ANTONIO TOTO AND VINCENT VOLPE
For the work on Henry VIII’s tomb in England he had enlisted the services of a young painter called Antonio Toto del Nunziata, of Florence, who, together with one Antonio di Piergiovanni di Lorenzo, sculptor, of Settignano, made a contract with Torrigiano in September 1519, to work with him for four and a half years in France, Italy, Flanders, England, Germany, or any other part of the world.[[582]] Toto either stayed behind in London when his master went to Spain, or returned to England from that country on Torrigiano’s death, and remained in the King’s service for many years; but there is no record to show what became of Antonio di Lorenzo. Before giving a short account of Toto, a few words must be said of the Neapolitan, Vincent Volpe, who appears to have been the first of the Italian painters regularly employed by Henry VIII. Much of the work he undertook was of a decorative character, of the same nature as that carried out by John Browne, Andrew Wright, and other members of the Painter-Stainers’ Company.
Volpe was often engaged upon work for the royal navy. The first reference to him in the State Papers occurs in the year 1512, in an account for the painting of ships’ banners. Among the payments made was one “to Mr. Domynyke Cyny, clerk, in reward for the use of Vincence of Naples and Alexe of Myllen, painters, £6, 13s. 4d.”[[583]] In April 1514 he was at work with John Browne and others on the royal ship Henry Grace à Dieu, for which “Vincent Vulp, painter, by the King’s command,” painted and made various streamers and banners, one with a dragon, one with a lion, one with a greyhound, and so on.[[584]] In June of the previous year he received £30 for similar work for seven ships, his name being entered in the King’s Book of Payments as Vincent Woulpe.[[585]]
In June 1516, as Vincent Volpe, he appears to be definitely in the King’s service, with a salary of £20 a year, paid quarterly.[[586]] Early in 1518, his name occurs in some accounts as Vincent, the King’s painter. He was sent to Antwerp apparently in connection with glass designs for windows for the church or some building in Calais.[[587]] In 1520 he was employed at Guisnes with John Browne and others in the decoration of the temporary buildings erected for the Field of the Cloth of Gold.[[588]] He received £40 for work done or purchases made in Antwerp, and twenty crowns (£4, 6s. 2d.) for his costs in going there. There is some uncertainty, however, about the date of these two last accounts, and both may refer to the same journey. In May 1524 he was employed in connection with the funeral of Sir Thomas Lovell, K.G., to make twenty-four small escutcheons in metal, “with my master’s arms in the garter, to be set on the altars at the interment,” for which he received 15s. For the same funeral, one John Wolffe, painter, was employed for providing stuff, £33, 3s.[[589]] The name Wolffe occurs more than once in connection with painting ships. Very possibly Vincent Volpe is intended, or this John may have been a relation.
ALESSANDRO CARMILLIAN
Volpe was also one of the many artists engaged in the decoration of the Banqueting House at Greenwich for the reception of the French envoys in 1527, dealt with in Chapter xiv., upon which Holbein also was employed. He appears, together with John Browne, to have provided various materials and also to have done some of the painting, for which he received a weekly wage, the entry running, “To Italian painters, Vincent Vulp and Ellys Carmyan at 20s. the week.”[[590]] In the treasurer’s accounts for quarter’s wages due at Christmas 1528 he is entered as receiving 50s. a quarter, but this is apparently a mistake in transcribing, for as early as 1516 he was getting a salary of £20 a year, and in September 1529, the larger amount is again entered against his name, to be paid quarterly. In May 1530 he received £15, 4s. 9d. for trimming the King’s new barge, and in December of the same year £3, 10s. “for paynting of a plat of Rye and Hastings”[[591]]—evidently a bird’s-eye view showing the fortifications and defences, such as were frequently made for the King. On New Year’s Day, 1532, he presented the King with two long and two round targets.[[592]] He appears to have died or to have left the country shortly after this. Mr. Nichols suggests that it is “by no means improbable that Vincent Volpe may have been the painter of some of those curious military pictures, something between plans and bird’s-eye views, that are still to be seen on the walls of Hampton Court”—the large painting of the “Field of the Cloth of Gold,” the “Embarkation of Henry VIII from Dover,”[[593]] and others.
