Giorgio Vasari

“ His master, Cosimo, found ample justification for the confidence which he reposed in him, and availed himself to a great extent of his aid; nay, he not unfrequently entrusted works of the utmost importance to Piero, knowing well that his disciple had a better manner as well as more judgment than himself. It was for this reason that he took Piero with him to Pome, when he was himself summoned thither by Pope Sixtus, to execute the historical paintings for the chapel, and in one of these Piero executed a very beautiful landscape, as we have related in the life of Cosimo. ”

“ Among these spectacles, which were numerous as well as ingeniously arranged, I am inclined briefly to describe one, which was, for the most part, invented by Piero, when he had already attained to mature age; this show was not of a pleasing or attractive character, but, on the contrary, was altogether strange, terrible, and unexpected: it gave no small pleasure to the people nevertheless, for as in their food they sometimes prefer the sharp and bitter savours, so in their pastimes are they attracted by things horrible ”

“ The father of Piero, perceiving a lively genius, and a strong inclination to the art of design in his son, entrusted him to the care of Cosimo Rosselli, who accepted the charge more than willingly, and seeing him make progress beyond most of the other disciples whom he had under his care, he bore to him
the love of a father, and as his acquirements in art increased with his years, he constantly treated him as such. ”

“ Around a chamber, in the house of Francesco del Puliese, Piero painted historical events in a similar manner, the figures being small. In this work also the artist has exhibited a singular variety of those fantastic objects which he so greatly delighted in painting; the buildings, the animals, the vestments, the instruments, all are of the most fanciful and varied character, he depicted whatever came into his head in short, the whole representation being entirely fabulous. ”

“ The old people who still remain, of those by whom the procession above described was witnessed, retain the most lively recollection of the scene, and are never weary of extolling the extraordinary spectacle presented by it. ”

“ The superintendent of the Foundling Hospital was a great friend of Piero’s, and, desiring to have a picture painted for the chapel of the Pugliese family, which is near the entrance of the church, on the left hand, he gave the commission for that work to Piero, who completed it at his leisure. But long before the work was brought to that consummation, the painter had well-nigh driven the superintendent to desperation, for on no condition would he permit the latter to have a sight of the work until the whole was finished. ”

“ It must be such a line thing to be led forth to one’s death in that manner; to see the clear, bright, open air, and all that mass of people; to be comforted, moreover, with sugar-plums and kind words; to have the priests and the people all praying for you alone, and to enter into Paradise with the angels. ”

“ He would never suffer his rooms to be swept, and would eat just at such moments as he felt hungry, he would not have the soil of his garden cultivated, or the fruit-trees pruned, but suffered the vines to grow wild, and permitted their shoots to extend over the paths, neither would he have the fig or other trees properly trained and attended to, preferring to see all things wild and savage about him, as he was himself, and he used to say that every thing of that kind was better left to Nature, to be tended by herself alone without further consideration. ”

“ To see at night, by the light of innumerable torches, twenty-five or thirty pairs of horses richly caparisoned, with their riders splendidly arrayed, according to the subject represented, was without doubt an attractive and beautiful spectacle. Six or eight attendants, also on horseback, accompanied each cavalier, all clothed in the same livery and each bearing a torch in his hand ”

“ Piero is said to have been the first who gave the character of a triumphal procession to these maskings, or who at least ameliorated them to such a degree that he may be said to have perfected them: for not only did he add appropriate words and music to the representation of the events chosen as the subject, but he also caused the procession to be accompanied by large trains, consisting of men on foot and on horseback in vast numbers ”

“ Nicholas, [6] for these, being exceedingly shining and lustrous, reflect the light one upon another, proving the singularity of the conceits affected by this artist, and the pleasure he experienced in investigating the difiSculties of art. The peculiarities of Piero’s character became more strikingly manifest after the death of Cosimo, seeing that he thenceforward kept himself constantly shut up, he would not permit any one to see him work, but lived the life of a wild beast rather than that of a man. ”

“ The triumphal Car was covered with black cloth, and was of vast size, it had skeletons and white crosses painted upon its surface, and was drawn by butfaloes, all of which were totally black: within the Car stood the colossal figure of Death, bearing the scythe in his hand, while around him were covered tombs, which opened at all the places where the procession halted, while those who formed it chanted lugubrious songs, when certain figures stole forth, clothed in black cloth, on these vestments the bones of a skeleton were depicted in white ”

“ He would sometimes discourse largely of the torments endured by those who die oi lingering diseases, and remark how deplorably they must suffer who find their strength, mental and bodily, alike gradually decaying, and see themselves to be dying by little and little, which he declared must needs be a great affliction: he would then abuse all physicians, apothecaries, and sicknurses, declaring that they suffered their patients to die of hunger ”

“ The files on the wall would sometimes arouse him to anger, nay, even the very shadows became an ofience to him, and thus, sickening of mere old age, the few friends who still continued to visit him exhorted the dying man to make his peace with Grod ”

“ On the predella of this work he executed small historical representations, which are extremely well done, among others that of Santa Margherita escaping from the stomach of the dragon: [11] in this monster indeed, and in the fantastic deformity imparted to it, he has displayed a degree of invention which could not, I think, be surpassed; venom is darting from its eyes, fire and death are in its aspect, the creature is indeed most frightful ”