Chap. VI. THE ANT0NIA8SI. 167 The narrative of the lives of the great Perugians, Van- nucci and Pinturicchio, inevitably takes the historian to Rome where their skill exhibited its mastery during a period of full fifteen years. Before them, we have said, Piero della Francesca and Melozzo extended the influence of Umbrian art. The lustre of these brilliant names has perhaps contributed to the neglect of men whose boast might be, that as Romans they partook of the progress made by their Perugian cotemporaries. Vasari relates, that when Filippino Lippi in 1493 gave up a chapel complete in its decoration to cardinal Ca- raffa, his frescos were valued by Lanzilago of Padua and Antonio, alias Antoniasso the Roman, the two best pain ters of that time in the capital. 1 Antoniasso was of a family which followed the same profession during three generations at least. The earliest of its . members of which we have any notice is Antonius, the designer of an altarpiece in the sacristy of S. Antonio del Monte at Rieti, dated 1464. The Virgin is represented giving the breast to the infant erect on her lap. On the sides (hanging in the choir) are S. Francis receiving the stig mata, and S. Anthony. An inscription at the base of the centre runs thus: “Antonius do Roma . epinxit 1464.” It is not rare to find pieces equally old and defective. This one is interesting not only for its authenticity, but because it shows a local Roman in the middle of the fifteenth century influenced by the example of Benozzo Gozzoli, and therefore following the track of the Um brians. 2 Twenty-five years later, Antoniasso, the son perhaps of Antonio, received a commission from Girolamo Gaetano, archbishop of Capua, for a Virgin and child between SS. Stephen and Lucy, to be placed on the altar of. a chapel built by his orders in 1489 in the cathedral of his see; 1 Vas. V. 249. j mantle is all but gone. The saints on the side panels are on gold ground, abraded entirely in that of S. Anthony. The tempera is light. 2 The Virgin is less than life size in a tunic of gold. Her blue