Rome
Stanze di Raffaello
The decoration of the papal palace had been begun by eminent painters before Raphael arrived at Rome, for beneath the rooms in which he was about to create such immortal works were the Borgia apartments, the walls of which, under Alexander VI, had been covered by Pinturicchio with frescoes, which are the best specimens of his work. Several generations of painters had embellished those “Stanze” of the second storey with which the name of Raphael is now indissolubly connected, and to this day a modest escutcheon, carved in the key-stone of the arch, and so concealed that it seems to have escaped the notice of all previous biographers, proclaims the glory of Nicholas V, the ardent champion of the Renaissance and the founder of this part of the palace.
The four chambers known as the “Stanze” vary both in dimensions and shape. While the immense chamber of “Constantino” (pp. 106-109), which is the first on coming in from the Loggia of the external corridor, is only lighted on one side, the chamber of the “Segnatura” (pp. 70-87) and the chamber of “Eliodoro” (pp. 88-97) have windows on two sides, one looking out on to the Belvedere court, the other to the Sistine Chapel. In the fourth, the chamber of the “Incendio di Borgo”, or of Charlemagne, (pp. 98-105) the windows do not correspond; for while one of them is in the centre of the wall which faces the Belvedere, the other is at one end of the opposite wall.
The completion of the pictures in the first Stanza, the Stanza della Segnatura, was doubtless the first work assigned to Raphael by his new patron. The second Stanza, that of the Heliodorus, was finished in the year 1514. About the middle of the same year Raphael received the commission for the frescoes of the third room, that which is known as the Stanza dell’Incendio di Borgo. However, it was not until the year 1517 that Raphael could find time, amid his innumerable occupations, to complete this great work; although, as we shall soon see, he painted but a very small portion of it with his own hand.
Gregory IX Approving the Decretals, 1508-1511. Fresco, width: 220 cm (base). Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
The third room from the Loggia, being the one where the Pope generally signed the documents submitted to him by his ministers, was called the Stanza della Segnatura, a title which, according to Paris di Grassis, it bore as early as the time of Leo X.
The artist endeavoured also to express the fresh ideal aimed at by the Renaissance, to give a tangible shape to the aspirations of the great epoch of which he was the most gifted interpreter. Upon the one hand was the glorification of Religion and upon the other that of Philosophy, or of science untrammelled by dogma. Then came the Parnassus, or Poetry, and lastly the consecration of Civil Law by Justinian and of Canon Law by Gregory IX. The theology was no longer dominant as in the Middle Ages, and religion, science, jurisprudence, letters and arts developed freely, side by side, completing one another and making up a civilisation worthy to rival that of the ancients.
The general plan being thus arranged, Raphael apportioned his composition as follows. Upon the two large walls were the Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament and the School of Athens, in the space above the window looking on to the Belvedere courtyard, the Parnassus, and beneath, Alexander Depositing Homer’s MS. on the Tomb of Achilles, and Augustus Preventing the Friends of Virgil from Burning the Eneid, while in the recess on the other side were the three Virtues representative of Justice: Force, Moderation, and Prudence. The ceiling was covered with allegorical figures enclosed in medallions and serving, to use Passavant’s description as emblems for the four great wall paintings below, of Theology, Philosophy, Poetry, and Justice. In each of the four corner compartments, Raphael represented a scene in harmony with the corresponding painting: next to the Parnassus, Apollo and Marsyas; next to the Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament, Adam and Eve; next to Jurisprudence,The Judgement of Solomon; and next to the School of Athens, Astronomy. Nothing could have been more ably conceived than this plan; it was worked out to its smallest details before it was begun to be put into execution, and no necessity arose for the slightest alteration.
Cardinal and Theological Virtues, 1508-1511. Fresco, width: 660 cm (base). Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
Compositions, half historical, half allegorical, such as those with which Raphael was about to decorate the Stanza della Segnatura, were familiar to the Italians of the Renaissance, though allegory had been in higher favour during the Middle Ages. This was perhaps all the better for him, as, not being in any way tied by tradition, he was able to give free scope to his imagination, and create entirely by himself the works which have made him immortal. His first care was to make a distinct separation between the reality and the ideal, putting history on one side and fiction on the other. He rightly held that the introduction of allegorical figures into the domain of history would clog the action and lessen the interest. He therefore placed the latter in special compartments, and the figures personifying Religion, Science, Jurisprudence, and Poetry occupy the medallions on the ceiling, while Force, Prudence, and Temperance are on the wall facing the Parnassus.
