So far as the writer knows, Piero was the only artist of the Renaissance who used this mythological story for a composition (his picture has hitherto been called an allegory), a circumstance which is rather singular considering the suitableness of the subject for the provision of effective designs. The Greek sculptors in dealing with the legend confined themselves to the moment when Athena threw down the pipes, apparently for the reason that this instant gave an opportunity of rendering Marsyas in a strong dramatic action. The famous statue of the faun after Myron in Rome, is supposed to have formed part of a group representing Athena and Marsyas immediately after the pipes were dropped, and the design appears on still existing coins and vases of the fifth and fourth centuries B.C. Piero takes a later moment, showing Marsyas comfortably squatting in the foreground of a delightful fanciful landscape, expressing boyish satisfaction with the prizes he is about to try. He is properly shown as a satyr instead of in the faun form of the sculptor. There appears to be no legitimate place in painting for a faun, while a satyr may at times be appropriately introduced into a pastoral composition. NOTE 48. PAGE 125 Controversy has raged around this picture for something like seventy years. The work came to light before 1850 at a public auction sale when it was attributed to Mantegna, with whom of course it had nothing to do. Then it was pronounced a Raphael, but this was disputed by Passavant who held that on account of the thin lower limbs of the figures, and the minute way in which the landscape was painted, it could not be by Raphael, but was of the school of Francia, or by Timoteo della Viti. Morelli brought back the attribution to Raphael, and the work then came into the possession of the Louvre. Subsequently Pinturicchio and Perugino were alternately suggested as the painter, and to the latter the picture was assigned by the Louvre authorities. All are agreed that the date of the work is about 1502. It does not seem possible that Perugino could have painted the picture, for the subject and invention are entirely foreign to him, while the lithe active form of Apollo does not consort with the least formal of his known figures. The landscape is much in his manner, but so it is also in the style of Raphael's early period, while the small buildings therein are closely finished as in some of Raphael's other works of the time.[a] Perugino used similar towers and buildings, but being a more experienced painter he did not so finely elaborate the details. The suggestion relating to the school of Francia was afterwards very properly withdrawn, and Pinturicchio must be ruled out on account of the landscape, apart from the supple figure of Apollo of which he was incapable. There remain then only Timoteo della Viti and Raphael as the possible painters of the work. But it cannot reasonably be suggested that Timoteo could have accomplished so perfect