towards the principal doors of the church, almost at the corner and
just before arriving at the organ, in a picture six braccia long and
four high that was in the space of a chapel, there was depicted the
extraordinary and unexampled favour that was paid to the rare genius
of Michelagnolo by Pope Julius III, who, wishing to avail himself in
certain buildings of the judgment of that great man, had him summoned
to his presence at his villa, where, having invited him to sit by his
side, they talked a good time together, while Cardinals, Bishops, and
other personages of the Court, whom they had about them, remained
constantly standing. This event, I say, was seen to have been depicted
with such fine composition and so much relief, and with such
liveliness and spirit in the figures, that perchance it might not have
turned out better from the hands of an eminent, aged, and
well-practised master; wherefore Jacopo Zucchi, a young man, the pupil
of Giorgio Vasari, who executed the work in a beautiful manner, proved
that a most honourable result could be expected from him. Not far from
this, on the same side (namely, a little below the organ), Giovanni
Strada, an able Flemish painter, had depicted in a picture six
braccia long and four high the story of Michelagnolo's going to Venice
at the time of the siege of Florence; where, living in that quarter of
that most noble city which is called the Giudecca, the Doge Andrea
Gritti and the Signoria sent some gentlemen and others to visit him
and make him very great offers. In representing that event the
above-named painter showed great judgment and much knowledge, which
did him great honour, both in the whole composition and in every part
of it, for in the attitudes, the lively expressions of the faces, and
the movements of every figure, were seen invention, design, and
excellent grace.
Now, returning to the high-altar, and facing towards the new sacristy:
in the first picture found there, which came in the space of the first
chapel, there was depicted by the hand of Santi Titi, a young man of
most beautiful judgment and much practised in painting both in
Florence and in Rome, another signal favour paid to the genius of
Michelagnolo, as I believe I mentioned above, by the most illustrious
Lord, Don Francesco de' Medici, Prince of Florence, who, happening to
be in Rome about three years before Michelagnolo died, and receiving a
visit from him, the moment that Buonarroti entered the Prince rose to
his feet, and then, in order to do honour to that great man and to his
truly venerable age, with the greatest courtesy that ever young Prince
showed, insisted--although Michelagnolo, who was very modest,
protested against it--that he should sit in his own chair, from which
he had risen, standing afterwards on his feet to hear him with the
attention and reverence that children are wont to pay to a
well-beloved father. At the feet of the Prince was a boy, executed
with great diligence, who had in his hands a mazzocchio,[6] or Ducal
cap, and around them were some soldiers dressed in ancient fashion,
and painted with much spirit and a beautiful manner; but beyond all
the rest, most beautifully wrought, most lifelike and most natural
were the Prince and Michelagnolo, insomuch that it appeared as if the
old man were in truth speaking, and the young man most intently
listening to his words.
[Footnote 6: See note on p. 132, vol. ii.]
In another picture, nine braccia in height and twelve in length, which
was opposite to the Chapel of the Sacrament, Bernardo Timante
Buontalenti, a painter much beloved and favoured by the most
illustrious Prince, had figured with most beautiful invention the
Rivers of the three principal parts of the world, come, as it were,
all grieving and sorrowful, to lament with Arno on their common loss
and to console him; and these Rivers were the Nile, the Ganges, and
the Po. The Nile had as a symbol a crocodile, and, to signify the
fertility of his country, a garland of ears of corn; the Ganges, a
gryphon-bird and a chaplet of gems; the Po, a swan and a crown of
black amber. These Rivers, having been conducted into Tuscany by the
Fame, who was to be seen on high, as it were in flight, were standing
round Arno, who was crowned with cypress and held his vase, drained
empty, uplifted with one hand, and in the other a branch of cypress,
and beneath him was a lion. And, to signify that the soul of
Michelagnolo had flown to the highest felicity in Heaven, the
judicious painter had depicted in the air a Splendour representing the
celestial light, towards which the blessed soul, in the form of a
little Angel, was winging its way; with this lyric verse:
VIVENS ORBE PETO LAUDIBUS ÆTHERA.
