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Chap. X. DOMENICO AND^ORAZIO ALFANI. 369 for the unusual introduction of S. Anna with a basin of water, the style, a mixture of Domenico's and imitative Raphaelesque, the colour, of a monotonous and all but shadowless rosy tone. Guide-books declare that the pre- della, now missing, was inscribed, and bore the date of 1536.* The handling is similar to that of the Crucifixion between SS. Jerom and Appollonia; it proves that an altarpiece at the Carmine of Perugia, designed with slight changes from Raphael’s Holy Family at Lille, and usually attributed to Domenico Alfani, cannot have been done by him, but must be considered either as a youthful production of Orazio, or of some one related to him in art. There is indeed room for uncertainty oh this point. The composition is copied with the help of squares from Raphael’s beautiful drawing, twelve cherubs’ heads being- introduced into the upper arched portion instead of three as Sanzio proposed. The execution is cold and careful, as one might expect from a young artist, the flesh but slightly shaded, and of a flat rosy yellow, laid on at one painting, the dresses, on the contrary, of thick impasto and high surface. These characteristics would suit Ora zio ; but on the side of a house forming part of the dis tance of the altarpiece, the word Anselmo is legible, and on the hem of the Virgin’s dress: “0. M.DXX. Anse ... & Meno XX.” which has been interpreted, by a considerable stretch of imagination, as Anselmo Gio vanni and Domenico Alfani. 2 A Martyrdom of S. Se- • Now without its predella, No. 43. in the gallery of Perugia. Three angels sing behind S. Jo seph, and the pastors are in the distance (wood, oil). The type and movement of the child are Rapha elesque as in the Holy Family at the Carmine (postea). The Vir gin’s regular features are reminis cent of Domenico’s. S. Anna looks somewhat Florentine; the angels poor in form. The picture is injured and abraded (the angels particularly). A lunette, with an Eternal in it, once formed a part VOL. III. of the piece. It had been christen ed Raphael, but is neither by him, nor by Orazio. See as to the predella and its date, Costantini, Guida di Perugia; ub. sup. 303. 2 The picture, once on an altar to the left in SS. Simone e Giuda (more commonly the Carmine) is now No. 59. in the Perugia gallery. The draperies are injured by re touching; and the violet of S. Anna’s dress is repainted. Orsini, in his life of Perugino (pp. 24 and foils) enriches the catalogue of Vannueci with this work. 24
