I 
 
 i 
 
ILLUSTRATED BLOGRAPHLES OF 
 THE GREAT ARTLSTS. 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 FRANCESCO RAIBOLINI, 
 
 CALLED 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
ILLUSTRATED BIOGRAPHIES OF 
 THE GREAT ARTISTS. 
 
 The following volumes, each illustrated with from \/\ to 20 Engravings, 
 are now ready, price 3J. 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 Eees. 
 
 TEUTONIC. 
 
 ALBRECHT DURER. 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 preparatiott : — 
 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 los. 6d. 
 
" The whole world wiihout Art would he one great wildertiess'' 
 
 MANTEGNA 
 
 AND 
 
 FRANCI A 
 
 By JULIA CARTWRIGHT ADV 
 
 AUTHOR OF "VARALLO AND HER PAINTER," ETC. 
 
 LONDON 
 
 SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE, & RIVINGTON 
 
 CROWN BUILDINGS, FLEET STREET 
 1881 
 
PEEFACE. 
 
 Although no separate Ibiograpiiy 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. Eobert Dohme's "Kunst und Kiinstler," to M. Armand 
 Baschet, Canonico WiUelmo BraghiroUi, and Dr. Karl Brun. 
 It is to be hoped that before long the last-named of these 
 scholars wiU 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 Eenaissance. 
 
 "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. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 MANTEGNA. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Eaely Years and Work at Padua, a.d. 1431 — 1457 . . 1 
 CHAPTEE 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 C^sar. Drawings, a.d. 1490—1500 38 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Last Works and Death — His Influence on Art. a.d. 150O 
 
 —1506 50 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 vii 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 FACE 
 
 Eaklt"Art in Bologna, a.d. 1300 — 1450 .... 65 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Early Life and Works, a.d. 1450 — 1500 75 
 
 CHAPTER ni. 
 
 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 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTEATIONS. 
 
 MANTEGNA. 
 
 
 
 PAOB 
 
 BvsT Portrait of Mantegna .... 
 
 Frontispiece 
 
 Meeting of Lodovico Gonzaga and his son, the 
 
 Cardinal 
 
 
 . 26 
 
 
 . 35 
 
 Judith ■with the Head of IIolofernes {drawing) . 
 
 . 37 
 
 Part op the Triumphs'of Julius CjESAk 
 
 . 42 
 
 
 . 46 
 
 YiEGiN 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 PietI 91 
 
 The Madonna of the Eose-Garden 101 
 
ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 EAELY YEAES AJO) WOEK 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 pecu- 
 liar in its characteristics, it rivalled for a time and even 
 surpassed the Venetian school in the vigour and indivi- 
 duality 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 Eenaissance 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 
 
 B 
 
2 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 Umbrian influences had later readied lier students througli 
 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 in- 
 creased steadily in numbers the results were poor, and the 
 few works which its members produced were feeble imita- 
 tions of Giottesque or Umbrian originals. 
 
 The first to raise Paduan art out of obscurity was Fran- 
 cesco 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.-'' 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 produc- 
 tion of works which bore his name, is the universal ver- 
 dict 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 
 * Crowe and Cavalcaselle doubt that ho went to Greece. 
 
EARLY YEARS AND WORK AT PADUA. 
 
 3 
 
 of line and heavy colouring that mark Zoppo and the 
 inferior Squarcionesques, while the latter in the dignity of 
 its pose and careful modelling hears 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 horn 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 rejpre- 
 sented 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 
 
 B 
 
4 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 and untried paths. Here too -sve find him. painting side 
 by side with, tlie best of Squarcione's other pupils, and we 
 have an opportunity of comparing bis 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. Christojaher. 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 Car- 
 mine, 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 f eatu];e which marks the work of all Squar- 
 cione's scholars, and was to attain its highest artistic 
 development in Mantegna's later conceptions, is the sculp- 
 tural treatment of form, which was a direct residt 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- 
 
EARLY YEAKS AND WORK AT PADUA. 
 
 5 
 
 loaded effect. This plastic tendency sprang from th.e 
 discovery, then first dawning- upon the men of the Re- 
 naissance, 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 suf- 
 ficient knowledge of nature, and, therefore, frequently 
 degenerated into a lifeless rigidity and absence of ex- 
 pression, 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 con- 
 siderable 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 Squarcion- 
 esques who approached Mantegna's style, and whose im- 
 proved 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 Yasari 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 
 
6 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 wliichin joyous life and freedom of movement so far surpasses 
 the ordinary manner of tlie Paduans tliat one of the best 
 critics, Dr. Woltmann, pronounces it to be by Mantegna's 
 band. Against this we have the testimony of the anony- 
 mous 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. Yasari 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 imcertainty 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 degress 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 anima- 
 tion. Nothing can be more natural than the two children 
 who look on with wondering eyes — the taller of the two 
 
EARLY YEARS AND WORK AT PADUA. 
 
 7 
 
 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 Eoman costumes and clas- 
 sical 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 Eoman, 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 skiU in 
 perspective, but in the next, " St. James blessing a kneel- 
 ing DisciiDle 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 difiiculties thus created are on the 
 whole correctly solved. Each figure is carefully fore- 
 shortened, and the Eoman arch under which the procession 
 passes is drawn in admirable perspective, but freedom 
 
8 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGXA. 
 
 of action is impaired, and the wliole suffers from an un- 
 pleasant sense of effort and unnatural constraint. Per- 
 spective 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 UcceUi, 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 Man- 
 tegna 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 
 
EARLY YEARS AND WORK AT PADUA. 
 
 9 
 
 strengthening the ties between these distinguished artists. 
 The influence each was to exercise on the other was des- 
 tined 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 Griovanni, Andrea would learn the softer colour- 
 ing and delicate feeling that impart so pure a charm to 
 those well-known Madonnas which fill the churches of 
 Yenice. 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 Yenetian masters. In all probability 
 this new influence, rather than Squarcione's jealous re- 
 proaches, 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 back- 
 ground, 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 reproduc- 
 tions of Italian landscape and streets, with red roofs, arched 
 loggias, or vine-treUised 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 
 
10 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 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-treUis in the scene where the saint is to meet his doom 
 are remarkable for their energetic action and expressive 
 faces. 
 
 According to Vasari, in this last subject, Mantegna repre- 
 sented 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. 
 
EARLY YEARS AND WORK AT PADUA. 
 
 11 
 
 If from details of execution we pass to consider the 
 work as a whole, it must be owned that the general im- 
 pression 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 conspicu- 
 ous 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 neces- 
 sary 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 atten- 
 tion 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. 
 
CHAPTEE II. 
 
 ■WORK AT VEROIs^A AXD 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 iDeculiar 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 DonateUo how to com- 
 bine 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 develop- 
 ment was the constant intercourse which he maintained 
 with the most learned Paduan scholars, and the keen 
 pleasure with which he joined in their antiquarian re- 
 searches in the neighbourhood. He accompanied Felice 
 
WORK AT VEKONA. 
 
 13 
 
 Teliciano, a famous collector of inscriptions, on several 
 excursions in the environs of Yerona and the Lago di 
 Garda for the express purpose of examining classical re- 
 mains, and in 1463 this same Teliciano dedicated his work 
 on ancient epigrams to the painter, whose learning he 
 extols in the highest terms. One result of these explora- 
 tions in the classic ground of Sermione appears in the 
 fragments of Latin inscriptions which are repeatedly intro- 
 duced in the Eremitani frescoes, and on one Eoman 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 Eome. 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 Uni- 
 versity of Padua, such as Matteo Bossi, afterwards Abbot of 
 Piesole, 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. 
 
14 
 
 ANDREA MAKTEGNA. 
 
 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 Pietd 
 with the Virgin, St. J ohn, 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, press- 
 ing invitations to move to Mantua had reached him from 
 Lodovico Gronzaga, 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 DonateUo, 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 6i 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 
 
WORK AT VERONA. 
 
 15 
 
 hands were full, and flattering as were Lodovico's entreaties 
 and assurances of good-will, lie 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 Grregorio Corraro, 
 Abbot of San Zeno of Verona, and protonotary to the 
 Apostolic See. Then he begs for six months more to com- 
 plete the work, then for another respite in order to do a 
 little piece for the Podesta 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 resoiirce 
 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 
 
16 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 festoons of fruit, tlirough "wMcli 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 Eome. 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 grace- 
 ful 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 fore- 
 taste 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 ToTirs, 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 facade 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, Podesta 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 
 
WORK AT MANTUA. 
 
 17 
 
 cranes and birds of prey, we recognise the city of Padua 
 with the Eremitani Church. 
 
 If we compare this picture with the well-known render- 
 ing of the same subject by Giovanni Bellini in the National 
 Gallery, we shall see how much of the original concep- 
 tion 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 Goito, 
 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. 
 
 c 
 
18 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 The "Adoration of the Magi" forms the subject of tlie 
 central panel, while the " Ascension " and the " Presenta- 
 tion 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 "Yirginof 
 the Grotto." The red cherub-heads, which remind us of 
 the similar wreath with which Griovanni 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 
 fuU 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 Piesole, since 
 the frame decorated with angels and instruments of the 
 Passion exactly corresponds with his description, and the 
 
WORK AT MANTUA. 
 
 19 
 
 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, Man- 
 tegna 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 aroxmd, and which by the deli- 
 cate 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. Greorge " of the Venice Academy, who stands under an 
 archway garlanded with flowers, leaning on his lance ia 
 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 cha- 
 racter of the execution approaches the style of the Uj0B.zi 
 trijDtych, evidently painted about the same time. 
 
