The History of Painting in Italy, Vol. 1 (of 6): From the Period of the Revival of the Fine Arts to the End of the Eighteenth CenturyLanzi, Luigi
History
The History of Painting in Italy, Vol. 1 (of 6): From the Period of the Revival of the Fine Arts to the End of the Eighteenth Century
Lanzi, Luigi
Painting -- Italy -- History
Proceeding from cards to books, we are made acquainted with the first
attempts at ornamenting them with cuts in metal. The most celebrated of
these consist of the _Monte Santo di Dio_, and the _Commedia of Dante_,
both printed at Florence, and the two editions of Ptolemy's Geography,
at Rome and Bologna; to which we may add the Geography of Berlinghieri,
printed at Florence; all the three accompanied with tables. The authors
of these engravings are not well known; except so far as we learn from
Vasari, that Botticelli was one who acquired the most reputation. He
represented the _Inferno, and took the impression_; and the two
histories, executed by Gio. de Lamagna in his Dante, display all the
design and composition of Sandro, so as to leave no doubt of their being
his.[101] Other prints are likewise found pasted in a few of the copies
of the same edition, amounting, more or less, to the number of nineteen;
and their manner is more coarse and mean,[102] as we are informed by the
Cav. Gaburri, who collected them for his cabinet. They must have been
executed by some inferior hand, and with the knowledge of the printer,
who had left blank spaces in parts of the work intended to receive the
engravings, not yet completed on the publication of the work. Of a
similar cast were other anonymous engravers of that period, nor is there
any name, except those of Sandro and of Pollaiuolo, truly distinguished
in the art among the Florentines. In Upper Italy, besides Mantegna,
Bartolommeo Montagna, his pupil, from Vicenza, (to whom some add
Montagna his brother,) and Marcello Figolino, their fellow citizen, were
both well known. Figolino is asserted to have been the same artist as
one _Robetta_, or rather one who subscribes himself so, or R. B. T. A.;
yet he ought not to be separated from the Florentine school, to which
Vasari refers him, which the character of his design confirms. The names
of Nicoletto da Modena, F. Gio. Maria da Brescia, a Carmelite monk, and
of his brother Gio. Antonio, have also survived; as well as Giulio and
Domenico Campagnola of Padua. There are not a few anonymous productions
which only announce that they were executed in the Venetian or Lombard
manner. For such artificers as were in the habit of taking impressions
from the roller, either wholly omitted names, or only affixed that of
the designer, or merely gave their own initials, which are now either
doubtful, or no longer understood. For instance, they would write M. F.,
which Vasari interprets into _Marc-antonio Francia_, while others read
_Marcello Figolino_, and a third party, _Maso Finiguerra_; this last
quite erroneously, as, after the most minute researches, made by the
very able Cavaliere Gaburri, throughout Florence, there is no engraving
of that artist to be found.[103] In the Durazzo collection, after twelve
plates, which are supposed to be proofs of the silver engravers, printed
in reverse, we find several others of the first impressions taken with
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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