representing the Transfiguration of Our Lord, and the other, which is beside the sacristy, the Adoration of the Magi.[1] But as these works are not of equal excellence with some others by this master, it is considered certain that they are among the first which he executed. In San Lorenzo, which is the cathedral of that city (Perugia), there is a Madonna by the hand of Pietro, in the chapel of the Crocifisso, with the Maries, San Giovanni, San Lorenzo, San Jacopo, and other saints.[2] For the altar of the sacrament, where the ring with which the Virgin Mary was espoused is preserved, this master painted an altar-piece representing the Marriage of Our Lady.[3]
At a later period, Pietro painted the Hall of Audience in the Exchange of Perugia entirely in fresco. The compartments of the ceiling, that is to say, which he decorated with the seven planets, each drawn in a kind of chariot by different animals, according to the old manner; on the wall opposite to the door of entrance he depicted the Birth and Resurrection of Christ;[4] and on panel he represented San Giovanni, in the midst of other saints. On the side wall of the building Pietro then painted figures in his own manner, those on one side represent Fabius Maximus, Socrates, Numa Pompilius, Fulvius Camillus, Pythagoras,[5] Trajan, L. Sicinius, the Spartan Leonidas, Horatius Codes, Fabius Sempronius[6] the Athenian Pericles, and Cincinnatus: on the opposite wall are figures of the prophets; Isaiah, Moses, and Daniel namely; with David, Jeremiah, and Solomon; the master likewise added those of the Sybils; the Erythrtean, the Lybian, the Tiburtine, the Delphic, and the others.[7]
- ↑ The Adoration of the Magi was taken to Paris, but is now (if, observe certain writers, that so-called be indeed the same picture) restored to the church.— See Rumohr, Ital. Forsch.y vol. ii. p. 359.
- ↑ No longer in the cathedral.
- ↑ Much has been said of this painting, and various stories are related respecting its fate, one declaring it to have perished with the ship in which it was about to be transported to America. The certain but grievous truth being, says an Italian writer, that it is lost to Italy.
- ↑ The Transfiguration, and not the Resurrection, as here asserted by Vasari, and repeated by all who have followed him. —Masselli.
- ↑ Pittacus, not Pythagoras.
- ↑ Publius Scipio, rather.
- ↑ For details respecting the Sybils, and the oflice assigned to them by certain theologians, see Blondell, Den Sibylles Celebres; Clasen, De Oraculis Gentilium. See also St. Augustine, De Civil. Dei., m.ddd.xlvii.
