pleasing the most devout bride, but also with truly extraordinary
pleasure for the whole people, who, having been deprived of such things
for many years, and part of the fragile apparatus having been lost,
feared that they would never be resumed, there was held the festival, so
famous and so celebrated in olden days, of S. Felice, so-called from the
church where it used formerly to be represented. But this time, besides
that which their Excellencies, our Lords, themselves deigned to do, it
was represented at the pains and expense of four of the principal and
most ingenious gentlemen of the city in the Church of S. Spirito, as a
place more capacious and more beautiful, with a vast apparatus of
machinery and all the old instruments and not a few newly added. In it,
besides many Prophets and Sibyls who, singing in the simple ancient
manner, announced the coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ, very
notable--nay, marvellous, stupendous, and incomparable, from its having
been contrived in those ignorant ages--was the Paradise, which, opening
in an instant, was seen filled with all the hierarchies of the Angels
and of the Saints both male and female, and with various movements
representing its different spheres, and as it were sending down to earth
the Divine Gabriel shining with infinite splendour, in the midst of
eight other little Angels, to bring the Annunciation to the Glorious
Virgin, who was seen waiting in her chamber, all humble and devout; all
being let down (and reascending afterwards), to the rare marvel of
everyone, from the highest part of the cupola of that church, where the
above-described Paradise was figured, down to the floor of the chamber
of the Virgin, which was not raised any great height from the ground,
and all with such security and by methods so beautiful, so facile, and
so ingenious, that it appeared scarcely possible that the human brain
was able to go so far. And with this the festivities all arranged by our
most excellent Lords for those most royal nuptials had a conclusion not
only renowned and splendid, but also, as was right fitting for true
Christian Princes, religious and devout.
Many things, also, could have been told of a very noble spectacle
presented by the most liberal Signor Paolo Giordano Orsino, Duke of
Bracciano, in a great and most heroic theatre, all suspended in the air,
which was constructed by him of woodwork in those days with royal spirit
and incredible expense; and in it, with very rich inventions of the
Knights Challengers, of whom he was one, and of the Knights Adventurers,
there was fought with various arms a combat for a barrier, and there was
performed with beautifully trained horses, to the rare delight of the
spectators, the graceful dance called the Battaglia. But this, being
hindered by inopportune rains, was prolonged over many days; and since,
seeking to treat of it at any length, it would require almost an entire
work, being now weary, I believe that I may be pardoned if without
saying more of it I bring this my long--I know not whether to call it
tedious--labour, at length to an end.
GIORGIO VASARI
DESCRIPTION OF THE WORKS OF GIORGIO VASARI
PAINTER AND ARCHITECT OF AREZZO
Having discoursed hitherto of the works of others, with the greatest
diligence and sincerity that my brain has been able to command, I also
wish at the end of these my labours to assemble together and make known
to the world the works that the Divine Goodness in its grace has enabled
me to execute, for the reason that, if indeed they are not of that
perfection which I might wish, it will yet be seen by him who may
consent to look at them with no jaundiced eye that they have been
wrought by me with study, diligence, and loving labour, and are
therefore worthy, if not of praise, at least of excuse; besides which,
being out in the world and open to view, I cannot hide them. And since
perchance at some time they might be described by some other person, it
is surely better that I should confess the truth, and of myself accuse
my imperfection, which I know only too well, being assured of this, that
if, as I said, there may not be seen in them the perfection of
excellence, there will be perceived at least an ardent desire to work
well, great and indefatigable effort, and the extraordinary love that I
bear to our arts. Wherefore it may come about that, according to the
law, myself confessing openly my own deficiencies, I shall be in great
part pardoned.