In the entry respecting Volpe quoted above, in connection with the Banqueting House at Greenwich in 1527, he is coupled with another Italian painter, “Ellys Carmyan.” The latter, who was in receipt of a regular salary from the King, it has been customary to regard as a woman, because the Christian name is entered in the accounts more than once as Alice. Thus in December 1528,[[594]] the entry for quarter’s wages is “Alice Carmillion, painter, 33s. 4d.” The writer, however, is of opinion that Carmillian was a man. At other times the name is given as Alys, Ellys, Alye, and other variations, and the surname is spelt Carmillion or Carmillian. This artist is more often described as a “millyner” than as a painter. The payment quoted above immediately precedes that of Volpe in the accounts, and the two painters were usually employed together at this period. In the payments for ships’ banners in 1511,[[595]] Volpe is joined with one Alexe of Myllen, painter. This Alessandro of Milan is evidently the same person as Ellys or Alys Carmillian; the change from Alexe to Alys is an easy one, and Bryan Tuke’s spelling of foreign names in his accounts is characterised by remarkable variety. It is not likely that a woman would be employed upon such work as the painting of a building; and the term “millyner” occurs much more frequently in recording payments to men than to women in the royal accounts. Mr. Digby Wyatt suggests that the name was Elisa Carmillione, Milanesa, and that she was a Milanese miniaturist.[[596]] It has been suggested, too, that this painter was a relative of Peter Carmeliano, of Brescia, the poet, Latin secretary to Henry VII and one of the King’s chaplains, who became lute player to Henry VIII.[[597]]
Carmillian was one of those who supplied materials for the work carried out at Westminster Palace in 1532. One of the entries in connection with this runs: “To Elys Carmenelle, of London, painter, for 200 Flemish paving tiles, 30s.”[[598]] On New Year’s Day 1529 he, or rather his servant, received a reward of 10s. in return for his gift to the King.[[599]] Carmillian’s salary was only £6, 13s. 4d. a year, paid quarterly.[[600]]
Antonio Toto, who, as already noted, was brought over to England by Torrigiano, was an artist of greater capabilities than Volpe and Carmillian. He spent nearly forty years in England, and throughout the whole of the time appears to have been in the royal service. He usually worked in conjunction with another Italian painter, Bartolommeo Penni, their names almost always appearing together in the Household Accounts. Toto was the son of one Toto dell’ Nunziata, a painter of Florence of some standing, a maker of “puppets,” and a great practical joker, as Vasari relates. The son was a fellow-pupil with Perino del Vaga in Ridolfo Ghirlandajo’s studio. Toto took part with his master in painting a Madonna and Child in the church of San Pietro Scheraggio, a building no longer in existence. Vasari says that he was taken to England by some Florentine merchants, and there executed all his works, “and by the King of that province, for whom he wrought in architecture (as well as in sculpture and painting), and for whom he built his principal palace, was most handsomely rewarded.”
The “principal palace” referred to by Vasari was evidently Nonsuch, near Cheam, in Surrey, which was begun in 1538 by Henry VIII, who acquired the site, previously called Cuddington, in that year. The original and principal structure was of two storeys, the lower being of substantial and well-wrought freestone, and the upper of wood, “richly adorned and set forth, and garnished with a variety of statues, pictures (i.e. coloured figures in relief), and other artistic forms of excellent art and workmanship, and of no small cost”—it is thus described in the survey of the Parliamentary Commissioners in 1650.[[601]] This singular building remained in good condition for more than a century, and was described by both Evelyn and Pepys in 1665. The former says that the plaster statues and basso-relievos “must needs have been the work of some celebrated Italian.” Pepys speaks of the same features as “figures of stories and good painting of Rubens or Holbein’s doing.” In the earliest account of it, published in Braun’s Urbium Præcipuarum Mundi Theatrum Quintium, in 1583, it is stated that Henry VIII “procured many excellent artificers, architects, sculptors, and statuaries, as well Italians, French, and Dutch as natives, who all applied to the ornament of this mansion the finest and most curious skill they possessed in their several arts, embellishing it within and without with magnificent statues, some of which vividly represent the antiquities of Rome and some surpass them.” A view of the palace by Joris Hoefnagel accompanied this account, which gives an excellent idea of the building before the additions were made to it by Lord Lumley.