Pietro Vannucci, called Perugino

by George C. Williamson

Canova gathered up, in the short time at his disposal, and with the limited means that he possessed, all the fine pictures that he could obtain, and the treasures now in Rome are the proof of his zeal and exertions.

Meantime the Priori of Perugia waited for two years, hoping against hope that their treasures might come back to them. At length, in September 1816, they wrote to Canova, and he replied to them on the 20th. His letter explained how encompassed with difficulty he had been in Paris, how short a time had been allowed him in which to remove the pictures, how small were the means at his disposal, how scattered were the pictures, and how impossible it was, without force of arms to travel from department to department and take possession of the property.

With regard to one notable picture about which the Perugians were specially anxious, the "Ascension," from San Pietro, he explained that the people of Lyons had appealed to the Pope for permission to retain it. They set forth their attachment to the Holy See, their zeal for the Chief Pontiff, and the singular affection which they had manifested toward His Holiness whenever he passed by Lyons. Their petition received attention, and the cardinal secretary wrote, on November 13th, 1816, an authorisation to the city of Lyons to retain the picture which had been so disgracefully torn from its resting-place in Perugia.

Canova was evidently as anxious as were the Perugians to obtain back all the pictures; but events were too strong for him, and the poor Perugians never again possessed the great treasures of art which, prior to 1797, made their city one of the richest in Italy.

Cesarei, the indefatigable mayor of Perugia, who had been appointed gonfaloniere year after year in order to obtain restitution of the pictures, did not give up hope of obtaining his end for some years. He tried hard to obtain the two pictures which English generosity had restored to Italy, and he worried the Holy See with repeated letters and appeals.

At length Cardinal Consalvi, on October 8th, 1817, closed the whole episode by a letter to Cesarei. He explained that the pictures were all presented by the allied forces to the Sovereign Pontiff as the Head of the Pontifical states from which they had been taken, and that they were exposed in Rome for the education of the students who came from all over Europe to study in the Queen of Cities. In consequence, the Papal Government had the right, the Cardinal continued, to retain the pictures.

It may be added that, even if the Holy See had not the right to retain the pictures, it had too much business on hand at that time to be able to give attention to works of art, and insufficient money in its depleted treasury to pay for their removal.

Such is the story, with all its mournful details, of the pillage of Perugia, and it will now be easily understood why the provincial museums of France are so rich in the works of this master.

To reconstruct the great altar-piece of St. Agostino means that visits must be made to Lyons, Grenoble, Toulouse, Nantes, and Perugia. For another altar-piece it is necessary to visit Rouen, Lyons, Perugia, Rome, and Paris; while yet other pictures are at Caen, Nancy, Tarbes, Bordeaux, Strassburg, Marseilles, Lille, and Chantilly.

The scattering is not now wholly confined to France, for pictures at one time in France are now at Altenburg, Frankfort, Vienna, and St. Petersburg, while odd pieces of these self-same pictures remain to-day in Perugia.