whom a choir of angels, guided by the archangel Michael, are happily conducting towards the right hand, or the abode of the blessed. And now is it truly to be lamented, that for want of writers to record the names of all that crowd of persons represented—knights, nobles, and other men of distinction, all evidently drawn and figured from the life— scarcely any, or at least but very few, are known, or can be identified: it is true that the pope in this picture is said to be Innocent IV, the friend of Manfredi,[1] but of the other figures very few are authenticated. After completing this work, and also certain sculptures in marble, which he executed greatly to his honour in the church of the Madonna, on the Ponte Yecchio, Orgagna returned to Florence, leaving his brother Bernardo working alone in the Campo Santo, where he painted an Inferno, as it is described by Dante; and this work of Bernardo’s having suffered great injury, was restored in the year 1530 by Sollazzino, a painter of our own day.[2] In Florence he continued his labours, painting a very large fresco on one of the walls of the church of Santa Croce,[3] near the centre of the building. The subject of this work is that which he had previously treated in the Campo Santo of Pisa, in three similar divisions, but the story of St. Macarius, exhibiting the dead kings, and that of the hermits on the mountain, is omitted. Repeating all the other parts of the Pisan pictures, he executed the Florentine work with improved design and greater care than he had bestowed on that of Pisa, but pursuing a similar plan as to the composition, as well as in the manner, inscriptions, and other accessories; in this respect the only change was in the portraits from life, those of the Florentine picture pourtraying his friends on one side, whom he placed in Paradise, and his enemies on the other, who were stationed in the Inferno. Among the good may be distinguished the profile of Pope Clement VI, drawn from the life, with the triple-crown on his head: this pontiff was very favourable to the Florentines.
- ↑ This must be considered an error of the press, and should be read “enemy”, and not “ friend” (“nemico”, and not “amico”), as our readers will readily perceive.
- ↑ See Morrona, Pisa Illustrata, for a copper-plate, which proves that Sollazzino departed widely from the original work in this restoration. See also Lasinio, Pitture del Campo Santo di Pisa.
- ↑ This work is lost.
