DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61022#0025
BIRTH AND FIRST YEARS
hand the name on as a surname to his son. The name ‘ di Sante ’
or ‘ Santi ’ became Latinised as ‘ Sanctius,’ returned to Italian as
‘ Sanzio,’ and in this way the Christian name of his grandfather
(and his great-great-grandfather) has become the surname of
Raphael, though there is no evidence that he was known during
his lifetime by any other name than ‘ Raphael of Urbino.’
Giovanni’s blood did not therefore bring him into any close
relation with the rulers of his town; nor yet did his profession,
of which he says himself that he adopted it on coming to man’s
estate when he might have chosen others of greater utility, and
that his choice had brought him often into contact with mis-
fortune. His goldsmith’s work is unknown. But as a painter,
he belonged to a school already too antiquated to satisfy the
tastes of Federigo, and, for all his efforts to adopt a more vigorous
style, he failed to secure Federigo’s patronage. That prince
bought pictures by Northern painters such as ‘The Bath’ by
Jan van Eyck, and in the decoration of his palace he employed the
mysterious Justus of Ghent, one of whose hard and painful pictures
is now to be seen upon its walls. Of the Italians he called to
Urbino men of the ambitious innovating stamp, such as Piero
della Francesca (who twice painted his portrait), Mantegna and
Melozzo da Forli. He asked for stronger colouring, more daring
representations of the human form, more violent expressions of
passion, more movement and more vigour than Giovanni could
have given him. It was more for the monasteries, perhaps more
for the women, that Giovanni worked, and his pictures are to be
seen in various churches of the region, always Madonnas with the
conventional groups of saints and donors, and always showing,
for all their excursions into differing styles and their stiffness of
execution, a gentleness and sweetness, an easy charm, such as
marks the whole range of painting in that century from Umbria
and the Marches. He is seen at his highest in the small ‘ Madonna
and Child ’ which is now in the National Gallery, where he
succeeds for once in grafting upon his fundamental sweetness
3
hand the name on as a surname to his son. The name ‘ di Sante ’
or ‘ Santi ’ became Latinised as ‘ Sanctius,’ returned to Italian as
‘ Sanzio,’ and in this way the Christian name of his grandfather
(and his great-great-grandfather) has become the surname of
Raphael, though there is no evidence that he was known during
his lifetime by any other name than ‘ Raphael of Urbino.’
Giovanni’s blood did not therefore bring him into any close
relation with the rulers of his town; nor yet did his profession,
of which he says himself that he adopted it on coming to man’s
estate when he might have chosen others of greater utility, and
that his choice had brought him often into contact with mis-
fortune. His goldsmith’s work is unknown. But as a painter,
he belonged to a school already too antiquated to satisfy the
tastes of Federigo, and, for all his efforts to adopt a more vigorous
style, he failed to secure Federigo’s patronage. That prince
bought pictures by Northern painters such as ‘The Bath’ by
Jan van Eyck, and in the decoration of his palace he employed the
mysterious Justus of Ghent, one of whose hard and painful pictures
is now to be seen upon its walls. Of the Italians he called to
Urbino men of the ambitious innovating stamp, such as Piero
della Francesca (who twice painted his portrait), Mantegna and
Melozzo da Forli. He asked for stronger colouring, more daring
representations of the human form, more violent expressions of
passion, more movement and more vigour than Giovanni could
have given him. It was more for the monasteries, perhaps more
for the women, that Giovanni worked, and his pictures are to be
seen in various churches of the region, always Madonnas with the
conventional groups of saints and donors, and always showing,
for all their excursions into differing styles and their stiffness of
execution, a gentleness and sweetness, an easy charm, such as
marks the whole range of painting in that century from Umbria
and the Marches. He is seen at his highest in the small ‘ Madonna
and Child ’ which is now in the National Gallery, where he
succeeds for once in grafting upon his fundamental sweetness
3