To begin, then, with my earliest years, let me say that, having spoken
sufficiently of the origin of my family, of my birth and childhood, and
how I was set by Antonio, my father, with all manner of lovingness on
the path of the arts, and in particular that of design, to which he saw
me much inclined, with good occasions in the Life of Luca Signorelli of
Cortona, my kinsman, in that of Francesco Salviati, and in many other
places in the present work, I shall not proceed to repeat the same
things. But I must relate that after having drawn in my first years all
the good pictures that are about the churches of Arezzo, the first
rudiments were taught to me with some method by the Frenchman Guglielmo
da Marcilla, whose life and works we have described above. Then, having
been taken to Florence in the year 1524 by Silvio Passerini, Cardinal of
Cortona, I gave some little attention to design under Michelagnolo,
Andrea del Sarto, and others. But the Medici having been driven from
Florence in the year 1527, and in particular Alessandro and Ippolito,
with whom, young as I was, I had a strait attachment of service through
the said Cardinal, my paternal uncle Don Antonio made me return to
Arezzo, where a short time before my father had died of plague; which
Don Antonio, keeping me at a distance from the city lest I might be
infected by the plague, was the reason that I, to avoid idleness, went
about exercising my hand throughout the district of Arezzo, near our
parts, painting some things in fresco for the peasants of the
countryside, although as yet I had scarcely ever touched colours; in
doing which I learned that to try your hand and work by yourself is
helpful and instructive, and enables you to gain excellent practice. In
the year afterwards, 1528, the plague being finished, the first work
that I executed was a little altar-picture for the Church of S. Piero,
of the Servite Friars, at Arezzo; and in that picture, which is placed
against a pilaster, are three half-length figures, S. Agatha, S. Rocco,
and S. Sebastian. Being seen by Rosso, a very famous painter, who came
in those days to Arezzo, it came about that he, recognizing in it
something of the good taken from Nature, desired to know me, and
afterwards assisted me with designs and counsel. Nor was it long before
by his means M. Lorenzo Gamurrini gave me an altar-picture to execute,
for which Rosso made me the design; and I then painted it with all the
study, labour, and diligence that were possible to me, in order to learn
and to acquire something of a name. And if my powers had equalled my
good will, I would have soon become a passing good painter, so much I
studied and laboured at the things of art; but I found the difficulties
much greater than I had judged at the beginning.
However, not losing heart, I returned to Florence, where, perceiving
that I could not save only after a long time become such as to be able
to assist the three sisters and two younger brothers left to me by my
father, I placed myself with a goldsmith. But not for long, because in
the year 1529, the enemy having come against Florence, I went off with
the goldsmith Manno, who was very much my friend, to Pisa, where,
setting aside the goldsmith's craft, I painted in fresco the arch that
is over the door of the old Company of the Florentines, and some
pictures in oils, which were given to me to execute by means of Don
Miniato Pitti, at that time Abbot of Agnano without the city of Pisa,
and of Luigi Guicciardini, who was then in that city. Then, the war
growing every day more general, I resolved to return to Arezzo; but, not
being able to go by the direct and ordinary road, I made my way by the
mountains of Modena to Bologna. There, finding that some triumphal
arches were being decorated in painting for the coronation of Charles V,
young as I was I obtained some work, which brought me honour and profit;
and since I drew passing well, I would have found means to live and work
there. But the desire that I had to revisit my family and other
relatives brought it about that, having found good company, I returned
to Arezzo, where, finding my affairs in a good state after the diligent
care taken of them by the above-named Don Antonio, my uncle, I settled
down with a quiet mind and applied myself to design, executing also some
little things in oils of no great importance. Meanwhile the above-named
Don Miniato Pitti was made Abbot or Prior, I know not which, of S. Anna,
a monastery of Monte Oliveto in the territory of Siena, and he sent for
me; and so I made for him and for Albenga, their General, some pictures
and other works in painting. Then, the same man having been made Abbot
of S. Bernardo in Arezzo, I painted for him two pictures in oils of Job
and Moses on the balustrade of the organ. And since the work pleased
those monks, they commissioned me to paint some pictures in
fresco--namely, the four Evangelists--on the vaulting and walls of a
portico before the principal door of the church, with God the Father on
the vaulting, and some other figures large as life; in which, although
as a youth of little experience I did not do all that one more practised
would have done, nevertheless I did all that I could, and work which
pleased those fathers, having regard for my small experience and age.
