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The art having declined in Siena through the disasters of the state, is revived by the labours of Salimbeni and his sons.

We have related the progress and best works of the Sienese school from the beginning, to about the middle of the sixteenth century; but we have not yet considered a circumstance that adds greatly to the merit of the artists and works of that period. If we search into the history of that half century, we shall find that all Italy groaned under the pressure of public calamities; but Siena, to a greater degree, and for a longer period than any other place, endured an accumulation of the most terrible evils. Famine, pestilence, and a suspension of commercial intercourse, afflicted other states, but here they seem to have exhausted their rage: civil commotions and external enemies agitated other states, but here, during a period of many years, they allowed not a moment of tranquillity. The republic of Siena, strong in the valour of her citizens, was feeble in every thing besides; and hence it resembled a gulph, where tempests are more frequent and more violent than on the ocean. The usurpation of the Petrucci, the dissensions between the nobles and the people, and jealousy of foreign powers, who sought her subjugation, kept Siena in constant alarm, and often incited to arms and to bloodshed. The remedy which they now expected in the protection of the emperor, at another time from France, only served to aggravate internal commotion and foreign aggression. Amid this perpetual agitation, I know not whether most to admire the genius of the people, ever directed to the decoration of their houses and public edifices, or the spirit of the artists, who could summon all the powers of their minds to such efforts: this I know, that similar instances are rare in other countries. The year 1555 at length arrived, when Cosmo I. deprived the Sienese of their long defended liberty. To any enemy but the Florentines they would have submitted with less reluctance; and on this account our astonishment is lessened on finding that, on this occasion, two thirds of the inhabitants abandoned their native soil, refusing to live subject to enemies so abhorred.

At this time, and in the disasters above alluded to, the city lost many able artists, and also several families, from whom eminent artists were descended, and whose Sienese origin is confirmed by history. Baglione says of Camillo Mariani, that he was born at Vicenza, and that his father was a native of Siena, who had expatriated himself on account of the wars; and he praises the cabinet pictures of this artist, who died at Rome with the reputation of an excellent sculptor. I likewise find at Bologna an Agostino Marcucci, of Siena, who is wholly unknown in that place, probably because he was the son of an emigrant. He was a disciple of the Caracci, till a schism arose in that school, which we shall notice in its proper place, when he ranged himself with the foremost adherents of Facini, the leader of the party, and they had the boldness to set up a new academy in opposition to that of the Caracci. He continued to reside in Bologna, and to teach to the time of his death, and is reckoned by Malvasia among "the first men" of that age. Of his scholars Malvasia mentions only Ruggieri, and he only notices one of his pictures at the Concezione;[299] to which several others, however, are added in the New Guide.

Siena, in the mean time, began to breathe from her misfortunes, and to be reconciled to the new government, which, through the prudence of Cosmo, appeared rather a reformation in the old, than a new domination. No long time elapsed before the void left in the city by the artists who had emigrated was filled up by others. Rustico had remained there, as well as his superior, Riccio, who painted the celebrated scene, already noticed, on the coming of Cosmo. Siena also possessed Tozzo and Bigio, whom Lancillotti reckons "among the most famous painters," I believe, in small figures; and it is not easy to distinguish between those two artists, who had an extraordinary similarity of style. Arcangiolo Salimbeni, who is expressly said by Baldinucci to be a "scholar of Federigo Zuccari," may have received the rudiments of the art from one of them. Perhaps, as the historian goes on to say, during his residence at Rome he might contract an intimate friendship with Zuccari; but the style of Salimbeni discovers very opposite principles from those of that master; and notwithstanding all researches, no one has succeeded in finding pictures of his that bear indications of that school. He loved precision more than fulness of design; and we may even observe in him an attachment to the manner of Pietro Perugino, as was observed by Della Valle with regard to a Crucifixion attended by six Saints, in the parish church of Lusignano. In his other pictures at Siena, especially in the S. Peter-Martyr, in possession of the Dominicans, he appears wholly modern;[300] but diligent, and free from the defects which we often observe in Federigo, who may be considered as a professed mannerist of that period. It was the good fortune of the Sienese school, that Riccio was succeeded by this artist, who, if he had not a lofty genius, possessed, at least, the judgment to avoid the faults of his contemporaries. Hence, amid the degeneracy of the neighbouring schools this remained uncontaminated, or but slightly infected; and the new disciples it sent forth contributed to the improvement of the art in Italy. They were not so much attached to home as Mecherino; they painted equally well beyond the territory of Siena; they visited very distant cities, and in them all left specimens of their art, both in public and in private, which are still preserved. After receiving the first instruction from Salimbeni, or some less known artist, each chose his own guide. We shall here proceed with their history.