 To these we may add the wonderful " Dead Christ " of 
 the Brora, a work almost terrible in its realism, and exag- 
 
20 
 
 ANDREA MAjSITEGjSTA. 
 
 gerated foreshortening, hut whicli reveals in a surprising 
 degree Mantegna's mastery hoth in drawing and manage- 
 ment 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 difSculty or solve 
 some problem from which a less powerful mind would have 
 shrimk. 
 
 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 " Pieta," but with more 
 attempt at decorative effect, is the picture exhibited by Sir 
 AVilliam 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 represen- 
 tatives 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. 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 THE CAMEEA DEGLI SPOSI, A.D. 1470 — 1474. 
 
 RECENT researelL has brought to light a series of valu- 
 able letters hetween 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. 
 Carissme 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 circtimstances, are beyond 
 all praise. 
 
 The first letter of the series is a complaint which the 
 painter, writing from Goito, 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 Irigatela he calls them in a 
 letter to the Marquis — and each year, when the summer 
 
22 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 heats returned, lie moved to a country-house at Buscoldo, 
 where he afterwards received a grant of landfrom his patron. 
 
 In 1466 he paid a visit to Elorence, where he had at 
 least one friend in the learned Abbot of Fiesole, and a 
 letter from Griovanni 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 re- 
 markable 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 fashion- 
 able 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 sufiicient 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 law- 
 
THE CAMEIiA DEGLI SPOSI. 
 
 23 
 
 suit in wliicli lie found liimself involved with, tlie engraver, 
 Zoan Andrea, wliom 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 neigh- 
 bour, 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 con- 
 vinced bore him secret ill-will with the theft. Upon this 
 Francesco Aliprandi, who Geems 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 disagree- 
 able 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 carefuUy investigating the case, 
 arrived at the conclusion that the quinces had been stolen 
 by some unknown thief. 
 
 This ruggedness of disposition and exaggerated sus- 
 ceptibility which, by attaching excessive importance to 
 the trifling cares of daily life, proved a constant torment 
 
24 
 
 AMDKEA MANTEGNA. 
 
 to Mantegna and those around liiin, remind ns curiously 
 of Michelangelo, whom in more -vrajs 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 any- 
 thing has been saved from the general wreck. 
 
 In 1630, little more than a hundred years after Man- 
 tegna's time, the city was besieged during three months 
 by the Imperialists, and ultimately taken and sacked for 
 three whole days. In I797_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." 
 
 "VVe pass through endless suites of spacious halls paved 
 with marble and adorned with decaying frescoes and other 
 
THE CAMERA DEGM SPOSl. 
 
 25 
 
 remnants of faded splendour, till we reaeli tlie older part 
 of the palace known in the days of the Gonzagas as the 
 Castello di Corte. Erom 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 held their splendid court, here the 
 banqueting-halls where they feasted, the hall-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 Avas the famous Camera degli Sposi, on which Andrea 
 was engaged between 1470 and 1474, and where he repre- 
 sented Lodovico Gonzaga and his wife, Barbara of Bran- 
 denburg, surrotmded by the different members of their 
 family. 
 
 AR the frescoes have been much damaged, and those on 
 two of the walls complete^ 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 
 
26 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 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 com^Dlete 
 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 com- 
 partment 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 dis- 
 grace 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 beat preserved 
 of the three, in which the Marquis meets his younger son, 
 the boy-cardinal Francesco, on his return from Eome. The 
 composition is stifi" and the dresses awkward, but nothing 
 can surpass the Hfe-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 xorofiles 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 Eome, 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 : — 
 
THE CAMERA DEGLI Sl'OSI. 
 
 27 
 
 111 Lodovico II. M.M. 
 Principi oj^timo ac 
 Eide invictissimo 
 Et 111 Barlbaras eius 
 Conjugi ]\Iiilieruni Glor 
 
 Incomparaljili 
 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 Cassars wreathed in 
 laurel, grisaille scenes from the myths of Hercules and 
 Antaeus, 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 Eome. Eound 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 
 sii, which Yasari 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 efitected in a masterly 
 way, and the playful boys, who push their heads through 
 
28 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 the open stone-work of the parapet or balance themselves 
 on its edge, are admirably foreshortened. 
 
 Curiously enough, this new principle of ceiling decora- 
 tion, 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 ' ' Griory of 
 Heaven" in the tribune of the Church of the SS. Apostoli at 
 E-ome. "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 Scal- 
 eheria; 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 Gronzaga is represented taking the oath as Cajpitano 
 del ijopolo, 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 frag- 
 ments 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. 
 
CHAPTER lY. 
 
 WORK AT MANTUA AND EOME : ENGRAVINGS, A.D. 1474 1490. 
 
 THE painting of tlie Camera degli Sposi gavetlie 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. Accord- 
 ing 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 difiiculties himself. 
 
30 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 for lie liacl been defeated by his enemies, and even com- 
 pelled to pawn bis jewels. None tbe less his reply was 
 frank and generoiis. 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 unfavour- 
 able 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 
 Pederico. 
 
 The young Gronzaga 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 Goi'to 
 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 
 iUness 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 viUas 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. Eederico himself had to make his painter's 
 excuses in an elaborate epistle to the Duchess of Milan, 
 
WORK AT MANTUA. 
 
 31 
 
 wliose portrait Andrea flatly refused to undertake. There 
 was no help for it, and the disappointed lady had to rest 
 satisfied with Federieo's explanation, that since these excel- 
 lent masters were so full of fancies we must be content with 
 what they choose to give ns. 
 
 But when Eederico's early death in 1 484 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 natu- 
 rally 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. AVhat 
 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 Ufiizi, which, with the master's habitual 
 slowness, he did not finish imtil the close of his visit to 
 Eome. This little gem remains a precious memorial of 
 the intercourse between two of the most interesting per- 
 sonalities of the Eenaissance, and few of Andrea's concep- 
 tions 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 Fran- 
 
32 
 
 A^^DREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 cesco himself took to Ferrara, where his mother-in-law was 
 impatiently awaiting its arrival. Most critics agree in iden- 
 tifying this picture with the noble Yirgin, formerly in the 
 possession of Sir C. Eastlake and now in the Dresden 
 Gallery, a work in which the thotightf ulness of the child aad 
 tender maternal feeling of Mary are peculiarly impressiye. 
 
 Very soon afterwards, in the year 1485, Mantegna began 
 the greatest work of his whole life, the " Triumphs of Julius 
 Ceesar," now at Hampton Court. They were origina'Jy 
 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 Inno- 
 cent 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 Mar- 
 quis to consent ; he knighted Andrea and sent him to Eome 
 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 tha: 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, aU painted, says 
 Vasari, with the same miniature-like finish. 
 
 But Andrea did not find the Pope a liberal patron or 
 Home 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. 
 
WORK AT ROME. 
 
 33- 
 
 "WTietlier lie was not treated with the deference to which 
 he was accustomed, or whether failing health oppressed 
 his spirits, his tone becomes more and more melancho'fy. 
 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 aU his works. 
 
 Francesco replied in the most friendly manner, promis- 
 ing 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 Eidolfi, is that he added the figure 
 of Ingratitude as an eighth to the seven deadly sins, say- 
 ing that this was the blackest of all crimes. In the follow- 
 ing J une he writes more cheerf uUy, describing a singular 
 visitor he has had in the person of Zizim, brother of the 
 Sultan Bajazet, then a captive in the Vatican, and send- 
 ing his portrait for Francesco's amusement. Another six 
 months passed, and the Marquis wrote again, this time in 
 
 D 
 
34 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 a very urgent strain, both, to the Pope and Mantegna, say- 
 ing that his marriage with Isabella of Este was to take 
 place in January, and that Andrea's presence was indis- 
 pensable. 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 Po]3e 
 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 Eoman time is 
 known to exist, a "Man of Sorrows, supported by Angels," 
 now in the Museum of Copenhagen, and, like the Brera 
 Pietd, 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 Eome, 
 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 " Scourg- 
 ing" 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 im- 
 perfect, but we trace a gradual improvement in the plates, 
 in proportion as he acquired greater technical knowledge 
 
ENGRAVINGS. 
 
 35 
 
 in the new art and became acquainted with. Maso di Fini- 
 guerra, 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 chiaroscuxo 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 repro- 
 duction 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 criticismj and many for- 
 merly 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. 
 
 Small as is the cycle of genuine prints, they embrace a 
 wide range of subject ; pagan myths, Eoman and Christian 
 themes, are all treated in turn with the same seriousness 
 of purpose and marvellous variety of invention. Some- 
 times he reproduces his own pictures — the ' ' Yirgin of the 
 Grotto " from the Uifizi 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 lis 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 " Herc\iles and Antseus," 
 already represented in grisaille on the ceiling of the 
 
36 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 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 Diirer, Luca Signorelli, 
 Daniele da Volterra, and Eubens in turn took their in- 
 spirations. In dramatic power and intensity of feeling 
 this plate is only equalled by the well-known "Entomb- 
 ment," 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 re- 
 strained. 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, ani- 
 mated 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 Eisen 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,* 
 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 
 
 * "Wc 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.) 
 
ENGRAVINGS. 
 
 37 
 
 whole volume might with profit he devoted to the considera- 
 tion of Mantegna's engravings, hut enough has been said 
 to show how important a part of his works they form, and 
 Low extraordinary was the genius of the man who could, 
 
 JUDITH WITH THE HEAD OF HOLOFERNES. 
 
 From the drawing by Mantegna in the Uffizi. 
 
 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. 
 
CHAPTEE V. 
 
 THE TRIUMPHS OF JULIUS CAESAR: DRAWIJ^GS, 1490 1500. 
 
