z
© Hessisches Staatsarchiv Marburg, Best. 340 Grimm Nr. Z 37
student of Raphael to accept the assumption, ably though
it be argued, that Raphael did not visit Florence before
1500.
No doubt it is proper and necessary to contest the accu
racy of Vasari when he relates the causes of Raphael’s first
journey to Florence, and the manner in which he was led to
make it; but it is quite another thing to deny that the
journey took place. As early as the middle of the fifteenth
century the most intimate connection existed between the
painters of Perugia and those of Florence. There was not
an artist of mark in the first who was not perfectly informed
of the commissions entrusted to craftsmen erf the second.
There was no road better known than the road from Pe
rugia to Florence, which had been frequently travelled by
Domenico Veneziano and Fra Filippo Lippi. It had been
hinted to Perugino on the very threshold of his career that
Florence was the only city in which an artist could rise to
fame; and he had been to Florence, where he caused his
name to be respected. At the very time of which we are
treating he had been induced to revisit the Tuscan capital,
where Michael Angelo’s " David ” lay finished and waiting
for a pedestal. Da Vinci, too, had returned to Florence from
Milan, and had partially completed the noble cartoon which
was copied at a later period by so many students. What
more probable than that the causes which induced Perugino
to leave Perugia should lead Raphael, his pupil, to quit
Sienna ?
Vasari says that, when Perugino went to Florence, Raphael
left Perugia for Citth di Castello, where he painted three pic
tures, including the Dudley " Crucifixion " and the “ Sposa-
lizio ” of the Brera. He then proceeded to Sienna, and took
service with Pinturicchio, for whom he executed certain
drawings. His connection with Pinturicchio was broken off
because he had heard of the completion of cartoons by
Lionardo and Michael Angelo. It is quite as natural to
suppose that Vasari was ill informed of the causes which
led Raphael to Florence as it is to conceive that Raphael
painted the pictures of Cittk di Castello at Perugia. We
can easily prove that da Vinci’s “Battle of Anghiari” was not
finished till 1506; and Grimm gives good, though not abso
lutely convincing, reasons for concluding that Michael
Angelo did not allow his cartoon to; be seen till 1508.
But putting this aside, there may have been reason enough
for Raphael’s desire to visit Florence, if we only suppose
him cognisant of Perugino’s presence there. He might have
learnt from Perugino himself that Lionardo was composing
his grand subject for the public palace; and he might expect
facilities for seeing the masterpiece in its unfinished state
from a man who was da Vinci’s friend, and had been his
companion in Verrocchio’s shop. He had doubtless heard—
as who had not ?—of the commotion caused by the question
how the " David ” of Michael Angelo should be moved from
its place in the sculptor’s studio to where it was in future
to be exhibited, for this was a question which had occupied
the mind of every one in Florence; and it is notorious that
it led to a general congress of artists in the early part of
1504. Why, then, should he not have gone to Florence ?
Perugino was at Florence in 1504. He was there with
slight interruptions till 1506. It was then that Lionardo
gave up to him the commission which he had accepted from
the brethren of the Santissima Annunziata de’ Servi to com
plete the “Crucifixion” unfinished at the death of Filippino.
Is there any reason to doubt that Raphael might have been
in Florence in 1505, when we know that his predella of the
“ Madonna of Sant’Antonio ” (1505) comprised an improved
version of the very group of the Virgin and her succouring
women which was introduced by Perugino,into the “Cru
cifixion” of the Servi? But this is not all the evidence
an opinion which is liable to be controverted, that the
" Madonna" of Sant’ Onofrio at Rome is by Lionardo da
Vinci. J. A. Crowe.
