|#
* · · ·--：·
v dºs º e, ， ， ， ：.£ € © · t, ae,|-�-3. № 4 · !!s º… º’,
№. ！！ ！！& & & & & & & &, +, −, × c. g.|-* ,e º £ © ® • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
* · * * · · · · · · · · · · · · · * * w：eº： "--ſae，;- ·~|-， ！|-- --
teºs.& №.3， ſºſ;· ·} |-， ， ， ， , ，... • • •====|-·
§ 33¿íſlººſſſſſſſ|}}}∞
�. . ^，3%Ķķ （）\,
ae ：•^，..，^.|§）,·
| ºffſ
#||
ſ ( ; ' ' : ; ;
§§§
;:
tli
Piłłłłł.
iſłłi
viſº¿
fºliº
it wº
; : " [1;
|
ſ
#fff;
* , ſº ºf . * * , º ſº
as at sº a sº- a sº-, - a
-- Hiſ;
• * : * * * * * *
- - -- . . . ~~~~ ** ****
EE-E-E--------------
º
*\ }
| 5 || №
)，
įſſ!
}
r. [， }.
ff;
#ff8
įºſ:
|№ſºſ
ſºſ
żęI:
| 2
Èſ
|
|]]';\, |-
|
ſ{
16y}\|\S）/Z(ſ）
ºſſ
·，.x v.-�-
× ：∞，|-（ ， ， .' * ***ae :-·..3->I-TOER， FĂCºº || ?
*...*， f*，• ~-|-·• • •：• • • •-
& & & & &.*VŠº ºš， *■■ ■●， ！º º ºſº º º º 4 ： $ $ % ^ & C º $ ！
· ·• ！ "·•º ae„ … º
）
* * * *-*- --º-º-º-ººrº ºsº º, ºr -
\，
* •U
• • •
Fºº, T.
[]
ºu,¿¿.*
（）...čºſ•
ſºſyº."¡||||||
§ © ®
i
i
º
#
º
fºrț¢ £ *@*?* '..?！!!
f
* * * *s*…*¿¿.*-"， ！！º• • • •
№.ſºº-ººººººººººſaeſrae！*， *）?
{{
' ' (; ; ; lſº j'ſ.
R
* **** *** *** **** *-* * * * * * * * ***, * * * *- : *-*.*.*.*.*
tři’ſ， №ſſºſ， š:
*******~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~ ~ ！！******
-- ……..- .-.….….….…….… …ºne…ſu
ºn:
§§
' * *******®
|-ſa- sºw （’’

ET
T Uyº. sº es YººHºº
IIIllllllllllllº & fºLI IIIllllllllll:
- - º Qº) # º cº-
LIBRARYºgº of THE
. tnIVERSITY OF MICH6AN
º
\- . .”
:
s
ººft2
&. Sº º: Sº, ſº ...".
§§fininsuº: *…
jºº §
•'-->
.* * * *
..fºr
sº lºº.
*
,-
ź
º
^, S it." --
:
E;
%
§
§
º -
º
sºlº", -
Nº.5
JºJº JALUATAIUKL.Kºlººlºº Rºſº.º.º.
- . . . • ' . . ]
=}
T
[-]
º
º
C-
[-
ſº
C
º -
|- tº
E {
[.
[-]
C
E.
E-3
E} i.
E
E
E
-4
.. . . ſ:
- ~...~. S.-S-Dºº"
- - ..º.º. º. & 2.É.-.
HIIITIIITITUTIRITUTIIITUTE: 3: |||||III
º

LP-UM PINXT CALA MATTA sºul ºr


-
M U R I L L ()
AND THE
SPAN ISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
F|F TEEN ENGRAVINGS ON STEEL
AND NINETEEN ON WOOD.
1777/y AAV ACCOUNT OF 7///E SCA/OOZ ANZ) / 7.S. GAZAZ MAS 7/2/'.S,
- º
- By WILLIAM B. SCOTT.
§||
º
| l º
|ºlſº
º | ---
-
*\tº\
º
- º
|\\
ſºlº
- \
º
---
|llº
M ---
º
L
º
º
º * Nº.
º º º
º
º W.
\\
º, ſº
º º
|\
Corsini Madonna (Murillo).
He who Sevilla has not seen
Has not seen a marvel great;
Who to Granada has not been
Can have nothing to relate.
Spanish Popular Rhyme.
LONDON AND NEW YORK :
GEORGE ROUT LED G E AND SON S.
1873.


' TO
SIR. W. STIRLING MAXWELL, BART.,
THE AUTHOR WHO HAS DONE MOST FOR
T H E PA. IN T E R S O F S P A. IN
OUT of TIIE LANGUAGE OF THE count RY,
THE FOLLOWING LITTLE ESSAY
*> * ## Iſmåtribet.
PREFACE.
NSºsſº Nº.
$HE literature of the Spanish Schools of Painting and Sculpture—or, more
properly speaking, that relating to the Artists biographically, as there
were three centres of activity in the Fine Arts in Spain, or four including
the later school of Madrid, so that a single narrative has not been found very
convenient—is considerable. The most important of the original authorities are
the following: “Arte de Pintura,” by Francisco Pacheco, 4to, Sevilla, 1649, a
book so rare that a fac-simile edition has been published at a high price in
Madrid, some time since; “Museo Pictorico,” by Don Antonio Palomino, three
volumes, folio, Madrid, 1795, which contains the lives of 233 artists flourishing
from the time of Ferdinand the Catholic to the conclusion of the reign of Philippe
IV. ; the “Diccionario Historico,” of Cean Bermudez, in six volumes, 12mo,
published so lately as 1800 in Madrid. This last is the storehouse from which
all later writers have liberally borrowed. A fourth Spanish authority is the
“Viage de España,” by Antonio Ponz.
Of the second of these works an English abridgment appeared in London in
1739, only a few years after its publication in Madrid; and a “Life of Murillo,
with Observations on the School of Seville,” a book partly made up by reprinting
in the language of the originals, partly a translation of a small separate tract by
Cean Bermudez, produced in 1806 as a letter to a friend, was published in London,
by Edward Davies, who calls himself an old guardsman, in 1819. In the preface
to this confused little work, Davies says that the works on Spanish painting are
so numerous that the Bibliografia Roma (1788) of the Abate Comolli occupies
eleven pages 4to, with their enumeration.
Previous to the appearance of Cean Bermudez' important work, Mr. Cumberland
had produced his “Anecdotes of Painters in Spain in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth
Centuries,” two volumes, 16mo, London, 1782. Cumberland had resided in Madrid
and enjoyed advantages there, and his book is a very creditable one for the time.
Of late years the subject has received much more attention in this country and in
France. Quilliet's “Dictionnaire des Peintres Espagnols,” 1816, was followed by
“Les Arts Italiens en Espagne: ou Histoire des Artistes Italiens qui contribuérent
b

vi - AREFA CE.
a embellir les Castilles,” a small folio, published at Rome, 1825. In Paris, L. Viardot
produced “Notices sur les Principeux Peintres de la l'Espagne,” 1839, and “Les
Musées d’Espagne, d’Angleterre, et de Belgique,” in 1843. More lately, the same
writer has been associated with W. Bürger, Paul Muntz, Paul Lefort, and the
Editor, in producing “L’Ecole Espagnole,” in M. Charles Blanc’s “Histoire des
Peintres,” &c. º
In England most of all has been done. W. Stirling (now Sir W. Stirling
Maxwell, Bart.) published his “Annals of the Artists of Spain,” in three volumes,
1848, and “Velazquez and his Works,” in 1855; works full of knowledge and fine
appreciation, written in a manner that invests the subject with continued interest.
Nearly at the same time Sir Edmund Head’s “Handbook of the Spanish School of
Painting” came out (Murray, 1848), intended to supplement Kugler's “Handbook
of Painting,” which bestowed only twenty-four pages on Spain. It is remarkable
that two such works should have been produced, independently of each other, at
the same moment. The “Annals of the Artists of Spain” is, of course, the more
complete and every way important. Both are now, it appears, out of print, and
indeed difficult to procure. We should also gratefully mention Mr. Ford’s “Hand-
book for Travelling in Spain,” the first edition in two volumes; a book unrivalled
for fulness of information and reliableness of critical judgment on the most of
matters connected with the Arts in Spain. This also is not a book in the market.
In Mr. R. N. Wornum’s “Epochs of Art” there is an able résumé of the subject,
and in Mr. Street’s able work, “The Gothic Architecture in Spain,” is much valuable
information on that branch of the subject, and a very complete list of the architects
and decorative artists employed on the Cathedrals.
It is remarkable that Germany has contributed so little to the literature of the
Spanish School of Painting, “Die Christliche Kunst in Spanien,” Leipsig, 1853,
by J. D. Passavant, being nearly alone. It is an able essay, but not much more,
and embracing architecture and sculpture as well as painting.
It is well for the writer of the following pages that the latest and most analytic
works on our subject are not in the Spanish language. Those above mentioned
have been his authorities for all the historical facts, and in some degree for the
inferences and conclusions deduced from them. The critical verdict, where the
author has ventured to express one, which he can only do within limitations,
belongs to himself.
BELLEVUE House, CHELSEA,
1872.
«»
CONTENTS,
INTRODUCTORY ESSAY 1.
LUIS DE MORALES AND HIS SUCCESSORS 25
JOSEPH RIBERA, CALLED SPAGNOLETTO 42
FRANCISCO ZURBARAN 52
DON DIEGO WELAZQUEZ DE SILVA 59
BARTOLOMIE ESTEBAN MURILLO 72
CONCLUSION (FROM THE DEATH of MURILLO To THE PRESENT). S6
101
APPENDIX, I.-MURILLO's PICTURES IN THIS Country
II.-CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE OF THE MASTERS OF THE SPANISH School, º . 107
5 *
STEEL ENGRAVINGS
PORTRAIT OF MURILLO
I'rontispiece
SPANISH (PEASANT) GIPSY BOYS (Dulwich Gallery)—MuRILLo. Beginning of Introductory Essay
EXTACY OF THE VIRGIN (Dulwich Gallery)
ECCO HOMO (Louvre)—MoRALES
ST. JEROME (Formerly in the Aguado Gallery)—RIBERA (SPAGNoLETTo) .
ST. PETER OF ALCANTARA (Formerly in the Aguado Gallery)—ZURBARAN
A SPANISH LADY (Sir Richard Wallace, Bart.)—VELAzquez .
THE VIRGIN OF THE ANGELS (Formerly in the Aguado Gallery)—MURILLO
SPANISH PEASANT BOY 3) 3)
SPANISH PEASANT GIRL 5 y 3 y
COUNTING THE GAINS (R. Gallery, Madrid)
FLOWER GIRL (Dulwich Gallery)
JACOB'S DREAM (Aguado Gallery)
JACOB WITH LABAN ,
THE YOUNG ST. JOHN (National Gallery, London)
33
3)
WOOD ENGRAVINGS.
. Face page 25
42
52
59
72
76
78
82
86
92
101
104
ENGRAVED BY
CALAMATTA.
J. STEPHENSON.
J. C. ARMYTAGE.
MAILLEFER.
Z. PREvost.
A. MAssoN.
LEROUX.
NARGEOT.
BLANCHARD.
BLANCHARD.
J. C. ARMYTAGE.
P. LIGHTFoot.
IKERNOT.
ICERNOT.
L. STOCKs, R.A.
MADoNNA AND CHILD (Corsini Palace)—MURILLO. Title Page.
MATER DOLOROSA (R. Museum, Madrid)—MoRALEs .
CIRCUMCISION 3) 52 3 *
RIBERA (SPAGNoLETTo), Portrait
MARTYRDOM OF ST. LAURENCE—RIBERA
MoNK IN PRAYER (National Gallery, London)—ZURBARAN
VELAzquez (Florence Gallery), Portrait
THE DRUNKARDS (R. Museum, Madrid)—VELAzquez
THE WATER SELLER of SEVILLE (Duke of Wellington)—VELAzou Ez
INFANT DoN CARLos (R. Museum, Madrid) 7 5.
Assembly of ARTISTs (Louvre) > )
THE THREAD SPINNERs (R. Museum, Madrid) $ 2
DoN FERDINAND of AUSTRIA (R. Museum, Madrid) * *
Court DWARF (R. Museum, Madrid)
MURILLo, Portrait (Formerly in Spanish Gallery, Louvre)
Box AND Dog—MURILLO
ExTACY of ST. FRANCIS (Formerly in the Aguado Gallery)
Goya, Portrait by himself
GIRL WITH FRUIT-MURILLO
IPAGIC
28
42
49
56
59
62
63
(35
66
G7
69
71
72
77
85
94
99
... Sºº-º-º-Nº on sºul-ºr
- -
//
// |-
·
%
|
ſ.
}}
}
M. Lºll-Lº. ºlº-


SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING,
–Q--
I.
a few words his point of view to begin with. Aware that the literary portion of a
volume whose attractions to the public are the engravings, is very frequently looked
upon with disregard as most probably done too slightly to be permanently valuable,
he is still willing to try his hand at the task, and hopes to write what will be
readable by those who know something of art, and interesting to those who do not.
He is told that gift-books or table-books, or whatever similarly illustrated publica-
tions are called, are never read, that “a gift horse should not be looked in the
mouth;” but if the courtesy of the receiver prevents him doing so, it does not follow
that the giver should not - o
Besides, this is possibly the first of a series of similar volumes intended to
illustrate in some small degree the labours of other countries or painters, and the
- writer does not see why so fair a field may not be visited by him with some benefit
to his readers, although but for a day. To make a book of reference, or an
exhaustive history of the life and works of men whose names follow each other so
closely, in such an essay as the following, is the labour of years, placing the author
thereof in the position of master like that of the artists themselves; and what the
popular essayist has to do in his narrower limits is to know what the master has said
as well as what the painter has wrought, but then the verdict of the critic may be
IB

