Miretto, a Paduan. This recent discovery justifies my own previous opinions, having been unable to prevail upon myself to ascribe such a production to Giotto, although it partakes strongly of his style, which appears to have spread pretty rapidly throughout the territories of Padua, of Verona, of Bergamo, and great part of the Terra Ferma.

Besides this manner, which may be, in some measure, pronounced foreign, there are others equally observable in Venice, no less than in Treviso, in the Chapter of the Padri Predicatori, and in other of the subject cities, and these might more accurately be termed national, so remote are they from the style of Giotto, and that of his disciples before mentioned. I have elsewhere pointed out how far the miniature painters contributed to this degree of originality, a class of artists, with whom Italy, at no time destitute, more fully abounded about that period, while they still continued to improve by employing their talents in drawing objects from the life, and not from any Greek or Italian model. Indeed they had already made no slight advances in every branch of painting, when Giotto first arrived in those parts. I have myself seen, in the grand collection of MSS., made in Venice, by the Abbate Canonici, a book of the Evangelists, obtained in Udine, illustrated with miniatures in pretty good taste for the thirteenth century, in which they were produced; and similar relics are by no means rare throughout the libraries of the state. I suspect, therefore, that many of those new painters, either having been pupils of the miniaturists, or induced to imitate them from the near connexion between the arts, attempted to vie with them in design, in the distribution of their colours, and in their compositions. Hence, it is clearly accounted for, why they did not become the disciples, though acquainted with the works of Giotto, but produced several respectable pieces of their own.

To this class belongs M. Paolo, whom Zanetti found recorded in an ancient parchment, bearing the date of 1346. He is the earliest in the national manner, of whom there exists a work with the indisputable name of its author. It is to be seen in the great church of St. Mark, consisting of a tablet, or, as it is otherwise called, Ancona, divided into several compartments, representing the figure of a dead Christ, with some of the Apostles, and historic incidents from the holy Evangelist. There is inscribed underneath—Magister Paulus cum Jacobo, et Johanne filiis fecit hoc opus; and Signor Zanetti, page 589, observes in regard to it as follows:—Among the specimens of simple painting, in St. Mark's, the ball centre of the great altar is remarkable for several small tablets of gold and silver, on which are painted several figures in the ancient Greek manner. San Pietro Urseolo had it constructed about the year 980, at Constantinople, and it was removed to this place in the time of the Doge Ordelafo Faliero, in 1102, though it was afterwards renovated by command of the Doge Pietro Ziani, in 1209. This historian did not discover the inscription which I found upon it in the year 1782. The artist is sufficiently distinguished for the period in which he flourished, although the stiffness in the design, false action, and expression, beyond those of the best followers of Giotto, are perceptible, so much as to remind us of the Greek specimens of art.^[13]

There can, likewise, be no doubt, that a painter of the name of Lorenzo, was one of these Venetians, whose altarpiece in St. Antony of Castello, to which is attached his name, with the date of 1358, paid him three hundred gold ducats, has been commended by Zanetti. Besides, we read inscribed on a picture belonging to the noble house of Ercolani, at Bologna, the words manu laurentii de venetiis, 1368; and there is every appearance of his being the author of the fresco in the church of Mezzaratta, not far from Bologna, representing Daniel in the lions' den; and bearing the signature of Laurentius, P. It is a work that bears no resemblance to the style of Giotto, and appears to have been completed about the year 1370. It is equally certain that Niccolo Semitecolo was a Venetian, he having also inscribed his name as we find it written upon a Trinity, which represents the Virgin, along with some histories of St. Sebastian, still preserved in the chapter library of Padua:—"Nicoleto Semitecolo da Veniexia impense, 1367." The work is an excellent specimen of this school; the naked parts are tolerably well drawn, and the proportions of the figures, though sometimes extravagantly so, are bold and free; and what is more important to our present purpose, it discovers no resemblance to the style of Giotto, being inferior in point of design, though equal to him in regard to the colouring. Two other painters, whose style betrays nothing of Giotto, were discovered by Signor Sasso, in Venice, upon the strength of two altarpieces, to which they had affixed their names. Upon one, found in the convent of Corpus Domini, he read Angelus pinxit; and upon the other, also in the same place, Katarinus pinxit. While on this subject, I ought not to pass over the opinion of Baldinucci himself, who always appears to have respected the freedom and independence of the Venetian as opposed to the Florentine school, by refusing to insert the name of a single Venetian in his tree of Cimabue. He merely maintained, that the Venetian painters had improved their style by the labours of Angiol Gaddi, and of one Antonio, a Venetian, whom, in spite of the authority of Vasari, he has declared to be a Florentine; on which point we must refer to what has already been stated in the first volume (p. 61) of this work. Moreover, he asserts of the same Antonio, that he took up his residence at Venice, and thence acquired the appellation of Veneziano; but that he took his departure again, owing to the intrigues of the national professors, as much as to say, of a school formed anterior to his arrival. And so long anterior was it, indeed, that the whole state, as well as the adjacent places, abounded not less with pictures than with pupils, although few of their names with their productions have survived.^[14]

Among these few is a Simon da Cusighe, who painted an altarpiece and a fresco, still remaining in his native parish, situated near the city of Belluno, where there exist memorials of one Pietro, and other artists of the thirteenth century, along with some very tolerably executed figures, bearing the epigraph of Simon pinxit. To these I add a native of Friuli, of whom there are no authentic remains beyond Gemona, where he painted the façade of the dome, and under a picture of the martyrdom of I know not what saint, appears his name written, mcccxxxii. magister nicolaus pintor me fecit. To this artist is ascribed, by some writers, that vast and meritorious production, still in such a fine state of preservation, ornamenting the dome of Venzone, and which represents the solemn scene of the Consecration; but its author is a matter of mere conjecture, founded in this instance upon the vicinity of the place and time, and resemblance of manner. There are also Pecino and Pietro de Nova, who