Thus ended the independence of San Gimignano, after a period of a century and a half. As long as the great Republic into whose hands they had fallen lasted, the Sangimignanesi kept up some sort of appearance of communal liberty, and were even allowed to send ambassadors and treat with the other communes of Tuscany on their own account--in small matters of commerce and boundaries. The nine Governors and Defenders of the Town became the eight Priors (reduced to six in 1390) and the Gonfaloniere of Justice, after the Florentine model. When the Podestà entered upon his term of office, he came out in state upon the steps of the Palace, presented the letters of the Signoria of Florence to the assembled people, took the oath and received from the Gonfaloniere the baton of command and the keys of the town. In like fashion the Priors and the Captains of the Parte Guelfa entered upon their terms of office with great pomp, always magnificently attired; the great banner and the seal of the Commune were still solemnly consigned to the crimson-robed Gonfaloniere; and in public ceremonies the magistrates were accompanied by young squires with trumpets, robed in red and yellow, the colours of the Commune, with black caps and green cloaks emblazoned with the arms of San Gimignano in silver. Down to the eighteenth century, San Gimignano was famous for the magnificence of its municipal functions. Until the end of the fourteenth century, painting in San Gimignano appears to have been exclusively practised by Sienese masters. In the fifteenth century it was exclusively Florentine. At the end of this century, San Gimignano produced two excellent painters of its own, though neither of them in the front rank. Sebastiano Mainardi (died in 1513) became the favourite pupil of Domenico Ghirlandaio, whose sister Alessandra he married; he was a diligent artist, who followed his master with ability, and frequently worked from his designs. Vincenzo di Bernardo Tamagni (1492-1533) worked under Raphael in the Vatican, and imitated his style with considerable success. Vasari praises his soft colouring and the beauty of his figures. His life appears to have been unfortunate. In 1511 Bazzi had him imprisoned for debt in the prison of the Podestà of Montalcino, and in 1527 he was ruined in the sack of Rome, after which, says Vasari, "he lived on, in little happiness." Bernardo Poccetti (1542-1612), by whom there is much second-rate fresco painting in Florence, was also a native of San Gimignano.