That for which it ought to be visited is the exquisite monument to S.
Peter Martyr, executed by G. Balduccio da Pisa, in 1339. It consists of
a sarcophagus supported on pilasters, in front of which are statues
representing virtues. Few works of the kind have ever been executed, in
which the skill of the sculptor has been more happily united with that
of the architect than in this. It deserves all praise.
Sta. Maria delle Grazie, which I next visited, is a church known
generally as that in the refectory attached to which is to be seen all
that remains of L. da Vinci’s painting of the Last Supper. I know not
how much this may have suffered within the last few years, but really,
when I read the kind of remarks which I so frequently see about it, I
cannot help fancying, rather strongly, that they have perhaps been
written before instead of after seeing the veritable picture. It is in
fact in the last stage of decay, with scarcely any of its colouring or
drawing intelligible; and has probably been entirely repainted since
Leonardo’s death. Visitors who go to admire and do admire the Leonardo,
might do worse than in examining and admiring the extremely fine and
fairly well-preserved earlier fresco or distemper painting by
Montorfano which covers the opposite wall of the refectory, and
contains a good and busy painting of the Crucifixion, painted in 1495.
The church is of very late pointed date, entirely of brick, with a large
and ugly dome added by Bramante. The nave arcades are pretty
good--pointed arches springing from the square Classical-looking
capitals of equally Classical-looking columns; very much as in the
church of San Francesco at Venice. Elaborate brick cornices and the
usual sham front leave the same kind of impression on my mind in respect
to this church that it has of all late Italian pointed work in
brick--one of a tasteless, unreal, and unsatisfactory school of art.
South of the cathedral there is a fine late brick campanile attached to
the church of San Gottardo, which rises from behind some of the great
public buildings in which the city abounds. This is a very elaborate
work, octagonal in plan and covered with arcades one above the other,
and finished with a low spire. It is a fourteenth-century building at
the earliest, but in spite of this most of its arches are semicircular.
It is certainly a rich and picturesque tower, and well deserves
inspection.
The remaining churches in Milan seemed to be all Classical, of different
grades of merit and size. There were indeed some very late examples of
brickwork of some value, but really, save the cathedral, there is not
much architectural art to be studied or dwelt upon in Milan. The
cathedral, too, teaches little; its main office is, rather, to prove the
consummate beauty and magnificence attainable by the pointed style,
carried out severely and simply on the very grandest scale, and this its
interior does triumphantly beyond all cavil.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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