At the sides, upon two bases, were two figures in the act of holding
open a curtain within which, so it appeared, were the above-named
Rivers, the soul of Michelagnolo, and the Fame; and each of those two
figures had another beneath it. That which was on the right hand of
the Rivers, representing Vulcan, had a torch in the hand; and the
figure representing Hatred, which had the neck under Vulcan's feet in
an attitude of great constraint, and as it were struggling to writhe
free, had as symbol a vulture, with this verse:
SURGERE QUID PROPERAS ODIUM CRUDELE? JACETO.
And that because things superhuman, and almost divine, should in no
way be regarded with envy or hatred. The other, representing Aglaia,
one of the Three Graces and wife of Vulcan, to signify Proportion, had
in her hand a lily, both because flowers are dedicated to the Graces,
and also because the lily is held to be not inappropriate to the rites
of death. The figure which was lying beneath Aglaia, and which was
painted to represent Disproportion, had as symbol a monkey, or rather,
ape, and above her this verse:
VIVUS ET EXTINCTUS DOCUIT SIC STERNERE TURPE.
And under the Rivers were these two other verses:
VENIMUS, ARNE, TUO CONFIXA IN VULNERE MOESTA
FLUMINA, UT EREPTUM MUNDO PLOREMUS HONOREM.
This picture was held to be very beautiful in the invention, in the
composition of the whole scene and the loveliness of the figures, and
in the beauty of the verses, and because the painter honoured
Michelagnolo with this his labour, not by commission, but
spontaneously and with such assistance as his own merit enabled him to
obtain from his courteous and honourable friends; and for this reason
he deserved to be even more highly commended.
In another picture, six braccia in length and four in height, near the
lateral door that leads out of the church, Tommaso da San Friano, a
young painter of much ability, had painted Michelagnolo as Ambassador
of his country at the Court of Pope Julius II; as we have related that
he went, and for what reasons, sent by Soderini. Not far distant from
the above-named picture (namely, a little below that lateral door
which leads out of the church), in another picture of the same size,
Stefano Pieri, a pupil of Bronzino and a young man of great diligence
and industry, had painted a scene that had in truth happened several
times in Rome not long before--namely, Michelagnolo seated in a room
by the side of the most illustrious Lord Duke Cosimo, who stood
conversing with him; of all which enough has been said above.
Over the said black draperies with which, as has been told, the whole
church was hung all round, wherever there were no painted scenes or
pictures, there were in each of the spaces of the chapels images of
death, devices, and other suchlike things, all different from those
that are generally made, and very fanciful and beautiful. Some of
these, as it were lamenting that they had been forced to deprive the
world of such a man, had these words in a scroll:
COEGIT DURA NECESSITAS.
And near them was a globe of the world, from which had sprung a lily,
which had three flowers and was broken in the middle, executed with
most beautiful fantasy and invention by the above-named Alessandro
Allori. There were other Deaths, also, depicted with other inventions,
but that one was most extolled upon whose neck, as she lay prostrate
on the ground, Eternity, with a palm in the hand, had planted one of
her feet, and, regarding her with a look of disdain, appeared to be
saying to her: "Be it necessity or thy will, thou hast done nothing,
for in spite of thee, come what may, Michelagnolo shall live." The
motto ran thus:
VICIT INCLYTA VIRTUS.
And all this was the invention of Vasari.
I will not omit to say that each of these Deaths had on either side
the device of Michelagnolo, which was three crowns, or rather, three
circlets, intertwined together in such a manner, that the
circumference of one passed through the centre of the two others, and
so with each; which sign Michelagnolo used either to suggest that the
three professions of sculpture, painting, and architecture are
interwoven one with another and so bound together, that each of them
receives benefit and adornment from the others, and they neither can
nor should be separated; or, indeed, being a man of lofty genius, he
may have had a more subtle meaning. But the Academicians, considering
him to have been perfect in all these three professions, and that each
of these had assisted and embellished the other, changed his three
circlets into three crowns intertwined together, with the motto:
TERGEMINIS TOLLIT HONORIBUS.