After receiving the rudiments of the art at Siena, Pietro Sorri went to Florence, under Passignano, and became his son-in-law, and the associate of his labours in that place and in Venice. He emulated the style of Passignano, which partook, as we have observed, of the Florentine and the Venetian: he succeeded so well, that their works bear a perfect resemblance, and are held in equal estimation. He painted less expeditiously than his father-in-law; but his colouring was more durable, and, if I mistake not, his design more graceful. The convent of S. Sebastian, which was ornamented by a competition of the best Sienese artists of this epoch, has one of his pictures, which are rather uncommon in Siena; for his best years were spent in other places. He was much at Florence: and afterwards visited many other Tuscan cities; and there is scarcely any considerable place among them which cannot boast the efforts of his easy and graceful pencil; but particularly Pisa, the cathedral of which could not but attract such an artist. He there represented the Consecration of that church on one large canvas, and, on another, Christ disputing with the Doctors, which is inscribed with his name: and never did he approach nearer to the excellence of Paul Veronese in architecture and other accompaniments. He was employed in the Carthusian monastery of Pavia, and also in Genoa, where we shall find him as a preceptor in that school.

Casolani took his surname from Casole, the little town from which his family removed to Siena. In the ducal gallery of Florence there is a portrait of a lady with three men, in the same piece, which is said to represent Lucrezia Piccolomini, with her three sons, Alessandro Casolani, Francesco Vanni, and Ventura Salimbeni, whom she bore to different husbands, in the course of a few years. This makes Alessandro the stepson of Arcangiolo Salimbeni, and the uterine brother of Ventura and of Vanni. I cannot find this story in any author, except in Niccolò Pio, a Roman writer of no authority, whose manuscript, containing notices of two hundred and fifty artists, which was drawn up about 1724, is preserved in the Vatican library.[301] The old writers of Siena have taken no notice of so remarkable an event, and we cannot, therefore, give credit to Pio, a stranger, and a modern author. The relation then in which Alessandro stands to Arcangiolo is that of scholar; but he learnt more from Cav. Roncalli in Siena and in Rome. He remained long in the latter city: he designed the finest works it contained, and obtained some idea of different styles. This knowledge was increased by a journey which he made some years afterwards to Pavia, where he painted in the Carthusian monastery, and in other places. His manner is prodigiously varied. It exhibits traces of the best style of Roncalli, a good design, sobriety of composition, a modesty of colouring, and tranquil harmony. He seems also to have aimed at originality, for he was continually altering his style, mingling it with the graces of various artists, and sometimes striking out into a novel path. He possessed promptness of genius and of execution: he was quick in committing his ideas to the canvas; and when dissatisfied with his work, he often chose to cancel the whole, rather than to correct a part. Although unacquainted with ideal beauty, he was esteemed by Guido, who may be considered as the father of modern painters, and who said of him "this truly is a painter." Whoever would see his best work, may examine the martyrdom of S. Bartholomew, at the Carmine of Siena. It is a picture of considerable size, with great variety in the figures and in the expression, and altogether excites surprise. We are told that when Roncalli examined it, he at length exclaimed, that the art of that period was comprised in that picture. But the short life of Casolani prevented him attaining the excellence which this specimen promised. His works are in various cities of Tuscany, and also in Naples, Genoa, and Fermo, in the metropolitan church of which there is a picture of S. Louis of France, that is numbered among the choice paintings in that city.

