. The painters of the school of Ferrara. irably rendered scenes from the Italian life of the epoch, in the country and the city, the camp and the court. We are shown the peasants pruning the vines, mowing the hay, ploughing, sowing, reaping, thrashing, and the like; we watch the harvest and the vintage, follow the condottieri as they lead the ducal mercenaries (i provmonati di Sna Eccellenza) through the land to protect the ducal subjects from foreign aggression, or the courtly trains passing to and from the chase. A state marriage is celebrated—possibly that of Borso*s half-sister, Bianca Mar
. The painters of the school of Ferrara. irably rendered scenes from the Italian life of the epoch, in the country and the city, the camp and the court. We are shown the peasants pruning the vines, mowing the hay, ploughing, sowing, reaping, thrashing, and the like; we watch the harvest and the vintage, follow the condottieri as they lead the ducal mercenaries (i provmonati di Sna Eccellenza) through the land to protect the ducal subjects from foreign aggression, or the courtly trains passing to and from the chase. A state marriage is celebrated—possibly that of Borso*s half-sister, Bianca Maria dEste, to Galeotto Pico della Mirandola—while ecclesiastics (under tlie shadow of Jupiter) exhort the soldiers to undertake a crusade against the Turk, or, it may Ix? (Borso not having yet obtained liis coveted ducal cap from tlic Pope), to take arms on behalf of the Holy See against Florence. Through all this pictured pageantry rides the old Duke himself, clad in cloth of gold, serene and gracious, on his way between Mm » • ^. .ttKli-raoii Francesco del Cossa DETAIL FllOil THE SCIIIFAXOIA FRESCOES FII vara To face page 36 FRANCESCO DEL COSSA 37 the palace and his beloved hunting-ground, or standingunder a portico to administer justice or exchangecourtesies with the ambassadors of the other potentatesof Italy. Many of the courtiers that surround hira aredoubtless portraits, but all the proposed identificationsare conjectural—the only exception being that of thehandsome young man with a falcon on his wrist, ridingat the Dukes side in the month of March, as Borsosfavourite, Teofilo Calcagnino, described by FrancescoAriosti as the ducal delight, that worthy and gentlecavalier. ^ The whole scheme was evidently devised by one ofthe humanists of the court—who, most probably, wasPellegrino Prisciano, astrologer, poet, and historian,who became tlie librarian and archivist of Borsossuccessor.^ There is still much question concerningthe painters by whom the frescoes were ex
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookidpaintersofschool00gardric
