DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61670#0462
CHAPTER V
THE MONKS OF THE ROBBIA FAMILY—LUCA
THE YOUNGER
Before following the career of Girolamo della Robbia in
France, and tracing to its total extinction the art originated
by Luca, some words must be said of other members of
Andrea’s large family and of their few authenticated works.
Among their names a terrible confusion reigns, which no
document so far helps us to unravel, for two on entering the
Convent of S. Marco appear to have changed their baptismal
names, and to identify them certainly with any of those
mentioned in the Declarations to the Catasto seems im-
possible. The discovery in recent times of a document
proving the existence of yet a third Dominican monk, certainly
the son of Andrea, also a worker in glazed terra-cotta, has
further added to the confusion.
Of the two eldest sons, Antonio and Marco, the only
mention is by Andrea himself in his Declaration of Property
to the Catasto of 1470, at which time they were respectively
three and two years old (Doc. xxi.). Giovanni is mentioned
in the same document as coming next in age. Girolamo was
the youngest of the family, being born in 1488. Between
these came Francesco, Luca, and Paolo, seven sons in all. So
much for the secular names. Vasari, who is likely to be fairly
correct since he was personally acquainted with Andrea, and
probably also with his sons, tells that two of them took the
Dominican habit in the Convent of S. Marco under Savonarola,1
and it has generally been supposed that these two were the
1 Vasari, ii. 181.
254
THE MONKS OF THE ROBBIA FAMILY—LUCA
THE YOUNGER
Before following the career of Girolamo della Robbia in
France, and tracing to its total extinction the art originated
by Luca, some words must be said of other members of
Andrea’s large family and of their few authenticated works.
Among their names a terrible confusion reigns, which no
document so far helps us to unravel, for two on entering the
Convent of S. Marco appear to have changed their baptismal
names, and to identify them certainly with any of those
mentioned in the Declarations to the Catasto seems im-
possible. The discovery in recent times of a document
proving the existence of yet a third Dominican monk, certainly
the son of Andrea, also a worker in glazed terra-cotta, has
further added to the confusion.
Of the two eldest sons, Antonio and Marco, the only
mention is by Andrea himself in his Declaration of Property
to the Catasto of 1470, at which time they were respectively
three and two years old (Doc. xxi.). Giovanni is mentioned
in the same document as coming next in age. Girolamo was
the youngest of the family, being born in 1488. Between
these came Francesco, Luca, and Paolo, seven sons in all. So
much for the secular names. Vasari, who is likely to be fairly
correct since he was personally acquainted with Andrea, and
probably also with his sons, tells that two of them took the
Dominican habit in the Convent of S. Marco under Savonarola,1
and it has generally been supposed that these two were the
1 Vasari, ii. 181.
254