A good many of his works in Siena shew traces of, and even whole figures by other hands; having been finished by Vanni, and Ventura Salimbeni, or by other artists, either of his own or of different schools. Ilario Casolani, his son, by a daughter of Rustici, finished the Assumption for the Church of S. Francis; and afterwards went to Rome, where he was "noticed by Cav. Pomaranci, out of respect to his father," says Mancini, as of a thing he knew, and adds, that Pomaranci had good hopes of him. Baglione and Pio called him Cristoforo, a name he, perhaps, received along with several others at baptism; and which probably the Sienese artist thought more becoming at Rome than Ilario, since he is named Cristoforo, by Roncalli. Under Pomaranci he became a proficient in his style in fresco, and imitated it particularly at Madonna de' Monti, in some pictures from the history of the Virgin, and in an Ascension on the ceiling; the best work, perhaps, produced in the short course of his life. Titi uniformly names him Cristoforo Consolano; but a consideration of the anecdotes of Mancini and Baglione leads us to convert it into Casolano. A Resurrection of Lazarus, begun by Alessandro for the church of S. Francis, was finished by Vincenzio Rustici; who was probably his scholar and his kinsman, and who is the least celebrated among this family of painters. One of his pictures, intended for Santuccio, was finished by Sebastiano Folli. The frescos of this artist are more numerous at Siena than his oil pictures: the ornamental parts of them are superior to his figures, in which he inclined to mannerism; his compartments are beautiful, his architecture finely conducted, his imitations of stucco deceive the eye, and he was expert in foreshortening what was to be seen from below. In 1608 he painted the frescos of S. Sebastian, in competition with various artists, and in this trial of skill he only yields to Rutilio Manetti. In the Guide of the Cav. Pecci I find mention made of designs of Casolani, executed in fresco by Stefano Volpi, whose name not unfrequently occurs in that work, and who was probably a scholar of that excellent artist.

Cav. Ventura, the son of A. Salimbeni, is reckoned the third scholar of that master, though his lessons from Arcangiolo must have been but few. The young man left his home early, and journeying through the cities of Lombardy, he studied the works of Correggio and others, whose taste began to be applauded in Tuscany. He went to Rome in the pontificate of Sixtus V. and raised a very favourable opinion of his genius, which, giving himself up to dissipation, he did not afterwards fulfil. In that city he left many frescos that are praised by Baglione, among which, the Abraham entertaining the Angels, in a chapel of the Gesù, appears, on the whole, the work of a consummate painter. It has something lively and graceful in the colouring and the countenances, which he always retained: it also shews attention to design and chiaroscuro, which, in a great measure, he afterwards neglected in his paintings. In conjunction with Vanni he executed some ceilings, and, perhaps, derived advantage from observing this painter, though his junior by eight years. In many of his works he undoubtedly resembles him in his imitation of Baroccio, and hardly yields to him in grace of contour, in expression, and in delicacy and clearness of colouring. He is admired in the church of S. Quirico, and in that of S. Domenick: in the one is his Appearance of the Angel at the Sepulchre; in the other a Crucifixion, with various Saints around, which are superior to the generality of his works. In several other places in Siena there are others of great merit, especially where he painted in the vicinity of the works of the best masters of his school. He likewise executed some beautiful historical pieces when he vied with Poccetti, in the cloister of the Servi at Florence, and in the cathedral of Pisa, where he was surrounded by such great painters. His Marriage of the Virgin, in the cathedral of Foligno, his S. Gregory, in the church of S. Peter at Perugia, his works in Lucca, in Pavia, and in various cities of Italy, justify the remark of Baglione, that Salimbeni was impatient of remaining long in any one place. In Genoa, however, his stay was not so short. The beautiful chamber in the Adorno palace, and other works which he there executed, are still in existence, while many others have perished. He went to Genoa at the same time with Agostino Tassi, who served him for an ornamental and landscape painter, and, perhaps, it was through him that Ottavio Ghissoni, of Siena, came to that place; an artist, if I am not mistaken, forgotten in the annals of his own country; in fresco he was more lively than correct. He studied at Rome under Cherubino Alberti; but his country, his style, and the time of his arrival at Genoa, afford ground to suspect that he had also received the lessons of Salimbeni. Soprani gives Ventura the surname of Bevilacqua, which is rather an addition to his name granted him by Cardinal Bevilacqua when he knighted him in Perugia.