In the Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament and the School of Athens, the features which command most admiration are the, so to speak, architectural distinctness of the composition, the grandeur of the ideas, and the ample majesty of the figures. While in the one Raphael rises to the height of an epic poem, in the other he shows with what consummate ability he could analyse the sentiments and creeds of his heroes, and render dramatic even the teaching of philosophy. The third fresco in the same room, the Parnassus, is marked by different qualities; in it Raphael shook off all anxiety as to symmetry of decorative effect, as he was justified by the nature of the subject in doing. For, in truth, while religion and philosophy each form a doctrine based upon strict rules, poetry, on the other hand, is solely an affair of the imagination. It is only right, therefore, that an artist, in celebrating poetry, should be allowed poetic licence. This is the first instance in which we see Raphael surrendering himself entirely to his inspiration, and disdaining all calculation, as if he felt certain from the first that his composition would be a success.
Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament, 1508-1511. Fresco, width: 770 cm (base). Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
The Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament occupies one of the large side walls, and though the surface upon which it is painted is flat, it is composed upon the lines of a re-entering semicircle, thus imitating the majestic arrangement of the mosaics and frescoes which decorate the apses of so many Italian churches. He has divided his figures into four grand zones. At the top, God the Father, grave, solemn, and sublime, raises one hand in the act of benediction, while with the other He holds up the globe; there is a diamond-shaped halo about His head, and choruses of angels and cherubim form His escort and sing His praises.
Words are vain to give an idea of the effect produced by these countless figures, transfixed with admiration, shining with a supernatural light, and rising and descending amid inexpressible joy. One seems to hear the songs of the angels and to see the heavens opening in all their glory, and giving us a glimpse of the infinite realms beyond. Lower down, and relieved upon a disc resplendent with gold, is seated Christ. As in the fresco of San Severo, the upper part of His body is nude, while a large mantle covers His knees, and, as at San Severo, He shows His bleeding hands in sign of the mystery of the Redemption. To His left St John the Baptist points to Him whose coming he had announced, and to His right the Virgin, bending in profound veneration, covers her head with her mantle, as in the severe pictures of the Byzantine school.
Underneath these figures, which are enlarged to indicate their divinity, are seated twelve patriarchs, prophets, Apostles, confessors, representatives of the old and of the new faiths, champions of the ‘Ecclesia ex gentibus’ and of the ‘Ecclesia ex circumcisione’, some full of majesty, and others preserving, even in the celestial regions, the gentle resignation of martyrs, or lost in contemplation of the infinite. These figures are among the grandest creations of modern art, and they express with a force such as Raphael had never shown the loftiest sentiments which the Sacred Books can inspire. Never before had Moses and David, St Paul and St John the Evangelist, St Lawrence and St Stephen, been so nobly portrayed. A symbolic idea runs through the grouping of all the personages, and the representatives of the ancient faith, arranged in chronological order, alternate with those of the new.
Adam and Eve, 1508-1511. Ceiling fresco, 120 x 105 cm. Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City.
Amidst the clouds upon which this august assembly is seated, these twelve champions of the old and the new alliance, these representatives of the militant and of the contemplative elements in the Church, are to be seen myriads of angels. Some of them are scarcely distinguishable from the light vapours which float around them, while others, standing out more distinctly, animate and light up the background.