But scarcely had I finished that work when Cardinal Ippolito de' Medici,
passing through Arezzo by post, took me away to Rome to serve him, as
has been related in the Life of Salviati; and there, by the courtesy of
that lord, I had facilities to attend for many months to the study of
design. And I could say with truth that those facilities and my studies
at that time were my true and principal master in my art, although
before that those named above had assisted me not a little; and there
had not gone from my heart the ardent desire to learn, and the untiring
zeal to be always drawing night and day. There was also of great benefit
to me in those days the competition of my young contemporaries and
companions, who have since become for the most part very excellent in
our art. Nor was it otherwise than a very sharp spur to me to have such
a desire of glory, and to see many who had proved themselves very rare,
and had risen to honour and rank; so that I used to say to myself at
times: "Why should it not be in my power to obtain by assiduous study
and labour some of that grandeur and rank that so many others have
acquired? They, also, were of flesh and bones, as I am."
Urged on, therefore, by so many sharp spurs, and by seeing how much need
my family had of me, I disposed myself never to shrink from any fatigue,
discomfort, vigil, and toil, in order to achieve that end; and, having
thus resolved in my mind, there remained nothing notable at that time in
Rome, or afterwards in Florence, and in other places where I dwelt, that
I did not draw in my youth, and not pictures only, but also sculptures
and architectural works ancient and modern. And besides the proficience
that I made in drawing the vaulting and chapel of Michelagnolo, there
remained nothing of Raffaello, Polidoro, and Baldassarre da Siena, that
I did not likewise draw in company with Francesco Salviati, as has been
told already in his Life. And to the end that each of us might have
drawings of everything, during the day the one would not draw the same
things as the other, but different, and then at night we used to copy
each other's drawings, so as to save time and extend our studies; not to
mention that more often than not we ate our morning meal standing up,
and little at that. After which incredible labour, the first work that
issued from my hands, as from my own forge, was a great picture with
figures large as life, of a Venus with the Graces adorning and
beautifying her, which Cardinal de' Medici caused me to paint; but of
that picture there is no need to speak, because it was the work of a
lad, nor would I touch on it, save that it is dear to me to remember
still these first beginnings and many upward steps of my apprenticeship
in the arts. Enough that that lord and others gave me to believe that
there was in it a certain something of a good beginning and of a lively
and resolute spirit. And since among other things I had made therein to
please my fancy a lustful Satyr who, standing hidden amid some bushes,
was rejoicing and feasting himself on the sight of Venus and the Graces
nude, that so pleased the Cardinal that he had me clothed anew from head
to foot, and then gave orders that I should paint in a larger picture,
likewise in oils, the battle of the Satyrs with the Fauns, Sylvan Gods,
and children, forming a sort of Bacchanal; whereupon, setting to work, I
made the cartoon and then sketched in the canvas in colours, which was
ten braccia long. Having then to depart in the direction of Hungary, the
Cardinal made me known to Pope Clement and left me to the protection of
his Holiness, who gave me into the charge of Signor Jeronimo Montaguto,
his Chamberlain, with letters authorizing that, if I might wish to fly
from the air of Rome that summer, I should be received in Florence by
Duke Alessandro; which it would have been well for me to do, because,
choosing after all to stay in Rome, what with the heat, the air, and my
fatigue, I fell sick in such sort that in order to be restored I was
forced to have myself carried by litter to Arezzo. Finally, however,
being well again, about the 10th of the following December I came to
Florence, where I was received by the above-named Duke with kindly mien,
and shortly afterwards given into the charge of the magnificent M.
Ottaviano de' Medici, who so took me under his protection, that as long
as he lived he treated me always as a son; and his blessed memory I
shall always remember and revere, as of a most affectionate father.
