Footnote 6: It is remarkable that, a century previous to the arrival of Giotto, we find in Ravenna one _Johannes Pictor_; a fact supplied by the learned Count Fantuzzi, to whom both Ravenna and the public owe so much valuable information. See his "_Monumenti Ravennati_, during the middle ages, for the most part inedited," vol. i. p. 347. In vol. ii. p. 210, there is mention of a parchment of 1246, in which one Graziadeo, a notary, orders that in the Portuense church there be made "imagines magnæ et spatiosæ ad aurum," which means mosaic, or painting upon a gold ground, a custom so much practised in those times. This was Niccolo Rondinello, mentioned by Vasari as one "who, above all others, imitated Gian Bellini, his master, to whom he did credit, and assisted him in all his works." In the life of Bellini, and in that of Palma, Vasari gives a list of his best paintings, exhibited in Ravenna. In these his progress is very perceptible. He displays most of the antique in his picture of S. Giovanni, placed in that church, for which he also executed one of the Virgin, upon a gold ground. His taste is more modern in the larger altar-piece of San Domenico; whose composition rises above the monotony of the age, giving a representation of saints in great variety of attitudes and situations. The design is exact, though always inclining to dryness, the countenances less select, and the colouring less vivid than those of his master; with equal care in his draperies, richly ornamented with embroidery in the taste of those times. It is, however, uncertain whether he had obtained any idea of the last and most perfect style of Bellini. He had a pupil and successor in his labours at Ravenna in Francesco da Cotignola, whom Bonoli, in his history of Lugo, and that of Cotignola, as well as the describer of the Parmese paintings, agree in surnaming Marchesi, while in the Guide to Ravenna, he is denominated Zaganelli. Vasari commends him, as a very pleasing colourist; although inferior to Rondinello in point of design, and still more of composition. In this he was not happy, if we except his celebrated Resurrection of Lazarus, which is to be seen at Classe; his extremely beautiful baptism of Jesus Christ, at Faenza, and a few other histories, where he checks his ardour, and more carefully disposes his figures, for the most part fine and well draped; occasionally whimsical, and in proportions less than life. One of his most extraordinary productions is a large altar-piece at the church of the Osservanti, in Parma, where he represented the Virgin between several Saints, enlivened by several portraits in the background. He never, in my opinion, produced any work more solid in conception, nor more harmoniously disposed, nor more ingenious in the colonnade, and the other accessary parts. Here he preserved the most moderate tints, contrary to his