Four other angels carrying the Gospels – for Raphael, as we see, disregarded the traditionary symbols of the Evangelist – serve together with the dove, which represents the Holy Ghost, to connect the upper part of the composition with that which is below. The animation which distinguishes this lower part is in striking contrast with the calm of the celestial scene above. Old men and youths, official personages and mere adherents of the faith, are discussing with animation or listening with reverence, teaching with authority or seeking enlightenment, some of them in science, others in the text of the Scriptures. Some, wearing mitres, are proclaiming the dogmas of their faith; others, full of learning, are inaugurating the exegesis of Scripture. Writings are here of more importance than deeds, for the doctors compose the majority of the assembly, while the miracle-workers and the martyrs are very sparsely represented, for even St Francis of Assisi does not appear in the fresco. An altar, upon which the Host stands out radiant from the background, serves as a centre for all these men, who differing in character and views, have yet a common faith. Around the altar are seated the four great doctors of the Church – St Gregory the Great to the left, looking heavenwards and holding on his knees his treatise on Job, the Liber Moralium; then St Jerome, lost in meditation on the Scriptures, with his faithful lion at his feet; to the right St Ambrose, admiring the spectacle above, which is pointed out by one beside him; and lastly, St Augustine, dictating to a young man who is writing, and having before him the manuscript of the De Civitate Dei.
Raphael sought to bring into this picture of the Dispute, all the feelings which have their origin in religion. After showing us the splendour of the heavenly regions, the enthusiasm, the confidence, and the resignation of the prophets and martyrs, after having glorified all the manifestations of faith, from unreasoning ecstasy to conviction fortified by critical discernment, all that was wanted to complete the picture was to typify Heresy and Indifferentism.
Such is this famous composition, which is deservedly regarded as the highest expression of Christianity in painting, and the most perfect summary of the fifteen centuries of faith comprised between the frescoes of the Catacombs and those of the Florentine realists. It is more than a masterpiece of art; it marks an epoch in the development of humanity.
Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament (detail), 1508-1511. Fresco, width: 770 cm (base). Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
School of Athens, 1508-1511. Fresco, width: 770 cm (base). Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
In The School of Athens, the scene is represented as taking place beneath a vast portico, the arcades of which are panelled, and pierced with niches in which stand the statues of Apollo and of the well-armed Pallas Athene. This splendid building, which Vasari attributes to Bramante, typifies the august temples raised by Philosophy and celebrated by Lucretius.
One seems to see before one those heroes of science and philosophy whose achievements have been handed down to us by history. Raphael sought for truth above all else, and his philosophers are more than the representatives of an abstract idea; they are living men, each having his particular disposition and his special sphere of action, taking with conviction their parts in the great thought-drama of Athenian philosophy.
The reason why Raphael in the School of Athens reached a loftier eminence than any painter had ever before attained, and discovered beyond Roman art in its decadence the purest inspirations of Grecian genius, was that he would not allow his artistic tendencies to be overshadowed by scientific lore, and that he kept complete independence even in respect to the programme placed before him. There can be no doubt but that Raphael endeavoured to represent the development of Greek philosophy from Pythagoras and Democritus, that is to say from the 6th century before our era, to Archimedes, who died in the year 212 BCE.
The more one examines this stupendous, almost superhuman work, the more admirable does it appear. Thus, while beginning the history of philosophy in the lower group to the left and terminating it with the corresponding group to the right, Raphael has also placed lower down in the composition the representatives of the exact sciences, so making mathematics the basis of speculative philosophy.
Every form of admiration has for centuries been lavished on the School of Athens, yet fresh beauties are to be discovered in it every day, and it may be said that the completion of this great work realised the dream of the Renaissance. The works of antiquity were at length equalled, if not surpassed, and the School of Athens was the crowning point in a long series of centuries, but it is more than a point of development; it is a model to which no man has since attained.
The Judgement of Solomon, 1508-1511. Ceiling fresco, 120 x 105 cm. Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City.
Parnassus, 1508-1511. Fresco, width: 670 cm (base). Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
The Parnassus is a series of lyrical effusions, and the whole composition is so pervaded by poetry, that there is no room for prose. The figures are grouped with a freedom and ease which surprise one in the case of a painter so reflective as Raphael, and the soft elegance of their attitudes and the languishing expression on their faces remind one rather of Sodoma, whose influence may very possibly have been exerted just at that time over Raphael.
