1. Elijah fed by Ravens. No. 47.
2. Elijah raises the widow’s son. No. 50.
3. Elijah asks bread of the widow. No. 49.
4. Elijah anoints Jehu, King of Israel. No. 48.
These designs were made by Professor Alessandro Franchi, the present Director of the Accademia delle Belle Arti, and were executed under his direction by Leopoldo Maccari and Antonio Radicchi.[142] The smaller ones follow to some extent the older lines, but in the larger ones, the artist has struck out for himself; and, if the result is in somewhat startling contrast to everything preceding it, there is no doubt that his work is full of skill and merit of a most scholarly and remarkable kind. Under his care, and with the able support of the above-mentioned two artists, aided by a generous legacy of a former Rector, Cav. Pietro Bambagini Galletti, the whole Pavement has undergone the Restoration, to which I have referred so often,[143] and is now in as perfect a condition as constant loving and intelligent care can keep it, without entirely hoarding it from view.
CHAPTER III
THE PAVEMENT MASTERS
The reader, having patiently followed me along the intricacies of the Pavement, and the ramifications of its history, will now like to know something more detailed about the men who made it. To satisfy this wish, I have collected from various sources, chiefly from Milanesi, the following notes.
Padre Micheli[144] gives no less than forty-one names of workers of various sorts on the Pavement. To these the writer in Miscellanea[145] adds three more; and if with them we include the six artists and sculptors, who, since the middle of the eighteenth century, and up to the present day, have restored, replaced, and made additions, we arrive at a total of more than fifty men, who have, in one way or another, contributed to this beautiful work.[146]
Of these, many remain but as names recorded in documents concerning the Pavement, and are heard of nowhere else; of others we catch a few glimpses in the pages of Milanesi; about a dozen were celebrated in their day as painters and sculptors, in the somewhat limited world of Sienese Art, and have left specimens of their work elsewhere; while two alone, Pinturicchio and Beccafumi, have attained world-wide fame.