Cav. Francesco Vanni, in the opinion of many, is the best painter of this school; and is reckoned one of the restorers of Italian painting in the sixteenth century. The early instruction of his genius is to be assigned with greater probability to his brother than to his stepfather. At sixteen years of age he went to Rome, for the purpose of designing after Raffaello and the best masters. He was for some time under the tuition of Gio. de' Vecchi, whose style he introduced into his native country. There are specimens of him in many churches, and it is related that they were not relished by his fellow citizens; a circumstance which might occasion him uneasiness at the time, but soon after afforded him a lasting source of satisfaction. It induced him to examine the pictures of Lombardy, as his brother had done: and having remained in Parma to design some of them, he afterwards went to Bologna, where he was assiduously occupied. Ugurgieri writes that he was at that place in 1667, at which time he was twelve years old: this I believe to be incorrect; for it was unknown to Mancini, who was acquainted with Vanni. Malvasia repeats it on the authority of Ugurgieri; but he can discover nothing further of Vanni, at Bologna, than his being there after he had arrived at manhood, and designing in the academy of Facini and Mirandola, to which he was probably introduced by his countryman Marcucci. He left some works at Bologna, in the style of the Caracci, if he is the painter of a Madonna, which was shewn me as a Vanni, in a cabinet of the Zambeccari collection. His Flight into Egypt, painted for the church of S. Quirico, in Siena, bears also undoubted marks of the Bolognese school.

Although he attempted other styles, he was not like Casolani an adherent to none. Vanni attached himself to the elegant and florid manner of Barocci, in which he was eminently successful. Of this, the Humiliation of Simon the Sorcerer, which he painted on a stone slab for the church of S. Peter at Rome, affords a proof; a picture which, though recently cleaned with little judgment, is still an object of admiration. Both the design and colouring are in the manner of Barocci; and it is prepared with a due regard to the humidity of that church; nor has it been found necessary to remove it, as has happened to other pictures. He also painted in Siena, and in other Italian cities, where he has approached the manner of Barocci more closely than Viviani, or any other pupil of that artist. His Marriage of S. Catherine, with a numerous group of angels, at the Refugio, is much praised in Siena: as is the Madonna, surrounded by saints, painted for the church of Monna Agnese; and the S. Raymond walking on the Sea, in the possession of the Domenican Fathers, which is supposed by some to be his best picture in Siena, where his works are very numerous. Among the finest pictures in the cathedral of Pisa, is the Dispute about the Sacrament, painted in emulation of his brother Ventura, who had surpassed his usual style in the altarpiece of the angels. At the Umiltà of Pistoia, in the convent of the Camaldules of Fabriano, and in that of the Capuchins of S. Quirico, are some of his most exquisite works; and they are so numerous in other places, that I do not imagine a full catalogue of them has ever been made out. He is generally a follower of Barocci, as we have observed; and amateurs, deceived principally by his colouring, and the heads of his boys, which appear cast in the mould of Barocci, frequently confound the latter with Vanni: but one, well acquainted with Federigo, observes in him more grandeur of design, and greater freedom in the touches of the pencil. The pictures which Vanni executed negligently, or at low prices (of which there are several at Siena), can hardly be recognized as his.

By the example and lessons of Vanni, the honour of painting was long supported at Siena. He taught many pupils, who did not, however, rigidly adopt his style; but, as is usually the case, imitated the master most recently in vogue, or, in other words, followed the fashion of the time. We shall begin with his two sons, to whom he had given the names most celebrated in the art. Michelangiolo, the eldest, we have mentioned with applause, as the inventor of staining marble: but he did not attain much celebrity except in this art. I know not whether he ever was out of Siena, and there we find few of his paintings, except a S. Catherine in the act of praying with the Redeemer, which was painted for the Olivetine monks. Raffaele, the second, left an orphan at the age of thirteen, was recommended to Antonio Caracci, and in that school, according to Mancini, made such progress as even to surpass his father; but this is not the opinion of posterity. All allow that he possessed grandeur of design, and a fine taste in shadows and in colouring, with some resemblance to Cortona, who, in his day, drew after him even his contemporaries. The birth of the Virgin Mary, in the Pace at Rome, and several of his other pictures, have no small portion of the ideas and contrasts of the followers of Cortona. He lived long in Rome, and on that account is frequently mentioned by Titi. Tuscany is not deficient in his works. At the church of S. Catherine, at Pisa, there is a picture of the titular Saint; Florence possesses the pictures of the Riccardi saloon; and at the church of S. George, in Siena, is his Procession of our Saviour to Calvary. These are esteemed among his finest productions; and the last is characterized as his masterpiece. Both brothers had the honour of knighthood; but it was more worthily bestowed on the second than on the first.