Seated on the summit of a sacred mount, under the shade of a laurel grove, Apollo, one of the softest creations of modern art, is running the bow over his violin, and with eyes raised heavenward, is absorbed in a poetic transport. Around him are ranged the Muses, some pensive, others filled with enthusiasm. They are lovely personifications of grace, nobility, and poetry; specially admirable is the attitude of infinite tenderness with which one of them leans her head on her sister’s shoulder. The other figures abandon themselves more freely to their various impressions. Standing erect, with lofty forehead and pathetic gestures, Homer recites part of the Iliad, which a young man seated beside him is taking down as he proceeds. Behind Homer, the gentle Virgil is pointing out Apollo to Dante, whose sombre profile stands out against the blue sky. In the background and in the least conspicuous position, is a timid, pensive youth who is generally supposed to be Raphael himself. Lower down, in the foreground of the picture, are four standing figures, engaged in serious conversation, while Sappho, seated upon a rock, is listening to them. Here again the critic comes face to face with a very difficult problem. One of the four poets in the background is unquestionably meant for Petrarch; but who are the three others? Until quite recently, they were supposed to be Alcaeus, Anacreon, and Corinna. There is a wide field for conjecture, for Vasari mentions among the poets represented in this fresco, Ovid, Ennius, Tibullus, Catullus, Propertius, Boccaccio and Antonio Tebaldeo. There is just as much uncertainty with respect to the poets on the opposite side. According to Passavant, the two figures in the foreground are Pindar and Horace, and the figure next to them that of the Neapolitan, Sannazaro. Behind them is Ariosto, conversing with one of the Muses, and further on Antonio Tebaldeo, one of Raphael’s most intimate friends. Thus the great modern writers, the creators of the national literature of Italy, are associated with the famous poets of Antiquity.
Apollo and Marsyas, 1508-1511. Ceiling fresco, 120 x 105 cm. Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City.
The Stanza della Segnatura, having been completed in 1511, after three years’ labour, Julius II, still full of enthusiasm, commissioned Raphael to decorate the room adjoining, now known as the Stanza di Eliodoro.
The greatness of religion and the power of the head of the Church are the chief ideas that strike us before the paintings of this hall. No more profane reminiscences or wanderings into the region of poetry. Art has abdicated her independence, and seeks only to remind us that we are in the palace of a sovereign pontiff named Julius II. On one side we see the glorification of the Pope’s military exploits in the transparent allegory of the expulsion of Heliodorus from the temple; on the other, the representation of a miracle destined to render the precepts of religion acceptable to the most incredulous. The two subjects added later by Leo X only increase this impression. One of them, in representing the Deliverance of St Peter, symbolises that of the reigning Pope. The other recalls one of the most glorious acts of the Pope’s namesake, Leo de’ Medici, St Leo, the first of the name.
In this chamber Raphael was assisted for the first time in much of the work by Giulio Romano, a youth then twenty years of age.
When Raphael commenced the decoration of the Stanza di Eliodoro, the ceiling was at least partly decorated by frescoes attributed to Baldassare Peruzzi. Here again Raphael respected the work of his predecessor as far as the Pope’s commands permitted, although his own work was sure to eclipse that which was already in place. Although the four subjects represented on the ceiling have now no affinity to the side frescoes, they at least, taken by themselves, form a homogeneous whole. All four are taken from the Old Testament, and recall the promises made by Jehovah to the people of Israel. They represent God Appearing to Noah, Abraham’s Sacrifice, Jacob’s Dream, and The Burning Bush. We have no fear of being taxed with presumption in comparing two of these scenes, God Appearing to Noah and The Burning Bush, with the great works in the Sistine.
In this chamber Raphael seems to have been mainly occupied with purely pictorial questions, and to have been bent on proving himself a great colourist as well as a master of design.
Expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple, 1512-1514. Fresco, width: 750 cm (base). Stanza di Eliodoro, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
The fresco which gives its name to the hall, the Expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple, is no less celebrated than the great works in the Stanza della Segnatura, and the enthusiasm which it has provoked for three centuries and a half can be easily understood. It is impossible, after contemplating the calm and balanced scenes depicted in the preceding rooms, not to be thrilled before this biblical drama, as terrible as it is realistic.
