Domenico Zampieri, called Domenichino for his small stature, was born at Bologna, the son of a shoemaker. He entered the school of the Carracci, and afterwards was invited to Rome by Albani, in whose house he lived. Here he soon acquired a great reputation, and was taken by Annibale Carracci as assistant in the execution of the frescoes of the Farnese Palace. The Cardinals Borghese and Aldobrandini were also among his patrons. In 1617 he revisited Bologna, where he married. In 1621 he was recalled to Rome by the Pope Gregory XV., who appointed him principal painter and architect to the pontifical palace. Some of the villas at Frascati were designed by him. In 1630 he was invited to Naples to decorate the Cappella del Tesoro of the Duomo, a commission which Guido Reni sought in vain. Here Domenichino incurred the hostility of the Neapolitan painters, and the machinations of the notorious triumvirate, the "Cabal of Naples," were suspected of causing his death. At Rome also he had been much persecuted by rival artists. Accusations of plagiarism were levelled at him, and his more pushing competitors "decried him to such a degree that he was long destitute of all commissions." It is interesting to contrast the conditions of (literally) "cut-throat competition," under which the Italian painters of the decadence worked, with the Guild System of the Flemish and the honourable time and piece-work of the earlier Italians.