![[See larger image]](#8958526208864448133_tapestry053.jpg.id-7025135481316162400.wrap-0.html.html){kind=link}
ITALIAN VERDURE. SEVENTEENTH CENTURY
The desire to imitate the cultivation and elegance of Italy was what made returning invaders carry the Renaissance into the rest of Europe; and in a lesser degree the process was reversed when, in the Seventeenth Century, a cardinal of the House of Barberini visited France and, on viewing in the royal residences a superb display of tapestries, his envy and ambition were aroused to the extent of emulation. He could not, with all his power, possess himself of the hangings that he saw, but he could, and did, arrange to supply himself generously from another source. He was the powerful Francesco Barberini, the son of the pope’s brother (Pope Urban VIII, 1623-1644), and it was he who established the Barberini Library and built from the ruins of Rome’s amphitheatres and baths the great palace which to-day still dominates the street winding up to its aristocratic elegance. It was to adorn this palace that Cardinal Francesco established ateliers and looms and set artists and weavers to work. This tapestry factory is of especial interest to America, for some of its chief hangings have come to rest with us. The Mysteries of the Life and Death of Jesus Christ, one set is called, and is the property of the Cathedral of St. John, the Divine, in New York, donated by Mrs. Clarke.
Cardinal Francesco Barberini chose as his artists those of the school of Pietro di Cortona with Giovanni Francesco Romanelli as the head master. The director of the factory was Giacomo della Riviera allied with M. Wauters, the Fleming.[13] The former was especially concerned with the pieces now owned by the Cathedral of St. John, the Divine, in New York, and which are signed with his name. Romanelli was the artist of the cartoons, and his fame is almost too well known to dwell upon. His portrait, in tapestry, hangs in the Louvre, for in Paris he gained much fame at the Court of Louis XIV, where he painted portraits of the Grand Monarch, who never wearied of seeing his own magnificence fixed on canvas.
It was the hard fate of the Barberini family to lose power and wealth after the death of their powerful member, Pope Urban VIII, in 1644. Their wealth and influence were the shining mark for the arrows of envy, so it was to be expected that when the next pope, Innocent X, was elected, they were robbed of riches and driven out of the country into France. This ended for a time the work of the tapestry factory, but later the family returned and work was resumed to the extent of weaving a superb series picturing scenes especially connected with the glory of the family, and entitled History of Urban VIII.
Although Italy is growing daily in power and riches under her new policy of political unity, there were dreary years of heavy expense and light income for many of her famous families, and it was during such an era that the Barberini family consented to let their tapestries pass out from the doors of the palace they were woven to decorate. In 1889, the late Charles M. Ffoulke, Esq., became the possessor of all the Barberini hangings, and added them to his famous collection. Thus through the enterprise and the fine artistic appreciation of Mr. Ffoulke, is America able to enjoy the best expression of Italian tapestry of the Seventeenth Century.
The part that Venice ever played in the history of tapestry is the splendid one of consumer. In her Oriental magnificence she exhibited in palace and pageant the superb products of labour which others had executed. Without tapestries her big stone palaces would have lacked the note of soft luxury, without coloured hangings her balconies would have been but dull settings for languid ladies, and her water-parades would have missed the wondrous colour that the Venetian loves. Yet to her rich market flowed the product of Europe in such exhaustless stream that she became connoisseur-consumer only, nor felt the need of serious producing. Workshops there were, from time to time, but they were as easily abandoned as they were initiated, and they have left little either to history or to museums. Venice was, in the Sixteenth Century, not only a buyer of tapestries for her own use, but one of the largest markets for the sale of hangings to all Europe. Men and monarchs from all Christendom went there to purchase. The same may be said of Genoa, so that although these two cities had occasional unimportant looms, their position was that of middleman—vendors of the works of others. In addition to this they were repairers and had ateliers for restoring, even in those days.