For the composition of this great work Raphael was inspired by the spirit of the Old Testament. In the book of Maccabees, the different events follow each other, and Raphael, desirous that not an episode of the sacred recital should be omitted, has fused them all into a single dramatic scene. This fusion of incident is certainly one of Raphael’s boldest ideas, and perceiving its success he gradually formed it into a regular system, which deserves all the credit of a happy invention.
Liberation of St Peter, 1512-1514. Fresco, width: 660 cm (base). Stanza di Eliodoro, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
The Liberation of St Peter, like the Heliodorus and the Attila, contains an allusion to the successes of the reigning Pope, but the allusion is no longer obscure. It was Leo X, not Julius II, who gave this subject to his artist. The Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici having been taken prisoner in a journey from Ravenna, shortly afterwards succeeded in escaping under the most extraordinary circumstances, a year to the very day before his elevation to the Pontificate. It was this deliverance that Leo X wished to symbolise under that of St Peter.
Vasari gives us a good description of this fresco and of the enthusiasm which it excited among Raphael’s contemporaries.
The architecture of the cell [he says], is so grand and simple that other artists seem to put more confusion into their works than true beauty. But Raphael always endeavoured to represent such scenes as the one I have described with graceful perfection. He vividly suggests the horrors of the cell in which the old man lies bound with iron and guarded by soldiers. Equally well has he rendered the profound slumber of the guards and the dazzling splendour of the angel. The brightness emanating from the body of the latter is marvellous and seems to illumine, through the shadows of the night, the darkest corners of the prison, and to make the armour shine like burnished steel rather than paint. Nor is the figure of the Apostle inferior. The face of Peter looks like that of a man in a dream. One can see, too, the terror of the other keepers as the noise made by closing the iron gate reaches their ears. A sentinel with a torch is awaking his comrades, and the light is reflected on his armour, and in the corners into which it does not penetrate, play the beams of the moon. As the Liberation of St Peter is above one of the windows, it is not so well lighted as the other frescoes. The daylight streams down from the window upon the face of the spectator, and its struggles with the painted illumination on the walls around have been so clearly anticipated and skilfully managed that one seems actually to see the smoke of the torch, the radiance of the angel, and the transparent darkness of the night. All this appears so natural and lifelike, and so great was the initial difficulty of the conception, that one can hardly believe oneself in the presence of a mere picture. The shadows and reflexes, the smoke and fire of the torches, the varied light playing upon the arms of the soldiers, are all so true that they prove Raphael to have been the painter of painters; so far as the imitation of a night event is concerned, painting has never produced a more divine or more universally admired and appreciated work.
Mass of Bolsena, 1512-1514. Fresco, width: 660 cm (base). Stanza di Eliodoro, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
The second fresco in the Stanza di Eliodoro, the Mass of Bolsena, is free from those extraneous preoccupations which were calculated to spoil both the painter and his art. Nothing is to be found in it but the most noble and touching of religious sentiments.
The surprise, the delight, the transport of faith, which do not appear on the right hand of the composition, where the prelates and representatives of authority successfully conceal their feelings, are forcibly indicated in the free and spontaneous enthusiasm of the groups on the left. First there is the priest, who seems astonished and humbled, and submissively passes from doubt or indifference to active belief. By his side, the kneeling acolytes express by their gestures the strength of their feelings. Behind the choir stalls we see two citizens, one of whom is triumphantly showing to his incredulous companion the miracle which has just taken place. The enthusiasm of the crowd below is indescribable; some with folded hands prostrate themselves on the altar steps, some excitedly wave their arms to show their amazement, whilst others seem to be rushing frantically into the sanctuary. The whole is full of life, movement, and eloquence. But even here Raphael does not abuse his triumph; he has placed in the angle formed by the steps a group of young mothers, who, like the Swiss to whom they form a pendant, have not yet perceived the bleeding Host. One of them is quietly caressing her infant, while another turns to learn the cause of all the tumult – in a moment they, too, will join in the general enthusiasm.
The whole scene is admirable, and combines all the beauties of composition with those of eloquent expression, and to these are joined a warmth of colouring not before seen in Raphael’s work.
