bas-reliefs. Their size is considerable, being about four feet long.
They have one theme in common, namely, the supernatural gifts of St.
Anthony and the veneration of the populace. Donatello's crowds are
admirable; they are deep crowds. The people are rather hot and
jostling each other: they stand on benches or stairs in order to get a
better view of what is proceeding. The edges of the crowds, where the
people are too far off to be active spectators, lose interest in the
central incident; they gossip as bystanders or sit down: often they
are shown actually leaving the place. It is singular how ill-designed
many of the classical crowds are, especially the battle-scenes: they
are constructed without regard for the human necessity of standing on
something; and we have grotesque topsy-turvy compositions, the
individual parts of which are unrivalled in technique.[197] Michael
Angelo's first and last representation of a crowd in sculpture shows
the same fault, which, indeed, was far from uncommon.[198] It arose
from a desire to show more of the crowd than could be naturally seen
from the eye level, and the whole relief was consequently covered with
figures, the background proper being suppressed. In these Paduan
reliefs Donatello manages to give ample density and variety, and there
is never any doubt as to the ownership of legs or arms. His early
relief at Siena, on the other hand, has a group where there is
confusion, which is not justified in a quiet gathering of people.
Another feature which the four reliefs have in common is Donatello's
treatment of narrative. Ghiberti's plan was to put several incidents
into one relief, forming a sequence of events leading up to the
critical episode, to which he usually gave the best place in the
foreground. He consistently followed up his formula in the second
gates, and brought the practice to its perfection. Whether suitable or
not for gates, it would have been an intelligible treatment of purely
decorative reliefs, like those at Padua. Donatello, however, confines
his plaques to single incidents: in one case only does he add a second
detail, and there only as a corroborative fact. The narrative is shown
in the crowd itself. Attitudes and expression are made to reflect the
spirit of what has gone before, while the actual occurrence suffices
to show the final issue of the story. Thus we have all the ideas of
which others would have made a series of subordinate scenes:
incredulity, fear, surprise, mockery, apathy and worship. The crowd
shows everything which has already passed, and the composition of the
bas-reliefs thus secures a striking homogeneity. It is difficult to
say which of them is best. The variety in dress, scene and physiognomy
is so remarkable; varying, no doubt, according to the tastes of the
_garzone_ responsible for finishing it. Probably the miracle of the
Speaking Babe is the best known. A nobleman of Ferrara doubted the
honour of his wife; St. Anthony conferred the power of speech on her
infant child, which proclaimed its mother's innocence. Donatello has
put an exquisite little Madonna and Child just above the central
figures of the legend. The composition of this group, as in the
others, is broken by the architecture, otherwise the length of the
bronzes might have tended to a monotonous row of figures. But the
projecting background does not make the episode less coherent. The
mother is just receiving back her baby from the saint; behind her are
women, friends and others; whereas the opposite side of the relief is
entirely occupied by men, who are around her husband; and the
suggested conflict of the sexes is averted by the miracle. The
husband, who wears an odd sort of _bonnet tricolore_, and several of
his comrades are simply dressed in short cloaks open at the sides and
ending just below the hip. The legs and arms, and especially the
hands, are very well modelled. In this relief the actors are quiet and
decorous, and where not motionless are moving slowly. The miracle of
the Miser's Heart is more emotional: "where thy heart is there shall
thy treasure be also." The miser having died, St. Anthony said that
his heart would be found in his strong box: this was proved to be the
case, and then when the body was opened it was found that his heart
was absent. The scene is nominally inside a church: in the background
is a procession of clergy and choristers with their cross and candles.
In the centre is the bier with the corpse lying on it. The body is
opened and the crowd looks on in feverish though suppressed
excitement. St. Anthony is pointing towards the dead man: and the
crowd realises that the heart is absent--_ubi thesaurus ibi cor_.
Numbers of people have dropped on to their knees, others kiss the
ground where the saint stands. There are signs of distress and
apprehension on all sides. Some children scuttle back to their
parents; one of the mothers bends down to catch her child just as it
is going to fall. Two boys have climbed on to an altar or pedestal to
get a better view: one of them wears the peaked cap still worn by the
undergraduates of _Padova la dotta_. The whole scene is immensely
dramatic and grim, without any frenzy or excess; and its solemn effect
is enhanced by the reserve of the people in spite of their excitement.