 MANTEGNA, as we liave 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 Cgesar on his way to the Capitol, after 
 the Conquest of Grau.1. 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 pic- 
 tures of Csesar's victories, smoking censers, and a large 
 bust of Eoma 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 compart- 
 ments, where strong men bend under the weight of vases 
 
THE TRIUMPHS OF JL'LIUS CJESAK. 
 
 39 
 
 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 trum- 
 peters 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 touch- 
 ing 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 Eome. 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 pahn in his hand, and a laurel crown, which a 
 winged Victory is in the act of placing on his brow. At 
 
40 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 liis feet children sliout for joy, and wave laurel bouglis in 
 Ms path ; tlie multitude press round his chariot wheels, and 
 a gaily-clad youth, with eager enthusiasm in his upturned 
 gaze, lifts aloft a banner hearing Caesar'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 
 Eoman citizens, followed by the first ranks of the advancing 
 legions, are represented marching in the conqueror's pro- 
 gress ; and the gTeat procession, after reaching its culmina- 
 ting 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. 
 
 These ancient Eomans 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 
 
THE TRIUMPHS OF JULIUS CJESAR. 
 
 41 
 
 gait and countenance are all familiar to him. Tlie same 
 intimate knowledge of Eoman times reveals itself in a 
 hundred details ; in the temples and viaducts of the back- 
 ground, in the mythological reliefs which adorn chariots, 
 shields and breast-plates, in tablets bearing Latin inscrip- 
 tions, in the triumphal arch imder which Csesar 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 Eome 
 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 re-painting, 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 princi- 
 ples 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 Eubens (in the National Gallery) to 
 see how the subject, released from the severe restraint 
 of Mantegna's art, could degenerate into a Bacchanalian 
 
42 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 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 pas- 
 sion 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 ajopeal 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 en- 
 graved 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 six- 
 teenth 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.*- 
 Charles II. placed them in the palace at Hampton 
 Court. There this precious series still remains, irre- 
 parably injured by frequent removal and repainting, but 
 * The Eaphael Cartoons only realised £300. 
 
PROSPERITY. 
 
 43 
 
 still in beauty and completeness botli of design and 
 execution one of th.e most remarkable works of the Italian 
 Eenaissance. 
 
 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 men- 
 tion of the great work which he had at length brought to 
 a happy termination. "If the Marquis had loved him 
 before, he loved him stiU more now," says Yasari, 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 be- 
 came 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 Yiano Yianesi, 
 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 day- 
 light, one of the thieves whom his son had caught in the 
 act of carrying away his spoil xmder his mantle being an 
 officer of Francesco's household. 
 
44 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 We hear occasionalh- 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 Eome 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 
 Eenaissance 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 
 J onah 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 fore- 
 most place among the foliage painters of the age. The 
 other, perhaps the most poetic of all Andrea's concep- 
 tions, 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 
 
DRAWINGS. 
 
 45 
 
 fluttering drapery and measured step of the dancing nine 
 there is a grace and charm of movement which no contem- 
 porary 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. Clas- 
 sical 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 Antaeus," and the "Bac- 
 chanalia," 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 Yenus," 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 
 to 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 "Judg- 
 ment of Solomon" in the Louvre, the " Sagrifizio," which 
 forms the chief ornament of the Yerona Museum, and the 
 well-known "Judith" of the Ufiizi (see page 37), which once 
 belonged to Yasari, and bears the date of February, 1491. 
 
 It was not in the nature of Mantegna's art to cast ofi" 
 
46 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 a hasty sketcli, or to leave to the world faces of rare loveli- 
 ness 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 foun- 
 tain, all he achieved was marked hy the same patient, 
 untiring labour, the same minute care, above aU by the 
 same feeling for beauty in every detail. Many of us 
 remember that exquisite design for a chalice which at- 
 tracted general attention in one of our last winter exhi- 
 bitions. 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 in- 
 stance — the fair faces of the youth and maiden in the pro- 
 cession 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 com- 
 memorate his pretended victory at Fornovo, where he had 
 
MADONNA BELLA VITTORIA. 
 
 47 
 
 encotmtered tlie French., but, far from being victorious, had 
 lost th.e 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. 
 
 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 acci- 
 dental 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 ulti- 
 mately his case was brought before a tribunal, which con- 
 demned 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 Pornovo took place, and Francesco, who in the 
 bour of danger had vowed to erect a church in Mantua to 
 the Yirgin, 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 
 churcb with great popidar 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 
 
48 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 visitors to tlie 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 Galler}', long in the pos- 
 session of different Milanese families, bears a close resem- 
 blance, 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." 
 
Virgin and Child, with St. John and thk Magdalen. By Mantegna. 
 In the National Gallery, London. 
 
MONUMENT TO VIRGIL. 
 
 49 
 
 The small blue-mantled "Madonna " of Bergamo, and a 
 good portrait of a Gronzaga 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 Mar- 
 chioness Isabella, who consulted the learned Latinists, 
 Pontanus and Vergerius, at Naples, as to the best mode 
 of carrying her scheme into effect. They suggested Man- 
 tegna 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 comjaission 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. Yirgil is represented crowned with 
 laurel and holding the iEneid in his hands, while winged 
 boys on the pedestal at his feet support a tablet with the 
 words : — 
 
 " P. Vergilii Maronis a a3terna3 sui memorige imago." 
 
 Unfortunately, Andrea never had the satisfaction of see- 
 ing 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. 
 
CHAPTEE YI. 
 
 LAST WOEKS AND DEATH : HIS INFLUENCE ON ABT, 1500 1506. 
 
 DUEINGr more than forty years Andrea Ixad 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 con- 
 sideration which but few artists have known in their life- 
 time. 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 anti- 
 quities. 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 difficidties, brought on by his 
 
MISFORTUNES. 
 
 51 
 
 own extravagance, and very probably by that of bis son, 
 Francesco; in order to meet bis liabilities be was com- 
 pelled to part witb tbe beautiful bouse wbich be bad 
 decorated witb bis own band, and to live in lodgings, wbicb 
 be disliked extremely. Yet, witb tbe strange recklessness 
 tbat formed part of bis character, we find bim entering 
 into new and imprudent engagements. In Marcb, 1504, 
 be made a will, leaving a sum of money to bis son Fran- 
 cesco and tbe cbief part of bis fortune .to Lodovico, together 
 witb tbe charge of bringing up tbe child Gian' Andrea, in 
 whose favour be afterwards altered certain provisions. At 
 the same time he left two hundred ducats for the endow- 
 ment 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 bad died some years before; and masses are ordered to 
 be said for the repose of her soul. In August of the same 
 year (1504) be obtained possession of this chapel by a 
 contract with Sigismondo Gonzaga, Bishop of Mantua, and 
 the canons of the church. Its decoration now became bis 
 favourite scheme, and it was his intention to paint the waUs 
 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 be could spend his time in 
 summer, and build a small room, where be might keep 
 himself warm in winter, "in order," be adds toucbingly, 
 "that I may take a Httle rest in my old age." But all 
 this expenditixre became the cause of fresh difiiculties, and 
 added to the burdens under which Andrea already groaned. 
 Other trials came to sadden bis 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 
 
52i 
 
 ANDEEA MAIsTEGNA. 
 
 owned tliat liis son liad offended grievously, but thouglit 
 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, ccetera 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 com- 
 menced 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 indig- 
 nation, 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 Eome. A colossal 
 bust of the Phrygian goddess is borne in state into the 
 
LAST WORKS. 
 
 53 
 
 presence of Scipio, wlio 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 witb which the artist brings this rapid actioi* 
 by degrees to a complete pause. The general character ol 
 the piece, its costumes, figures, and draperies, all recall the 
 " Triumphs." It is, as it were, a last echo of the great com- 
 position whose harmonies still lingered on in Mantegna's 
 ears. 
 
 Before the end of the year Andrea, tired of a wander- 
 ing life, had again bought a house, this time in the Con- 
 trada 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 mytholo- 
 gical 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 cava Faustina.'''' Often in brighter 
 days great masters and connoisseurs had wished to buy 
 this bust, but he had refused all their olfers, 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, 
 
54 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 and with a meanness unwortliy 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. Isa- 
 bella, 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 demon- 
 strations 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 Gronzagas 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 Man- 
 
HIS DEATH. 
 
 55 
 
 tegna's death. AlbrecM Diirer was at that time in Venice, 
 on his way to visit the great Lombard artist whose engrav- 
 ings 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 sud- 
 den 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 else- 
 where 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 difiiculties 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 con- 
 tents 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 afi'airs 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. 
 
56 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 Tlie 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 white- 
 washed, 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 Eomano and the Hall of the G-iants, 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 
 
FOLLOWEES. 
 
 57 
 
 story whieli has invested the marble with so deep an 
 interest. 
 
 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 
 Eenaissance. 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 rem- 
 nants 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 out- 
 line, and the classical tendency of his types, not only in 
 the works of his brothers-in-law, the BeUini, but in those 
 also of the rival Murano painter, Luigi Yivarini. Mon- 
 tagna and Buonconsiglio at Yicenza, 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 Yerona, are indeed 
 exact imitations of the style of decoration adopted by Man- 
 tegna in the Camera degli Sposi. We trace the same aU- 
 prevailing Mantegnesque in the works of Lorenzo Costa, 
 who spent some years of his life in Mantua, and if we are 
 
58 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 to believe Yasari 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 Eoman 
 frescoes derived no help or suggestion from Andrea, Gio- 
 vanni 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 degh 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 dis- 
 tinct 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 remark- 
 able 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 Man- 
 tuan wife, owes his knowledge of the laws of perspective 
 and composition in a large measure to the study of Man- 
 tegna's works, and, whether or not he visited Mantua him- 
 self, 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 
 
FOLLOWERS. 
 