2 SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
given in few words, and must indeed be his own, It is this critical verdict after
all that determines the value of the Writing, and decides the length of its career,
whether it shall be annual or perennial.
The besetting sin of the writer for picture books, is a species of sentimental
rhetoric, as if each of the various works that have descended to us from past times
was a marvel, and the painters themselves different from us in kind as well as in
quality. In this he resembles the old-fashioned collector who used to demand from
his visitor an amount of admiration as he led him from picture to picture, sometimes
fine and sometimes bad, now genuine and now too clearly spurious, that made him
the bane of his circle. So far from this, the present writer may acknowledge at
once that he considers many of the works left us by even the great men of the past
as supremely interesting only in connection with the time in which they were done.
They are to us the flowers of extinct plants preserved to us by the accidents of
genius, flowers that can never be found again, but which for the most part were
developed into higher forms, and live with us still. It has been said with sufficient
general truth by Monsieur Taine that genius is nothing but power expressed, and
no power can be fittingly expressed except in the country of which it is the product,
and amongst the people whose education, example, and character, in a thousand
shapes, fed and trained it, and whose condition of Taste calls it forth. This Monsieur
Taine says in relation to writers, poets, but with how much more force is it true of
artists, who deal only with the aspects surrounding them, and who can speak only
by the symbols of their age When the renaissance had completed its triumph, and -
several generations of Romans had lived under pagan popes, the pretty naturalism
of Raphael's Madonnas was received with unspeakable gratification instead of the
earlier purism, and the learned and wholly unchristian nakedness of Michelangelo
eclipsed every other form of art.
These two developments of religious art, Raphael's female grace and Michelangelo's
masculine grandeur, resulting from the same conditions, and taking place simul-
SPAM/SH SCHOOL OF PA/WZZAWG. 3
taneously, are, it must be allowed, sufficiently different from each other, and this
difference shows how wide is the area to be filled by the individuality of the artist,
animated by the largest amount of original force, and acting under a régime of
intellectual freedom; but in Spain, where the faith grew up side by side with a hated
Mahometanism, and a red-hot sword of clerical conservatism turned every way in
all men's sight from the end of the middle ages to the close of the seventeenth
century, no such diversity was possible, even if the intellectual force had been
there. As it was not, we find no attempt to express either the beauty of the one
or the sublimity of the other, but the whole art of Spain shows a uniform motive
and character; it is ascetic, monastic, and subservient to the church, the church in
the narrowest form of tyranny any clerical body has yet assumed.
Dut apart from the objects and motives which limited the subjects of the Spanish
painter, and determined his treatment of these, there is his art itself, which in
nearly all technical qualities is so superb and rich and powerful, that we forget to
inquire further, and are willing to accept him as he is. These qualities are most
often seen in portraiture, but they glorify nearly every canvas that came out of the
ateliers of the Peninsula, and elevate the most painful of the thousands of martyrdoms
into noble works of taste.
And here we may as well state what may be looked upon as a kind of confession
of faith, in beginning to treat, however shortly and popularly, the works and artists
of former ages and countries, that we hold the art of Painting to be in its nature a
materialistic art, its proper subject the solid bodies of things; and secondly, that it
appears to us to have completed its task, fulfilled its cycle, and that all that is left
for the modern artist, in respect to the technique of his art, is to endeavour to do
again what has been done before, and to use it in obedience to other motives. To
say this may appear to value the schools of the past too highly, Rome; Venice, the
Low Countries, and Spain, with their composition, colour, chiaro-scuro, and power
of hand; but all these qualities are only elements in the education of the “coming
SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAYWTYWG.
man,” whereas they are nearly everything in the art of the past. If they were not
so, the value of the religious pictures of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries would
have decreased with the decay of mythological religion, instead of the antiquated
dogmas and apocryphal gospels being preserved to us by the odour of art, and
made poetic by its beauty. In the iconoclastic struggle during the early middle
ages, when the Eastern and Western Churches were both consolidating their positions,
the idea was that Sculpture was the materialistic, and therefore the art liable to
Superstitious uses, and that Painting was representative like language, and had,
properly speaking, no existence by itself. And this no doubt is in one sense a
statement of the distinction between the arts, painted sculpture being, of all art-
products, applied to religion most anthropomorphic, and dangerously allied to
fetish worship; but it was only a defective criticism to suppose Painting was
essentially different. The stronger influence of painted sculpture the Latin Church
continued to employ, and its development in Spain, where we shall see the Church
had entire control of the arts, and employed a surveillance over the life and death
of the painters as well as sculptors, became so complete that we cannot help
breaking the thread of our argument to introduce an account of it, although from
so well-known a source as Mr. Ford’s Handbook. The making of statues for the
churches, and the colouring of them, was the occupation of thousands, and deemed
of so much importance that Alonzo Cano and Montañes frequently stipulated that
no one but themselves should paint the images they carved. It will be remembered
that Praxiteles said he valued most those of his own works that Nicias had painted,
but these Spanish artists were painters as well as sculptors, and kept the work in
their own hands. But they were and are dressed as well as painted. In the
ancient times these figures were treated exactly as if they were living gods. Real
food was provided for them; they were washed and dressed by their own attendants,
as we learn from St. Augustine, Livy, and other authorities. They spoke, bled,
perspired, and wept, and all this many do in Spain, whereby, as Palomino justly
---

SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
5
remarks, “the Church has been much enriched, and innumerable souls converted.”
Mr. Ford says, “No one is allowed to undress the Paso or Sagrada imagen of the
Virgin. Such images, like queens, have their camerera mayor, their mistress of the
robes, and their boudoir or camerin, where their toilet is made. This duty has
now devolved on venerable single ladies, and thence has become a term of reproach,
ha quedada para vestio imagines, ‘she has gone to dress the images;' but the
making and embroidering the superb dresses of the Virgin still afford constant
occupation to the wealthy and devout, and is one reason why this Moorish manu-
facture still thrives pre-eminently in Spain. Her costume, when the Pasos are
borne in triumphal procession through the streets, forms the object of envy, critique,
and admiration. The ancients paid much more attention to the decorum and
propriety of costume than the Spanish clergy: the Roman signa being so well
dressed that it was considered to be a compliment to compare a fine lady to one.
In the remote villages and in the mendicant convents the most ridiculous masquerades
were exhibited, such as the Saviour in a court-dress with wig and breeches, whereat
the Duc de St. Simon was so offended. The traveller will see stranger sights even
than this. If once a people can be got to fancy a manequin is a god, if they can
get over this first step, nothing else ought to create either a smile or surprise. Some
figures have only heads, feet, and arms, the body being left a mere block, became
destined to be covered with drapery; these are called imagines à vestir, images to
be dressed, and are exactly like those described by Pausanias. These Pasos are
only brought out on grand occasions, principally during the holy week. The rest
of the year they are stowed away, like the properties of a theatre, in regular store-
houses, and for these the traveller should inquire.” All this prevailed most in
Andalusia, from whence the greatest artists sprang, and although it still subsists
in great force, was still more triumphant in the time of Alonzo Cano, Ribera, and
Zurbaran, the most monastic of painters.
Compared to this degradation of sculpture, any legitimate application of the art
C
6 SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
of painting may be considered to appeal purely to the imagination; but the relative
position of the two arts, in regard to their aims, has entirely changed of late years;
witure or form, is representative of the Ideal, and painting, or colour, of the Real.
Nor do we desire to speak of the painter's art in relation to religion only when we
call it materialistic, it deals only with the appearances of tangible objects, whatever
application it may serve, and we hold that the great masters of the great schools
have carried it to perfection. As the art of sculpture attained to a full expression
of Form in the time of Phidias, so painting, in its various technical components, has
attained the fullest and most perfect expression already. Every art has its
appropriate field, in which no other art can supply its place; and besides there
are periods of history more favourable than all others for the realisation of the
powers of each of the fine arts, and in Spain painting attained an intrinsic excellence
and an extrinsic importance about the end of the reign of Ferdinand and Isabel,
equal to any of the Italian schools at the same period, and greater than it is possible
can ever be reached by Germany, France, or England, now that painting is only a
luxury, and the engineer is in the ascendant.
The rise of the art in Spain was late compared to Italy, and was, in fact, imported
from thence, at a time when a native school had already existed for a century in
Germany; so that, chronologically, it stands third; but in technical excellence it is
only second to Italian painting in the hands of the few greatest masters the modern
world has seen.
II.
The beginning of Painting, properly called fine art, in Spain, does not go back to
the middle ages, nor has it any Byzantine origin, although the great cathedrals—
Leon, Santiago, Tarragona, Burgos, and Toledo are all of an early date, and show
extraordinary powers of design, both as architectural monuments and as storehouses
SPAAW/SH SCHOOL OF APAIAWTYWG. 7
of sculpture. The two arts of painting and sculpture have been more closely allied in
Spain than anywhere else, and the earliest names in the history of art in that country
are not only those of the men who built these wonderful churches, but of their deco-
rators by means of carving—Maestro Jayme Castayls, who made the statues on the
grand front of the cathedral of Tarragona, in 1376, Maestro Anrique, and others.
There, as with us in England, the earliest names of painters are those of strangers;
Gerardo Starnino, an Italian, and Maestro Jorge Inglès, who must have been one
of our countrymen, at a time when we had no artists at home. *
The first centre or school of the art was doubtless at Seville, and the earliest
name worth noting of any importance is that of Antonio del Rincon, who is supposed
to have studied under Andrea Castagno and Ghirlandajo, towards the last years of the
fifteenth century. These early indications of Italian influences, and this late com-
mencement when the renaissance was in full authority, must be always kept in mind
in speaking of Spanish art. Italy inherited the arts and spread them over Europe;
north of the Alps, the earlier native tastes contended with the southern influence;
but in Spain there was a greater sympathy and no mediaeval or Gothic pictorial art
to supplant, and suddenly in the beginning of the year 1500 we find in Toledo,
Valencia, and Seville able painters and admirable works—evidences of a fully
formed technical art—without a period of infancy having preceded it to the same
extent as elsewhere.
To be a Castilian and to speak Castilian is to be a Spaniard par excellence; but
among all the little kingdoms that went to form the greater one, as it now exists,
Andalusia was thought of with most pride, and the proverbial rhyme we have
placed on our title-page—
“He who Sevilla has not seen,
Has not seen a marvel great;
Who to Granada has not been,
Can have nothing to relate,”
8 SPAAWISH SCHOOZ OF PA/WTIZVG.
shows the pleasure taken by natives of other parts of the peninsula in the southern
states, especially in the province Wrested at last, after many bloody days and years,
from the Moors. The banner of Castile first appeared on the towers of the .
Alhambra on January 2nd, 1492. This date inaugurates the century of Spanish
greatness, when it could be truly said, “When Spain is angry, the whole world
trembles.” Ferdinand of Arragon had married Isabel of Castile, and before he died,
Naples, Navarre, and the New World were his, with the apparently exhaustless
wealth of Mexico and Peru. Both commerce and war added to the greatness of
“the Spains,” and the Kaiser Charles V. (I. of Spain) in a great measure subjected
Italy to his beloved country, as well as Flanders; thus the three countries where
painting then flourished were under the rule of Madrid, up to that day a com-
paratively insignificant town.
As the whole population, greedy of gain, was moved to precipitate itself on
the newly-discovered countries, so the whole of the coming men in art crossed over
to Italy, and many of them returned as able as the masters they had studied—
Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, Titian, Tintoretti being all beginning their career.
A mere list of the names of the painters at one period of time thus educating them-
selves in Italy and bringing home Italian ideas and practice, is rather more than we
can give. The greatest of these were, perhaps, Naverrete the mute, called commonly
El Mudo, Juan de Joanes, and Pablo de Cespedes, who being three of the twelve
greater artists of Spain, as classified by M. Viardot, we may have to speak of
again; others were Alonzo Berruquete, Correa, Liańo, Gaspar Becerra, all from
Castile; Francesco Ribalta, Herman Yañez, Pablo Esquarte, Luis de Vargas,
Pedro de Villegas-Marmolejo, Pedro de Rapis. These names—of which not one
is likely to be known to the reader—will serve to show how little Spanish art is
enjoyed or understood out of Spain. Wilkie called Spain the Timbuctoo of artists,
meaning that the great national school of painters he found there had to be explored.
Except Velazquez, Spagnoletto, and, above all, Murillo, we possess few works by
SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAAV7/AWG. 9
the masters. Now and then such a lovely picture as the portrait of his daughter,
by El Greco (Dominico Theotocopuli), sent to the late Exhibition of Old Masters
at Burlington House by Sir W. Stirling Maxwell, attracts the artist; but, as a rule,
the works of the several painters cannot be identified in London or Paris, and so
possess no marketable value. The collecting propensities of the French generals
during the Peninsular War, particularly of Soult and Sebastiani, neither of whom,
unfortunately, knew very much of art independently of market value, did a good
turn to Spain, as far as extending the knowledge of her greatness in painting; but
they limited themselves to the masters already valued out of Spain. In Cumber-
land’s time even Murillo was little known, and he says very many of the best
pictures can “ never be extracted from the country, as they are in the palaces.” The
War of Independence and its effects altered everything; but public collections
belonging to the towns remain, and have been increased by the suppression of the
monasteries. Few cities, however, possess good collections, and, with the exception
of the capital, are very much restricted to the works belonging to their own
province. This has some propriety, but also some disadvantage, the result being
that the masters of one part of the country are not to be seen elsewhere; and the
cause of this narrowness of appreciation, beginning, perhaps, in the early indé-
pendence of the provinces, has been confirmed by the indifference to all the arts in
Spain of a century and a half. “As for Murillo,” says Cumberland, in 1782,
“although some pieces of his have been exported from Seville, yet I think I may
venture to say that not many of them which pass under his name are legitimate,
and in a less proportion can we find among such as are true pictures any of so capital
a rank as to impart a competent idea of his extraordinary merit.” . . . “In private
houses it is not unusual to discover very fine pictures in neglect and decay, thrown
aside among the rubbish of cast-off furniture, whether it be that the possessor has
no knowledge of their excellence, or thinks it below his notice to attend to their
preservation; but how much soever the Spaniards have declined from their former
J)
I O SPAWISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
taste and passion for the elegant arts, I am persuaded they have in no degree fallen
off from their national character for generosity, which is still so prevalent among
them that a stranger who is interestedly disposed to avail himself of their muni-
ficence, may, in a great measure, obtain whatever is the object of his praise and
admiration.” This amount of indifference had, a few years before this, in 1779, called
forth an edict from the king, Charles III., prohibiting the exportation of pictures by
Murillo, he being the best-known painter of the school out of Spain, and his beggar
boys being more generally acceptable than either his or any other Spanish master's
religious subjects.
Mr. Ford says the works of the men native to the old centres of the art, first
Seville, secondly Valencia, and thirdly, Toledo and Madrid.” (that is to say, Castile)
“in local and uncommunicating Spain” are still “hanging like ripe oranges on
their native branches.” But few cities possess good collections, and, “with the
exception of the capital, those which do are seldom enriched with any specimens of
foreign schools, for such is that of Valencia as regards Seville, and vice versé.” As
to the possibility now of acting on Mr. Cumberland’s hint, and taking a fancy for a
few fine examples, Mr. Ford, who knows the country so well, gives a word of advice
about making purchases in Spain. “A notion exists,” he says, “because few people
have been there curiosity-hunting, that it is ungleaned ground. Nothing can be
more erroneous. The market never was well provided with literary or artistic
wares; the rich cared not for these things, and the clergy made art subservient to
religion, and tied it up in mortmain. Whatever there has been is pretty well
cleared out, during the war, by the swords of the invaders, and since the peace by
the purses of amateurs. Those who expect to pick up good things for nothing,
de gangas, will be woefully disappointed. Let them beware of getting for an old
song, by the merest chance in the world, an ORIGINAL Murillo or relane. These
bargains are indeed as plentiful as blackberries. But when the fortunate amateur
has paid for them, their packing, freight, duty, repairing, lining, cleaning, framing,
SPAAV/SH SCHOOL OF PA/WZTIAWG. I I
and hanging, he will be in a frame of mind to suspend himself.” Spanish pictures,
moreover, are very dark, more visible under the bright sunshine of the south than
through the fogs of England, and they are large, having been for the most part
done for churches and convents. Still, the number by the three or four best-known
painters now in England and Paris is very considerable. Many of these will be
mentioned under the names of the painters. In our National Gallery the Murillos,
three in number, are the subject of conflicting opinions; they are in his later
manner—the principal one, the large Holy Family called the Pedroso Murillo, from
its having belonged to the family of that name until 1810, is one of his latest works,
and the entire absence of elevation or of Sacred character in the figures, is apparent
to every one. Perhaps this very absence recommended the master to the priests of
his time, who did not reflect that the mystical is the very life of art applied to
religion, and also to the French of the present day, who have given way to a furore
for the master. In the Louvre are nine pictures by Murillo, several of them very
important, and One of them, “Le Mystère de la Conception de la Vierge,” the
chef d'oeuvre of the painter, was bought, as the reader may remember, at the sale of
Marshal Soult's gallery, for the largest sum yet paid in an auction room for a
picture, 615,300 francs, being £23,440.
Besides the three Murillos in our National Gallery, there are four works by
Velazquez; one by Zurbaran—a Carthusian praying fervently, with a skull in his
hand, so noble and vigorous in character and expression, we hope the reader
remembers it; two by Ribera, Spagnoletto (the little Spaniard), as he was called
in Naples, because the simpler designation, Lo Spagno (the Spaniard), had been
already appropriated to Giovanni di Pietro, by whom we also possess two. This
last painter never lived in his native country, but was, after Raphael, the most
distinguished of the scholars of Perugino, and does not appear among the artists
of the Spanish school at all. Ribera, on the contrary, was so great a realist, did
so many works for his native country, although he resided in Naples, and these
I 2 SPAWISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
were so influential on the school that he must always be considered as one
of the most important men Spain has produced in the arts.
But not only did painting in Spain rise into its full strength by the professors
crossing over to Italy for their education, foreign artists came to Spain. The
crown of Spain carried with it so many sovereignties that this was natural enough,
especially as it suddenly acquired the credit of having half the riches of the
world. Of these some remained altogether, as Dominique Theotocopuli, called
El Greco, and became Spaniards; others were but visitors, as Titian, but still
immensely important, when we consider their visits were paid just at the time
when nearly all the men who have made Spain great in painting were rising into
manhood. Torregiano, the sculptor, whose stay had so unhappy an end infamous
to Spain, as he died in the Inquisition, was one of many sculptors: among painters
we may mention Antonio Moro, Peregrino Tibaldi, Pierre de Champagne, Isaac
de Helle, Antonio Ricci, Bartolomeo, Carducci, and his younger brother Vincenzo,
and Rubens, who was not too late to exercise an influence on the last set who
supported the greatness of Spanish painting. Latest of all, when the decline of
Spain was expressed with fatal clearness by the decline of the native arts, the
foreigner appeared again upon its soil, Luca Giordano, and Raphael Mengs, German
by birth and Italian by culture, being at the head of painting in Madrid for some
years before the death of the latter in 1779.
All this influence from without, however, although it carried the school to a
rapid perfection, did not prevent a strongly-defined national character showing
itself from the first to the last. This character may be described in a few words.
It is grave and ascetic, dark and lurid, and above all natural. Even when treating
the thousand and one saints in the Catholic mythology, and the thousand and one
visions they saw of the divine º persons of the Trinity themselves, the same
naturalistic treatment prevails. There was no early period of purism and archaic
independence, except, indeed, in the Middle Ages, when efforts were isolated and
SPAAISH SCHOOZ OF PAIAWTTWG, I 3
more rude than elsewhere; so the Spanish school never had an ideal, nor any
ascertainable love of the beautiful, and remained without it to the end, Murillo, the
latest master, having never risen above truth to his model and a popular loveliness.
To define the reason of this would lead us a long way about, but it is, after
all, the most interesting of inquiries. What the art of Painting of any people
expresses, that is most at the heart of the nation, and if the cycle of its history
has been fulfilled, and throughout its rise, flourish, and decline, we see so distinct
a unity of expression as exists in Spanish art, we are bound to receive it as the
type and the visible form of the life of the people. There may, however, be some
iron arm interposed to prevent this result, some power foreign to the popular tastes
and antagonistic to the free developments of these, and such a power we imme-
diately find to have existed in Spain: this power was the Church.
III.
Before describing more particularly the directing and repressing authority of
the Church over the arts in Spain, we ought to say that there must have been
a perfect harmony between such authority and the spirit of the people; that, indeed,
the religious element in the Spanish nature was, and perhaps still is, the most
powerful motive force in existence. It is said that even at the present day the
leaders in politics have to be most careful to appear at least to respect everything
and everybody connected with religion. This is, no doubt, the case in all Roman
Catholic countries, where the greater the ignorance the stronger the faith; and
the further we descend in the social scale, the more attached are the people to
the forms of devotion taught them by their fathers; but in the Peninsula, above
all other places, this appears to be the case. “The proverbial gravity of the
Spaniard distinguishes him like his cloak; it is the index of his earnest and
I}
I4. SAEAAVYSH SCHOOL OF AAAWZZMG.
thoughtful nature,” says Mr. Stirling. The faith of the Cross, as developed in
the tenth century, struck its root deeper in his heart than in that of any other
European man, and it was nourished by the blood spilt by him fighting against the
encroachments of the insolent Moor, compared with whom he was illiterate and rude.
Architecture and all the appliances of social life were cultivated very highly
by the Moors, who carried on a trade, in earthenware, for instance, all along the
shores of the Mediterranean, and served the Christian markets in Valencia and
Seville. They were disallowed the use of the likeness, by painting or sculpture,
of the human form, or of any animal; and this may by antagonism have increased
the bias towards the use of images by the Spaniards, entirely without the inter-
vention of the clergy.
In the second place, there was absolutely no respect for the remains of the
antique, if, indeed, any fragments had been preserved. In Italy the existence of
these was one great means of the renaissance and of the ideal; in Germany and
in Flanders there was a thoughtfulness that gave an intellectual ideal,
“For dark and true and tender is the north,
But bright and fierce and fickle is the south.”
Moreover, in Spain, poetry and painting seemed never to have discovered relation-
ship, rather to have gone south, south-west, and north, north-east; poetry, that
is, the ballad, the romance, and the satire, having been the enemy of the cloister
and even of the priest at the end of the middle ages.
In the third place, the Spaniard never was a good merchant: he was cut off
from the rest of Europe by the surrounding sea and the barrier of the Pyrenees,
and was naturally by disposition as well as by climate averse to industry and the
production of wares marketable by use or beauty. When he left home he left
it as a Warrior, a mercenary, and he returned for a long period victorious, prouder
and more brutal than he left. He despised the arts, and left them to the Church.
SPANISH SCHOOL of PAINTING. 15
The descendants of the Iberians and the Celts were then, by the character
of their genius and by historic fatality, the people eventually fitted to be enthusiastic
Catholics, “essentiellement propres à devenir Chretiens,” as M. Charles Blanc has
it. Some portion of the country—that wherein the most pious population have ;:
ever since been found—submitted for long to the régime of an Asiatic despotism,
nursed the determination, at last realised, of expelling the Moslems, who immediately
changed in the mouths of the vulgar from Moros to the diminutive Moriscoes, and
were hunted down till none remained. For this Ferdinand received from the Pope
the appellation of “Most Catholic;” and from this time we have internal peace in
Spain, peace and the Inquisition.
M. Charles Blanc considers the Moors to have induced the love of colour in
the Spaniard, as he considers the commerce with the East to have done in Venice;
but this seems an unnecessary supposition, as the Neapolitan is exactly like the
Spaniard in this taste for colour, both in life and in art.
Thus the Spaniard willingly confided himself and his art into the hands of
the Church, and she looked not to this world, but to the next, not to Venus and
the Graces, but to St. Frances and poverty, the bride he espoused in her foul
rags. “To provide painted books for those who could not read printed ones,”
to disseminate and fix on the popular memory those especial subjects by which
her system was best supported, her purposes answered, and what Tacitus calls
the “sacra ignorantia” of her flocks maintained, was what the Church required
of art; treating it in her palmy power, like the priests of Egypt, it was to be
silent, impassive, and immutable. She exacted a stern adhesion to an established
model; she forbade any deviation from her religious type. To have changed an
attitude or attribute would have been a change of Deity.” But the artists,
there is no doubt, were thoroughly imbued with the spirit of their work; they,
* Ford’s “Handbook of Spain.”
16 SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTIWG.
for the most part, were as earnest in their desire to carry out the objects of the
priest as he himself could be. “In fact,” says Mr. Stirling, “the painter was
not the least popular nor the least important of the servants of the Church. His
end was not merely to decorate or to please, to satisfy the eye or the pride of
the employer; he had to instruct the ignorant, correct the vicious, to guide into
the ways of piety and virtue. It was from him that the young and the indigent
took the little that they knew of evangelical history, of the touching legends of
the saints they were told from the cradle to adore. Perhaps it is difficult for
a Protestant to enter into the importance of the functions of the artist seen from
this point of view. The character and the surroundings of the English people
have rendered it possible, even for the masses, to throw aside symbols and to
receive directly the dogma, even to feel a spiritual enthusiasm for the abstractions
of doctrine. But to the Spaniard these things were then, and are still to-day,
unintelligible; the only ideas he can comprehend, he has arrived at by means
of the pictures or the sculptures that decorate the sanctuary where he prostrates
himself. The greatness of the artist's mission was thus proclaimed by himself as
well as by the public. -
The homilies, as we may call them, with which the painter covered the walls
of cloister or church were finer and more charming than the fiery rhetoric of a
Dominican, or the cunning considerations of the Jesuit. He recognised, he felt
the dignity of the example set before him, and applied himself to it with all the
fervour of the most pious monk. Like Fra Angelico, Juan Joanes had the habit
of turning to prayer, to fasting, and to the communion, to prepare himself on
beginning a new work. Luis de Vargas applied the discipline to his own shoulders,
and he had a coffin by his bed in which he sometimes lay and meditated on death.
Painters occasionally entered into orders, and priests, again, turned pºinters. The
majority of religious houses had, some time or other, some one initiated
in the arts, from whose hand the brethren could show picture or bas-relief in the
SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTING. - 17
chapel, or perhaps a cup or a ciborium in the sacristy. Brother Nicolas Borsas
filled the church and the cloister of the J eronymites at Gandia with a multitude
of compositions, of which some would not derogate from the reputation of his
master, Joanes. Nicolas Factor, the Franciscan, of Valencia, was also known as -
much by his merit as a painter as by the sanctity of his life, which was so great that
he obtained canonisation. The genius of El Mudo (Navarrete) was discovered and
his course directed by a monk of Estrella. Andres de Leon and Julian Fuente
del Saz, brethren of the Escorial, distinguished themselves by the delicacy of the
miniatures with which they ornamented the book of music for the choir of their
convent. The Chartreux of Granada and Seville, Paular and Scala Dei, are proud
of the artistic names of Cotau, Berenguer, Ferrado. Cespedes, one of the leading
painters of Spain, and poet as well, was canon of Cordova. Las Roëlas (el clerigo
Ročlas) and Alonzo Cano occupied prebendaries, the one at Olivares, the other at
Granada.” ”
This seizure of the art of painting by the Catholic clergy was the cause of the
limitations and unsympathetic character of the school properly so called, as well as
of its most striking excellences. And what a difference there must be between
painters working under the wing of the Inquisition and those of any other school
of Europe, men in the world breathing the same atmosphere as all other intellectual
labourers and thinkers about them . But this difference was indeed a national
difference. Piety was the glory of Spain, and this glory has a shadow, or at least
it had in Spain—a shadow of the darkest, intolerant persecution. Savonarola
made an ineffectual attempt to throw the licentious off, in arts, literature, and social
life, and the wº clergy in Rome were entirely indifferent; but in Spain, where,
about the same time, the noble Ximenes was Bishop of Toledo, and where a truly
* This quotation from Mr. Stirling I am under the necessity of re-translating from the French
translation, “Velasquez et ses (Euvres,” by G. Brunet, not having at the moment access to the
original book.
18 SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTING.
pious and humbly orthodox spirit prevailed, long before any martyr fires were lit
for heretics in any other country, except one now and then for some enthusiast
who made himself too obtrusive and importunate, the terrible executions San benito
had begun; and in nine months of one year, 6th January to 4th November, 1481,
two hundred and ninety-eight heretics had suffered at Seville, and these horrible
scenes, more depressing than any under Nero or Dioclesian, were called Acts of
Faith, Autos de Fe 1 And so it continued; Italy became more and more in love
with antique mythology. The remains of sculpture were eagerly sought for and
admired without bounds; Spain, more and more exclusively Christian, condemned
Olympus, abhorred the naked, interdicted it rigidly, and shut up the artist, by force
of law, within the legends of Saints and martyrs, occupied him with the translation
of the evangelists into impressive pictures, of things spiritual into human forms.
The result was the most material and realistic expression of religious story and
symbolism ever known; a people of strong faith and fiery wild passion, whose art
had, from the beginning, no fancy or play—no purely poetic or beautiful side,
as has been said before, threw themselves, with exclusively naturalistic habits of
study, into the service of monachism and the tenets most extreme in southern
Christianity.
Some of the anecdotes illustrating this service are extremely striking. Pacheco
held for a time the commission of the Holy Office to see that no pictures were
painted likely to disturb moral or religious ideas, and he gives his advice to his
brother painters, younger men than himself, he being then seventy years of age,
warning them on many points. His strictures on Michelangelo's Last Judgment,
introduced as illustrating his views, quoted by Sir E. Head, are highly interesting.
He objects to angels without wings and saints without clothes: also to the damned
being in the air, because, as they are without the power of grace, they could not
leave the solid earth. These criticisms have a manifest propriety, we must admit,
from the Orthodox point of view; and when he treats of the Virgin Mary, we find
SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTVAWG. I9
his directions supported by similar reasons. Her feet are by no means to be visible,
and it will be observed, by turning to the engravings in this volume, that this
rule has been strictly observed by Murillo many years after. He points out how
the incidents in her life are to be treated; for example, she is to be dressed in
blue and white in the Immaculate Conception—a peculiarly Spanish mi ect—as we
find her in Murillo's great works. The reason given is conclusive; the Blessed
Virgin was so dressed when she appeared to Doña Beatrix de Silva, a Portuguese
nun, who founded the order called after her. students are not to study the nude,
and, in regard to the female figure, they must see only the hands and faces of
relatives or honourable ladies when painting the saints. “There is not, probably,
in the whole of Spain, such a thing as a painting of a naked female figure of the
size of life, or of any other size.” Even portraits were not to represent extreme
fashions; and prudery was carried so far in the time of Ferdinand VII. that all
the great Italian works which could be reproached with any nakedness were
removed into a closed set of apartments, called the Galeria Reservada, which was
only opened to those who had procured special orders. Mr. Ford terms this
gallery a sort of penitentiary, into which were banished all peccant pictures that
were supposed by possibility corrupting to the purity of Madrid, where purity, it
has been said, is little known after a certain early stage of life. In it Italian and
Flemish improprieties blushed unseen, all the pictures were the works of foreigners
—lumped together like the naughty epigrams of Martial, when collected into an
appendix in well-intentioned editions. “Nothing,” he says, “gave the holy tribunal
greater uneasiness than how Adam and Eve in paradise, blessed souls in purgatory,
the lady who tempted St. Anthony,” or the Last Day of Judgment were to be
* This, however, need not have troubled them, as the Flemings had represented her fully clothed.
Nothing peculiar appears about her in Lucas of Leyden's engraving, for instance, except the horns
budding through her fashionable head-dress, she being, after all, only the Devil himself, disguised as a
lady, politely offering the saint a cup of wine !
2O SAPAAVISAT SCHOOL OF PAIAWTYWG.
painted—circumstances in which either small clothes or long clothes would be highly
misplaced. Describing the Last Judgment of Martin de Voss, at Seville, Pacheco
relates how a bishop informed him that he had chanced, when only a simple monk,
to perform service before this naked multitude—the mitre had not obliterated the
recollection—he observed (he had been a sailor in early life) that rather than
celebrate mass before it again, he would face a hurricane in the Gulf of Bermuda;
the moral effect of the awful Day - of Judgment was so much counterbalanced by
the immoral deshabille.” -
But not only did “the one institution of Spain,” as Sir E. Head terms it, look
well after the painters and sculptors, Pacheco's pupil, Alonzo Cano, narrowly
escaping for having destroyed his own statuette of St. Anthony of Padua;
Torregiano actually dying or committing suicide in his cell when under sentence
for a similar action;” and Antonio Moro having to leave the country because he
had smeared the hand of the most Catholic king with carmine, the Holy Office
being more particular than Philip himself, who took the familiarity jocularly;
they were punished in the next world as well. A painter who had made an
improper picture appeared to his confessor after his death, and informed him that
it was only the intercessions of the saints whose altars he had adorned or whose
deeds he had commemorated while in life, that saved him from being sent to hell.
As it was, he said, he was subjected to the severest treatment of purgatory,
and begged his confessor to prevail on the possessor of the picture to burn it.
* The particulars of the death of Torregiano are considered doubtful by Mr. Stirling and many
others. Yet it seems very certain that he died in the cells of the Inquisition, of self-starvation.
Mr. Stirling mentions in corroboration of the story of his smashing to pieces the statue in terra-cotta
of the Virgin, that a female hand lying upon and partially holding drapery, used for students drawing
from in Spanish ateliers, is traditionally said to be one of the hands of the statue. There is an engraving
of this hand in the “Annals,” and the author recognises the hand as one employed in the same manner
in this country. This does not invalidate the tradition certainly, but it shows this hand is not
exclusively a Spanish property.
SPAAWYSH SCHOOL OF PA/WZYAVG. 2 I
This the confessor did, and then, we are told, the unhappy soul got out of
the fire.
There is a still more astonishing narrative in this rare book by the Inspector of
the Inquisition, quoted at length by Sir E. Head. Miracles, of course, are to be
expected; but one so truly amazing as the following is not often on record.
Pacheco gravely relates that a painter on a high scaffold had just half finished the
figure of the Blessed Virgin, the head, shoulders, and one arm only being done,
When he felt the whole Woodwork on which he stood giving way, and called out
in his horror, “Holy Virgin, hold me up!” The noise made by the falling
timbers on the pavement of the church brought the people in from the neigh-
bourhood, and when they rushed to the spot, they saw the painted arm of the
Virgin thrust out from the wall, supporting the painter in mid-air | When a ladder
was brought and the poor man got his feet on it, the arm and hand relapsed again,
and became only a painting on the wall.
IV.
In enumerating the principal painters of Spain we may follow M. Louis Viardot,
in his “ Notices sur les Peintres de l’Espagne,” a work to accompany the engravings
of the Galerie Aguado, which was brought to the hammer in 1843. These he
estimates to be the following, twelve in number. We append the dates of their
births and deaths, and the localities to which they properly belonged.
Morales, called El Divino ....... ................ 1509 1586 Badajos.
Coella (Alonzo Sancho)........ .................. 1515 1590 Madrid.
Joanes (Juan de).................................... 1523 1579 Walencia.
Navarrete, called El Mudo ... .................... 1526 1579 Madrid.
Cespedes (Pablo de) * . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1538 1608 Cordova.
Theotocopuli (Dominico), called El Greco ... 1548 (?) 1625 Toledo.
Pacheco (Francisco) ........................ . . . ... 1571 (?) 1654 Seville.
22 SPANYSH SCHOOZ OF PAIAWTIAWG.
Ribera (Joseph), called Spagnoletto............ 1588 1656 Valentia.
Zurbaran (Francisco).............................. 1598 1662 Seville.
Velazquez (Don Diego)........................... 1599 1660 9 y
Cano (Alonzo) .................................... 1601 1665 9 3
Murillo (Esteban) ................................. 1618 1682 3 5
Nearly all these illustrious painters, either as children or as old men, it will be
seen, must have been living at one moment, and the time comprehended between
the dates of the deaths of the first, Morales, and of the last, Murillo, to whom this
volume is principally dedicated, is almost exactly a century; the meridian hour of
the art of painting in Spain.
Before Morales there were many artists, a short account of whom may be here
given before proceeding to the particular masters we are able to illustrate by
engraving.
ANTONIO RINCON; born in or near 1446, and growing into manhood while
Spain was rising into importance. This name is really the first among native
painters to be inscribed in the “Libro Doro” of art. Before him there was only a
promise of great excellence—the aurora before the day, and it is unnecessary to
enumerate the stars then fading in the coming light borrowed from Italy. Of late,
some of these have been more appreciated, but out of Spain it is not likely they will
ever be more than names. Rincon went to Italy while still very young, and in his
works there is some warrantry for believing the tradition that he studied under
Andrea del Castagno, who, it will be remembered, was one of the teachers of oil
painting to the Italians, and also under Ghirlandajo. On his return, he was imme-
diately employed by Ferdinand, and from his hand are many portraits of that king,
and his wife, Isabella. By them he was ennobled with the order of Santiago, and
made court-painter. Of these portraits, the principal is in the church of San Juan
de los Reyes, at Toledo, above the altar-piece there; and the most important works
SPANISH SCHOOL OF AAAWTING. 23
by him preserved are seventeen panels, subjects from the life of the Virgin, forming
a retable in the church of Robledo de Chavela. Except these, indeed, it appears
difficult to cite any absolutely authentic subject pictures by him. In public European
galleries there is only one, and that is in the Hermitage at St. Petersburg. He
died about 1500.
ALONZO BERRUQUETE Y GONZALES.—Painter, sculptor, and architect, the first
who carries out entirely the spirit and tastes of the Renaissance, he returned from
Italy to spread this influence in his native country, and on this account has been
placed in the very first class of Spanish painters. He possessed elevation of style,
learning in design, and was completely acquainted with the methods then in use,
oil painting especially, which has been in Spain nearly the exclusive vehicle.
Born about 1480, he died at the age of eighty-one, having seen the arts rapidly
developed in his native country. Vasari mentions Alonzo Berruquete as being in
Florence in 1503, when Michelangelo admitted him among his pupils, and took
him to Rome when called there by Julius II. At the death of Filippo Lippi we
find him again in Florence, finishing the picture left incomplete by that master
at his death in the Jeronymites; but from this work he was called again to
Rome by Michelangelo, and did not return to his own country till 1520, from
which time, for forty years, he executed many and various works at Saragossa,
Walladolid, Toledo, and elsewhere. These works were, many of them, architectural,
and his pictures are now little known, no museum in Spain possessing any of them.
JUAN DE WILLOLDo.—This painter is also supposed to have studied in Italy.
He painted at Toledo; but, although very influential in his day, we are never
likely in England to see an authentic example of his manner, which is said to be very
accomplished.
LUIs DE WARGAs is more important. He also imported his art from Italy, and
24 SPAAVYSH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTING.
spread the knowledge of it by his many works and pupils, establishing the greatness
of the School of Seville, which continued for a century in all its vigour. Born in
that town, in 1502, he was sent into the atelier of Diego de la Barrera, who was
employed in painting immense sheets of cloth, called Sargas, which were used as wails
or tapestries on Saints' days in the great churches, and also as hangings in palaces
and great houses. These were executed in tempera, and were, no doubt, done in
the manner of scene painting at the present day, but in a somewhat archaic senti-
ment, more interesting now to us than the works of Vargas that superseded them.
It has been said the beginning of Vargas was the end of the Gothic in Andalusia;
but at this distance of time the archaeological interest that attaches to the so-called
Gothic ages more than counterbalances the art of Perino del Vaga, at second-hand,
as that of Vargas is said to be. After spending twenty-eight years in Italy, or
nearly that time, he returned home, and from his hand we find frescoes—a rare
thing in Spain—as well as oil pictures. These frescoes, for the most part, as we
might expect, are gone; of the most important, for which he received 136,000
maravedas from the chapter of the cathedral at Seville, there are only vestiges
disfigured by restoration, as mentioned by Cean Bermudez. This was the “Way
to Calvary,” and before it the condemned were stopped to say their prayers on
their dolorous way, which caused the picture to get the name of “El Christo de
los azotados”—the Christ of the Scourged. Another great fresco of his is the
“Last Judgment,” in the Casa de la Misericordia, which is now visible only in
the upper portion.
It is not necessary to give any lengthened account of the oil pictures of Vargas,
only we may mention the Nativity in the cathedral at Seville, engraved in the
work of M. Charles Blanc ; and in the church of St. Maria la Blanca there is a
large altar-piece with wings, the picture being the Dead Christ with Mary and
the Magdalene; the wings representing St. Francis receiving the Stigmata, and
the donors of the picture, in 1564, four years before his death.
-- MOR-ALES P. Nixº MAILLE FER ------