Which was intended to signify that in those three professions the
crown of human perfection was justly due to him.
On the pulpit from which Varchi delivered the funeral oration, which
was afterwards printed, there was no ornamentation, because, that work
having been executed in bronze, with scenes in half-relief and
low-relief, by the excellent Donatello, any adornment that might have
been added to it would have been by a great measure less beautiful.
But on the other, which is opposite to the first, although it had not
yet been raised on the columns, there was a picture, four braccia in
height and little more than two in width, wherein there was painted
with beautiful invention and excellent design, to represent Fame, or
rather, Honour, a young man in a most beautiful attitude, with a
trumpet in the right hand, and with the feet planted on Time and
Death, in order to show that fame and honour, in spite of death and
time, preserve alive to all eternity those who have laboured valiantly
in this life. This picture was by the hand of Vincenzio Danti, the
sculptor of Perugia, of whom we have spoken, and will speak again
elsewhere.
The church having been embellished in such a manner, adorned with
lights, and filled with a countless multitude, for everyone had left
every other care and flocked together to such an honourable spectacle,
there entered behind the above-named Lieutenant of the Academy,
accompanied by the Captain and Halberdiers of the Duke's Guard, the
Consuls and the Academicians, and, in short, all the painters,
sculptors, and architects of Florence. After all these had sat down
between the catafalque and the high-altar, where they had been awaited
for a good while by an infinite number of lords and gentlemen, who had
been accommodated with seats according to the rank of each, there was
begun a most solemn Mass for the dead, with music and ceremonies of
every kind. Which finished, Varchi mounted the above-mentioned pulpit,
who had never performed such an office since he did it for the most
illustrious Lady Duchess of Ferrara, the daughter of Duke Cosimo; and
there, with that elegance, those modes of utterance, and that voice
which were the peculiar attributes of that great man in oratory, he
recounted the praises and merits, life and works of the divine
Michelagnolo Buonarroti.
Of a truth, what great good fortune it was for Michelagnolo that he
did not die before our Academy was created, whereby his funeral rites
were celebrated with so much honour and such magnificent and
honourable pomp! So, also, it must be considered most fortunate for
him that it happened that he passed from this to an eternal and most
blessed life before Varchi, seeing that he could not have been
extolled by any more eloquent and learned man. That funeral oration by
M. Benedetto Varchi was printed a short time afterwards, as was also,
not long after that, another equally beautiful oration, likewise in
praise of Michelagnolo and of painting, composed by the most noble and
most learned M. Leonardo Salviati, at that time a young man of about
twenty-two years of age, and of a rare and happy genius in all manner
of compositions, both Latin and Tuscan, as is known even now, and will
be better known in the future, to all the world. And what shall I say,
what can I say, that would not be too little, of the capacity,
goodness, and wisdom of the very reverend Lord Lieutenant, the
above-named Don Vincenzio Borghini? Save that it was with him as their
chief, their guide, and their counsellor, that the eminent men of the
Academy and Company of Design celebrated those obsequies; for the
reason that, although each of them was competent to do much more in
his art than he did, nevertheless no enterprise is ever carried to a
perfect and praiseworthy end save when one single man, in the manner
of an experienced pilot and captain, has authority and power over all
others. And since it was not possible that the whole city should see
that funeral pomp in one day, by order of the Duke it was all left
standing many weeks, for the satisfaction of his people and of the
strangers who came from neighbouring places to see it.
We shall not give in this place the great multitude of epitaphs and
verses, both Latin and Tuscan, composed by many able men in honour of
Michelagnolo; both because they would require a work to themselves,
and because they have been written down and published by other writers
elsewhere. But I will not omit to say in this last part, that after
all the honours described above the Duke ordained that an honourable
place should be given to Michelagnolo for his tomb in S. Croce, in
which church he had purposed in his lifetime to be buried, because the
sepulchre of his ancestors was there. And to Leonardo, the nephew of
Michelagnolo, his Excellency gave all the marbles, both white and
variegated, for that tomb, which was allotted to Battista Lorenzi, an
able sculptor, to execute after the design of Giorgio Vasari, together
with the head of Michelagnolo. And since there are to be three statues
there, Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture, one of these was
allotted to the above-named Battista, one to Giovanni dell'Opera, and
the last to Valerio Cioli, Florentine sculptors; which statues are in
process of being fashioned together with the tomb, and soon they will
be seen finished and set in their places. The cost, over and above the
marbles received from the Duke, has been borne by the same Leonardo
Buonarroti. But his Excellency, in order not to fail in any respect in
doing honour to that great man, will cause to be placed in the Duomo,
as he has previously thought to do, a memorial with his name, besides
the head, even as there are to be seen there the names and images of
the other eminent Florentines.