Contemporary with the Cav. Raffaello, as well as his assistant at S. Maria della Pace at Rome, and in several places at Siena, we find the name of Bernardino Mei. I am unacquainted with that of his master; and P. della Valle, who saw several of his works, sometimes compares him to the Caracci, at others to Paul Veronese, and to Guercino, much as the eclectic philosophers adopt or change the maxims of the different schools. He commends him for the airs of his heads, and, as one of his best productions, alludes to a fresco in the Casa Bandinelli, with an Aurora in a ceiling, and with several other elegant figures and designs.

Francesco di Cristofano Rustici, called Rustichino, is better known in Siena than those just mentioned. He obtained the name of Rustichino, either because he was the last of a family that had produced three painters before him, or because he died in the outset of life. This circumstance, perhaps, has contributed to his reputation. All his remaining works are beautiful, which seldom happens to artists who live to a great age, and who abate in diligence as they advance in reputation and in years. He is a graceful follower of Caravaggio; and particularly excels in confined or candle lights, much in the style of Gherardo della Notte; but he is perhaps more select. The Dying Magdalen, in possession of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, and the S. Sebastian, cured by S. Irene, which belongs to Prince Borghese, in Rome, are in this style. But it was not the only one in which Rustichino painted. He had visited Rome, and had studied the works of the Caracci and of Guido, of which traces may be discovered in several of his works; but, at the same time, all of them possess a certain originality, and something peculiarly his own. The best of all his pictures at Siena is an Annunciation, in Provenzano, before which the Virgin, S. Catherine, prays, surrounded by a multitude of angels. If Rustichino pleases in other works, in this he enchants us. He began a work on the history of the city in the public palace, in which his father, whose figures were not equal to his decorations, was also employed, and it was finished by other artists.

Rutilio Manetti, or, as Pecci writes it, Mannetti, followed Caravaggio with less discrimination, but with greater force in the shadows. His pictures at Siena are easily recognized by invariably partaking of a certain sombre hue, which deranges the due balance and participation of light and shade. The same objection lies against many of his contemporaries of every school. The method of purifying colours, and of composing vehicles,[302] had degenerated; and the injury sustained from this defect was not observed in the pictures: the artist only looked to the grand effect, to which the age so much aspired. Manetti united an improved design to ideas above the common order, and beautiful architecture; and hence, at times, he approaches rather to Guercino than to Caravaggio. In the cathedral of Siena is his Elijah under the juniper tree, in which the historian of that church commends the force of the colouring, which is juicy and natural. Many of his works remain in the Carthusian monastery of Florence, and in several churches of Siena, the most admired of which is the Repose of the Holy Family, in S. Peter's of Castelvecchio. In private collections, where pictures are better preserved than in churches, we find very beautiful Madonnas by this artist; and there is a most exquisite Lucretia in the possession of the Bandinelli family. He sometimes departed from his usual manner, as in the Triumph of David, in the ducal gallery, in which the shadows are not so dark, and the tone of the whole is more lively. Mention is made in the Lettere Pittoriche,[303] of Bernardino Capitelli, a scholar of Manetti, and an etcher: and in the third volume there is casual mention of one Domenico Manetti, probably of the same family, but not to be mistaken for the great individual of the same name. He appears rather to have employed himself in ornamenting private collections, and painted a Baptism of Constantine for the casa Magnoni, that has been much commended.

Astolfo Petrazzi, as well as Vanni, was a pupil of the younger Salimbeni and of Sorri; and seems, more than any other, to have adhered to the manner of his master. He frequently aims at pleasing the eye, and not unfrequently chooses his models from the schools of Upper Italy. A Marriage-feast of Cana, by his hand, in a private house, brings Paolo strongly to our recollection. His Communion of S. Jerome, in the possession of the Augustine friars, partakes, perhaps, too strongly of the manner of the Caracci. This picture, which he painted at Rome, was much admired at Siena, and was the origin of his great employment in that city, where his pictures are always decorated with most pleasing choirs of angels. His cabinet pictures were also lively; witness the four Seasons at Volte, a seat of the noble family of Chigi. He kept an open academy for painting in his house, which was much frequented by natives of Siena, and honoured by the attendance of Borgognone, who stopt some months with Astolfo before he went to Rome. Hence, many of this artist's early battle-pieces and landscapes are to be met with at Siena: the house of Sig. Decano Giovanelli, a literary ornament of that city, abounded with them.