Mater Dolorosa (Morales).
LUIS DE MORALES, CALLED THE DIVINE
(AND HIs SUCCESSORs).
ORN at Badajos, about 1509, Morales takes up the thread of our story,
the story of the most Christian art, as the exponent of mediaeval tradi-
tions and esoteric doctrines expressed by dramatic symbols, just at
the time when the whole north of Europe was freeing itself from these, and a
spirit of self-dependence and liberty began to be felt there. It is interesting
to reflect that at this very moment as we approach the centre of the clerical
power, Rome itself, we enter an atmosphere of supreme indifference. The heart
beats equably, and only wants to be left to the enjoyment of life and the tastes
of classic revival; while the terrible earnestness of the reformation is making
evangelists of its preachers, and a state of civil war is threatening the cities
beyond the Alps, and Spain shrinks more closely within the sanctuary, shutting
out equally the new critical and the revived classical spirit from its literature
and art. The continual intercourse with priests, and the necessity for sympathetically
H


26 SPANYSH SCHOOL OF PA/WTYWG.
entering into the sentiment of their subjects, made the painters grave and thoughtful
men, often pure-minded and ascetic, even seeing visions and receiving messages
from the other world. Such was in some measure Luis de Vargas, just mentioned;
but of Morales, we find no anecdotes of this kind, although he has got the surname
of The Divine, from the ascetic sanctity of expression found in his works. Of this
the “Ecce Homo " here engraved is considered a good example, and the “Mater
Dolorosa” in the Royal Gallery at Madrid. º,
The facts of the life of Morales have never been recorded. At the end of last
century Abbe Ponz and the conscientious Cean Bermudez both tried to recover
them without much success. It is certain, however, that he did not resort to
Italy, but studied at home the pictures within his reach, which were principally
by Flemings. His master is supposed to have been Pedro Campaña at Seville, but
that painter, it appears, was not settled there till 1548, while a panel by Morales at
Badajos bears an earlier date—1546. Besides, the early pictures by Morales do not
recall the style or the execution of any works done at Seville either by natives or
foreigners at that time, so that it is concluded he had gone to Castile, entered some
atelier in Toledo, and attached himself to the practice of that northern school and
its visitors from the Low Countries. Every authentic picture by him is on wood,
and his earlier works are remarkable for their numerous figures, with minute
perfection of detail recalling the manner of Van Eyck, Albert Dürer, or Roger
van der Weyden.
There is, moreover, an expression of melancholy and of profound and settled
sadness about his figures, a grave simplicity in his compositions, a rigidity and
angular crushed character in his draperies, that put us in mind of a Northern
derivation. This characteristic severity of expression, strong enough to be distinc-
tive even in a country where all were touched with the same sentiment, it was,
that gave him the cognomen of Divine. He is the most spiritual and the most
austere of the heads of the schools of Spain.
A. UMS DE MORAZ.E.S. 27
His own manners, on the other hand, do not appear to have been strictly in
harmony with his art. From the number and importance of his pictures existing,
Or known to have existed, in the churches and convents of Estramadura, he must
have spent much of his life there and been largely commissioned. The street where
he lived in Badajos, was called by his name, and he was much honoured by his
fellow-citizens. His fame rapidly spread to Toledo, Burgos, Walladolid, and even
to Seville, and all over Spain—a fortune much greater than any of his contemporaries
enjoyed. He adopted an extraordinary style of living, at least according to the
ideas of the age; and when Philippe II, called him to court in 1563, while the
royal monastery of the Escorial was in progress and its decoration employed his
thoughts, Morales appeared there “avec le faste et l'aparat d'un grand seigneur.”
This was thought by king and courtiers so absurd in the painter of church pictures
that he was laughed to Scorn; and when he had executed one work, not for the
Escorial, but presented by the king to the church of St. Jeronimo of Madrid, he was
dismissed with his travelling expenses.
This was the turning-point in the life of Morales. He returned to Badajos, but
his spirit was broken; he accused himself violently, his hand forgot its cunning,
and he fell into poverty and indifference. The single document recovered by Cean
Bermudez relating to Morales is a deed of sale during this period of his life. It
is dated February 11, 1575, and conveys his vineyard on the heights of the Vega
de Merida to the licentiate Buenavida, for the consideration of a hundred ducats.
Long years after, when approaching old age, Philippe saw Morales again. He
was passing through Badajos on his way from Portugal; the painter at seventy-
two, all his bravery turned to old clothes, placed himself in the way. The king's
heart smote him, and he addressed him, asking him about his age. Morales said
he was not only old, but poor; and the king at Once Ordered him a pension of
three hundred ducats. Five years after Morales died, in 1586.
This touching story, showing the power of kings at that day (and it is possible
28 SPAN/SH SCHOOL OF PA/WT/WG.
that the whole clerical party followed the lead of the prince, so that the painter's
occupation was gone), is nearly the only thing known of Morales. But his works,
which are divided into two periods, the first that of small figures on crowded
canvases, considerably in the manner of the Flemings, the second, pictures with
|-
=
E.
E
E
E.
|
|
The Circumcision (In the Museum, Madrid).
only one or two figures, frequently only single half-figures, are numerous, and
tolerably well preserved. In the Museum of Madrid are five, one of them being an
“Ecce Homo.” Another, “The Circumcision,” may be instanced as showing the
reverence and refinement of his treatment. The high priest only receives the child