FRANCESCO PRIMATICCIO
DESCRIPTION OF THE WORKS OF FRANCESCO PRIMATICCIO
PAINTER AND ARCHITECT OF BOLOGNA, AND ABBOT OF S. MARTIN
Having treated hitherto of such of our craftsmen as are no longer
alive among us--of those, namely, who have lived from 1200 until this
year of 1567--and having set Michelagnolo Buonarroti in the last place
for many reasons, although two or three have died later than he, I
have thought that it cannot be otherwise than a praiseworthy labour to
make mention likewise in this our work of many noble craftsmen who are
alive, and, for their merits, most worthy to be highly extolled and to
be numbered among these last masters. This I do all the more willingly
because they are all very much my friends and brothers, and the three
most eminent are already so far advanced in years, that, having come
to the furthest limit of old age, little more can be expected from
them, although they still continue by a sort of habit to occupy
themselves with some work. After these I will also make brief mention
of those who under their discipline have become such, that they hold
the first places among the craftsmen of our own day; and of others who
in like manner are advancing towards perfection in our arts.
Beginning, then, with Francesco Primaticcio, to go on afterwards to
Tiziano Vecelli and Jacopo Sansovino: I have to record that the said
Francesco, born in Bologna of the noble family of the Primaticci, much
celebrated by Fra Leandro Alberti and by Pontano, was apprenticed in
his early boyhood to commerce. But, that calling pleasing him little,
not long afterwards, being exalted in mind and spirit, he set himself
to practise design, to which he felt himself inclined by nature; and
so, giving his attention to drawing, and at times to painting, no
long time passed before he gave proof that he was likely to achieve an
excellent result. Going afterwards to Mantua, where at that time
Giulio Romano was working at the Palace of the Te for Duke Federigo,
he employed such interest that he was set, in company with many other
young men who were with Giulio, to labour at that work. There,
attending to the studies of art with much industry and diligence for a
period of six years, he learned very well to handle colours and to
work in stucco; wherefore, among all the other young men who were
labouring in the work of that Palace, Francesco came to be held one of
the most excellent, and the best of all at drawing and colouring. This
may be seen in a great chamber, round which he made two friezes of
stucco, one above the other, with a great abundance of figures that
represent the ancient Roman soldiery; and in the same Palace,
likewise, he executed many works in painting that are to be seen
there, after the designs of the above-named Giulio. Through these
works Primaticcio came into such favour with that Duke, that, when
King Francis of France heard with what quantity of ornaments he had
caused the work of the Palace to be executed, and wrote to him that at
all costs he should send him a young man able to work in painting and
stucco, the Duke sent him Francesco Primaticcio, in the year 1531. And
although the year before that the Florentine painter Rosso had gone
into the service of the same King, as has been related, and had
executed many works there, and in particular the pictures of Bacchus
and Venus, Psyche and Cupid, nevertheless the first works in stucco
that were done in France, and the first labours in fresco of any
account, had their origin, it is said, from Primaticcio, who decorated
in this manner many chambers, halls, and loggie for that King.