 59 
 
 earnestness of purpose, as well as a fantastic element in 
 liis art, whicli attracted the Teutonic mind, and it is per- 
 haps not too much to say that he influenced Grerman art 
 more than any other Italian painter. 
 
 "We have already alluded to Albrecht Diirer'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 
 Diirer 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 afiinity between the avenging angels of Diirer's 
 "Apocalypse" and the angry Tritons of Mantegna's en- 
 graving. 
 
 Nor is Diirer alone among northern painters in his adop- 
 tion of Mantegnesque motives. Holbein repeatedly availed 
 himself of these episodes of the " Triumphs " which he knew 
 from Andrea's own engravings in his works at Basle and 
 Liicerne ; and a portfolio of Mantegna's works was numbered 
 among the treasures of art in Rembrandt's possession. 
 
 More singular is the admiration which Eubens 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 life-time. 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 exces- 
 sive, for Mantegna stands half-way between those men who 
 first brought art to life again, and those who carried it to 
 
60 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 the highest degree of perfection, "and he occupies the fore- 
 most place among the artists of the mid-Eenaissance, who 
 saw how much was wanting before further 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 studies 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 impxilse of the age ; and, by bringing this in- 
 fluence 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 con- 
 flict, but this conflict is surely the highest in which ever 
 artist was engaged." The perfect union of the two prin- 
 ciples was to be effected by artists of the next generation, 
 and where Mantegna had sown Raphael and Leonardo were 
 to reap. 
 
HIS WORKS. 
 
 61 
 
 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 tiU 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 some- 
 thing 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 
 
62 
 
 ANDREA MANTEGNA. 
 
 mythical creatures as Tritons and Nereids, satyrs and sea- 
 monsters, the sublime and rapt devotion of a Magdalen, 
 tlie 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 concen- 
 trated either the tempest of the most ungovernable fury or 
 the agony of the bitterest despair. Once seen, these crea- 
 tions of his brain refuse to loose their hold on our imagina- 
 tions, and remain to haunt us with their terrible forms, 
 just as the wailing St. John of "The Entombment" was 
 ever present to Albrecht Diirer'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 enthu- 
 siastic object of general v>^orship. 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. 
 
FRANCESCO RAIBOLINI 
 
 CALLED 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
FRANCIA. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 EARLY ART IN BOLOGNA, A.D. 1300 1450. 
 
 'E,OM the earliest days of the revival of Italian paint- 
 
 X ing 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 cen- 
 tury. 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. 
 
 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, 
 
66 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 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 
 Yitale, who painted in the first half of the fourteenth cen- 
 tury, and whose few remaining pictures are marked by a 
 softness and dehcacy 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 expres- 
 sion 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 sur- 
 name of ''Lippo delle Madonne." 
 
 This artist, who lived at the close of the fourteenth cen- 
 tury, 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 Yirgin, he invari- 
 ably spent the night in prayer and fasting, and received 
 communion on the morning of the day itself. In his life- 
 time 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 
 
EARLY ART IN BOLOGNA. 
 
 67 
 
 images, and were only uncovered on festivals dedicated to 
 the Virgin. Several are still to be seen in the ancient 
 clixirches 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 devo- 
 tion, 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 super- 
 natural 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 Pra 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 in- 
 fluences 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 
 
68 
 
 FRAIsCIA. 
 
 two otlier Bolognese painters of tMs 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 Griotto's example, but 
 retains much of the bad taste of Byzantine art in the emacia- 
 tion 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 Cru- 
 cifix;ion" 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 con- 
 fusing him with d'Avanzo of Verona, who assisted Alti- 
 chiero 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 Oampo-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 Perrara. 
 
EARLY ART IN BOLOGNA. 
 
 69 
 
 Tlie frescoes of tlie Mezzaratta were no doubt tlie 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 accom- 
 plished 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 pil- 
 grimage to this shrine. A steep ascent along a path lined 
 with acacias leads from the gate of San Mammolo to the 
 garden of YiUa 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 
 
70 
 
 FRAKCIA. 
 
 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 sjDot 
 may have been one cause of the celebrity which the church 
 of Mezzaratta acquired in those days, but the oldest paint- 
 ing on the walls takes us back a whole century before his 
 time. It is a large " Nativity" painted over the door by 
 Yitale 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 paint- 
 ings, 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. 
 
EARLY ART IN BOLOGNA. 
 
 71 
 
 Of these tlie 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 colour- 
 ing can detract from the originality and life of the repre- 
 sentations. Each head is individual in expression and 
 character, and the whole composition is marked by the 
 pleasing naivete of very early art, and an evident anxiety 
 to shake off the fetters of conventional types. 
 
 Simone is said by Yasari 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 Calasso Gralassi, or other 
 Perrarese 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 Grallery 
 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 Plorence and Siena, but still possessing a 
 force and individual character which inspires interest and 
 promises well for the future. 
 
72 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 During tlie greater part of the fourteentli century no 
 native painter of any genius arose, and the pictures of this 
 date in the Bologna Gallery are principally hy unknown 
 followers of Lippo Dalraasii. The only names preserved 
 there are those of Pietro Lianori and Michele di Matteo Lam- 
 hertini, 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 Oaterina Vigri, a Bolognese nun, chiefly 
 remarkable as the only woman-artist who ever attained the 
 honours of canonization. 
 
 Towards the middle of the fifteenth century a new 
 element was introduced into Bolognese art by the Fer- 
 rarese masters, whom the patronage of the Bentivogho 
 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 Prancesca had himself painted in Duke 
 Borso's Schifanoia (Sans-Sou.ci) palace, and both his pre- 
 sence and the all-pervading influence of Mantegna, who 
 had known several of the best Perrarese artists, had con- 
 tributed in a large measure to mould the school of native 
 artists. These different elements were now imported 
 to Bologna by the Perrara 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, Prancesco 
 
EAKLY AKT IN BOLOGNA. 
 
 73 
 
 Cossa, was commanded by Giovanni Bentivoglio to restore 
 an ancient picture of Lippo known as tlie ' ' Madonna del 
 Baraccano," and Ercole Grandiwas 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 Man- 
 tegna 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 princi- 
 pal works, and probably became acquainted with the 
 goldsmith, Francia, whose first master he is said, by some, 
 to have been.* 
 
 But the most important of all the painters who came 
 to Bologna from Perrara was Lorenzo Costa, whose friend- 
 ship 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 repre- 
 senting ''The Triumph of Life and Death," and various 
 other works in the great Basilica of San Petronio. 
 
 In many of these 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 
 * Crowe and Cavalcaselle doutt that Erancia studied under Zojipo. 
 
74 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 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. 
 
CHAPTEE II. 
 
 EARLY LIFE AND "WOEKS, A.D. 1450 1500. 
 
 FEANCESCO di Marco Eaibolini, commonly called 
 II Erancia, 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, Erancia began life in the goldsmith's 
 shop, but unlike Botticelli and PoUaiuolo, 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 apprentice- 
 ship, but it seems more probable that Erancia was merely 
 the popular abbreviation of Erancesco, and the supposi- 
 tion 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 strik- 
 ingly 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 con- 
 
76 
 
 FRAN CIA. 
 
 versation had the power to drive away the saddest moods 
 and brighten the darkest hours. In this manner he be- 
 came a general favourite, and he numbered members of the 
 noblest families of Bologna among his intimate friends. 
 
 At the time Francia grew uj) the power of the Benti- 
 vogli family was supreme in Bologna. This proud house 
 claimed descent from King Enzio, the unfortunate son of 
 the Emperor Erederico II., whose long captivity, vain at- 
 tempts at escape, and loves with the fair Lucia di Viado- 
 golo have thrown a romantic charm over the grim walls of 
 the Palazzo del Podesta. 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 suc- 
 ceeded 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 j)roved the cause of his ruin, he was 
 a liberal and munificent patron of Erancia, 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 bim 
 Master of the Mint, an office which, in spite of many vicis- 
 situdes in public affairs, Erancia 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 Griacomo 
 and Griulio 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 Gio- 
 vanni Bentivoglio, Erancia showed his fine taste and artistic 
 
EARLY LIFE AND WORKS. 
 
 77 
 
 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 Griovanni 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 Eesur- 
 rection, surrounded by a wreath of delicate foliage, was 
 executed on the occasion of the marriage of Bartolommeo 
 Eelicini and Dorotea Einghieri, 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 teUs 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 instruc- 
 tion 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 aflanity exists between the Squarcionesque master's 
 style and that of Francia, but it is very possible that he may 
 
78 
 
 rilANCIA. 
 
 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 pro- 
 bably acquired the rudiments of tempera and oil paint- 
 ing 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, Eome. 
 This interesting little piece was evidently one of his first 
 eflForts 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 bright- 
 ness 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 Ma- 
 donnas. 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. 
 
LIFE AND WORKS. 
 
 79 
 
 Another work belonging to this early period is the por- 
 trait of Bartolommeo Bianchini, formerly in the Northwick 
 collection under the name of Eaphael. 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, £artholomei sum{ptu) BiancMni maxima matrom hie 
 vivit manihus Francia picta tuis. " Here — painted by thy 
 hands, 0 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 sharp- 
 ness 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 proflted 
 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 re- 
 ceived 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 com- 
 
80 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 mission was given liim hy a wealthy Bolognese citizen, 
 Bartolommeo Felicini, wlio destined the picture for a 
 chapel in the church of the Miserieordia, a confra- 
 ternity of nobles for the assistance of hospitals and 
 other works of mercy. In this work, which Yasari 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. Unfor- 
 tunately no historical evidence exists to satisfy our curi- 
 osity, and there is no authority for the probable supposi- 
 tion 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 Miserieordia. It is worthy of mention that the same 
 Umbrian character appears in a small Madonna* at Berhn, 
 the sole remaining work of Antonio Crevalcore, a Bolog- 
 nese 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 
 
 * See Crowe and Cavacaselle. " A History of Painting in North 
 Italy," Vol. I., p. 294. Crevalcore's name, however, does not occur 
 in the Berlin official catalogue. 
 