The background is full of detail, largely obtained by the chisel: one
part of it, with the stairs, ladders and upper storey, resembles the
Lille relief. There are two important inscriptions, cut into the
metal, to which reference will be made later. The subject of the third
relief (now placed on the retable and already getting dimmed by
candle-grease) is the healing of the youth Leonardo, who kicked his
mother and confessed to St. Anthony, who properly observed that so
sinful a foot should be cut off. The injunction was taken too
literally, and the saint's miraculous power replaced the severed limb.
Strictly speaking, this miracle takes place in the open air, for
Donatello has introduced a rudimentary sun with most symmetrical rays,
and half a dozen clouds which look like faults in the casting. But the
whole relief is framed by an architectural structure, some
amphitheatre with the seats ranged like steps. A balustrade runs all
round the huge building, and a number of idlers standing about at the
far end are reduced to insignificant proportions, thus giving
distance and depth to the scene. Leonardo lies on the ground in sad
pain, and Anthony has just restored the foot. The central group is not
much animated, but two or three of the men's heads are telling
character-studies. Donatello has concentrated his crowd into the
centre: at the sides the miracle passes unheeded. A fat man is
soliloquising with his hand reposing on an ample stomach: a boy with a
long stick and something like a knapsack on his back is attracting the
attention of a young woman, who seems absorbed in watching the
miracle: her child tries to pull her along to go closer. In the corner
are some strange recumbent figures, almost classical in idea; and a
tall woman completely veiled, with her face buried in her hands. The
last of the reliefs illustrates St. Anthony's power over animals. One
Bovidilla, a sceptic, possessed a mule; the saint offered the
consecrated wafer to the animal when starving, and Bovidilla was
converted by the refusal of the animal to eat it. The scene takes
place within a church, which, so far as we see the apse and choir, is
composed of three symmetrical chapels with vaulted and coffered roofs.
There is plenty of classical detail, but still more of the
Renaissance; there is no occasion to assume the design to have been
copied from the Tempio di Pace or the Caracalla baths. St. Anthony
occupies the centre, and the kneeling mule is on the right, his master
close at hand. The church is crowded with people, who, on the whole,
show more curiosity than reverence. Several garrulous boys by the door
are amused; an old beggar hobbles in; a mother tries to keep a child
quiet. Others take any post they can secure, and a good many are
crouching on the ground in all sorts of postures, making a variety
which amounts to unevenness. In all these panels the head of St.
Anthony is of a finer type than that shown in the other version on
the altar. The features are clear cut, and there is an air of earnest
distinction which is not observed on the large statue. Speaking
generally, one notices that while ample scope is allowed to the
fancies of picturesque architecture in all these reliefs, Donatello
always keeps it within proper bounds. Donatello was not tempted into
the interacting problems of perspective and _intarsia_, which caused
so many Paduan artists to lose grasp of the wider aspects of their
calling. Then we notice how the crowd _qua_ crowd plays its proper
part: out of some two hundred faces in these panels not more than two
or three look out to the spectator--a quality inherited by Mantegna.
The reliefs are essentially local pictures of local significance; not
only the costume, but the types are Paduan, such as we find in the
local school of painting: but we find nothing of the kind in Donatello
before the journey to the north, and the types scarcely reappear on
the altar of San Lorenzo. But, in spite of this, the reliefs have a
catholicity which extends their influence far beyond the limits within
which Donatello confined his work. Finally, the wealth of local
colouring and animation makes these reliefs among the earliest in
which "genre" or "conversation" has prominence. They offer a most
striking contrast to the sedate Florentine crowds painted in the
Brancacci chapel by Masaccio.
[Footnote 197: _Cf._ Battle of Romans and Barbarians, No. 12. Museo
Nazionale, Rome.]
[Footnote 198: Battle, Casa Buonarroti, Florence.]
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Alinari_
SYMBOL OF ST. MATTHEW
SANT' ANTONIO, PADUA]
[Sidenote: The Symbols of the Evangelists.]
There are four other bronze reliefs, the Symbols of the Evangelists.
