Pietro Vannucci, called Perugino

by George C. Williamson

Alinari photo] [Sta. Maria, Trevi

THE ADORATION OF THE MAGI, 1521

Outside Montefalco is San Fortunato, where Tiberio d' Assisi painted the cloisters, and here probably Perugino stopped, and one figure in the ceiling is certainly his work, perhaps done to show Tiberio a suggestion as to the decoration, or put in at the pupil's own request. Then he journeyed on to Trevi, another delightful hill town, full of charm and beauty, and there, an old man of seventy-five, in the church of Sta. Maria della Lacrime, outside the town, he painted his "Adoration of the Magi." It is the old, old design. There is the wooden erection, the enthroned Madonna and Child, the kneeling Magi, the crowd of attendants. In the distance are the servants with horses and camels, and away beyond are the blue hills, the river, and the sky.

Certainly it is degenerate work; but which of the men of his time could do such work? No one else could so present the continuous space of nature, the spaciousness and vastness of the distance, or bathe his pictures in the dreamy sunlight of summer. I lingered long before this fresco, loth to leave it, its tranquillity is so marked, its airiness is so impressive.

It was while completing this picture that the message as to the San Agostino ancona reached Pietro. Back he came to Perugia in 1522, painted the "Transfiguration" for Sta. Maria Nuova, and its three predella panels now in the Perugia Gallery, and the frescoes in the Nunnery of S. Agnese (where he had relations), which I have not been able to see, as the Nunnery is now strictly cloistered.

Three more frescoes only remain for mention. A harsh and hurried one in the cathedral of Perugia, in which the Magdalen's face is the redeeming feature, a faded but lovely "Nativity" in the Alfani Rooms (Room 13) in the Perugia Gallery, which is full of exquisite feeling and tender, reverent grace, and finally, the last and unfinished work which now hangs in the National Gallery. This is a huge fresco transferred to canvas, and measures 19 ft. 6 in. long. It was executed at Fontignano in 1523, and is said to have been the last work of the artist. The hand had not lost its cunning, and there is much of the early sweetness in this huge fresco. There is the charm of its faded blues and purples, the haze of its shimmering sunshine, and the tender reverence of the kneeling figures.

There are just the same accessories as were adopted by Perugino in earlier "Adorations," very much the same grouping, and almost identical figures, and in these respects the two last pictures that the artist painted are almost copies, one of the other, differing only in proportions. The Perugia fresco is small, the London one very large; but both are really lovely compositions, full of mysterious charm, and it is pleasant to know that the artist's last works were not the queer, quaint ones of Spello and Bettona, but the wonderful, scenes of the "Adoration," painted with much of his old vigour and with all his earlier charm.

Mariotti tells us that Perugino died at the Ospedale of Fontignano, and Orsini suggests that it was of plague. There were various traditions as to his burial; even in Mariotti's time, Vasari states, he was honourably buried at Città della Pieve, but there is absolutely nothing to support this statement. The artist was, according to local account hurriedly buried in a field, as at that time all town funerals were forbidden on account of the violence of the epidemic. In the following year, his sons, desirous of affording him an honourable burial, according to the rites of Holy Church, tried to make arrangement for the removal of the body.