PLATE VII.—PUTTO WITH GARLAND

(In the Academy of St. Luca, Rome)

The fresco of a putto, now at the Academy of St. Luca in Rome, is the only fragment that is left to the world of all the decorative work executed by Raphael for the corridor leading from the famous Stanze of the Vatican to the Belvedere. It probably belonged to a shield bearing the papal arms, and is a graceful and characteristic example of the master's treatment of the form of children which he loved to introduce into his compositions.

Henceforth Raphael is to be considered rather as the head of a little army of painters and craftsmen, whom he supplied with ideas and designs to be executed under his directions, than as a master who is to be held responsible for the working out of every detail in the works which were turned out from his bottega with his sanction, and under his name. Even in the early years of his Roman period, comparatively few of the altar-pieces and easel pictures commissioned from him were entirely the work of his brush. In the ever popular "Madonna della Sedia," at the Pitti Palace, we have pure Raphael, and also in the masterpiece known as the "Madonna di Foligno," which was painted for the Pope's Chamberlain Sigismondi dei Conti, for his family chapel in the church of Ara Coeli in 1512, in commemoration of this dignitary's escape from a bursting fireball, as is indicated by the meteor in the landscape background. This picture was subsequently removed to Sigismondo's birthplace Foligno, whence it was carried off by the French in 1797, but had to be eventually restored, and is now among the treasures of the Vatican. The sadly deteriorated "Madonna of the Tower," at the National Gallery, and the "Madonna di Casa d'Alba," at the Hermitage, are probably of the master's own execution; but Giulio Romano and other pupils must be held responsible for the "Vierge au Diadème," the "Madonna del divino Amore," the "Garvagh Madonna," the "Madonna of the Fish," the "Madonna of the Candelabra," and several other well-known pictures for which Raphael had supplied the designs.

[IV]

A letter written by Raphael to his uncle Simone Ciarla on the 1st of July 1514 is of incalculable importance for the light it throws upon the master's private life and character. It is written by a man flushed with success, but modest withal—in the full enjoyment of all the gifts that fortune and his talent and tact have brought to him, but in no way overbearing or boastful. And through it all sounds a note of cool calculation—in money matters as well as in the weighing of matrimonial chances. He states the amount of his fortune, of his salary as architect of St. Peter's, and of the payments that are to be made to him for "work in hand." And in the same way he refers to an "advantageous match" proposed to him by Cardinal Bibbiani, to which he has already pledged himself, but should it fall to the ground, "I will fall in with your wishes"—a reference apparently to an eligible matrimonial candidate in Urbino. Nor are there chances lacking in Rome, where, indeed, he knows of a pretty girl with a dowry of 3000 gold crowns! He also mentions with no little pride that he is living in Rome in his own house.

These remarks about his matrimonial schemes take us to one of the most interesting and most disputed chapters of Raphael's life—his irregular attachment to the "Bella Fornarina," the beautiful daughter of a baker from Siena, which is referred to first by Vasari, and then, in 1665, by Fabio Chigi, and has been treated as mere invention by many modern writers. The evidence collected by Signor Rodolfo Lanciani proves, however, the truth of Vasari's story, and furthermore establishes the name and ultimate fate of the "Fornarina." According to local tradition, three houses in Rome are pointed out as the successive homes of Raphael's inamorata; and each of these houses is in close proximity to the buildings, on the decoration of which the master was successively employed. The first of these houses in the Via di Sta. Dorotea is still occupied by a bakery known as "il forno della Fornarina;" the second is in the Vicolo del Cedro near St. Egidio in Trastevere; and the third is the Palazzetto Sassi, which has a tablet let into the wall with an inscription to the effect that "Tradition says that the one who became so dear to Raphael, and whom he raised to fame, lived in this house."

It has now been ascertained from a census return made under Leo X. in 1518, that one of the houses of the Sassi family was occupied by the baker Francesco from Siena, which completely tallies with the tradition that "Margherita, donna di Raffaello," as she is described in a contemporary marginal note in a copy of the Giunta edition of Vasari in 1568, was the daughter of a baker from Siena. But even more decisive is the proof which was found in 1897 in an entry in the ledger of the Congregation of Sant'Apollonia in Trastevere, a kind of home for fallen and repentant women. This entry, which is under the date of the 18th August 1520, that is a little over four months after Raphael's death, runs as follows: "A di 18 Augusti 1520 Hoggi e stata recenta nel nro Conservatorio maa Margarita vedoa, figliola del quondam Francescho Luti da Siena." ("August 18, 1520.—To-day has been received into our establishment the widow Margarita, daughter of the late Francesco Luti of Siena.") The remarkable coincidence of dates and names leaves no doubt that this "widow" was the Bella Fornarina, Margherita, the daughter of the baker Francesco from Siena, and the beautiful creature who served Raphael as model for the "Donna Velata," for the "Sistine Madonna," and for one of the heads in the "St. Cecilia."

The story goes that Raphael's attachment lasted up to the time of his death, when, on the insistence of the Pope's messenger who was to bring the dying man the benediction, she was removed from the room. Vasari also relates that in his will Raphael "left her a sufficient provision wherewith she might live in decency." His long infatuation with the baker's daughter may well account for his unwillingness to enter into the bonds of matrimony even with as desirable and noble a partner as Cardinal Bernardo Divizio's niece, Maria Bibbiena, to whom he was practically engaged in 1514, and who after years of postponement is said to have died of a broken heart. Vasari's statement that Raphael's hesitation was due to the prospect of a cardinal's hat being bestowed upon him is utterly untrustworthy and contrary to all precedent and reason. It is much more likely that Raphael considered it diplomatic to humour a man in as powerful a position as Cardinal Bibbiena, and to agree to become engaged to his niece, even though his own position at the time was such that he could speak on terms of equality to cardinals, as may be gathered from this witty repartee recorded by his friend Baldassare Castiglione: Two cardinals, who examined a painting upon which he was just engaged, found fault with the redness of the complexion of St. Peter and St. Paul. "My Lords," retorted Raphael, "be not concerned; because I painted them so with full intention, since we have reason to believe that St. Peter and St. Paul are as red in Heaven as you see them here, for shame that their Church should be governed by such as you!"