52 THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. Chap. III. root, Sano di Pietro as leader, and a ruck of men of less mark behind them. These clung, not merely to the old system of composition, form, and drapery, but to the old methods of tempera, modelling their style, ac cording to their ability, on the antiquated one of Ugo- lino and Segna. Domenico di Bartolo was born at Asciano in the early part of the fifteenth century, and was free of the guild of Sienna in 1428. 1 The sphere of his activity is limited by that date and 1444, after which time his name has not been discovered in records. His productions justify in part the criticisms of Vasari, who assigns them to one taught in the school of Taddeo Bartoli. 2 His man ner is Umbro-Siennese, deficient in order and balance, in repose and purpose, unadorned with any of the charms of perspective, unattractive because of the weakness and rigidity of figures attired in tasteless dress, be cause of the rare presence of pleasing types, and the monotony consequent on a shadowless reddish brown tone of dim texture. In this respect, his earliest and his latest efforts are consistently the same. In a panel, of 1433, at the Academy of Sienna, inscribed with the name of “Dominicus” alone, in which the Virgin sits on the ground amidst angels, and holds the infant on her knee, the principal group hardly differs from that of a mother with her child in the less sacred subject of the Marriage of a Foundling at the Spedale. 3 In both pieces, the heads overweigh the slender necks and frames; a meaningless grimace overspreads the faces; but in the former a lus trous reddish tone colours the entire surface of the panel. The Siennese themselves seemed to attach less value to the pictorial works of this time, than to those of archi- 1 Proof of his birth at Asciano is afforded by a contract in the Siennese arch. (Doc Sen. II. 172.) which shows that Vasari (II. 223) errs in calling him Taddeo Bartoli’s nephew. 2 Vasari JI. 223. 3 No. 138. Sienna academy; in scribed: “Oh decus o speties o Stella supremi eteris exaudi mise- ros famulosque deprecantes. Do- minicus Domini matrem te pinxit et orat. anno. MCCCCXXXI1I.”
