No. IX.

LIFE OF RAPHAEL.*

FOR more than two centuries every account of the life and labours of Raphael may be said to have been derived, with little material alteration, from Vasari. It would be unjust to so pleasing a narrator to attribute this solely to the indolence of the writers who succeeded him; indeed modern critics, without excusing the occasional inaccuracies of the Florentine biographer, have acknowledged that his just and artist-like criticism, and the naïveté and interest of his details, as far as they go, could scarcely be improved. It was, in short, chiefly owing to Vasari's well-earned reputation that the task of revising and, what was far more difficult, of completing the valuable outlines he had left, was so long-unfortunately too long-deferred. Of the more voluminous accounts of the Italian painters which have appeared within the present century, the greater part, however embellished by the de

* Review of J. D. Passavant's "Rafael von Urbino und sein Vater Giovanni Santi, in zwei Theilen mit vierzehn Abbildungen. Leipzig, F. A. Brockhaus, 1839." Quarterly Review, No. cxxxi. June, 1840.

scription of works of art, or enlivened by the connexion with general history, can scarcely be said to have contributed any additional facts. To this class belong the lives of Raphael by Duppa, Braun, and Quatremère de Quincy-the Italian translation of the last, overwhelmed as it is with notes not always remarkable for their importance or correctness, may nevertheless be considered the fullest memoir that had appeared prior to the far superior work of Passavant.

The credit of instituting a new kind of research in the history of art, as opposed to the habit of copying Vasari, is perhaps due in the first instance to Pungileoni. The first volume of his Life of Correggio, published in 1817, proved that it was still possible to wrest from the mouldering records of convents and similar archives a few important facts and chronological data, with which, as safe links, other materials might be connected. The same writer was equally fortunate in his patient researches at Urbino respecting Giovanni Santi, the father of Raphael, and respecting the great painter himself; but conscious, perhaps, that his life of Correggio had failed to unite a comprehensive spirit of criticism with mere historic accuracy, he contented himself with giving the latter results of his investigations in two small pamphlets, as materials for future historians.

Of the writers on art on this side the Alps, the first who followed the example of Pungileoni in

original research, while he far surpassed the Italian in philosophic criticism, was Von Rumohr. In the first two volumes of his " Italienische Forschungen," after briefly tracing the vicissitudes of art in the dark ages, this writer gives the history of several painters of the Florentine, Sienese, and Umbrian schools. His sources were original documents and the testimonies of early writers employed to verify or correct the accounts of Vasari; his descriptions and criticisms were fresh from the works themselves in every case where this was possible. Thus a scrupulous spirit of investigation, combined with the views of an enlightened historian and not unskilful connoisseur, at once distinguish Rumohr from most of the writers on these subjects who appeared about the same time; of the two opposite qualifications of patient research and a generalising, philosophic treatment of materials thus acquired, it must, however, be admitted that the latter is ever active with or without sufficient data. The third volume was devoted to Raphael and his contemporaries, but the account is brief, and the method this author had followed with such pains in his former volumes he wanted either leisure or inclination to pursue. We shall have occasion, however, to show, that even in this portion he still appears to advantage in his occasional enlightened remarks on the works of Raphael.

The same spirit of accurate research, the same conscientious principle as to actual inspection, a

still more practised eye, and a still more artist-like feeling, are united in Passavant with a more cautious indulgence of particular opinions and impressions. In philosophic criticism he is, perhaps, inferior to Rumohr; his laborious and wellarranged book might be rendered still more complete and accurate even in its facts, but on the whole it may safely be said, that no production of the kind has approached it for copiousness and originality of information. The second volume will be found eminently useful, and, with very little correction, may serve as a model for future compilations of the kind; it consists of a catalogue of all Raphael's works, first arranged chronologically with reference to the periods of their production. The description of each work, with an indication of the gallery or collection, if known, where it exists, is followed by a list of the drawings or preparatory studies for the composition; these are described in like manner then follows an enumeration of all the engravings and known copies. A second catalogue contains a list of such works as are known only from description, and of others falsely ascribed to Raphael, or which were only executed by his scholars and imitators from his designs. The justness of the grounds on which the author inserts many a highly-prized possession in this category will naturally be challenged by those interested in the decision. A third catalogue is devoted to the drawings alone, arranged according to the countries

where the various collections exist. The old engravings after Raphael are also enumerated together; and lastly, all the works attributed to the master are classed, according to their subjects, as an index to both volumes. The biography itself, which is thus comparatively a small part of the work, occupies about half the first volume, the rest being composed of incidental memoirs, documents, and extracts. By far the most valuable portion is that relating to the earlier history and productions of Raphael, a subject on which conjecture had too long usurped the place of any attempt at chronological accuracy.

A circumstance that at once forces itself on our notice, and which we here find treated with the attention it deserves for the first time, is the importance of Urbino, both in a political and social point of view, at the period when Raphael began his career. The resources and renown of this little dukedom, improved and upheld by Federigo da Montefeltro, remained ultimately unimpaired in the hands of his successor Guidubaldo: the state, in short, was represented and its warlike population led to the field by hereditary sovereigns, before Florence had learned to yield even to temporary sway. That a Tuscan writer on art should be silent on the past glories of a neighbouring state is quite natural; but it seems unaccountable that so many biographers, in following Vasari, should have overlooked the remarkable circumstances by which