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Chap. XXIV. MASOLINO. 499 CHAPTER XXIV. MASOLINO. Two painters of the same name, but of different ages, were born in the neighbourhood of Florence and exercised their art in Italy in the first half of the fifteenth century. One was Tommaso di Cristoforo Fini, commonly called Masolino, the other Tommaso di S. Giovanni, better known as Masaccio. This coincidence of name in two painters who practised in the same city, and who both rose to a high rank amongst the artists of the Peninsula, was the cause of a pardonable confusion in the notices which were written respecting them in the sixteenth century. It is the object of the following sketch to replace the history of Masolino’s life and works upon a securer foundation, and to give him the place to which he is entitled amongst the artists of his time. In attempting to perform this duty, many familiar theories will be destroyed, and facts sanctioned by the acquiescence of centuries will be denied; but the reader will remember that hitherto no pictures of undoubted authenticity have been assigned to Masolino, and that his name had not been found in any record. The student now enjoys the faculty of seeing and examining not merely the frescos of the Brancacci chapel at Flo rence, which Vasari assigns in part to him, but a ge nuine series of wall paintings, signed with his name, of which it is justifiable to affirm that they were executed about the year 1428- These paintings, commissioned by Cardinal Branda Castiglione, were painted in the church 32*