XIFE AND WORKS. 
 
 81 
 
 breast. For nowliere is tMs 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. 
 
 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 "Ma- 
 donna and Angels," at Munich, the Piet^, 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 scroU 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. 
 
 G 
 
82 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 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, glow- 
 ing 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 loveKest 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 Prancia painted 
 another Enthroned Madonna,* 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 at- 
 tendant 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 pro- 
 tonotary, ordered the ''Nativity," now removed to the 
 Gallery,! 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 
 * No. 80, in the Pinacoteca, Bologna. t Ko. 81. 
 
LIFE AND WORKS. 
 
 83 
 
 and attendant saints are represented in tlie act of adoring 
 the new-born child, and celebrating his advent on earth. 
 This class of composition, always a favourite with rehgious 
 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, Pieta, Assumption, and Coro- 
 nation 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 con- 
 temporaries." \_George Miot.'] 
 
 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, Grirolamo 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 efiElgie 
 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." 
 
84 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 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 ex- 
 pressive face and refined air correspond exactly with con- 
 temporary descriptions. Two angels kneel in lowly adora- 
 tion on either side of the child, who lifts his head and 
 raises his tiny hand in benediction, while a btillfinch 
 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 landscapea 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 dis- 
 tinctly 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 grace- 
 ful 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 con- 
 tinued to exist between the two artists. 
 
 Besides these works for the Misericordia, Francia exe- 
 cuted 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- 
 
LIFE AND WORKS. 
 
 85 
 
 piece is still to be seen in San Martino of Bologna. 
 With, these larger subjects we may mention tbe cliarm- 
 ing group of boy-angels playing on musical instruments 
 round an old picture of the Madonna in San Yitale, 
 although their Eaphaelesque grace would seem to 
 indicate a later date of production. The Franciscan 
 church of the Annunziata, outside the gate of San Mam- 
 molo, also possessed two pictures, a "Madonna" and 
 " Annunciation," which have been removed to the Grallery 
 since that sanctuary has been used as a barrack by the 
 Italian G-overnment. Both have been much damaged, but 
 the "Annunciation," in spite of its bad state of preserva- 
 tion and unpleasant rawness of colour, is singularly in- 
 teresting. 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 aovl 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 mcccco., and Fraticia\Aurifexpinxit, 
 a form of signature which the goldsmith painter retained to 
 the end of his life. 
 
CHAPTEE in. 
 
 THE FBIENDSHIP ANB ESTLTTENCE 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 ohtained 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 improve- 
 ment 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 
 Eaphael. It is evident from many of our master's works 
 at this time that he had studied Eaphael's pictures ; but 
 beyond this, both the presence of this new element and 
 certain expressions which Eaphael uses in his letter of 
 
FRIENDSHIP AND INFLUENCE OF RAPHAEL. 
 
 87 
 
 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 con- 
 viction that no Madonnas are so beautiful or so well calcu- 
 lated to inspire devotion as the creations of the Bolognese 
 master. And on receiving Prancia'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 Eaphael 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 
 Eaphael. 
 
 In July, 1490, Timoteo came to Bologna to perfect him- 
 self 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. G-od grant that all blessing and good fortune may 
 be with him." 
 
 Timoteo returned to Urbino, where he became Eaphael's 
 assistant, and carried with him the fame of the master who 
 
88 
 
 FBANCIA. 
 
 remembered him so kindly. Soon Francia received com- 
 missions 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 Eaphael 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 
 Eaphael 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 
 Eaphael's genius in the following sonnet, which he 
 addressed to him in an outburst of enthusiasm : — 
 
 " Non son Zeusi nc Apelle, e non son tale, 
 Che di tanti tal nome a me convegna ; 
 
 mio talento, ne vertude b degna 
 Haver da un EafiFael lodo immortale. 
 Tu sol, cui fece il ciel done fatale, 
 
 Che ogn' altro excede, e sora ogn' altro regna, 
 L'excellente artificio a noi insegna 
 Con cui sei reso ad ogn' antico uguale. 
 
 Fortunato garxon, che nei primi anni 
 
 Tant' oltre passi ; e che sara poi quando 
 In piii provecta etade opre migliori ? 
 
 Vinta sara natura ; e, da' tuoi inganni 
 Kesa eloquente, dira, 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 EafTael. 
 
Deposition from the Cross. By Francia. 
 In the Accademia, Parma. 
 
FRIENDSHIP AND INFLUENCE OF RAPHAEL. 89 
 
 " 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." 
 
 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. AW excellente pictore Raffaello Sanxio, 
 Zeusi del nostro secolo. Di me Francesco Raibolini decto 
 il Francia. Even without these convincing proofs of 
 Eaphael's friendship with Francia, it would have been 
 difl&cult not to assvmie the existence of some similar con- 
 nection from the strong marks of the great painter's -in- 
 fluence 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 
 "Pietd"of the National Grallery 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 backgroimd 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 
 hiUs. 
 
 Not many years afterwards Francia was asked by a 
 
rillENDSHIP AND INFLUENCE OF RAPHAEL. 91 
 
 opening beyond, all the great future that was to grow out 
 of the suffering and death which she mourned. 
 
 "The ■wave 
 Of love wliicli set so deep and strong 
 By Christ's yet open grave." 
 
 \_Matthew Arnold.l 
 
 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 Pieta 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 Eomualdo 
 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 
 
92 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 figures wlio stand below in devout contemplation. Eacli 
 bears a scroll in his liand : David points to a verse of 
 Psalm xxvii, " /^^ the secret of Ms tabernacle sJiall he 
 hide me; " Solomon, a noble, kingly profile, gazes earnestly 
 upwards, stowing us a text from liis song, " Thou art all 
 fair, my love;'' while Anselm and Augustine bear scrolls 
 on which we read passages from their own writings relat- 
 ing 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 Prancia'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 
 predeUa are painted with exquisite taste and deKcaey. 
 
 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 Perrara; 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 Zam- 
 beccaro at Bologna, is now in the Picture Gallery of Porli, 
 but the frescoes with which he adorned Zambeccaro's 
 viUa have aU 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 Griovanni 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 eye- 
 witnesses, declares the Judith to have been the finest 
 work which Prancia ever painted, and describes minutely 
 
FRIENDSHIP AND INFLUENCE OF RAPHAEL. 
 
 the splendour of the surroundings introduced, the horses, 
 banners, and armed guards brought on the scene as be- 
 longing to the camp of Holofernes. The fame of this 
 fresco had also reached the ears of Eaphael, 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,* but has nothing classical in character. The 
 Eoman matron raising her eyes to heaven as she plunges 
 the dagger into her breast is in feature and expression the 
 exact counterpart of Erancia'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 cha- 
 racter admit no doubt as to their genuineness, meet us occa- 
 sionally both in foreign galleries and in 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. 0. Eobinson in the Grosvenor 
 Gallery of 1879, in which the grace of antique art is deli- 
 cately 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 Eaimondi, who served his first apprentice- 
 ship 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 associa- 
 tions and examples of the Eoman world, in the midst of 
 which his later years were spent. 
 
 * At Tew Park, OxfordsMre. 
 
CHAPTEE lY. 
 
 THE FRESCOES OF ST. CECILIa's CHAPEL, 1506 — 1509. 
 
 HE only series of frescoes painted by Francia 
 
 X in Bologna of which some traces still remain, 
 are those in the Oratory of St. Cecilia, attached to the 
 church of San Griacomo 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 pro- 
 bably 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 Eaibolini (or 
 Tamaroccio) — the Ferrarese master is the only one who 
 
FRESCOES OF ST. CECILIA's CHAPEL. 
 
 95 
 
 approaclies 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.-^ 
 
 4. Valerian and Cecilia crowned with roses by an 
 
 Angel. CModarolo. 
 
 5. Martyrdom of Valerian and his brother Tiburtius. 
 
 Aspertini. 
 On the left of the altar : — 
 
 6. The Burial of the Brothers. Aspertini. 
 
 7. CeciHa before the Prefect. Aspertini. 
 
 8. Cecilia condemned to the boiling bath. Cesare 
 
 Tamaroccio.'^ 
 
 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 Eaphael'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 Eaphael'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 
 
 * These two frescoes are usually ascribed to Giacomo Kaibolini ; but 
 Frizzoni and Milanese after bim attribute them to Tamaroccio, who 
 assisted his master Francia in the chapel. 
 
96 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 which Valerian places the ring. On either side are groups 
 of youths and maidens who, by their intent gaze and ani- 
 mated 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 remark- 
 able 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 Avant of dramatic action in the 
 spectators, and at the same time a formality in the arrange- 
 ment 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 por- 
 tion, 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 stiU so fair in 
 death. As in the Christ of the Pieta aU trace of suf- 
 fering 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 vaUey, above the taU 
 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 Grod. 
 
 The frescoes of St. Cecilia were the last works which 
 Francia painted for his patron Giovanni Bentivoglio, In 
 
FRESCOES OF ST. CECILIA's CHAPEL. 97 
 
 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 country- 
 men 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 trium- 
 phal 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 occa- 
 sion, 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 stiU lamented the loss he had suffered. 
 