Returning then to my usual studies, I received facilities by means of
that lord to enter at my pleasure into the new sacristy of S. Lorenzo,
where are the works of Michelagnolo, he having gone in those days to
Rome; and so I studied them for some time with much diligence, just as
they were on the ground. Then, setting myself to work, I painted in a
picture of three braccia a Dead Christ carried to the Sepulchre by
Nicodemus, Joseph, and others, and behind them the Maries weeping; which
picture, when it was finished, was taken by Duke Alessandro. And it was
a good and auspicious beginning for my labours, for the reason that not
only did he hold it in account as long as he lived, but it has been ever
since in the chamber of Duke Cosimo, and is now in that of the most
illustrious Prince, his son; and although at times I have desired to set
my hand upon it again, in order to improve it in some parts, I have not
been allowed. Duke Alessandro, then, having seen this my first work,
ordained that I should finish the ground-floor room in the Palace of the
Medici which had been left incomplete, as has been related, by Giovanni
da Udine. Whereupon I painted there four stories of the actions of
Caesar; his swimming with the Commentaries in one hand and a sword in the
mouth, his causing the writings of Pompeius to be burned in order not to
see the works of his enemies, his revealing himself to a helmsman while
tossed by fortune on the sea, and, finally, his triumph; but this last
was not completely finished. During which time, although I was but
little more than eighteen years of age, the Duke gave me a salary of six
crowns a month, a place at table for myself and a servant, and rooms to
live in, with many other conveniences. And although I knew that I was
very far from deserving so much, yet I did all that I could with
diligence and lovingness, nor did I shrink from asking from my elders
whatever I did not know myself; wherefore on many occasions I was
assisted with counsel and with work by Tribolo, Bandinelli, and others.
I painted, then, in a picture three braccia high, Duke Alessandro
himself in armour, portrayed from life, with a new invention in a seat
formed of captives bound together, and with other fantasies. And I
remember that besides the portrait, which was a good likeness, in
seeking to make the burnished surface of the armour bright, shining, and
natural, I was not very far from losing my wits, so much did I exert
myself in copying every least thing from the reality. However,
despairing to be able to approach to the truth in the work, I took
Jacopo da Pontormo, whom I revered for his great ability, to see it and
to advise me; and he, having seen the picture and perceived my agony,
said to me lovingly: "My son, as long as this real lustrous armour
stands beside the picture, your armour will always appear to you as
painted, for, although lead-white is the most brilliant pigment that art
employs, the iron is yet more brilliant and lustrous. Take away the real
armour, and you will then see that your counterfeit armour is not such
poor stuff as you think it."
That picture, when it was finished, I gave to the Duke, and the Duke
presented it to M. Ottaviano de' Medici, in whose house it has been up
to the present day, in company with the portrait of Caterina, the then
young sister of the Duke, and afterwards Queen of France, and that of
the Magnificent Lorenzo, the Elder. And in the same house are three
pictures also by my hand and executed in my youth; in one is Abraham
sacrificing Isaac, in the second Christ in the Garden, and in the third
His Supper with the Apostles. Meanwhile Cardinal Ippolito died, in whom
was centred the sum of all my hopes, and I began to recognize how vain
generally are the hopes of this world, and that a man must trust mostly
in himself and in being of some account. After these works, perceiving
that the Duke was all given over to fortifications and to building, I
began, the better to be able to serve him, to give attention to matters
of architecture, and spent much time upon them. But meanwhile, festive
preparations having to be made in Florence in the year 1536 for
receiving the Emperor Charles V, the Duke, in giving orders for that,
commanded the deputies charged with the care of those pomps, as has been
related in the Life of Tribolo, that they should have me with them to
design all the arches and other ornaments to be made for that entry.