Donatello has contrived to invest these somewhat awkward themes with
alternate drama and poetry. The emblems of Ezekiel's vision were too
intricate for Western art, and long before the fifteenth century they
had been reduced to the simple forms of the lion, ox, eagle and angel,
with no attribute except wings. All four reliefs are rectangular,
about eighteen inches square. The ox is, of course, the least
inspiring, and here as elsewhere is treated in a dry perfunctory
manner. The oxen on the façade of Laon Cathedral offered some scope to
the sculptor, being life-sized; but in a small relief the subject was
not attractive. The lion is more vigorously treated. As a work of
natural history he is better than the Marzocco, and he has a certain
heraldic extravagance as well. The limbs have tension, the muscles are
made of steel, and there is strength and watchfulness, attributes
which led the early architects to rest the pilasters of the pulpit and
portal upon lions' backs. But the eagle of St. John is superb, even
grander than the famous classical marble of the same subject.[199] It
has the broad expanse of wings, vibrating as though the bird were
about to take flight: the long lithe body with its soft pectoral
feathers, the striking claws, and the flattened head with cruel
gleaming eye, all combine to give a _terribilità_ which is, perhaps,
unsurpassed in all the countless versions of the symbol. But the drama
of the eagle is eclipsed by the quiet unostentatious poetry of the
angel of St. Matthew. We see a girl of intense grace and refinement,
winged as an angel and looking modestly downwards to the open gospel
in her hands. Delicacy is the keynote pervading every detail of the
relief: in her hands, arms and throat, in the soft curves of the young
frame, and in the drapery itself, which suggests all that is dainty
and pure--everywhere, in fact, we find charm and tenderness, rare even
in a man like Ghiberti, almost unique in Donatello.
[Footnote 199: The Walpole Eagle from the Tiber, belonging to the Earl
of Wemyss.]
* * * * *
[Sidenote: The Choir of Angels.]
In the original contract with Donatello, ten angels were commissioned,
and were exhibited on the provisional wooden altar (13, vi. '48). It
appears, however, that they were insufficient, and two more panels
were ordered. These may possibly be the reliefs in each of which a
couple of angels are represented singing, certainly the most
successful of all. There is a palpable inequality in the remainder.
They not only show differences of treatment in the details of drapery,
chiselling and general decoration, but there is a substantial lack of
harmony in their broad conception. It is impossible to believe that
the two angels leaning inwards against the edge of the relief (the
fourth respectively from either end of the altar) could have been
modelled by Donatello. Not only are they vulgar and commonplace, but
they are malformed: well might Donatello long for criticism and
censure if these two stupid little urchins were standards of his
production. Next to one of these pipers is a child playing the lute,
delicious in every respect: he is made by the genius, the other by the
hack. They contrast in every particular--drapery, anatomy, face and
technique. The lutist is admirable as he looks down at his instrument
to catch the note; capital also is the boy playing the double pipe,
with the close drapery swirling about his plump limbs, as one sees in
San Francesco of Rimini, that temple dedicated to Isotta and to
Childhood. The head of the boy playing the harp shows the best
characteristics of this group. The hair is relatively short, and falls
in thick glossy ringlets over his ears; it is bound by a heavy chaplet
of leaves and rosettes; above this wreath the hair is smooth and
orderly. There was no occasion to exclude the pleasing little touches,
as in the case of the Cantoria children, where deep holes penetrate
the children's hair, so that the "distance should not consume the
diligence." At Padua, where the choristers were to be seen a few feet
only from the ground, the sculptor's efforts to show the warm shades
and recesses of the hair were amply repaid. The boys singing the duets
differ from the remainder: they are busily occupied with their music,
carefully following the score. The disposition of two children in a
panel only large enough for one has not been so successfully met as
when Abraham and Isaac were fitted into the narrow niche on the
Campanile; but the affectionate attitude of these boys and their
sincerity make one overlook a slight technical shortcoming. The two
heads in close proximity give a certain sense of atmosphere between
them, not easily rendered when one of them had to be modelled in
comparatively high-relief.
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Alinari_
CHORISTERS
SANT' ANTONIO, PADUA]
[Illustration: _Alinari_
CHORISTERS
SANT' ANTONIO, PADUA]
[Illustration: CHRIST MOURNED BY ANGELS
LONDON]
[Sidenote: The Pietà and the Entombment.]
The remaining work for the high altar consists of a marble Entombment
and a bronze relief of Christ mourned by Angels, treated as a Pietà.
The tabernacle door, which occupies the centre of the high altar,
differs in shape, quality and design from everything else, and is
wholly unworthy of its prominent position. The lower relief is,
however, a work of exceptional interest. It is placed in the centre of
the frontal with the reliefs of choristers on either side of it, a
tragic culmination to all the happy children around it. The Christ is
resting upright in the tomb, half of the figure only being visible.
