Chap. III. DOMENICO DI BARTOLO. 55 duction of a pure Siennese in an Umbrian city, destined to be the cradle of a reviving art. It offers occasion for comparison with other creations of the time; and proves that Giovanni Boccati, whose panel of 1447 is hard by in S. Domenico, was educated on the same principles, and struggled with similar defects. The Siennese school was, no doubt, superior generally to that of Umbria and the Marches up to this time. Still, it is not easy to deter mine whether Domenico shed an influence on the Boccati, or whether the converse proposition would hold good. Gentile da Fabriano had already interposed both at Si enna and in Umbria. If, however, Sienna now ceased to wield supremacy over the neighbouring country; the ef fect was as yet hardly perceptible; and this is equally true at Camerino, east of the Appennine, and at Foligno, west of that chain, where local art was modified by the presence of Benozzo Gozzoli. But Domenico’s Perugian Madonna seems not a solitary Siennese example of its time at a distance from Sienna. The Priory of S. Giovanni Evangelista at Borgo S. Se- polcro, the inmates of which have parted with the “Bap- , tisrn” of Piero della Francesca, * 1 still shelters the remains of an altarpiece, of which that episode was the centre, reminiscent of the Virgin and saints at S. Agostino of Asciano. An improvement upon the style of that piece may be conceded, but the SS. Peter and Paul combine the feebleness of figure, overweight of head, and peculiar draperies, which have been described as characteristic of della (left to right) are: 1. S. John’s departure to the desert; 2. his ser mon ; 3. his execution and the dance of the daughter of Ilerodias; 4.tlio interview with Herod; and 5. the Baptism of Christ. On a scroll at the Virgin’s feet are the words: “Dominicus Bartoli de Senis mo pinxit,” on a border below: “Hoc opus fecit fieri Domina Antonia fi- liaFrancisci de Domo Bucliolis, ab- batissa istius monasterii in lianno M.CCCCXXXVIII de mensisMaii.” The colour is abraded and dimmed by time. Since the foregoing was written the altarpiece has found a place in the Galleria Comunale. 1 This Baptism, is painted in tempera and not in oil as we, in error, stated. See Vol. II. Piero della Francesca, p. 541 and foil. The observations made as to Piero’s use of oil medium are however cor rect and apply to other pieces pro duced by him on the new system.