I find some other painters of this school who are known beyond the state of Siena. Antiveduto Grammatica, an eminent painter, of Sienese extraction, was known at Rome, where he was president of the academy of S. Luke. It is true that he was deprived of that office for attempting to substitute one of his own copies for a S. Luke, by Raffaello, which he had sold to a gentleman. He had a peculiar talent in the art of copying, especially heads, and, on this account, he was a good portrait painter. Although we are not certain that he had any master but one Domenico Perugino, a painter of little wooden scenes,[304] he obtained applause in large compositions. There is an Annunciation by Grammatica of a most brilliant colouring, in the hospital of the Incurables; and several of his other pictures, in different churches. He died at Rome in 1626.

Two other artists, unknown in their native place, are made known to me by their signatures. On a Last Supper, in the convent of the Angioli, below Assisi, I discovered Franciscus Antonius Senensis, 1614, or thereabouts. The style has enough of Baroccio to lead me to suspect that he was the scholar of Vanni, or of Salimbeni: nor must he be reckoned the meanest of that school, for he was master of expression in a degree superior to mediocrity. The figure of the departing Judas is the image of desperate resolve, and would be much better had he not given it the feet of a bat; a grotesque conceit. In the same neighbourhood, at the church of Foligno, I read, beneath a Holy Family, the name of Marcantonio Grecchi, and the date 1634. The style is solid, expressive, and correct; more resembling Tiarini di Bologna than any master of Siena. Niccolo Tornioli, lately mentioned, painted in the church of S. Paul, at Bologna, in various cities of Italy: in Siena he left, perhaps, no picture in public but the Vocation of S. Matthew, still remaining in the custom-house. Towards the close of the century, painting was practised at Siena chiefly by foreigners. Annibale Mazzuoli, a fresco painter of rapid execution but of little merit, was most employed: he afterwards went to Rome, and is the last name inserted in the Eulogies of Pio.

Painting, however, came again into repute at Siena, about 1700, when its credit was restored by Cav. Giuseppe Nasini, a scholar of Ciro Ferri. Nasini possessed the qualities for which I have commended many of his nation, a fervid genius, a fertile imagination, and a poetic vein; but his poetry was of the species that prevailed in Italy during his younger days, a composition unrestrained by fixed rules. To this spirit we not unfrequently discover some analogy in his paintings, in which we could desire to find more order, a more choice design, and colouring less vulgar. He always shews, however, a taste for allegory, great command of pencil, and an imposing air on the whole; and the observation of Redi, that "he stuns the beholder," is not without some foundation.[305] This remark was made when Nasini had finished the cupola of the chapel of S. Anthony, in the church of the Apostles at Rome; in which chapel there is a picture by Luti. He afterwards entered into a competition with Luti, and the first artists then in Rome, in the large prophets of the lateran cathedral. His masterpiece is supposed to be the S. Leonard, in Madonna del Pianto, at Foligno, the ceiling of which he painted with good frescos. Siena contains some of his finest productions of every kind; above all, the pictures of the Novissimi, intended for the Pitti palace, but transferred from it to the church of the Conventuals of Siena. It contains a great number of figures neither so select nor so well arranged as to arrest the eye of the spectator; but he who would contemptuously overlook it, let him say how many painters then in Italy could have produced such a picture.