[Illustration: DECORATIVE PANELS
(_After =Primaticcio=. Fontainebleau: Galerie Henry II_)
_X. Photo_]
Liking the manner of this painter, and his procedure in every matter,
the King sent him in the year 1540 to Rome, to contrive to obtain
certain antique marbles; in which Primaticcio served him with such
diligence, that in a short time, what with heads, torsi, and figures,
he bought one hundred and twenty-five pieces. And at that same time he
caused to be moulded by Jacopo Barozzi of Vignuola, and by others, the
bronze horse that is on the Campidoglio, a great part of the scenes on
the Column, the statue of Commodus, the Venus, the Laocoon, the
Tiber, the Nile, and the statue of Cleopatra, which are in the
Belvedere; to the end that they might all be cast in bronze. Rosso
having meanwhile died in France, and a long gallery therefore
remaining unfinished which had been begun after his designs and in
great part adorned with stucco-work and pictures, Primaticcio was
recalled from Rome; whereupon he took ship with the above-mentioned
marbles and moulds of antique figures, and returned to France. There,
before any other thing, he cast according to those moulds and forms a
great part of those antique figures, which came out so well, that they
might be the originals; as may be seen in the Queen's garden at
Fontainebleau, where they were placed, to the vast satisfaction of
that King, who made in that place, one might say, another Rome. I will
not omit to say that Primaticcio, in executing those statues, employed
masters so excellent in the art of casting, that those works came out
not only light, but with a surface so smooth, that it was hardly
necessary to polish them.
This work done, Primaticcio was commissioned to give completion to the
gallery that Rosso had left unfinished; whereupon he set his hand to
it, and in a short time delivered it finished with as many works in
stucco and painting as have ever been executed in any place. Wherefore
the King, finding that he had been well served in the period of eight
years that this master had worked for him, had him placed among the
number of his chamberlains; and a short time afterwards, which was in
the year 1544, he made him Abbot of S. Martin, considering that
Francesco deserved no less. But for all this Francesco has never
ceased to have many works in stucco and in painting executed in the
service of his King and of the others who have governed that kingdom
after Francis I. Among others who have assisted him in this, he has
been served, to say nothing of many of his fellow-Bolognese, by Giovan
Battista, the son of Bartolommeo Bagnacavallo, who has proved not less
able than his father in many scenes and other works of Primaticcio's
that he has carried into execution. Another who has served him for a
considerable time is one Ruggieri da Bologna, who is still with him.
In like manner, Prospero Fontana, a painter of Bologna, was summoned
to France not long since by Primaticcio, who intended to make use of
him; but, having fallen ill to the danger of his life immediately
after his arrival, he returned to Bologna. To tell the truth, these
two, Bagnacavallo and Fontana, are able men, and I, who have made
considerable use both of the one and of the other, of the first at
Rome, and of the second at Rimini and Florence, can declare this with
certainty. But of all those who have assisted the Abbot Primaticcio,
none has done him more honour than Niccolò da Modena, of whom mention
has been made on another occasion, for by the excellence of his art
this master has surpassed all the others. Thus he executed with his
own hand, after the designs of the Abbot, a hall called the Ball-room,
with such a vast number of figures, that it appears scarcely possible
that they could be counted, and all as large as life and coloured in
so bright a manner, that in the harmony of the fresco-colours they
appear like work in oils. After this work he painted in the Great
Gallery, likewise from the designs of the Abbot, sixty stories of the
life and actions of Ulysses, but with a colouring much darker than the
pictures in the Ball-room. This came about because he used no other
colours but the earths in the pure state in which they are produced by
Nature, without mixing with them, it may be said, any white, and so
heavily loaded with darks in the deep parts, that these have
extraordinary relief and force; besides which, he executed the whole
work with such harmony, that it appears almost as if painted in one
and the same day. Wherefore he merits extraordinary praise,
particularly because he executed it in fresco, without ever retouching
it "a secco," as many at the present day are accustomed to do. The
vaulting of this gallery, likewise, is all wrought in stucco and
painting, executed with much diligence by the men mentioned above and
other young painters, but still after the designs of the Abbot; as is
also the old Hall, and likewise a lower gallery that is over the pond,
which is most beautiful and better adorned with lovely works than any
other part of that place; but to attempt to speak of it at any length
would make too long a story.
[Illustration: DECORATIVE PANEL
(_After the painting by =Primaticcio=. Fontainebleau: Escalier du
Roi_)
_Mansell_]