Encounter of Leo the Great with Attila, 1513-1514. Fresco, width: 750 cm (base). Stanza di Eliodoro, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
There can be no doubt that both the Encounter of Leo the Great with Attila and the Expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple are allusions to the victories gained by the Papacy. Whatever the Pope’s motive may have been in having the Encounter of Leo the Great with Attila painted, the choice of the subject was a happy one. It recalls one of the most brilliant successes of the Papacy after it had become the sovereign power in Rome, and that a success due solely to moral force. What could be happier than the choice by the painter of a victory gained by papal eloquence in the presence of two opposed civilisations, that of ancient Rome, which was at its last gasp, and that of the invaders who were approaching their triumph?
By placing the Pope in front of Attila, Raphael justifies the apparition of the two Apostles who intervene in answer to his appeal. He has accentuated as much as he could the contrast between classic civilisation and the half-savage hordes whose arrival was a signal for waste and desolation. We may well say that in the Encounter of Leo the Great with Attila there is more than mere flattery to the reigning Pope; there is the representation of a great historic event. The terrible scenes of the invasion have never been recalled more graphically or by a more energetic brush, and Raphael’s genius for once raised official painting to the height of epic poetry.
Aeneas Carrying Anchises (detail from Fire in the Borgo), 1514-1517 . Fresco, width: 670 cm (base). Stanza dell’Incendio di Borgo, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
About the middle of the same year Raphael received the commission for the frescoes of the third room, that which is known as the Stanza dell’Incendio di Borgo. In fact, the Incendio di Borgo (Fire in the Borgo) is the only one among them that can be considered as his own personal work. In the Battle of Ostia, still more in the Crowning of Charlemagne and the Oath of Leo III, the assistance of pupils is only too evident. Overwhelmed with work, Raphael had only time to compose the Cartoons, leaving to his scholars the labours of tracing and painting them. Hence the want of life in the heads, the coldness of the colouring, and the want of delicacy in the details. Sometimes he was obliged to allow others to help in the execution of the Cartoons. The time had passed when he could ponder a subject, and wait for its execution till his ideas were ripened by meditation.
In the first of the frescoes in the Torre Borgia, the Incendio di Borgo, Raphael carries an episode of the Liber Pontificalis to the height of an epic poem. The representation of a miracle accomplished six or seven hundred years before by Pope Leo IV – who, by making the sign of the cross, stopped the flames which threatened to destroy the Borgo – was not a subject likely to inspire an artist of the Renaissance. But Raphael’s imagination clothes this event of mere local interest with splendid pictorial capabilities. It is not the Borgo which is burning, as Burckhardt has so eloquently expressed it, it is Troy. The admirable group on the left, composed of Æneas, Anchises, Crëusa, and Ascanius, forbids any doubt upon the point. The subject suggested by Leo is relegated to the background: reminiscences of the Æneid eclipse those of the papal chronicle, and the artist has created a splendid and typical conflagration, equally adapted to all ages and all countries, which no other man has portrayed with equal force.
Fire in the Borgo, 1514-1517. Fresco, width: 670 cm (base). Stanza dell’Incendio di Borgo, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City.
Fire in the Borgo (detail), 1514-1517. Fresco, width: 670 cm (base). Stanza dell’Incendio di Borgo, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
Stupor, resignation, despair, devotion, heroism, are here personified once for all. In this celebrated work qualities of the first order are blended with great faults. In it Raphael has renounced that unity and rhythm which had formerly ruled his compositions. Here, in place of a large and excited crowd, there are but a few groups, sometimes even solitary figures, all without any very intimate cohesion. Everyone is thinking of himself, and not of his neighbour. Hence the scattered interest, which in some degree lessens the effect of the work. The individual figures are admirable – the weeping mothers, the desperate young man letting himself down by the wall, the water-carriers with robes blown about by the wind. Maternal solicitude, stupefaction, and individual heroism, are marvellously rendered; the energy of the expression is equalled only by the boldness of the design. The modelling is perfect, and Raphael shows, by the Incendio di Borgo, that anatomy had no secrets from him. There is much in its tours de force which reminds us of Michelangelo. It is to be regretted that a motive more adapted for a melodrama than an epic should have been allowed to diminish the effect of so great a conception – we mean that of the mother who hands her infant over the wall to its father, who, escaping half-clothed, stands on tip-toe to receive the precious burden. Such an episode would not have been out of place in the naive compositions of the quattrocentisti, but it would have been better omitted from the Stanze of Raphael. The unity and harmony that are wanting in the foreground of the composition are to be found in full force in the farther groups. Painting has never given us a passage more warm in feeling or more pure in line than the group of women who kneel beneath the balcony which supports the Pope. This scene is admirable both in expression and composition, and may be fairly compared to the finest passages in the Stanza della Segnatura.