Which done, there was allotted to me for my benefit, besides the great
banners of the castle and fortress, as has been told, the facade in the
manner of a triumphal arch that was constructed at S. Felice in Piazza,
forty braccia high and twenty wide, and then the ornamentation of the
Porta a S. Piero Gattolini; works all great and beyond my strength. And,
what was worse, those favours having drawn down upon me a thousand
envious thoughts, about twenty men who were helping me to do the banners
and the other labours left me nicely in the lurch, at the persuasion of
one person or another, to the end that I might not be able to execute
works so many and of such importance. But I, who had foreseen the malice
of such creatures (to whom I had always sought to give assistance),
partly labouring with my own hand day and night, and partly aided by
painters brought in from without, who helped me secretly, attended to my
business, and strove to conquer all such difficulties and treacheries by
means of the works themselves. During that time Bertoldo Corsini, who
was then proveditor-general to his Excellency, had reported to the Duke
that I had undertaken to do so many things that it would never be
possible for me to have them finished in time, particularly because I
had no men and the works were much in arrears. Whereupon the Duke sent
for me, and told me what he had heard; and I answered that my works were
well advanced, as his Excellency might see at his pleasure, and that the
end would do credit to the whole. Then I went away, and no long time
passed before he came secretly to where I was working, and, having seen
everything, recognized in part the envy and malice of those who were
pressing upon me without having any cause. The time having come when
everything was to be in order, I had finished my works to the last
detail and set them in their places, to the great satisfaction of the
Duke and of all the city; whereas those of some who had thought more of
my business than of their own, were set in place unfinished. When the
festivities were over, besides four hundred crowns that were paid to me
for my work, the Duke gave me three hundred that were taken away from
those who had not carried their works to completion by the appointed
time, according as had been arranged by agreement. And with those
earnings and donations I married one of my sisters, and shortly
afterwards settled another as a nun in the Murate at Arezzo, giving to
the convent besides the dowry, or rather, alms, an altar-picture of the
Annunciation by my hand, with a Tabernacle of the Sacrament accommodated
in that picture, which was placed within their choir, where they perform
their offices. Having then received from the Company of the Corpus
Domini, at Arezzo, the commission for the altar-piece of the high-altar
of S. Domenico, I painted in it Christ taken down from the Cross; and
shortly afterwards I began for the Company of S. Rocco the
altar-picture of their church, in Florence.
Now, while I was going on winning for myself honour, name, and wealth
under the protection of Duke Alessandro, that poor lord was cruelly
murdered, and there was snatched away from me all hope of that which I
was promising to myself from Fortune by means of his favour; wherefore,
having been robbed within a few years of Clement, Ippolito, and
Alessandro, I resolved at the advice of M. Ottaviano that I would never
again follow the fortune of Courts, but only art, although it would have
been easy to establish myself with Signor Cosimo de' Medici, the new
Duke. And so, while carrying forward in Arezzo the above-named
altar-picture and the facade of S. Rocco, with the ornament, I was
making preparations to go to Rome, when by means of M. Giovanni
Pollastra--and by the will of God, to whom I have always commended
myself, and to whom I attribute and have always attributed my every
blessing--I was invited to Camaldoli, the centre of the Camaldolese
Congregation, by the fathers of that hermitage, to see that which they
were designing to have done in their church. Arriving there, I found
supreme pleasure in the Alpine and eternal solitude and quietness of
that holy place; and although I became aware at the first moment that
those fathers of venerable aspect were beside themselves at seeing me so
young, I took heart and talked to them to such purpose, that they
resolved that they would avail themselves of my hand in the many
pictures in oils and in fresco that were to be painted in their church
of Camaldoli. Now, while they wished that before any other thing I
should execute the picture of the high-altar, I proved to them with good
reasons that it was better to paint first one of the lesser pictures,
which were going in the tramezzo,[2] and that, having finished it, if it
should please them, I would be able to continue. Besides that, I would
not make any fixed agreement with them as to money, but said that if my
work, when finished, were to please them, they might pay me for it as
they chose, and, if it did not please them, they might return it to me,
and I would keep it for myself most willingly; which condition appearing
to them only too honest and loving, they were content that I should set
my hand to the work. They said to me, then, that they wished to have in
it Our Lady with her Son in her arms, and S. John the Baptist and S.
Jerome, who were both hermits and lived in woods and forests; and I
departed from the hermitage and made my way down to their Abbey of
Camaldoli, where, having made a design with great rapidity, which
pleased them, I began the altar-piece, and in two months had it
completely finished and set in place, to the great satisfaction of those
fathers, as they gave me to understand, and of myself. And in that
period of two months I proved how much more one is assisted in studies
by sweet tranquillity and honest solitude than by the noises of public
squares and courts; I recognized, I say, my error in having in the past
placed my hopes in men and in the follies and intrigues of this world.
That altar-picture finished, then, they allotted to me straightway the
rest of the tramezzo[3] of the church--namely, the scenes and other
things in fresco-work to be painted there both high and low, which I was
to execute during the following summer, for the reason that in the
winter it would be scarcely possible to work in fresco at that altitude,
among those mountains.
[Footnote 2: See note on p. 57, Vol. I.]
[Footnote 3: See note on p. 57, Vol. I.]