Giuseppe brought up two pupils in his house. He had a brother named Antonio, who was a priest, whose likeness is among the eminent portrait painters in the gallery at Florence. Cav. Apollonio Nasini, the son of Giuseppe, was inferior to his father in the profession; yet assisted him in his greatest works, and held an honourable rank among his contemporaries. Gioseffo Pinacci, of Siena, a disciple of Mehus in figures, and of Borgognone in battle-pieces, lived in the time of Nasini. He was a good painter of portraits, and made a considerable fortune, first at the court of Carpio, Viceroy of Naples, and afterwards in the service of the grand duke Ferdinand, at Florence, where several of his works remain. But his chief merit consisted in a knowledge of the pencilling of the old masters. Nicolo Franchini distinguished himself rather by restoring the work of other hands than by his own productions, and thus furnished Pecci with much convenient information for his City Guide; "by his skill," says the Cavaliere, "in restoring injured specimens to their original beauty, without applying to them a fresh pencil, and in supplying the faded colours with others taken from paintings of less value, he entitled himself, in fact, to the praise of a new discovery." We shall here conclude the school of Siena; and shall add in its praise, that if it did not produce painters of the very highest class, it at least boasts many artists, eminent when we consider their era, and few inferior, or not above mediocrity.[306] It indeed appears, that either a genius for painting is natural to that people, or that none of them have embraced the art who were not capable of prosecuting it successfully.

[299] See Malvasia, tom. i. p. 571; and tom. ii. p. 355.

[300] It has his name and the year 1579, which date must be false. The widow of Arcangiolo married again, and bore Francesco Vanni in 1565. Consequently the latter could not be the scholar of Arcangiolo, though such an idea is very prevalent; and he could give lessons only for a short time to his son, Ventura, or to Sorri, and Casolani, if the period of their birth is true.

[301] See letter 127 in vol. v. of Lett. Pittor., in which there is a catalogue of those painters.

[302] The idea that the brilliant colouring of the Venetian school was owing to the use of a peculiar vehicle for the colours, or a certain varnish, has been long entertained by artists and connoisseurs; and the opinion has been sanctioned by great names: yet it is highly probable that the great secret of the Venetian painters consisted not in vehicles nor in varnishes, but in employing mineral colours, and in laying them on the canvas as little mixed as possible. No colour derived from the vegetable kingdom will stand well when mixed with oil, and our best colours are composed of metallic oxides, or earthy bodies highly charged with those oxides. When colours are much mixed on the palette they become invariably muddy, and to him who aims at brilliancy of colouring no maxim is of greater consequence than to keep his palette as clean as possible. The use of transparent colours in the shadows is another great cause of brilliancy, and this cannot be obtained by the use of mixed colours. It is produced by what is called glazing, or laying transparent colours one over another. In nothing is the effect of glazing, in giving transparency, more obvious, than in the astonishing clearness of the skies and water in the works of the best Dutch artists. That the magical effect of Kuyp's pictures is thus produced, I had an opportunity of knowing, from the blunder of a picture-cleaner, who thought he had made a great discovery when he found the Rhine of a deep blue in a picture by this master; from which, along with the varnish, he had removed a thin coating of yellow, with which the blue was glazed over, to produce the beautiful greenish hue of the water. (Note by Dr. Traile.)

[303] Tom. i.

[304] His name alone survives in Perugia; though it is believed that one of his pictures remains in the church of S. Angelo Magno, at Ascoli, where the figure of S. Giovanni is ascribed by Lazzeri, in his Ascoli in Prospettiva, to one Giandomenico da Perugia, and the landscape to Gio. Francesco da Bologna, that is to say, to Grimaldi. The figure is in the Guercino taste, according to the opinion of Sig. Orsini; but I cannot conceive how he or the Sig. Mariotti (p. 273) should not have remarked that it must be the production of Giandomenico Cerrini, of Perugia, contemporary with Grimaldi and Guercino, and not of that Domenico, the painter of wooden scenes, who lived about an age anterior to them.

[305] Lett. Pittoriche, tom. ii. p. 69.

[306] A few of the names that obtained least celebrity in Siena are pointed out by P. M. della Valle in the third volume of the Lettere Senesi, (p. 459,) among which are found Crescienzio Gamberelli Nasinesco, Deifobo Burbarini, a poor artist, Aurelio Martelli, called Il Mutolo, Gio. Batista Ramacciotti, a priest and connoisseur in painting; and the same may be said of Bernardino Fungai, and of the noble Marcello Loli, of Galgano Perpignano, with others of like merit, either omitted or slightly mentioned by Sig. Pecci. P. della Valle excuses himself from the task of treating of them in favor of happier writers, but as we do not pretend to aspire to that felicity, we shall leave others to avail themselves of the Father's liberality.