We pass rapidly over the other pictures of the third room; Raphael’s part was confined to the Cartoons, and it is not certain that even those were done by his own hand. The genuineness is disputed of many of the figures, and critics are quite unable to agree as to the part that may be attributed to the master himself. Innumerable restorations, the earliest dating from the reign of Clement XII, further tend to diminish our interest in the Battle of Ostia, the Crowning of Charlemagne, and the Oath of Leo III.
Crowning of Charlemagne, 1514-1517. Fresco, width: 670 cm (base). Stanza dell’Incendio di Borgo, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City.
The Battle of Ostia, 1514-1517. Fresco, width: 770 cm (base). Stanza dell’Incendio di Borgo, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City.
Justice, Raphael (design) and School of Raphael (execution), c. 1517-1524. Fresco. Sala di Costantino, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
In the Vatican yet one more Stanza had to be decorated before the Pope’s apartments could be called complete. It was the immense saloon at the corner of the court of San Damaso, which is now known to us as the Hall of Constantine. Although we have had to condemn some of the subjects previously chosen by Leo X for illustration, we must acknowledge that in this case the adopted programme could hardly be objected to by the severest critic. The history of the emperor who assured the final triumph of the Church, and the glorification of so many illustrious popes (St Peter, Clement I, Urban I, Damaso, Leo I, Felix III, and Gregory VII), were subjects perfectly adapted for commemoration in the chief papal dwelling. But this superiority of programme has not sufficed to raise the fame of the Hall of Constantine to a level with that of the other Stanze, because, among all the vast paintings which it contains, there is not one which comes from the hand of Raphael.
It has been said that Raphael meant to use the oil method for the decoration of this hall. Some attempts were made in that direction, and they obtained the approbation of Bibbiena, who belauded them in the presence of Sebastiano del Piombo, declaring that from thence forward people would think nothing of the rooms painted in fresco. But Raphael’s successors soon changed their opinion, and caused the parts executed in oil to be destroyed.
Battle of Constantine against Maxentius, Raphael (design) and Giulio Romano (execution), 1517-1524. Fresco. Sala di Costantino, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
At the death of the master in April 1520, the work in the last of the Stanze was not even commenced. The Pope had not even definitely fixed upon the subjects to be illustrated. A letter addressed to Michelangelo a few months after Raphael’s death, by Sebastiano del Piombo, informs us that the decision had been suspended with the following scenes: the Vision of the Cross, a Victory of Constantine, a Battle, and the Leprosy of Constantine. This list was in no way final, as two of the subjects, the Victory and the Leprosy, were afterwards rejected and replaced by others, with which Raphael had absolutely nothing to do, as they were commissioned long after his death.
We shall not describe this series of pictures, most of which owed nothing to Raphael beyond their general arrangement. His pupils seem to have respected his instructions in the Battle of Constantine – as we may convince ourselves by comparing with it the beautiful drawing now in the Louvre – but in the other scenes, suggested, in their general lines, by him, they made numerous modifications and alterations. But with all its imperfections, the Battle of Constantine, as we now see it, produces a great impression. Our attention is not broken up between the episode of a combat, as in the works of Paolo Uccello, of Leonardo, and of Michelangelo; what we see is a real battle, with its crowded masses, learnedly arranged, indeed, but with all the confusion of mortal strife. The victory, however, is in no doubt. The young emperor has forced himself clear, as if by supernatural energy, of the crowding ranks of his own army; his head high, his looks proud and assured, he curbs his charger with one hand, while with the other he directs his javelin against the unhappy Maxentius, who, but a few paces away, sinks into the muddy Tiber and carries with him the last hopes of the pagan world.
