and published by Gerli in his _Disegni di Lionardo da Vinci_, Milan, 1784.

[247] Vasari is the chief source of these legends. Giraldi Lomazzo, the Milanese historian of painting, and Bandello, the novelist, supply further details. It appears from all accounts that Lionardo impressed his contemporaries as a singular and most commanding personality. There is a touch of reverence in even the strangest stories, which is wanting in the legend of Piero di Cosimo.

[248] Even Michael Angelo, meeting him in Florence, flung in his teeth that "he had made the model of a horse to cast in bronze, and could not cast it, and through shame left it as it was unfinished." See _Arch. St.

It._, serie terza, xvi. 226.

[249] In the Royal Collection at Windsor there is a whole series of studies for these two statues, together with drawings for the mould in which Lionardo intended to cast them. The second of the two is sketched with great variety of motive. The horse is rearing; the fallen enemy is vainly striving to defend himself; the victor in one drawing is reining in his steed, in another is waving a truncheon, in a third is brandishing his sword, in a fourth is holding the sword in act to thrust. The designs for the pedestals, sometimes treated as a tomb and sometimes as a fountain, are equally varied.

[250] "Concevoir," said Balzac, "c'est jouir, c'est fumer des cigarettes enchantees; mais sans l'execution tout s'en va en reve et en fumee."

Quoted by Sainte-Beuve, _Causeries du Lundi_, vol. ii. p. 353.

[251] See Vol. II., _Revival of Learning_, p. 128, 129.