[7] Archives of Perugia, vol. viii. ter.
[8] Della Valle. Storia del duomo d’Orvieto.
In 1497 we have a deed, issued October 24th, commuting the tax levied upon the painter’s grant of land. In this is recited and set forth Pintoricchio’s complaint that the tax is too heavy, and that it swallows up all the revenues. The claim is admitted to be well founded on the part of “a faithful and devoted servant of Alexander and the Church, to whom a recompense is due for his art in painting and adorning the apostolic palace and our residence in arc castri Angeli.” Instead of the grain, a yearly tax of two pounds of white wax was adjudged on July 28th, to be paid on the Feast of the Assumption, for two years, by decree of the Cardinal Camerlengo.[9] A further endorsement shows that the municipal authorities were inclined to ignore the papal decree; but a third brief, in May 1498, confirms the tenure of the land and tenements, and in February 1499 the first commutation is extended for a further term. After all these gracious concessions, it is surprising to find the tax-gatherers in the same year again trying to exact the condoned thirty baskets. Pintoricchio once more appealed to the Pontiff, with whom he was in high favour, and Alexander ordered that restitution should be made in effects or money, according to the price at which grain was valued on the Piazza in Perugia on the first Saturday in August; and in September we find Pintoricchio receiving of the vice-treasurer, Bonifazio Coppi, eighty florins in return for the tax extorted in opposition to the papal behest.[10]
[9] Vermiglioli, App. pp. viii. and x.
[10] Mariotti, p. 131.
While this interesting decision was in the balance, Bernardino was once more in Rome, and able to plead his own cause, for about July 1497 he was recalled there, and spent a year frescoing the castle of Sant’ Angelo for the Pope, but in the following year he was back at home, and finished the polyptych for Santa Maria dei Fossi. Probably about this time he married, and he may also have visited Spoleto, besides producing a good many panel paintings, for no very definite work can be assigned to these years in Perugia. He was very naturally engrossed with his new wife, and busy with his little property, and not undertaking any important commissions.
In October of the following year, Cæsar Borgia, son of the painter’s great patron, was encamped at Deruta, the little town that lies out among the hills, a few miles west of Perugia. Pintoricchio visited him here while he was resting after his campaign in the Romagna, and obtained an order desiring the vice-treasurer to get permission for him to sink a cistern in his house in Perugia. What interests us even more than this domestic detail is Cæsar’s statement that he has “again” taken into his service Bernardino Pintoricchio of Perosa, whom he always loved because of his talents and gifts, and he desires that in all things he shall be treated “as one of ours.”[11] Cæsar’s expression that he had “again” taken him into his service, suggests that he had not quite recently been retained by the Pope.
[11] Conestabile Archives.
Very soon after his visit to the Borgia’s camp, he was in treaty with the Cardinal of Spello, thirteen miles from Perugia, to decorate the chapel of his House; but before leaving home he was elected Decemvir of the city, a proof of how high he stood in repute among his fellow-citizens. It could only have been an honorary distinction, for his work in Spello must have taken all his remaining time in Umbria to accomplish. One short visit he was to pay to his own province, but early in 1502 the summons reached him which changed the course of his life. Cardinal Francesco Piccolomini made him the offer which caused him to move to Siena and begin one of his most important undertakings.
Siena is a long journey from Perugia across the hills and plains that lie around Lake Thrasymene, past Chiugi, and so through the breadth of Italy. It brought the painter into new surroundings, and took him quite out of the beaten track. The long and elaborate contract between the Cardinal and the painter must have taken no little time to discuss and agree upon, but it was finished and signed June 29, 1502. During the following autumn and winter, he made his preparations, gathered his workmen and assistants together, and by the spring of 1503 was hard at work in the building, beginning with the ceiling, which we are able, with tolerable certainty, to determine was nearly completed by the autumn.