ALO/WZO SANCHEZ COELAEO. 29
in his arms, and holds him over a white altar-cloth. All the spectators, except
Joseph, are young women following the Virgin, each with a lighted candle; and
the foremost, who also holds a basket with the pair of doves, descends out of
the picture, her drapery disposed so as to give her something of the character
of a terminal figure.
In the Louvre is one work by Morales, “Christ bearing His Cross;” and in
the Soult sale there was one, “The Way to Calvary,” which brought 24,000 francs
(£980). At Dulwich there is a “Christ” by him, and several other known
examples of his art exist in this country, in the collection of Sir J. Stirling Maxwell,
and elsewhere.
FROM MoRALES TO RIBERA.—The period of time, about two generations, if we
consider thirty years as a generation, from the middle life of Morales to that
of Ribera, is numerically the richest in the history of Flemish art, and many of
the artists are so great as portrait painters as well as church painters, that the
wonder is we know them so little. One reason for this is the completely clerical
or hagiological field in which they worked, their subjects being such as were
prescribed to them by the chapters, abbots, and bishops who employed them, and
the treatment fitted to the objects those authorities had in view. These objects,
happily, are foreign to us, and in Some measure to all countries but Spain; and
it is also difficult to take an interest in a portrait, however admirable, if we have
no clue to the individual painted, and little sympathy with him. A short account
of some of these painters, such of them as no book on Spanish artists, however
short, can pass without mention, may here be given.
ALONZO SANCHEZ CoELLO, one of the twelve most important names, according
to Viardot and others, begins the list. “As Velazquez was for Philippe IV.,
Coello had been for Philippe II,” says that writer, “the cherished painter, the
I
3o SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
familiar courtier, the privado del rey.” He might have added, as Titian was to
Charles W., Holbein to Henry VIII., or Cranach to Luther. He was called
Lusitano Famoso by Carducci in his “Dialogues;” and Palomino, founding on this,
supposed he was a Portuguese by birth, and gave him the surname of Titiano
Portugues. He was, however, born in Valencia, at Benifayro, although the date
is lost. If he died at the age of sixty-four in 1590, as it is said, the year of
his birth must have been 1515. Neither date is confirmed by any evidence;
we only know the approximate dates of his leading works his portraits of the
Prince Charles, and Princess Isabel, the daughter of Philippe, for instance, now
in the Museum of Madrid, and of the “Marriage of St. Catherine, there likewise;
and also that he was married in 1541, at Madrid, to Doña Luisa Reynalte.
Coello became more and more necessary to the king, and the degree of affec-
tionate intimacy became so great, that Philippe addressed him in his frequent
correspondence as his beloved son, “al muy amado hijo Alonzo Sanchez Coello.”
To convey some account of this, we cannot help repeating the words of Pacheco,
as quoted by Viardot.
“The king gave him for lodging the large houses adjoining the palace; as
there existed a secret communication, of which Philippe only had the key, he
went in upon the painter in his robe de chambre, at all hours, sometimes when
he was sitting at dinner with his family. On these occasions Philippe made him
sit still, and went into the painting-room to pass the time; when the painter was
at his easel on the king's sudden entrance, it was the same; Philippe put his
hands on the artist's shoulders and told him not to move, standing for hours
behind his chair seeing the progress of the work.
“Coello many times painted the portrait of the king, in cloak and bonnet,
armed, in travelling dress, on foot, and on horseback. He painted also many
times the whole seventeen of the royal household, queens, princes, and children,
who all esteemed him in the same manner, and visited his wife and children in
PAA CO DE CESPEDES. 31
the same familiar way, the royal children and the painter's playing together.
He became honoured in a like manner by the Popes Gregory XIII. and Sixtus W.,
the Grand Duke of Florence, and others; the consequence was that the greatest
in Spain and highest in birth paid their court to him, his table was never without
distinguished guests, and his house was frequented by the most illustrious of the time
—Cardinal Granvella, the Archbishops of Toledo and Seville, Don John of Austria,
Prince Don Carlos, and an infinity of seigneurs, ambassadors and others; so that
many times the horses, litters, carrosses, and chaises d porteurs filled two large
courtyards. He was the most renowned painter of his time, and made more than
fifty-five thousand ducats.” In 1582 he filled the Gallery of Portraits in the
Palace of Pardo, containing emperors, kings, princes, and princesses, of Spain,
Portugal, Austria, and other allied countries. “Never was there born,” says
M. Viardot, “so fortunate and so celebrated a painter.”
PABLO DE Cºsrºops, another of the leaders of art in Spain, was born in Cordova,
in the house of his grand-uncle, the canon of the cathedral, with whom he remained
as pupil in the classics till he was eighteen years of age. In 1556 he entered
the University of Alcala de Henares for higher studies and to acquire the Oriental
languages; and some years later he went to Rome. It was before the works of
Michelangelo and among his disciples that he was first impressed with the great-
ness of the painter's vocation, and felt that his real business in life ought to be
to cultivate the arts and abandon literature. Before this he must have acquired
very considerable facility, however, in drawing and painting, because very shortly
after we find him employed with his friend Frederico Zucchero on the frescoes
in the church of the Ara Coeli, and on the decorations of the Trinita da Monte
with Zucchero, where Julio Romano, Volterra, Taddeo Gaddi, and others painted.
The History of the Virgin pictures in that church are from his hand, and the
prophets on the pilasters; and these possess a majesty and grandeur of style
32 SPANYSH SCHOOZ OF PAIAWTING,
worthy of the school he had adopted. Like Michelangelo, he practised sculpture
also, beginning by restoring the lost head of Seneca, on the antique statue of that
philosopher, who was, like himself, a native of Cordova.
In 1577, while still at Rome, he was made canon of the chapter in his native
town, and returned thither to take possession of the office and fulfil its duties,
which he did for the rest of his life, making journeys to Seville, where he possessed
a home in which he lived during his annual vacation; and here he amassed a
quantity of books and antiquities. One of these possessions he mentions in
a dissertation addressed to Pedro de Valentia, an Egyptian statue in black stone,
all covered with hieroglyphics, which he regrets was lost when his servant, the
custodé of the museum, died during the visitation of the plague.
Cespedes was in many ways an important man. As a painter we do not know
him, indeed; but his influence was so great at a time when so many were in
the field, that his name is highly necessary here. Sculptor, also, and poet, he
returned to his first literary habits, and wrote much on art; we may mention
a “Treatise on Perspective,” on the “Temple of Solomon,” on the “Corinthian
Order;” and he was, we believe, the first to draw a systematic “Parallel between
Ancient and Modern Painting and Sculpture.” He died in 1608.
JUAN DE JoANES is supposed to have been born in 1523, probably at Fuente-
la-Higuera, in Valencia. His real name is unknown; his testament has indeed
been found, bearing the signature of Vicente Juan, and it appears his son was
called Juan Vicente. Juan de Joanes is, however, his name in history, and
sufficiently well respected. What is really known of his youth is very little. He
went to Italy, was said to have studied under Raphael, but as Raphael died in
1520, this could not be the case, and we must suppose him associated with Julio
Romano, Perino del Vaga, and others, at the same time as Cespedes. He returned
to Valencia, where he remained.
EZ MUDo. - 33
Joanes was one of the most pious of artists, and his devotion was tinged
deeply with asceticism. One of the most celebrated of his works is the “Purisima
Concepcion,” which originated in a vision seen by his confessor the Jesuit Martin
Aberro. The Virgin appeared to the enthusiast in great beauty vested in blue
and white, with the crescent under her feet, as we have seen her ever after
represented; and above her in the refulgent light the three persons of the Trinity
descended crowning her with a celestial diadem. She turned to the Jesuit Father,
and told him to have her picture painted as he then saw her; and Aberro, on
awakening, charged Joanes to execute the order of Mary. The painter prepared
himself by fasting and prayer, and never in the whole time occupied on the
picture did he set to work without purifying himself by confession and communion.
It was thus, as they say, that he was able to fix on his canvas imperishably the
ecstatic vision. In this work, it seems, there is a practical minuteness of a surprising
kind, and a solemnity contrasting wonderfully with the brightness of colour.
Afterwards we know little of Joanes. In the cathedral of Valencia are preserved
a set of tapestries on the history of the Virgin, designed by him, and worked in
Flanders at the instance of St. Thomas de Villanueva. He died in 1579, and is
accounted the happiest of all the imitators of Raphael. Judged by engraving
we should say there is so strong a Spanish and clerical character that this praise
is scarcely justified. At the great Manchester Exhibition of 1857 there were
no less than four works by him—S.S. Peter and Paul, lent by Mr. Hoskins, the
“Coronation of the Virgin,” by Mr. Alfred Stowe, and a legendary subject by
Sir W. Eden.
EL MUDo (JEAN FERNANDEZ NAVERRETE)—The life of this artist, according to
Viardot, is a surprising testimony to the power of natural instincts. He was born
about 1526, in the little town of Logrono, in the province of Rioja. At the age
of three an ague left him deaf, and, like all who are so early deaf, he was scarcely
IK
34. SPAAVYSH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTIZVG.
able to speak. At this time the good monk Pedro de Ponce had not begun to
take care of the education of the deaf and dumb ; but the speechless Juanito
from the first dawn of intelligence took to the charcoal and the pencil, and it
was clear to all that he was to be a painter. His father, who had plenty of
private means, took him to a convent of Jeronymites, where was a certain Father
Vicente, who employed himself in painting, and his vocation was assured.
By-and-by he visited Rome, Florence, Naples, Milan, and Venice. Every-
where he went to the auliers of the great artists, and at last stopped at that of
Titian, and became his assiduous pupil. He remained in Italy twenty years at
least; and it is remarkable that no works of his in that country are pointed out,
the more so as there are evidences that his character stood very high there.
When Philippe II. planned the decorations of the Escorial, so often alluded to
in this volume, he ordered home El Mudo, who commenced work for him by a
“Calvary” in grisaille, and a number of figures of the Prophets, when ill health
compelled him to leave for the country. After three years he returned as painter
to the king, and now he executed a series of excellent works which serve to
maintain his name in history. For these he was paid 500 ducats; and after-
wards, for eight pictures painted at Madrid and presented to the Escorial, 800.
These works and others, nearly twenty in all, remain there to this day; and in
the Museum of Madrid are four.
In this country we know of only one, the portrait of a lady, in the collection
of the Marquis of Lansdowne. - - -
El Mudo died on the 28th of March, 1579; and his last will, from its extreme
brevity, gave rise to a long and curious law proceeding. This will, translated as
correctly as possible, is the following:—
Jesus. Notre Dame.
Testamentary Executor, Nicolas de Vergara.
Soul: the poor : 200 ducats.
EL GRECO. 35
Brother monk: 200: the poor.
Daughter, nun: 600.
Estrella : monks: 500: masses.
Maria Fernandes: 100.
Father: masses: 200.
Walet : 40. •.
The interpretation of which, at last arrived at by the lawyers, was this:—
1st.—He invokes Jesus and Mary.
2nd.—He makes Vergara his executor. -
3rd.—For prayers for the good of his soul and to the poor, 200 ducats. º
4th.--To his brother, a Franciscan monk, he gives 200, to go to the poor at the death of the
brother. -
5th.-He makes provision for his natural daughter taking the veil.
6th–He makes over to the monks of Estrella 500 ducats to found a perpetual daily mass for
his soul.
7th.-He leaves to his relative Maria 100 ducats.
8th.-He leaves to the parish where his father died 200 ducats, to found a perpetual mass. And,
lastly, he makes a gift to his valet.
EL GREco (Dominico THEotocoPULI)—In the year 1577, a painter of distant
origin appeared in Toledo, and settled there; he was found to be a Greek, so
his brother painters, instead of the name whereby he designated himself, called
him simply, as indeed they found he had been called in Italy, The Greek. His
early history remains an entire mystery. His face has no especial Greek character,
and it has been presumed that he was really a Venetian, descended, it might be,
from a Byzantine family, but educated in the city of the sea, and in the school
of Titian. -
His manner, though a little sharp and hard, was sufficient proof of this last;
but, besides, we cannot help feeling that an influence from the school into which
he had thrown himself very quickly modified the sentiment and character of his
design and conception. Last year (1871) we had an opportunity of seeing a
36 SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PA IV.7//VG.
fine example of his portraiture—the half-length of his daughter, sent by Sir
J. Stirling Maxwell, and another portrait by him from the same collection was
in the Manchester Exhibition of 1853, and at Leeds, in 1868, that of the sculptor
Leoni, from the Louis Philippe collection. His great works are, however, not
portraits, but religious subjects; like every one then painting, he was the servant
of the church. He was also a sculptor, especially of architectural decorative
figures, which certainly does not incline one to believe in his Venetian origin.
One of his most successful works in Toledo is the “Interment of the Count
d'Orgaz,” in which the body, still in armour, is supported by a bishop and an
acolyte, both in brocade of cloth of gold, and this group is surrounded, from side
to side of the canvas, by a line of Spanish heads in ruffs, over which, to an
immense height, is a vision of the heavenly hierarchy, the soul of the count
kneeling before Christ and appealing to the Virgin for her protection.
Pacheco, and others who have written about El Greco, have done so with
considerable bitterness. That writer reports a visit he paid to the Greek, who
said, in conversation, that colour was greater than drawing, and that Michelangelo
was doubtless a valiant artist, but he knew nothing of painting, which Pacheco
very properly calls a monstrous opinion: Yet El Greco was a learned man and
a Writer, leaving, at his death, treatises on the three arts he practised, painting,
sculpture, and architecture: he has also left engravings by his own hand. He
died at Toledo in 1625.
FRANCISCO PACHECO, whom we have just quoted, and who has been so often
mentioned throughout this book as the Inspector for the Holy Office, and as a
writer on art, has also some character as a painter. In the museums, both of
Seville and Madrid, there are a number of his works, but they have an unattractive
character, and as he has never been said to have had a beneficial influence on his
school, we shall only mention here the dates of his birth and death (circa)
ZUIS TRISTAW. - 37
1571–1654, and introduce a translation, to the best of our ability, of an amusing
epigram made upon a picture of Our Lord by him :—
“What have we painted here, Senor,
So pallid, hard, and secco 3
You say it is divine amor,
But I say its Pacheco l’’
LUIs TRISTAN may be also mentioned here, although he cannot be called a
capo Scuola at any place or time. In the sale of the Spanish gallery of Louis
Philippe in London, in 1853, which the French have never ceased to regret, there
were six pictures by Tristan, which gave us a very high idea of his power, and
the very celebrated “Christ on the Cross,” with the sunken head, from which the
dark hair hangs over the breast, by Velazquez, in the museum of Madrid, is said to
be a derivation from another, equally fine, by Tristan. His influence on Velazquez
we find acknowledged on all hands, and in Mr. Stirling’s “Annals of the Artists of
Spain,” we find it said, “Of all the painters whose works passed under the eyes
of Velazquez, while studying at Seville, it was Luis Tristan that produced the most
vivid impression. The favoured disciple of El Greco, Tristan had formed for himself
a style in which the sober tones of the Castian artists were united with the bright
colours of the Venetians. His works had taught Velazquez to place on his palette
some brilliant tints that he applied with an effect still more magical e Q e venue.
constantly acknowledged his obligations to Tristan, of whom he never spoke but
with enthusiasm.” Tristan was born in a village near Toledo, about 1586. El
Greco had settled there in 1577, and he received Tristan into his studio at an
extraordinary early age. So early, indeed, was he able to be his own master that El
Greco transferred to him the commission to paint a “Last Supper” for a convent
beyond the walls, the convent of Sisla, which he finished to the admiration of all
the world, at so young an age, that the monks would not pay him the price (200
L
38 SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTING.
ducats), on the pretence that it was too much money to place in the hands of a
boy. El Greco, however, continued his generosity to Tristan, fought his battle,
and obliged the monks at last to pay 500 instead of 200. His pictures are very
numerous in the churches of Toledo and Madrid. He died in 1640.
ALONZO CANo.—Doubtless one of the greatest artists of Spain. M. Viardot
says of him: “If there is among Spaniards any one whom we can justly place in
comparison with Michelangelo, for the character of his genius and the grandeur
of his works, no less than for the universality of his talents, it is Alonzo Cano.
All the arts we define as Fine Arts, which indeed interpenetrate each other, were
united in him.” M. Charles Blanc begins his memoir in a rather different spirit.
“It appears to me,” says M. Blanc, “that the most distinguishing characteristic
of Alonzo Cano is that he is the least Spanish of all the painters of Spain, and I
believe, if we could transport his works into the proper localities, they would
easily be taken for those of a Lombard.” But another singular point in this
master is that his works do not in any way accord with his own character. A
proud man, bizarre in his humour, passionate and violent, he paints in a correct
style, wisely and temperately. Formed much by study of the antique statues,
he imitated the simplicity of their attitudes, the sobriety of their actions, the
gravitation and step of their motions; and besides, his execution was as soft
and calm, as his life was agitated. He had in his mind the ideal spirit of
Greek art, but in his veins the hottest blood of Spain.
He was born in Granada on the 19th March, 1601; his father, who had
come thither from La Mancha, was a skilful carpenter, constructing the Woodwork
about altars, in churches, and other semi-architectural erections: he was able to
teach his son a good deal. Afterwards he placed him where his faculties could
most advantageously be developed, at Seville, in the midst of the masters then
living in that Andalusian Athens, and Alonzo determined not only to construct
ALONZO CANO. 39
the altar, but to be able to design and work out with his own hand, architecture,
statues, and pictures, as other Spanish artists—Berruguete and Beccera—had done.
By a singular chance, he studied under the masters of both Velazquez and
Murillo, Francisco Pacheco and Juan de Castillo, for painting; and Juan Martinez
Montañes, a genius in sculpture, in his way, inducted him into that art; at the
same time he began his study of the antique in the palace of the Dukes of Alcala,
called Casa de Pilatos. -
During all these years he had still assisted his father, but now he had a
commission for himself, and this realised his ambition—he was employed to build up
and decorate the high altar with its belongings, in the church of Lebrija, an
immense work, for which he was to receive 3,000 ducats. This task he completed
so successfully that he was presented with 250 more than the stipulated sum, large
as it was. In this extensive piece of decorative architecture, the statue of the
Virgin and Child, which occupies the principal niche, is always spoken of with the
most enthusiastic praise.
At this moment, while Velazquez was in Madrid, and Murillo, still a boy,
was daubing his cargo of pictures and banners for exportation, to gain for him-
self the means of travelling, Alonzo Cano took the first place in all the three
arts he professed. But, by a personal trait, that of jealousy, carrying out the
resemblance to the great Florentine, according to M. Viardot, although we fail
to find Michelangelo really jealous (only contemptuous where he found nothing to
admire), he was forced to quit Seville. Having quarrelled with a brother painter,
Sebastian de Llano y Waldes, and being a skilful swordsman among his other
accomplishments, he wounded his adversary so dangerously he was under the
necessity of flying. In the course of our various narratives we have several times
found men forced to fly from one province in Spain, taking refuge in another,
showing how distinctively the old landmarks remained, the different territories
lying together with little interchange of rights. Alonzo only went to Madrid,
- 40 SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTIZVG.
and having had to fly without supplying himself with means, he went straight to
Velazquez, who not only provided for him, but got him appointed drawing-
master to the Infant Don Baltazar, and he soon found himself enriched again by
various commissions. He remained three years in Madrid. -
During these years he painted much, and the pictures then executed are those
on which his fame rests in a great degree. These years were comparatively
quiet; but shortly afterwards he was accused of murdering a woman, thrown into
the prison of the Cortes, and subjected to the torture—mildly called the e. question—
which he bore grimly without confessing. This incident in his wild career has
lately been discredited by the entire absence of any record of the proces, which it
is supposed would, in some way or other, have been preserved.
The ferocity or wildness of his passions on other occasions has subjected him
to this accusation of murder which was said to have been committed in his own
family. A few years after, when he was made major-domo of the confraternity
of Notre Dame des Douleurs, we find him again in trouble, being fined 100 ducats
for refusing to walk in procession on the saint's day along with the fraternities of
painters and goldsmiths who were associated with the alguazils of the Court. It
was this association he objected to, not the Saint whose day it was, happily, or we
should probably have heard no more of our hero. Another affair of his might have
also ended fatally; we allude to his destruction of the statue of St. Antony of Padua,
mentioned before, which was indeed a capital offence. .
As time wore on and Cano passed the age of fifty, he took it into his head
to return to Granada, become a priest, and spend the rest of his life in ease. No
Sooner determined upon than he got the place of cantor in the quire of the
cathedral, by impressing the chapter with the fact that they had too many singers,
and that it would be much better to have a versatile artist like himself, able alike
in painting, sculpture, and architecture. But once in possession of the benefice
and installed in the great tower of the cathedral, he did nothing, either to qualify
AZONZO CANO. 4. I
himself for priest's orders or in his profession; and after no end of difficulties and
two royal rescripts, he was first ejected, and afterwards received again on his
prevailing on the Bishop of Salamanca to ordain him. The third rescript, securing
to him the benefice so long disputed, is dated 1658, from which time to his death,
on the 5th of October, 1667, he lived in peace, and was buried in the pantheon of
the prebends of the cathedral.