The head is bowed and the hands crossed: the face is wan and haggard.
The body is modelled to emphasise the pronounced lines of the big
curve formed by the ribs from which the lower part of the body is fast
sinking: Donatello did the same thing with the crucifix. An angel
stands at each side of the Christ, holding up a curtain or pall behind
the figure. Each of these boys has a hand pressed against his cheek,
the picture of tragedy: they weep over the dead Saviour, their anguish
is indescribable. In the marble version of the same subject in
London,[200] the angels are actually supporting the Christ, who,
without their maintenance, would fall down. His head is resting
against one of the children's hands: one of the arms has slipped down
inanimate, while the other hangs over the shoulder of the second
angel, a consummate rendering of what is dead: the veins are tumified,
the skin is shrinking, and the muscles are uncontrolled. This Christ
is in some ways the more remarkable plastic achievement, though it is
not so characteristic as the Paduan version. The two reliefs are
probably coeval, though that in London, with its attendant angels, has
indications of being rather earlier in date, and almost shows the hand
of Michelozzo in one or two details. But the head of Christ, with its
short thin beard, and the hair held back by a corded fillet, is
similar to much that is exclusively Paduan. The Entombment, a very
large marble relief, consists of eight life-sized figures, four of
whom are lowering the body into the sepulchre. Here for the first time
we have that frenzied and impassioned scene which became so common in
Northern Italy. The Entombment on the St. Peter's Tabernacle is
insipid by the side of this, where grief leads the Magdalen to tear
out thick handfuls of her hair; others throw up their hands as they
abandon themselves, as they scream in ungovernable sorrow. It is a
riot of woe, and the more solemn figures who are engaged with the dead
body have grown grey with care. This relief dates a new departure: the
Entombment and other episodes of the Passion henceforward lose their
calm emblematic character, and are fraught with tragedy and gloom.
Donatello's relief became the prototype for the Bellini, for Mantegna,
and a host of artists who, without, perhaps, having seen the original,
drew their inspiration from what it had already inspired. For a while
this intensification of the last scenes of Christ's life bore good
fruit for art, especially in the northern provinces: but after a
certain point nervous exhaustion ensued and produced a kind of
hysteria, where the Magdalen's tears must end in convulsive laughter,
and where the tragedy is so demonstrative that the solemn element is
utterly lost.[201] The profound pathos and teaching of the earlier
scenes were exchanged for what was theatrical. But Tragedy always held
a place in Italian, or rather in Christian art: it was out of place in
antiquity. The smiling and perennial youth of the gods, their
happinesses, loves, and adventures, gave relatively small scope for
the personal aspects of tragedy. There was no need for vicarious or
redemptive suffering: what pain existed, and they rarely expressed it
in marble, was human in its origin and punitive in effect: Icarus,
Niobe, Laocoon, Prometheus; and even here the proprieties of good
taste imposed strict limits, beyond which the portrayal of tragedy
could not go without violating unwritten laws. It had to occupy a
secondary place in their art: the dying gladiator was merely a broken
toy tossed aside. Their tragedies were largely limited to Nemesis, the
Moirai, the Erinnydes, and lower forms, such as harpies. But
occasionally one gets a breath of mediævalism and its haunting
mysteries. The Sleeping Fury at Rome, for instance,[202] where sleep
steals in during a moment of respite from torture, is superb, and,
moreover, stands almost alone in its presentment of a certain
impelling tragedy, which, with the advent of Christianity, became an
integral and dominating feature of its art.
[Footnote 200: Victoria and Albert Museum, No. 7577, 1861. M.G.
Dreyfus has a fine plaquette analogous to these large reliefs.]
[Footnote 201: _Cf._, for instance, Madame André's Pietà lunette, or
the stone "Lamentation" in Victoria and Albert Museum, No. 314, 1878,
almost German in its harsh realism. This came from the Palazzo Lazzara
at Padua.]
[Footnote 202: In Ludovisi Buoncompagni Collection, Museo Nazionale,
marble. _Cf._ also the bust of Minatia Polla, so called, which might
be by Verrocchio.]
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Alinari_
SUPER ALTAR BY GIOVANNI DA PISA
EREMITANI CHURCH, PADUA]
[Sidenote: Donatello's Assistants.]