 It was then that Eaphael addressed his weU-known letter 
 to Francia, begging him to take heart, and assuring him of his 
 sympathy. The two painters had, it appears, agreed to ex- 
 change portraits, and in this letter Eaphael thanks Francia 
 for having sent him his likeness painted by his own hand. 
 We give a translation of this interesting document, whio 
 was first discovered with Francia' s sonnet in the papers of 
 the Lambertini family, and brought to light by Malvasia :— 
 
 "My dear Messer 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 beauti- 
 ful, 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 inces- 
 santly engaged, and which have been the cause why I have 
 not yet painted the portrait with my own hand, according 
 
 H 
 
98 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 to our agreement. Nor would I allow it to be painted by 
 one of my pupils and retoucbed by myself, since tbis would 
 not bave been seemly, altbougb I bave no bope of ever 
 equalling your work. Have compassion on me, I say, since 
 you know by experience wbat it is to be deprived of liberty 
 and bound to patrons. I a;m sending you by tbis same 
 messenger, wbo returns in six days, anotber drawing, tbat 
 of 'Tbe Nativity,' somewbat different from tbe original, 
 wbicb you were good enougb to praise so bigbly, witb tbe 
 same kindness witb wbicb you speak of my otber works in 
 a manner tbat causes me to blusb. 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 Da- 
 tario awaits his ' Madonella ' with much impatience, and 
 Cardinal Eiario 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 
 vrith which I see and praise aU your other works, never 
 having seen any images that are fairer or more devout and 
 weU painted. In the meantime take courage, summon up 
 all your habitual wisdom, and be sure that I feel your 
 afilictions 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, 
 
 "Eafaelle Sanzio. 
 " Eoma, the fifth day of September, 1508." 
 
 Pew documents in art history are more interesting than 
 this letter, which breathes aU the sunny gladness of 
 Eaphael'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- 
 
PORTRAITS. 
 
 99 
 
 length figure of Francia holding a diamond ring, by liis 
 own hand, was in the Boschi collection at Bologna, and a 
 few years ago a similar work belonged to a private gallery 
 at Turin.*'' 
 
 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 Eaphaelesque manner. 
 
 Such is the noble portrait of the Liechtenstein Gallery at 
 Yienna long ascribed to Eaphael, but rightfully restored to 
 Francia by Crowe and Cavalcaselle, and probably the like- 
 ness 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 repre- 
 
 * 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. 
 
100 
 
 TRANCIA. 
 
 sented 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 Eaphael'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 Prancia's school, and of which so many repeti- 
 tions 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 Belve- 
 dere at Vienna, while the same fate has attended the 
 Berlin altar-piece, originally painted for the Friars of the 
 Osservanza at Modena. 
 
 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 Eose 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 Em- 
 
MADONNA OF THE ROSE GARDEN. 
 
 101 
 
 press Joseplune, Tintil in 1815 it passed from Malmaison 
 into tlie 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 heen 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. 
 
CHAPTEE y. 
 
 LAST WORKS AND DEATH, A.D. 1509 — 1517. 
 
 WE have few details of the last years of Francia's 
 life, hut the dates that mark some of his pictures 
 show us that his powers were not impaired, nor his acti- 
 vity 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 ficMe 
 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 prin- 
 cipal 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 
 Eavenna ; 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 Gonfahoneri 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 
 
FOLLOWERS. 
 
 103 
 
 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," 
 saysVasari, " and not even his friendship forEaphael, 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 Eaphael, as Timoteo Yiti had already done, and 
 adopted a style which has httle in common with that of 
 Prancia. Such were Innocenza da Imola and Bartolom- 
 meo Eamenghi, 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 con- 
 tented themselves for the most part with weak and con- 
 ventional repetitions of those Saints and Madonnas which 
 his genius had rendered popular. Chief among these was 
 Francia's own son, Giacomo Eaibohni, an active and careful 
 artist who never aspired to originality, and whose concep- 
 tions are generally wanting in life and freedom. Three of 
 his best panels are in the BerHn 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 dehcacy and finish to 
 those of Marc Antonio himseK. 
 
 Francia's second son, Giulio by name, also became a 
 paiater, 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 
 
104 
 
 FRANC! A. 
 
 did Giacomo, in the frescoes of Cecilia, was Aniico 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 hoth 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 Yolto 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 Eavenna 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 GaUery 
 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 Pieta 
 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 featm-es are 
 the same as those of the larger Parma "Deposition." The 
 
LAST WOTIKS AND DEATH. 
 
 105 
 
 dead Christ lies in the Virgin's arms supported by the Mag- 
 dalen 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 Ibranches 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 Pieta by Erancia. 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 Eaphael 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 Duglioh, had erected in the 
 church of San Giovanni del Monte, and wrote to Erancia, 
 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. Erancia, in accordance with his 
 friend's directions, placed it above the altar in the chapel 
 for which it was destined. The Bolognese hailed the ap- 
 pearance of Eaphael' s masterpiece with enthusiastic accla- 
 mations, and we may well believe that Erancia 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 ridi- 
 culous story, which Vasari repeats, of Erancia having died 
 from the transport of jealous rage with which he was filled 
 at the sight of Eaphael'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 
 
106 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 know of Francia's character and natural disposition. Yasari 
 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, hut the real date of his death hasheen 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 iUness which 
 ended his life, and the grave where he lies, are both un- 
 known, 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 Oarracci, Domenichino, and Guide — 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. Eio 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. 
 
 AYith 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 
 
HTS INFLUENCE ON ART. 
 
 107 
 
 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 reli- 
 gious painters. Living as he did in the days of Kaphael, 
 at a moment when the Eenaissance 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 influ- 
 ence, 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 reli- 
 gious 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 beauti- 
 ful 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 con- 
 trasted 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 
 
108 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 Christian motives which had so largely influenced the 
 first efforts of ItaHan 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 affecta- 
 tion in the later works of the Umbrian master, and was 
 rapidly yielding to the growing influences of a worldly 
 age in the creations of Eaphael. 
 
 ^ 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 Era 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." 
 
THE PEINCIPAL WORKS OF MANTEGITA. 
 
 Beegamo. LocMs- Carrara Gallery. 
 
 Madonna and Child. 
 
 Portrait of man ia red dress (Francesco Gonzaga ?). 
 
 Berlin. Museum. 
 
 Portrait of an Ecclesiastic. (Matteo Bosso, Abbot of 
 Fiesole.) 
 
 Madonna and Child. {Painted ahout 1464.) 
 Presentation in the Temple. {Fainted about 1464.) 
 
 Copenhagen. Museum. 
 
 Man of Sorrow supported by Angels. (Andreas Mantinea. 
 Painted about 1489.) 
 
 Dresden. Gallery. 
 
 Holy Family {formerlij in the possession of Sir Charles 
 JSastlake). 
 
 Florence. UJizi. 
 
 Madonna and Child, in a rocky landscape. {Painted in 
 1488—90.) 
 
 Adoration of the Magi ; Presentation ; and Ascension. {A 
 triptych, painted about 1464.) 
 
 Frankfort. Stddel. 
 
 St. Mark {doubtful.) , 
 
110 
 
 rRINCIPAL WORKS OF MANTEGNA. 
 
 Glasgow. Hamilton Collection. 
 
 Woman carrying a basin. {Painted about 1470.) 
 "Woman drinking. {Painted about 1470.) 
 
 Hampton Court. 
 
 The Triumphs of Julius Cassar, 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.) 
 
 The Triumph of Scipio {in monochrome : paitiied in 1505). 
 
 Maduid. Ilusetim.. 
 
 Death of the Virgin (formerli/ in the collection of Charles I. ; 
 painted abottt 14:70). 
 
 Mantua. Castello {frescoes in the Camera degli Sposi, 1470—74]. 
 
 Lodovico Gonzaga and Barbara of Brandenburg sur- 
 rounded by their family and Court {on the tvalk). 
 
 Lodovico meeting his son, Cardinal Francesco, on his return 
 from Eome {on the walls) . 
 
 Scenes from the fables of Hercules, Orpheus, Apollo, &c. ; 
 Medallions of Cajsars, Cupids, and other figures {iti 
 monochrome, on the ceiling). 
 
 Milan. Brera. 
 
 St. Luke and other saints {altar-piece in twelve parts : 
 
 jyainted for Santa Giustina, Padua, in 1454). 
 The dead Christ bewailed by the Maries. 
 Casa Trivuhi. 
 
 Virgin and Child in glory, with SS. John the Baptist, 
 Eomualdo, and Jerome, a bishop and three angels. A 
 Mantinia p. an. gkacie, 1497, 15 Augusti. 
 
 Munich. Pinakotheh. 
 
 Madonna enthroned with Saints. 
 
PRINCIPAL WORKS OF MANTEGNA. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Naples. Museum. 
 
 St. Euphemia, Opus Andke^ Mantegn^, mccccliii. 
 
 Padua. Church of the Eremitani. 
 
 St. James baptizing Hermogenes. 
 St. James before Herod. 
 
 St. James blessing a convert on bis 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). 
 Pakis. Louvre. 
 
 The Crucifixion {part of the predella of the altar-piece of 
 
 San Zeno in Verona). 
 Madonna della Yittoria {painted in 1495— 96/or Santa Mai ia 
 
 delta Vittoria, Mantua). 
 Parnassus. 
 
 Wisdom victorious over the Vices {from Isabella Gonzagas 
 "Grotto"). 
 
 Paema. Finacoteca. 
 
 Copies in oil of the frescoes in the church of the Eremitani 
 at Padua {doubt fid). 
 
 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 Vei-ona). 
 
 Turin. Gallery. 
 
 Madonna and five saints. 
 
 Venice. Academy. 
 
 , St. George. {Tainted about 1464). 
 
 Verona. San Zeno. 
 
 Madonna and eight Saints. {Fainted about 1459 ; altar-piece : 
 the predella, a copy of which is in San Zeno, is part in the 
 Louvre and part m the Tours Museum.) 
 Vienna. Belvedere. 
 
