In the year 1300, Giovani Cimabue and Giotto, both of Florence, were the
first to assert the natural dignity and originality of art; and the
story of these illustrious friends is instructive and romantic. The
former was a gentleman by birth and scholarship, and brought to his art
a knowledge of the poetry and sculpture of Greece and Rome. The latter
was _a shepherd_; when the inspiration of art fell upon him, he was
watching his flocks among the hills; and his first attempts in art were
to draw his sheep and goats upon rocks and stones. It happened that
Cimabue, who was then high in fame, observed the sketches of the gifted
shepherd; entered into conversation with him; heard from his own lips
his natural notions of the dignity of art; and was so much charmed by
his compositions and conversation, that he carried him to Florence, and
became his close and intimate friend and associate. They found Italian
painting rude in form, without spirit, and without sentiment. They let
out their own hearts fully in their compositions, and to this day their
works are highly esteemed for grave dignity of character, and for
originality of conception. Of these great Florentines, Giotto, the
shepherd, is confessedly the more eminent: in him we see the dawn, or
rather the sunrise, of the fuller light of Raphael.