258 THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. Chap. VIII. face, Pinturicchio placed the Adoration of the Shepherds, with his patron in full robes on his knees before the new born Christ. In five lunettes he represented scenes from the life of S. Jerom, introducing a number of slender personages into them with such skill as one might expect from a man who had witnessed the progress of Perugino. He gave a graceful movement and a fair shape to the infant Saviour in the mode afterwards repeated at Spello and elsewhere. His landscapes are already a medley of rocks of fretful curves tunnelled into holes, and clothed with spare verdure, a permanent feature in him, and essentially characteristic of the Umbrian. 1 About the time when these frescos were completed, Giovanni della Rovere, Duke of Sora and Sinigaglia, died (1485). He had also built an oratory in S. Maria del Popolo, with the intention of being buried there. His mo nument, as well as the rest of the sacred space, was de corated by Pinturicchio, probably at the request of Do menico, or of Cardinal Giuliano the deceased’s brother. At the altai’, the Virgin and child are enthroned between SS. Francis, Augustin, and two other friars, the third person of the Trinity above in a lunette half-length, giving the blessing, the whole in a rich white marble tabernacle, bearing the della Rovere arms. To the left, the Virgin is taken to heaven by angels, whilst the apostles stand about the tomb. In the pointed -alcove of Giovanni’s mo nument Christ is supported in the sepulchre by two angels, and in the remaining lunettes five scenes from the life of the Virgin are depicted. These pieces are in a framework of fictive architecture, — columns supporting a real cornice and resting on imitated plinths that start from a skirting 1 In the distance of the Nativity, the procession of the Magi is given. To the right the hut with the ox and the ass. The blue man tle of the Virgin is repainted. The blue dress of one shepherd, the yellow one of another, the heads of all, are in ruin. The blue starred ceiling with its now colour increa ses the bad effect created by the damaged condition of the fresco. The incidents from the life ot S. Jerom are much damaged.