 St. Sebastian. {Fainted abotct 1464.) 
 
 Studies for the Triumphs of Julius Csesar {doubtful). 
 
PAINTINGS BY MANTEGNA IN PRIVATE COLLECTIONS IN 
 ENGLAND EXHIBITED AT VAEIOUS TIMES* 
 
 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. Eobinson, Esq. 
 
 At the Manchester Art Treasures Exhibition, 1857. 
 
 Cat. No. Subject. 
 
 Owner. 
 
 91. 
 
 Pieta, with the Crucifixion in the 
 
 
 
 Distance 
 
 Liverpool Eoyal Institution 
 
 96. 
 
 
 Earl of Pembroke. 
 
 97. 
 
 Christ hearing 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. 
 67. 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. 
 
 * 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 oificial catalogues have 
 been strictly adhered to ; it must not be supposed that every picture classed as the work of 
 Maategna 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." 
 
PKINCIPAL WORKS OF MANTEGNA. 
 
 Date. Subject. 
 
 1871. The Triumph of Scipio 
 The Wise Men's Offerings . 
 Subjects (four) from the Life of Christ 
 
 1872. Two Figures ; a Study 
 
 1875. The FKght into Egypt 
 
 1876. Judith with the Head of Holofernes . 
 Dido 
 
 1878. A Triumphal Procession 
 
 1880. The Virgin and Child 
 
 1881. APietu 
 
 Owner. 
 George Vivian, Esq. 
 Louisa, Lady Ashhurton. 
 Earl of Dudley. 
 Duke of Buccleuch. 
 W. Graham, Esq. 
 Colonel Markham. 
 )> 
 
 Hugh Owen, Esq. 
 
 Charles Butler, Esq. 
 
 Sir WiUiam IST. Abdy, Bart. 
 
THE PEIl^CIPAL WOEKS OF FEAKCIA. 
 
 Berlin. Museum. 
 
 Madonna and Child, -with. SS. Geminiano, Bernard, 
 Dorothea, Catharine, Jerome, and Louis of France. 
 Francia ArRiPABER BoKON, 1502 {painted for Santa 
 Cecilia, Modena). 
 Holy Family {early work) Bartholomei sum (ptu) Bianchini 
 Maxima matrom hic yivit manibus Fraxcia 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 Francije Aurificis, mcccclxxxx (iv ?). 
 
 80. Madonna and Child, with SS. John the Baptist, 
 Augustin, Jerome, and Stephan, and an angel {painted 
 for the Manziioli). 
 
 81. The Infant Christ adored by the Virgin, SS. Joseph, 
 Augustin, and Francis, the donor and two angels. 
 {Fainted for Antonio Galeazzo Beutivoglio in 1499.) 
 
 82. Birth; Infancy; Death of Christ. {A predella.) 
 
 83. Pieta. 
 
 \_These five were formerly in Santa Maria delta Misericordia, 
 Bologna.'] 
 
 371. Annunciation, with SS. George, Bernardino of Siena, 
 Francis of Assisi, and John the Evangelist. Francia 
 
 AURIFEX PINXIT, MCCCCC. 
 
PRINCirAL WORKS OF FRANCIA. 
 
 115 
 
 Bologna. 372. Madonna and Child, witli SS. Jolin the Baptist, Paul, 
 and Francis of Assisi. 
 373. Crucifixion, with the Madonna, the Magdalen, St. 
 Jerome, and St. John the EvangeUst. Opus Francis 
 AtJRir. 
 
 {These three were formerhj in the SS. Amiunziata, 
 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 Aueifex riNXiT {in 1499). [In the 
 Bentivoglio Chapel.] 
 Marriage; and Burial of St. Cecilia, /mco 1509. \_In the 
 Oratory of Santa Cecilia.] 
 
 San Martino Maggiore. 
 
 Madonna and Child, with SS. Eoch, Sehastian, Bernardino, 
 and Anthony of Padua. Francia Auru-ex v. 
 
 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 {apredella). 
 
 Madonna and ChUd, with the bird, and St. John the 
 Baptist. 
 
 Baptism of Christ. Francia Aurifex Bon. F. M. V. 
 Vim. (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 Eyangelista Scappi. So. Vangelista ScAiiri. 
 
116 
 
 PRINCIPAL WORKS OF FRANCIA. 
 
 PoRLi. Finacoteca. 
 
 Adoration of the CMd {fromtheFalazzo Zambeccari, Bologna)- 
 Fkankfoiit. Stcidel. 
 
 Portrait of a young man. 
 
 Hampton Coukt. 
 
 Baptism of Christ. Fkangia 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 Eomualdo {with the annexed signature). 
 
 FRA^rciA-AVRirEX-^ONOKIESIS • P«--a^ 
 
 The Virgin and two angels Aveeping over the dead body of 
 Christ {lunette of the above). 
 
 [These two pictures, formerly an altar-piece, were origin- 
 ally in the Buonvisi Chapel in San Frediano, at Zucca.^ 
 The Virgin and Child with two Saints. 
 
 Dudley Souse. 
 
 Virgin and Child with St. Joseph. JAcoja-s 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 Fellegrino. 
 Madonna and Child. 
 
 Madrid. Duke of Fernan Nunez, 
 St. Sebastian. 
 Milan. Brera. 
 
 Annunciation. 
 
 Casa Fertusati. 
 Madonna and Saints. 1511. 
 
PKINCIPAL WORKS OF FRANCIA. 
 
 iir 
 
 Munich. Finahothek. 
 
 Madonna of the Eose-garden. Francia Aurifex Bono. 
 
 {A copy is in the Berlin Museum, and another in the 
 
 Finacoteca, Bologna. ) 
 Madonna and Cliild (who holds a hiid), with two angels. 
 
 Paris. Louvre. 
 
 The iSTativity. 
 
 Christ on the Cross, with Joh, the Virgin, and St. John. 
 Francia AuRiFABER {formerly in San Giobbe, Bologna). 
 
 Parma. Aceademia. 
 
 Deposition. Francia Aurifex Bonon. f. 
 Madonna and Child, St. John the Baptist, and SS. Joseph, 
 Benedict, Scolastica, and Placida. Francia Aurifex 
 
 BONONIENSIS, F. MCXV. 
 
 Madonna with the little St. J ohn. 
 
 EoME. Palazzo Borghese, 
 
 St. Stephen. Yincentii Desiderii votum Fraci^ 
 
 EXPRESSUM manu [early work). 
 Madonna and Child. 
 
 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. Decretoru 
 
 DOCTOR CANONICUS. S.P BON REDIFICATOR AUCTORQ. 
 
 domus et restaurator huius eclesije fecit fieri. p. 
 Me Franciam Aurifice Bonon. ano. mccccc. 
 
 Turin. Museum. 
 
 Pieta, 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). 
 
 Ziechtenstein Gallery. 
 
 Portrait of a Bolognese nohleman {formerly ascribed to 
 Raphael). 
 
PAINTINGS BY FEANCIA 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 Leo, Esq. 
 
 127. Virgin and Child .... Lord North wick. 
 
 132. The Baptism The Queen (Hampton Court). 
 
 146. St. Eoch Sir W. R. Farquha;p, 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 Six- 
 
 
 tus and Laurence 
 
 Wolsey Moreau, Esq. 
 
 86. 
 
 
 Alexander Barker, Esq. 
 
 248. 
 
 
 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 land- 
 
 
 scape in distance 
 
 Thomas SheflSeld, 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. Bom in the neighbourhood of Padua. [PageZ.) 
 
 1441. Entered on the register of Paduan painters as the adopted son of his 
 
 master Squarrione. (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 Ercmitani 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.) 
 „ Eeceived a grant of land at Buscoldo. (P 22.) 
 
 1470-1474. Painted the frescoes of the Camera degli Sposi. {P. 25-28.) 
 
 1473. Eeceived 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 Ilffizi for Lorenzo de' Medici. (P. 34. ) 
 1490. Left Rome and returned to Mantua, Sept. C. (P. 34.) 
 1490-92. Worked at the " Triumphs of Julius Cajsar " 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 Viancsi. (P. 43.)^ 
 
120 
 
 CHRONOLOGY OF FRA.NCIA. 
 
 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 Unicomo. (P. 53.) 
 
 1506. Altered his will in favour of Gian' Andrea, his illegitimate son, Jan ''4. 
 
 (P. 51.) 
 
 „ Painted the Masque of Comus for Isabella Gonzaga. (P. 53.) 
 „ Sold his bust of Faustina to Isabella's agent, Aug. 1. (P. 64.) 
 „ Died at Mantua, Sept. 13. (P. 54.) 
 
 OF FKANCIA. 
 1450. Bom at Bologna. (P. 75.) 
 
 1482. Entered the Goldsmiths' Guild. (P. 76.) 
 
 1483. Elected steward of the Guild. (P. 76.) 
 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 Eaphael 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 Piet^ at Turin. (P. 104.) 
 
 1516. Eaphael sent his St. Cecilia to Bologna. (P. 105.) 
 
 1517. (New style, 1518). Died, Jan. 5. (P. 106.) 
 
BIBLIOGEAPHY. 
 
 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, Caklo d'. Delle Arti e degli Artifici di Mantova, notizie raccolte ed 
 
 illustrate con disegni e con documenti. Mantova, 1859. 
 BASCHET, Akmand. Documents sur Mantegna. In the " Gazette des Beaux 
 
 Arts." Paris, 1866. 
 