- º
º
º
JOSEPH RIBERA, CALLED SPAGNOLETTO
(1588–1656).
is, however, so much of the Spaniard in him, not merely by birth but
nature; he was so completely, moreover, individual and original, and his influence
in the peninsula was so great, that he may properly be considered entirely Spanish
though he lived in Naples.
In the history of painting in all countries there are men of the class of innovators
by means of force, masters by strength of hand, after whom, wherever they have




--
---,
----- PLN-
_-|- （ ）





JOSEPH RIBERA (SPAGNOZETTO). 43
lived, the old studious forms are no more possible. There are the Naturalists,
the painters in the strong manner—in Italy, Caravaggio, Salvator Rosa, Tintoretto
and his pupil Correnzio, RIBERA; and all of them have been men whose private
lives have been violent, romantic, full of stories and dramas; some of them having
been conspirators, brigands, living between glory and the galleys. The existence
of Ribera in particular was a long contrast of splendour and misery, of black
shadow and shining light, like his painting.
The very beginning of our story of his life is a romantic incident. In the first
years of the seventeenth century, a cardinal driving in his carriage through the
narrow streets of Rome, observed a very young boy, half naked about the shoulders,
his body only clad in rags, with a miscellaneous heap of pieces of bread given him in
charity lying by him on a stone, drawing with profound gravity and forgetfulness
of his surroundings, the frescoes on the front of a palace. The cardinal called the
boy—curious to know something of him; found the little man was an independent
enthusiast, offered to provide for him, and did dress and feed him, giving him a
home in his family or household. This boy called himself Joseph Ribera, and
gave a very good account of himself. He had been sent to Valencia from the
place where his parents resided to study the classics at School, had hated books
and fallen in love with pictures, had been humoured and allowed to have his own
way; but still discontented to remain in Spain at all, had crossed the sea without
a penny, found his way to Rome, and begun living on charity, spending all his
time educating himself by sketching and copying everything about him—statues,
frescoes, ornaments, and the people themselves.
He had applied to artists whom he sought out, and they had given him partial
help, calling him the Little Spaniard, “Spagnoletto,” a name that remained with
him through life, and by which he is known everywhere but in his native country.
It was in the atelier of Francisco Ribalta that the old Luis Ribera had placed his
son, and from which he had come in this reckless manner to Rome, inspired,
44. SAEAAVYSH SCHOOL OF PA/WZYZWG.
perhaps, by hearing the reminiscences of his master, who was himself partly
educated there.
Ribera found himself in this new position precisely as his illustrious compatriot
Cervantes did, when, forty years later, the author of “Don Quixote’’ was at Rome,
Camerero to Cardinal Giulio Acquaviva; but the great painter was not condemned
much longer than the great writer to the degradation of the antechamber of a
prince of the church. Both of them heard a voice calling them away to a more
noble and active sphere.
The best of it seems to have been, the cardinal did not care about the boy's
skill in art, and Ribera, after some months of inaction and forced comfort, blushed
at the abasement into which he had fallen. From the depths of his heart burst up
again the love of painting, the hopes of the future, the thirst of science and glory
that had brought him all the way to Rome. One fine day, throwing off his livery
and drawing on his old tattered travelling suit again, he disappeared from the
rich home, and found himself again enjoying the life of poverty, labour, and
independence. He was accused of ingratitude, called an incorrigible vagabond;
but as time developed his powers, even the good priest himself acknowledged that
he admired the force of mind that had abandoned the vulgar advantages he had to
offer, and triumphed in the battle of life by a noble passion for art.
To live anyhow is easy in Italy now, and must have been infinitely easier
then; besides, Ribera managed to get something to do, and, looking about with
so decided and untameable an instinct as he always acted under, he soon saw the
works that seemed to him the grandest in the world. These were the works of
Michelangelo Caravaggio. In these the facile and skilful violence of the drawing,
the rich puissance of the invention, and the formidable chiaroscuro, all took posses-
sion of him, and he applied, cap in hand, at the door of the master. Caravaggio
received him freely, but he did not long enjoy the privilege he coveted so much ;
the master died in 1609, when Ribera had just attained twenty years of age.
JOSEPH RIBERA (SPAGNOLETTO). 45
Yet in this short time he had worked so hard, and had assimilated sympathetically
the manner and even the powers of this master, that it was found difficult to
distinguish between the pictures of the veteran and those of the youth. A
Wonderful fact, if we consider the acquaintance of the human form in violent action
as well as the knowledge derived from the schools, that Caravaggio possessed.
On the death of his master, Ribera quitted Rome for Parma, drawn thither
by hearing so much of Correggio. Before this new master's painting another
enthusiasm seized him : he copied with a supernatural celerity, and soon acquired
the soft tenderness and gracious roundness of his new model. On his return to Rome
his friends—for he already had many who watched his progres—were sufficiently
surprised; and now we see that this imitation of Correggio must have been a merely
temporary impulse his natural bent was that which had led him to Caravaggio,
his love of strange subjects, sombre and terrible, determined his manner which was
developed through the intervention of Caravaggio. And this manner, to which he
reverted, intensified and carried out to the completest mastery, continued with him
to the end. And here we must remark, what the reader is very likely prepared at
once to agree in, that this necessity for a leader and a predecessor shows that Ribera
was a genius of the second, not of the first order; he was not on the level of
Da Vinci, Michelangelo Buonarroti, or even of Rembrandt, Rubens, or Velazquez,
as artist, whatever place (still lower, we presume) he may be allowed to take
intellectually, compared with these thinkers and painters.
The interval of study at Parma had, it is said, a very beneficial effect, however;
although he returned to the manner of Caravaggio, he certainly became a much
superior painter. In colour Ribera is very great, and in the use of colour as a
power in design he may be considered supreme, if we define his limits as to subject
and sentiment. He was now surrounded by friends and advisers, true or false,
and to deliver himself from them, so as to follow his instincts, he simply left
Rome for Naples.
N
46 SAEAAWISH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTVZVG.
Here he arrived, as usual with him, without money or recommendations, having
had even to leave his mantle in pawn at the hostelry where he had lived. In his
new home scarcely settled, he found out a rich picture dealer who employed
him, and who, finding him, as he thought, an exhaustless mine of ability,
planned to keep the advantage to himself by offering the Bohemian painter
his only daughter in marriage. From this moment Ribera became the most
successful of men, producing innumerable pictures. These would have been
enough to secure his celebrity, but an extraordinary circumstance did so at once.
His large picture of the “ Martyrdom of St. Bartholomew” being finished, his
father-in-law seeing it to be a prodigiously powerful performance, placed it,
on a crowded midday, on the balcony of his house, which was on the public
place, near the house of the viceroy—Naples at that time being an appanage
to the kingdom of Spain. The crowd gathered, and, becoming excited, began to
shout, and the whole neighbourhood became roused; the little court had had too
much experience of emeutes, as it was not far from the time of Masaniello, and
the guard was called to arms. But when they arrived on the spot and found the
cause of all the noise to be so innocent, the viceroy, Count de Monterey, came to
the painter, and finding him a Spaniard, was so overjoyed that he transferred Ribera
to the palace and gave him all the appointments at his command.
All these anecdotes in the life of Ribera are perfectly well authenticated, yet
the name of the cardinal who first provided for him, and of his wife and her
scheming father are not recorded. Ribera was a painter and nothing else; even
the incidents in his own history external to his art seem to have made no impres-
sion on him. These two steps, his marriage and the favour of the viceroy, made
his fortune both in riches and authority. He began to paint for the Church; the
Jesuits commissioned him to do many works for the Convent of St. Francis-
Xavier and the Jesu-nuovo; in the chapel of the Treasury of the cathedral,
under the cupola painted by Lanfranc, he did “St. Januarius coming out of
JOSEPH RIBERA (SPAGAVOLETTO). 47
the Furnace;” and for the Chartreux he executed the famous “Descent from the
Cross,” the chef-d'oeuvre of the painter's works still retained in Naples.
Many of his paintings went to other places, all over Italy, and, indeed, all
over Europe; but the greatest number, and perhaps on the whole the finest, went •
to his own country. Naples being then a province of Spain, and the resort of
many Castilian and Andalusian nobles, he was soon surrounded by the great
Of his own nation, all wanting his pictures. From the viceroy the king himself,
Philippe IV., became acquainted with the wonderful Spaniard in Naples, and
anxious to be his patron. The boy on whom the cardinal had bestowed his
protection became the most opulent and the most sumptuous host of princes.
He never went out but in his carriage, and his wife was always accompanied
by her equerry; the two most coveted and ostentatious signs of wealth and the
limits of luxury in those days. It is said, that one day two officers in the
Spanish guard, infatuated by the pretended miracles of alchemy, offered him a
share in the probable gains, if he would only advance the funds necessary for
their researches after the philosopher's stone. “I can make gold myself." said
Ribera; “come to-morrow, and I shall show you my secret.” The two friends,
true to the hour, found Ribera in his studio, giving a picture its last touches.
He finished, called his valet, charged him to take the picture to its owner, ind
to bring back 400 ducats. “The alembic will soon be ready to open,” said he ;
“wait but a minute;” and when the valet returned and laid the rouleaux on
the table, “there,” he continued, “not a bad yield. I require no other secret to
produce abundance.” With his sure hand, full brush, hundreds of orders, and
large prices, he must have made an immense deal of gold.
When at his work, he went on with such violence indeed that he could not
sustain the fatigue. By-and-by he made a rule only to paint six hours a day,
and that only in the morning; and at frequent intervals a domestic went in to
inform him how long he had continued and how much time remained. The rest
48 SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PA/WZZAVG.
of the day was spent on promenade, in visits, and, above all, in receptions, his
house being open, and his atelier the resort of artists, and at the same time of
the Court. It was then that the fazzioni pittori, the factions rather than coteries
of painters adhering to different principles and leaders, began, the members of
which made war on rival schools, even with the poniard. Ribera was the head
of the faction of Naples, so absolute and tyrannical that it would not allow any
stranger to its principles to enter the town; and the body counted among its
members two men fairly entitled to the name of bravo–Correnzio, the pupil
of Tintoretto, and Giambatista Caracciolo, called Batistrello. These two, supported
by younger men, sustained at the point of the sword the superiority of the master.
Several of the greatest artists from distant parts of Italy had been called to take
part in the work. going on in the Duomo of St. Januarius—Annibale Carracci,
Guido, and others—but they were forced hastily to leave the city, to escape the
determined villains surrounding Ribera. Domenichino was later in beating his
retreat, and died on the way to Rome, under suspicion of poison, administered
by some one of the faction deputed to secure him. A fearful length to carry
jealousy, only possible in an age and country when violence in many other forms
passed without punishment. As to Ribera, why should he have envied any one?
He had all the advantage he wished, and honours too. The Pope decorated
him with the Order of Christ, and the Academy of St. Luke of Rome received
him after these violent actions. His faction was the last and most violent form
of the Naturalisti, or Tenebrosi, as they are sometimes called, Caravaggio and
Ribera, with their imitators and disciples, indulging in painting the most painful
subjects, rendered apparently with a ferocious enjoyment. These martyrdoms and
other horrors were often lighted by the lurid flames of furnaces or torches,
showing the bodies of an orange yellow, and making white drapery like the
colour of gold. Ugliness in the characters represented, as executioners especially,
was sometimes exceedingly repulsive, as in the man bringing the wood in the
JOSEPH RIBERA (SPAGMOLETTO). 49
“Martyrdom of St. Laurence,” covered with warts and wrinkles; yet the power
of drawing and free vigour of action, the terrible interest of heroism, and the
splendour of effect we may properly call infernal, make one united impression,
such as scarcely any other school of art can compete with.
N
W
Martyrdom of S. Laurence.
Can we wonder that all these gladiators came to an evil end? Caracciolo
died indeed without any special circumstances of retributive justice, except that
he was not past middle age; and he died a few months after Domenichino, whose
end he is accused of having hastened. Two years after (1643) Correnzio broke
his neck by a fall from a scaffold; he was the head of the cabal, and had
certainly poisoned his own scholar Luigi Rodrigo. Ribera, the third of this
O

5& , SPAWISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
triumvirate and chief of the Neapolitans, we shall 'see fall from his ostentatious
position without much pity. He lived in the house, or rather palace, opposite
the church of St. Francis-Xavier, in the greatest state. Among his domestics
was one, “on distinguait un porte-enseigne réformé,” whatever that may be,
whose charge was to hand him his brushes, and to stand behind him. When
Ribera, absorbed in his work, and painting with passion as he always did, had
gone on for the prescribed number of hours, he was stopped by this ancient, who
said, “Signor cavalier, your time is over, and your carrosse is waiting;” at which
the painter, like a skilful actor, threw aside his palette, and turned round to
acknowledge the presence of the noble visitors who had stood silent and over-
awed, observing the picture growing under his rapid hand.
Among these sometimes appeared Don Juan of Austria, whom the painter
had received at a grand fête, and who had repeated his visits to Maria-Rosa,
Ribera's eldest daughter, a girl of extraordinary beauty, whose head was turned
by the handsome youth of such high rank. The result was he carried her off;
and on the disappearance of his daughter Ribera's pride collapsed, he left Naples,
bought a house on the shore at Pausilippo, where he saw nobody, and one day
he pretended to be called to Naples, left home with a servant whom he got rid of
on the way, and never was seen again. This was in 1656,
Such was the current story, told by the Napolitan Domenico on the authority
of his father, but nothing is really known of the end of Ribera. Viardot relates
the tale, but discredits it; and it appears Cean Bermudez says he died in Naples.
His wild and overpowering manner of painting did not die with him. His many
pupils carried it out with variations; Giovanni Do imitated him so nearly that it
is difficult to distinguish his works from those of Spagnoletto. Errico Fiamingo,
Michelangelo Fracanzani, who was one of the most turbulent of the faction, were
among his best pupils; best of all, perhaps, was Luco Giordano, who later in life
went to Madrid.
Joseph RIBERA (SPAGNozz770). 5 I
- There are many pictures by Spagnoletto in this country. At Louis Philippe's
sale in London, 1853, were four : “The Assumption of Mary Magdalene,” “ The
Adoration of the Shepherds,” “A Philosopher,” and “Hercules combating the
Centaur,” all of which brought good prices. -
National Gallery: two pictures—“The Dead Christ,” or, the subject termed
a Pietà by the Italians, the Virgin weeping over the dead body of Christ, and
“Shepherd with a Lamb;” full length, life size. Probably a portrait: both
ºutled to the country.
National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh—“A Mathematician,” and “The
Martyrdom of St. Sebastian.”
Hampton Court—“Duns Scotus” (?) “St. John with a Lamb.”
At the Great Manchester Exhibition, 1857, were two pictures by Ribera—
“S. Carlo Borromeo at Prayer,” sent by Earl Spencer; “Jacob keeping Laban's
Sheep,” Earl of Derby. - -
In the Exhibition of Old Masters at Burlington House, 1871, were two pictures
by Ribºn- St. Peter weeping in the Garden,” 29 inches by 34, sent by
J. Grant, Esq., Kilgraston, Scotland, and “St. Peter holding the Keys,” 65 inches
by 52, Earl Dudley. In the same, 1872, was “The Holy Family,” 794 inches y
60, lent by Thomas Baring, Esq., M.P.
Louvre. In the French national collection are twenty-five examples of our
master, the most remarkable being “The Adoration of the Shepherds,” “St. Jerome,”
« Combat of Hercules with the Centaur,” and “The Martyrdom of St. Bartholomew,”
a picture of extraordinary power. This subject, which first brought him into
notice, he repeated frequently in various forms. It is to be seen in the Pitti
at Florence, and at Berlin. In all of them there seems to be a horrible enjoy-
ment on the part of the painter in the vivid rendering of the painful scene.
FRANCISCO ZURBARAN
WXFTER the life of adventure and violent contrasts we have just related,
|ſ)
{
tº
this of Zurbaran that follows is entirely colourless; and yet his art
i. in several ways, and especially in chiaroscuro and sentiment, "...' closely
related to that of Ribera. In truth, although Zurbaran never left Spain, he is
an adherent of the Naturalisti and Tenebrosi, he may be properly spoken of as
one of the followers of Caravaggio, and classed with the imitators of that master
at Naples. *
Zurbaran is one of the many artists whose lives are passed without noise or
ea. without events, of whom there is not much more on record than a few
dates, and these, perhaps, found out with difficulty; men who live only in the
studio, and whose pictures are their only memento—in the case of Zurbaran a
sufficient one, as he is one of the greatest painters of Spain. He was born in
Estremadura, at the town of Fuente de Cantos, in the year 1598, and was baptized
on the 7th of November, as Cean Bermudez found by recovering the register.
His parents, Luis Zurbaran and Isabel Marquet, were labourers in the field, and
at first saw no other chance for their son than the same life of toil. But the
child, with the instinct of genius, began to imitate the things about him with
charcoal; and attention being attracted to him, Luis took his boy into Seville,
- and got him entered on any, possible terms in the atelier of the licentiate Juan
de Las Roelas.
JUAN DE LAS ROELAS is one of the painters of whom separate notice should
be given. He was the son of Pedro, admiral, general de armada, whose family,
originally perhaps from Flanders, held a distinguished place in Andalusia. Juan