 BRAGHIROLLI, Willelmo. Alciini documenti inedite relative ad Andrea 
 
 Mantegna : in the " Giornale d'Erudizione Artistica." Perugia, 1872. 
 BRUN, Karl. Neue Documente iiber Andrea Mantegna : in the " Zeitschrift 
 
 fiir Bildende Kunst," vol. xi. Leipzig, 1875-6. 
 WOLTMANN, Dr. Alfred. Biography of Andrea Mantegna in the " Kunst 
 
 und Kiinstlor des Mittelalters und der Neuzeit." Edited by Dr. Robert 
 
 Dohme. Leipzig, 1876. 
 
 FRANCIA. 
 
 CALYI, Jacopo Alessandro. Memorie della vita ed opere di Francesco 
 
 Raihohni. 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, Marcheoe, Vite dei Pittori ed Artefici 
 
 Bolognesi. Bologna, 1841-43. 
 FRIZZONI, Gustavo. Gli Atfreschi di Santa Cecilia in Bologna. Bologna, 
 
 1876. 
 
 K 
 
INDEX. 
 
 TO MANTEGNA. 
 
 Aldobrandini 22 
 
 Aliprandi, quarrel with ... 23 
 
 ,, exchanged land with 43 
 
 Alticideri of Verona .... 2 
 
 Andrea, Zoan 23, 35 
 
 Ansuino of Forli 6 
 
 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 
 Ghalice, Design for ... 46 
 
 Entombment 45 
 
 Herculei killing the Lion . . 45 
 Judgmtnt of Solomon ... 45 
 
 Judith 45, 46 
 
 Mars, Diana and Venus . . 45 
 Sagrifizio . . . . 45, 46 
 
 Uiirer 36, 65 
 
 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, 6'2 
 Hercules and Antaius . . 36, 45 
 Portraits of Lodovico and Barbara 
 
 Oonzaga 3G 
 
 St. Andrew, St. Longimis and the 
 Risen Christ . . . , 3G 
 
 St. Sebastian 36 
 
 Scourging of Christ . , . c4 
 Triumphs . . . , 35, 40 
 Virgin of the Grotto . . 18, 35 
 
 Eremitani Frescoes . . . 4 — 1 1 
 Eate, Isabella d' . . . . 31, 34 
 
 Fancelli 14 
 
 Faustina, Mantegna' s 
 Feliciano .... 
 Finiguerra .... 
 
 Gian' Andrea . . . 
 
 Giotto 
 
 Giusto of Florence . 
 Gonzaga, Federigo . 
 Gonzaga, Francesco . 
 Gonzaga, Francesco II. 
 Gonzaga, Lodivico 
 
 PAGE 
 
 53, 54, 56 
 . . 13 
 . . 35 
 
 Gonzaga, Sigisjinondo 
 
 Influence of Mantegna on 
 Bellini, the 
 Bonsignori . 
 Buonoonsiglio . 
 Caroto . 
 Correggio . 
 Costa . 
 Dih-er . 
 
 Forli, Melozzo da 
 Francia 
 Holbein 
 
 Libri, Girolamo dai 
 Grandi, Ercole . 
 Leonardo . 
 Liberale 
 Michelangelo 
 Montagna . 
 Morone 
 Raphael 
 Bubens 
 Tura, Cosinio 
 Vivarini, Luigi , 
 
 Innocent VIII. . 
 
 43, 50, 51 
 1 
 2 
 
 30, 31 
 . 22 
 32, 33, 43 
 14, 15 17, 21, 
 25, 26, 29, 30 
 ... 51 
 
 57 
 57 
 57 
 
 57 
 58 
 57 
 59 
 58 
 58 
 
 57 
 57 
 58, 60 
 57 
 oS, 61 
 57 
 57 
 5S, 60 
 59 
 57 
 57 
 
 32, 33 
 
 Julius II. . 54 
 
 Lomazzo g 
 
 Lorenzo di Pavia 55 
 
 Mantegna, Andrea {iSee Chro- 
 nology p. 119) 
 Mantegna, Francesco . . 51, 57 
 Mantegna, Lodivico . . 32, 43, 51 
 Mantegna, Niccolosia . . 43, 51 
 Mantegna, Taddea .... 43 
 
 Mantua, sack of 24 
 
 Medici,-! 
 
 lOronzode', visits Man- 
 tegna 30 
 
INDEX. 
 
 123 
 
 Melozzo da Forli 28 
 
 Mocetto S5 
 
 Niccolosia 43, 51 
 
 Norsa 47 
 
 Paintings — 
 
 Adoration of the Magi, of the 
 
 Uffizi 
 
 >, „ of the 
 
 Vatican . 
 
 Autumn 
 
 Baptism of Chi ist 
 Birth of Christ 
 Burial of St. Christopher 
 Christ on the Mount of Olives 
 Crista in Scurto . 
 Comus .... 
 Dead Christ . 
 Death of the Virgin 
 Descent of Christ into Liinho 
 Execution of St. James 
 Glorified Madonna, of Milan 
 History of St. James and St. Chris 
 
 topher .... 4 
 Lodovico Gonzaga and his so7i, 
 Francesco ..... 
 Lodovico Gonzaga and his wife . 
 Madonna, of Bergamo 
 
 „ holding the cfiild on a 
 
 parapet . . . 18 
 Madonna, of the Dresden Gallery 32 
 ,, ofSanZeno . 15,16 
 Madonna della Vittoria . 46, 47, 48 
 Man of Sorrows .... 34 
 Martyrdom of St. Christopher . 10 
 
 Parnastut 
 
 44, 48 
 
 Paintings — 
 
 PietH 
 
 Portrait of an Ecclesiastic . 
 Euhens's copy of the Triumphs 
 SS. Anthony and Bernardino 
 St. Euphemia 
 
 St. George .... 
 St. James baptizing Converts 
 
 „ before Ilerod 
 
 „ blessing a kneeling dis 
 ciple . 
 
 St. Luke .... 
 St. Sebastian 
 
 „ ofLaMotta . 
 Summer 
 
 20 
 18 
 41 
 3 
 14 
 19 
 
 7 
 
 14 
 
 19 
 52, 55 
 . 19 
 
 Triumphs of Julius Ca;sar 32, 33, 38, 
 43, 46, 60 
 
 Triumph of Scipio . . 52, 56 
 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 Bo- 
 logna . 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 
 \fudgmtnt of Paris ... S3 
 
124 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 PAGW 
 
 Franco Bologncse .... 65 
 
 relicini 80, 83 
 
 Francia {See Chronology, p. 120) 
 
 Galassi 68, 71, 72 
 
 Gambaro 81 
 
 Gaston de Foix 102 
 
 Grandi, Ercole 73 
 
 „ Ercole II 101 
 
 Gubbio, Oderisio da . . . . 6o 
 Guido of Bologna .... 65 
 Guido Eeni 106 
 
 Imola, Innocenza da . . .103 
 
 Julius II 97 
 
 Lambertini 72 
 
 Landscape 8t 
 
 Lianori 72 
 
 Mantegna 72,77 
 
 Marchesi 104 
 
 Mezzaratta, Frescoes of the 68, 69 
 Michelangelo ...... 69 
 
 Kadi 94 
 
 Niello work 77 
 
 Paintings — 
 
 Adoration of the Magi, of the Brera 84 
 „ „ at Dresden 100 
 
 Annunciation, of the Annunziata 85 
 „ Bologna Galleuy . 100 
 „ of the Brera . .81 
 Baptism of Christ, Dresden . 99 
 „ ,, Hampton Court 100 
 Surial of St. Cecilia . . 95, 96 
 Coronation of the Virgin, at Lucca 9t 
 „ „ at Ferrara 92 
 
 CTOaj?a;ion, of the Louvre . . 81 
 Deposition, Parma . . 89, 104 
 92 
 104 
 70 
 81 
 92 
 3, f 3 
 85 
 82 
 82 
 104 
 100 
 100 
 
 Dispute of Philosophers 
 God the Father . . 
 Holy Family, of Berlin 
 
 ,, of Dudley House 
 
 Judith . ... 
 Lncrezia .... 
 Madonna, of the Annunziata 
 BentivDglio 
 Manzuoli 
 Parma Gallery . 
 Dresden 
 
 Nfitional Gallery 
 
 Paintings — 
 
 Madonna, Vienna 
 ,, Berlin 
 
 ,, St. Petersburg . 
 ,, San Martino 
 ,, Munich 
 „ of 1490 
 „ of 1511 
 Madonna of the Rose Garden 
 Marriage of Cecilia and Valerian 
 Nativity, of Bologna . 
 
 of Forli . 
 Pietd, at Bologna 
 
 ,, of the National Gallery 
 ,, Turin tiallery . 
 Portrait of Bartoloynmeo Bianehini 
 
 „ 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 
 
 PAGB 
 
 100 
 100 
 84 
 84 
 81 
 79 
 104 
 100 
 95 
 82 
 92 
 81 
 89, 90 
 104 
 79 
 
 Pietro della Francesca 
 
 72 
 
 Kaibolini, Francesco {See Chro- 
 nology p. 120) 
 Raibolini, Giacomo 94, 95, 76, 103 
 „ Giulio . . . 76, 103 
 
 Eaimondi 93 
 
 RaphaeljFrancia' s friendship for 86 
 Eaphael 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 Ora- 
 tory of 94, 95 
 
 Simone dai Crocifissi . 67, 68, 71 
 
 Tamaroccio 94, 95 
 
 Ursone 65 
 
 Ventura 65 
 
 Vigri, Santa Catarina . . .72 
 
 Vitale 66, 70 
 
 Yiti, Timoteo 87 
 
 Zoppo, Marco . . . ,73, 77, 78 
 
 6 29 89 
 
GEHY CENTER LIBRARY MAIN 
 
 ND 623 ICS A24 BKS 
 c 1 *dy, Julia Mary Cart 
 
 Mantegna and Francla. 
 
 3 3125 00352 9316