--- Fº
---
-
|- -ſae
|×
-
---
-------
----- ----- - - -|------------~~~~_
~~~~---- |-~|-



FRANC/SCO ZURBARAM. 53
became a priest, and is always styled El Clerigo Roelas, although he went to
Italy to study the art, and practised it uninterruptedly all his life. He was one
of the men most influential in carrying the Italian practice and spirit into Spain,
and also in identifying painting with the interests of the Church. His best
works have a strong Venetian character, and show that if he was not really the
pupil of Titian—who was dead, some say, before he visited Venice, he must have
associated with his disciples and studied his works.
In 1630 he was prebend in the chapel of the town of Olivares; shortly after
elevated to the rank of collegiate, and he became more lately canon. At this time
he painted for the treasurer of the chapter four pictures of the Life of the Virgin,
and these were the first after his return from Italy. He now executed many
pictures, “The Death of St. Isidore,” in the cathedral of Seville, being among
the most important; scarcely any of these, however, have left Spain. He went
to Madrid, and his application for the office of painter to the king was endorsed
by the junta, with the recommendation that he was very virtuous, a good painter,
and the son of the king's servant, the admiral. He did not, however, get the
office; returned to Olivares, and died there in 1625. In this country are several
of his works. At the Louis Philippe sale, in 1853, three of his pictures were sold
in London for small sums; one of these, the portrait of Roelas himself, was
bought by Mr. W. Stirling (Sir H. Stirling Maxwell), and appeared at the
Manchester Exhibition, 1857, along with the “Madonna and St. Elizabeth with
the Meeting of the Holy Children,” sent by Mr. G. A. Hoskins, which was
another of Louis Philippe's pictures.
Roelas had several pupils, but only one of great note, Zurbaran, who in some
measure left his master's manner for one formed on the works of Caravaggio.
Under Roelas, however, he began well and made rapid progress. He also appears
to have formed his habits by those of the priest, and been impressed by the
monastic society about him to a large extent. Quickly surpassing his fellow-
P
sº SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
pupils and even his master in certain executive qualities, he first showed an
extraordinary aptitude for imitation of drapery from nature, and more especially
white drapery; he became confirmed in a very safe and simple principle, which
was always to paint from the object—never to paint without nature before him,
a principle which is sure to produce vigorous and splendid naturalistic results,
but which suppº the painter to be entirely without higher motives than the
solid objects within his reach can carry out. Never did he paint a figure without
the model under his eye, and every fold of drapery was disposed on the lay-
figure, every accessory in the picture painted from the object itself. This rule,
as an educational one, is undeniably good, and even necessary; command over
the brush and ability to imitate being nearly all that can be taught; and it
may be Zurbaran followed the method in question only in beginning his career.
He certainly at last gave us the full expression of the heart and soul of the
characters he dealt with, confining himself, however, very much to those he
knew in life—the Franciscan, the Capuchin, ascetic and meagre, the eye lit up
and the hands quivering with pious emotion. * *
Seville was then, it appears, the city above all cities in the most Catholic
country, where monks were to be found in perfection. Nowhere was there
greater devotion than in this stronghold of orthodoxy, and the number of religious
communities was great, exhibiting all varieties; there were sixty convents, either
of men or women. The order of the Trinity, devoted to the redemption of captives,
went about with shaven heads, except the ring of hair to represent the crown of
thorns, in a dress of white linen bound with a black band; the Carmelites,
reformed by the saint of the town, St. Teresa, wore a gown of brown cloth
gathered by a large cincture, the hood hanging long behind, but attached to
the dress all round the throat; the Capuchins, also with heads shaved, dressed
in brown, tied by a great rope with three knots, ready for flagellation, their woollen
garments worn and patched, and the hood, like a pyramidal sack nearly as long as
FRANCISCO ZURBARAM. '55
themselves, hanging down the back; the Franciscans, offering the passers-by tobacco,'
perhaps just then beginning to appear, or amulets, chaplets, or the Agnus-dei, in
exchange for food or money, were everywhere to be seen. These last were always
provided with prayers for rain, for warm weather or for cold, as the case might :
be ; against thunder or the toothache. They were the favourites, and for centuries
in Spain country people bought up their old habits, to use them in dressing the
dead, so that St. Peter might pass them into heaven, thinking they were Fran-
ciscans ! Here were also the terrible Dominican Brothers, smelling of burnt wood
and riº, who take the wall of every one, and, above all, of the poor Franciscans.
seville was the theatre most honoured by all the correct practices of devotion;
and here Zurbaran found not only the models but the accessories and furniture
of his pictures—the well-used vellum books, rough wooden benches, death's heads,
and also, says M. Charles Blanc, “les instruments de la pénance, disciplines CIl
cuir, en parchemin tortillé, en plomb, avec ou sans nouds, cilices, haires, tétes
de mort, sacs en crin, bàillons, cadenas, ceintures de cuivre, peaux de chèvres
retournées, cendres, haillons ! Il n'y manui rien l’” The day when the Gallery
of Spanish Pictures was inaugurated in the Louvre, he goes on to say, that gallery,
which all Frenchmen so much regret, now that it is dispersed by the hammer
of the auctioneer, being the private property of Louis Philippe, there was in Paris
a vivid emotion. “And that which remained most strongly in the Parisian mind,
so impressionable and so blasé, was not the suavity of Murillo, nor the seraphic
expression of his angels () nor the astonishing pencil of Velazquez, making the
C3I) V8S speak and palpitate with life—a second creation, so to say ; it was a
certain “Monk in Prayer’ of Zurbaran, which it was impossible to forget, even
if one had seen it only once. On his knees, in a poor garb of grey-brown WOrn.
and patched, his visage lost in the shadow of his hood, the monk implores
the mercy of the Christian God, God soft and terrible. The hands, pallid and
emaciated, hold the death's head, and the eyes are lifted to heaven; he seems to
56
SPAN/SH SCHOOL OF PA/WTING.
"say, ‘De profundis clamavi ad te Domine, Domine.’”
. This is the great work
s
$
º
§
N
N.
N
N
|
The Monk in Prayer (National Gallery).
now in our National Gallery, happily purchased at the sale of the pictures of the

. . . FRANCISCO ZURBARAN. 57
ex-king of France. It is, indeed, a picture truly emotional and absolutely masterly;
Mr. Stirling in his “Annals” speaks of it with the greatest admiration; and every
one who sees it for the first time is overcome by it.
Always grave, Zurbaran never departed from the class of subjects suitable to *~
his powers. Several large compositions full of figures, the “Adoration of the
Magi,” for one, came from his hand; but he chose by preference simple subjects,
understood at once, with few figures, often only one. And the sentiment was
uniformly severe and devotional. He never touched comic or plebeian character,
like Murillo, or ugly dwarfs and deformities, like Velazquez, or grotesque and
bizarre cruelties, like Ribera. His saints are men and women truly of his own
time and country, but they are also inspired by faith and purified by penance;
they are animated with anxiety for all the world, but they themselves have
conquered fear and death.
Zurbaran had many children and also many pupils, but these it is not necessary
to particularise, as they did not carry out any principle or quality further or so
far as he had done. He died in 1662.
In this country there are now a good many pictures by Zurbaran; that just
mentioned in the National Gallery being one, the finest and most distinctive work
of the master. In the National Gallery of Scotland is one picture, “The Virgin
in Glory,” 8 feet 2 inches by 5 feet 8 inches, from the Louis Philippe Spanish
Gallery also, at the sale of which in London seven works by Zurbaran were
dispersed.
Stafford House. The Duke of Sutherland possesses three pictures by the master,
which were exhibited at Burlington House, 1870. These are “ St. Cirillo,” “St.
P. Thomas,” and “St. Anthony.”
Sir W. Stirling Maxwell. In his (we believe) large collection of Spanish pictures
are “Regina Angelorum,” the Madonna crowned and robed in crimson, cherubs
Q
58 SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
hovering round her; from the Standish Gallery in the Louvre: “ St. Catherine,”
from the Soult collection. *
In the Leeds Exhibition there was a “Santa Justa,” lent by the Right Hon.
the Speaker. In the Burlington House Exhibition, 1871, there were two—“Santa
Margareta,” Dowager Lady Ashburton; and “The Annunciation,” Earl Dudley.
In the same place, in 1872, there was also one, a fine work, in the earlier manner,
with less of Caravaggio in it—“St. Francis at his Devotions,” life size, lent by
Sam. Mendel, Esq. In the Louvre he is now unrepresented, nor does he appear
in many public galleries out of Spain.
-----> ------
---
U - P.
sº

º
§
º
|ºS
º
DON DIEGO WELAZQUEZ DE SILWA
(1599-1660).
2EXT to Murillo, the most celebrated painter of Spain is Velazquez, and
the best known out of the peninsula; one of the great painters of the
world, perhaps as a portrait painter equal to any, but very much
confined to that province in his best and most characteristic productions.
In Spain he is called Don Diego Rodriguez de Silva y Velazquez, his father's
family being de Silva, and his mother's Velazquez. He was born at Seville in
1599. Sent to college for the classics and philosophy, the story of his boyhood
is that of many other artists; he covered his books and exercises with sketches,
and at last was relieved from the oppressive burden of words, and sent to a different
school—the atelier of Francisco Herrera the elder.



6o SAPAAWISH SCHOOL OF AZAZAV7/AWG.
FRANCISCO DE HERRERA holds an important place in Spain from the number
of works of a remarkable kind produced by him, and by his son, F. de Herrera el
Mozo. These are, however, so restricted in interest in point of subject, at least
such of them as the writer has known either in galleries or by engravings, that
this incidental mention of them must suffice. Over and over again, in writing of
Spanish painters, we have to acknowledge that the great qualities of the art alone
arrest us, and in spite of the peculiarities of the ideas or motives expressed by
them, religious, or rather mythological. In the works of the Herreras, such as the
“Triumph of St. Hermenegilde,” in the Museum of Madrid, and the “St. Francis
lifted to Heaven,” we have heavy saints in monks' frocks or soldiers' armour
floating in the air, gesticulating in a way that answers no pious sentiment with
which we have any sympathy; dozens of Cupid-angels. about them in all possible
attitudes, and, in the case of the first saint, stunned adversaries lying below. Yet
the powers evinced are astonishing; in the “St. Basil dictating his Doctrine,” in
the Louvre, for example, the individuality and intellect of every one of the eight
or nine heads make the picture one of the highest interest Eſerrera the elder
was born in 1576, and died 1656; the younger was born in 1622, and died 1685.
Velazquez found among the painters of Seville Pacheco, a former pupil of
Herrera, who was poet and writer as well as painter, especially in fresco. His
house, says Palomino, quoted by M. Blanc, was the “golden prison of painting."
where was to be met the most brilliant and learned society, among whom were
Quevedo de Villegas, the poet and author of the “Visions,” Luis de Gongora, and
the immortal author of “Don Quichotte de la Mancha,” Cervantes. Velazquez
changed his master and went to Pacheco. Which of the visitors to the painter
and Inquisition inspector was the author of the epigram we gave before, is not
recorded; but if that epigram was well deserved, one would say Velazquez did
not owe much to his second instructor. However, Pacheco drew the portrait of
Cervantes in red and black crayons, a drawing which called out some verses from
DOW DIEGO VELAZQUEZ DE SIL VA. 61
Quevedo; and Alonzo Cano was also a pupil, Velazquez and Cano forming a long
friendship.
Velazquez was a sociable youth, of polished manners, and the visitors he met
in Pacheco's studio began the society he naturally cultivated, and which gathered
as naturally round him all through life. At an early age, about twenty, he
married the Dona Juana, Pacheco's daughter, and in 1622, three years later, he
quitted Seville, for Madrid, where his townsman, the Canon Fonseca, had the
means of assisting him at the palace. Velazquez was, however, recalled to Seville,
but being followed there by a letter from the Duke d’Olivares, minister and
favourite of Philippe IV., accompanied by fifty ducats of gold, he returned to
Madrid, and shortly after the king sat to him for his portrait, the first of many,
not only of him, but of all the royal family, of the court, and of all the grandees
of Spain, and of half the world. This portrait was one of great difficulty ; the
king was in his armour, mounted on a war-horse in violent action, the background
an open country. The success of the young painter was complete ; and, indeed,
it does not appear that Velazquez, like so many other men in the first rank in
the history of art, ever had any difficulties to overcome—as if the painter, like
the poet, was born, not made. He attained at once the power of illusion, and
transferred the mobility of life to his canvas, with all the vigorous individuality
of his models. The whole figure of his sitter was thus informed, and impressed
the spectator with its unity and completeness, as if he had at once impressed on
his picture the entire action of the person, and had done so at twenty feet distance.
Soon made painter to the king, - pintor de camera, Velazquez was in the highway
of fortune. Philippe IV. does not occupy a very high place among kings, but he
seems to have been able to estimate the value of Velazquez, and also of Calderon,
who was at court in those days. Since the grand time of the Emperor Charles W.
Spain had lost much, it had shrunk from the Netherlands and from other countries,
and Philip could not but feel the difference; but he could be happy in cultivating
R
62 SPANISH SCHOOL OF PA/WTING,
the amenities of art, and, it is said, really had friendships with men of great
abilities.
Murillo has been sometimes spoken of as a versatile painter, because he turned
from gipsy boys and beggars to Madonnas in glory; but if we properly consider
the character of these Madonnas, we find that they, too, are but common mortals,
although sweet and beautiful in an obviously natural way; so Velazquez, when
he turned from the noble hidalgo and donna to “The Water Seller” and
The Drunkards (Los Borrachos) 1624. (R. Museum, Madrid.)
“The Drunkards,” we find the old man handing the glass in the first is as noble
as any of his sitters for portraits, and the action of the half-naked bacchanal,
crowning the kneeling wreck of a soldier, recalls an act of chivalry. So it was
also in his landscapes, he painted always with the same force and freshness of

DOW DIEGO VELAZQUEZ DE S/L VA. 63
pencil, in a large manner, quite apart from any of the Dutch landscape painters
then beginning to appear in numbers, but like other painters of history, Salvator,
or even Rubens.
The Water-seller of Seville (Duke of Wellington).
In 1629 Velazquez asked the king's permission to travel, and received it with
difficulty, embarking, on the 10th August, in the vessel of the Marquis de
Spinola. He shortly reached Venice, where the Spanish ambassador lodged him


£4 SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING,
Y
in his palace. Titian, Veronese, and Tintoretto all impressed him deeply, but
the last named seems to have had the greatest effect upon him, as he copied the
{{ Calvary ” and the “Communion of the Apostles,” proposing to send them to
Philip. Ferrara, Bologna, Rome, Naples were successively visited. In Rome,
he copied a great part of the “Last Judgment” of Michelangelo, and at Naples
he met his countryman, Ribera, with whom he must have had many points of
sympathy, and returned to Spain and Madrid in the beginning of 1631, giving
proofs of his matured powers by the production of the “Forge of Vulcan ” and
“The Coat of many Colours.” Immediately recommencing his work of painting
the children of Philippe, except two short j ourneys with the king, in Arragon,
in 1642 and 1644, he remained for seventeen years busily employed in the
atelier, where Philippe visited him familiarly every day. In Mr. Stirling's delightful
monograph, “Velazquez and his Works,” we have much interesting information
about the manners and ways of the king and royal family, which we wish we
could find space here to refer to more at large.
For some time the idea of establishing a public academy of the Fine Arts had
been in the king's mind, and at last, in the end of 1648, he sent Velazquez to Italy
to collect models and other materials for the intended schools. He embarked
along with the Duc de Naxera, who went to conduct the Archduchess Marianna,
the second wife of Philippe IV., into Spain. He now passed from Genoa through
many towns, till at last he again arrived at Naples, where Ribera was now living
in a princely manner, but surrounded by the invo. and unscrupulous scoundrels
before described, breathing so vile an atmosphere of jealousy, that Velazquez
quickly returned to Rome, where Innocent X., then Pope, sat for his portrait.
At that time there were, it is true, only second-rate artists in Rome; Bernini
in sculpture, Pietro da Cortona, Salvator Rosa, in painting; but, on the com-
pletion of the portrait, which is a truly noble work, the enthusiasm for Velazquez
reached an extraordinary height. The picture is full of varieties of red; the
DOW DIEGO WEZAZQUEZ DE S/L WA.
65
face full of colour;
the
y
is red
is fauteuil
rmine, h
lothed in scarlet and e
pope IS C
|ſºſ
|||||，|-
|
, ，
|
|
}
|
|||||
||
|||||||||||||
||
，
|
|
| ||
"|||-
|-|
||||||||||||
The Infant, Don Carlos (R. Museum, Madrid).
1 with
S Cal'I’leſ
Rome, and wa
in
t was such a portrait as had not been seen
i












66 SPAN/SH SCHOOL OF PA/WT/NG.
great pomp in procession, the painter receiving an ovation from his brethren
in art.
Philippe was by this time impatient for the return of his friend and painter.
Velazquez commissioned all the leading artists in Rome to paint pictures for
him, and left. These artists were twelve in number: Guido, Domenichino,
Lanfranc, Joseph d'Arpinas, Pietro da Cortona, Guercino, Valentin, Andrea Sacchi,
Assembly of Artists, his Contemporaries (Zouvre).
Poussin, Massimo, Gentileschi, and Joachim Sandrart.” On his arrival again in
Madrid, he was recompensed by an appointment in the palace and other advan-
tages—appointments which raised this source of income to a thousand ducats
a year. The war then just beginning with France had, it is said, prevented
* Mr. Stirling simply says “he ordered various works of living artists,” but I find all these names
given by various authorities. It will be observed Ribera does not appear among them. It is true he
was not in Rome, but some of the others were not resident there, only visitors.







DOW DIEGO VE/AZQUEZ DE S/L VA. 67
Velazquez visiting Paris; but, shortly after his return home, he commemorated
the success of Spinola, with whom he had travelled on first leaving Spain,
producing one of the most astonishing pictures in the world, “The Surrender
of Breda,” which has been called “The Picture of the Lances,” in which the
Marquis of Spinola advances before the troop of lance-bearers to receive the
The Zhread Spinners (R. Museum, Madrid).
keys from the conquered general. On one side are the Flemings, on the other
the Spaniards, two lines of soldiers, all of them men of mark, and above is
the mass of flags and red lances against the sky. A truly surprising picture,
like that of the Battle of Lepanto in the ducal palace in Venice, a scene to
recall for ever, when one likes to repaint it on the retina, by shutting one's








.68 • SPA.VISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING..
eyes. The power of reproducing a moment like this is the poetry of the painter:
Velazquez had no creative imagination, nor any one of all the Spanish painters;
but he had the power to realise a historical moment again on his canvas, by
rightly using the materials actually composing the original scene in nature. Other
works of similar power and realistic truth, is that called “The Family of Philippe
IV.,” painted in 1656, his last important work, and “The Thread Makers,” or
rather Tapestry-workers, both of them truly surprising, in a way now utterly
forgotten; beauty, for its own sake, is not a motive in the production of these
pictures; they are far from giving us a vivid impression of lovable female life
or of admirable men, yet we are intensely interested, partly because we are
sure a true insight into the times is offered us, and also of course because the
art is so complete.
When this portrait-work, the “Family of Philippe IV,” which is called in
Spain “Las Meninas"—The Maids of Honour, was finished and the king came
to see it, Velazquez asked if he saw anything yet wanting in it. “Yes,” said
he, taking the palette in his hand, “just this; ” going up to the figure of the
painter in the picture and painting on its breast the cross of the order of
Santiago. This cross, it is said, is still to be seen roughly done on the picture
as it now hangs in the gallery in Madrid; but a copy, which only we have
seen, does not convey this exactly. Mr. Bankes, of Kingston Lacy, Dorsetshire,
has a repetition of his work, said to be excellently like the original.
In Versailles there is a representation of the scene in the Ile de la Conference,
When Louis XIV. and Philippe met, at the conclusion of the war, when the
Infanta Marie-Thérèse was espoused to Louis. Velazquez, as Aposentador-major or
quarter-master general of the king's household, had to design and arrange the
accommodation for this meeting, and was present at it. The picture in Versailles
is by Charles Lebrun, and the portrait of Velazquez therein shows him as an
old and sad-looking man, to whom the world had been rather an exacting than
DOV D/EGO
VE/AZQUEZ DE S/L VA.
69
inter was
great pa
Cardina! /r/ant Don Ferdinand of Austria (R. Museum, Madrid).
·
·
1660, when the
in
ing took place
1S meet
Th
a hospitable host.
but sixty-one years of age, but his aspect, from his youth, was that of a sombre
T

7o SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
and proud man, whom we never expect to laugh. Lebrun's cadaverous portrait
was, no doubt, done from the life. He returned to Madrid, and his family
were shocked to see some change in him of evil presage. He lived only a few
weeks, and died on the 7th August, 1660. His wife, the daughter of Pacheco,
he had married when they were both so young, did not survive him long, but
died of grief seven days after, and was buried by his side. If Velazquez is not
altogether the greatest painter among Spaniards, which we incline to think he
is, his is doubtless the noblest figure in their gallery. º
The portrait of Pope Innocent X., we have mentioned, is now in the Doria
Palace, Rome. A portrait of himself is in the gallery at Florence. Nearly all
European public galleries possess pictures from his hand.
In this country there are many. In the list of his known works at the end
of Mr. Stirling's “Annals of the Artists of Spain,” there are seventy oil pictures
by Velazquez particularised as existing in Britain. Of these five are sacred
subjects; four fancy, mythological &c.; forty-seven portraits, and ten landscapes.
Mr. Stirlings work was published in 1848, since which time the Soult and Louis
Philippe sales have taken place, the last in London.
In the National Gallery are four : “ Philippe IV, hunting the Wild Boar,”
&l picture with numerous small figures, much repainted, it is said, by Mr. Lance;
º The Nativity,” or Adoration of the Shepherds ; “A Dead Warrior,” known as
the Dead Roland, El Orlando Muerto ; and a bust portrait, life size, of Philippe IV.
In the Scottish National Gallery are two: “Portrait of Don Balthazor Carlos,”
SOIl of Philippe by his first wife, Isabel, a child who died at the age of six; and
“An Incident in the Life of Pope Sixtus W.,” a sketch.
At Dulwich there are three, and at Hampton Court one picture by the master.
In the great Manchester Exhibition, 1867, were no fewer than fourteen, four of
them from the Marquis of Hertford's collection, now belonging to Sir Richard
Wallace, Bart., to whom the original of our engraving, “A Lady with a Fan,”
DOW DIEGO VELAZQUEZ DE S/L VA. 71
belongs. This picture was sent by Sir Richard to the last Burlington House
Exhibition, and called in the catalogue (No. 75), without any reason, “A Spanish
Infanta.” In the Leeds Exhibition of 1868, there were nine, principally portraits.
Court Dwarf (Velazquez). (R. Museum. Madrid.)

BARTOLOME ESTEBAN MURILLO
(1618-1682).
E now arrive at the artist whose name has been placed on the title-page
of this volume; the latest, and, in the estimate of nearly every
writer on the Spanish Schools, and of every public and private col-
lector in Europe, the greatest painter Spain has produced. Compared to him
there are three who may be preferred by those who are exclusive or peculiar in
taste, or who object to the common nature of Murillo: these are Zurbaran, whose
sympathies were in the cloister; Ribera, whose power of hand is as great as that
of Tintoretto, whose sympathies were cruel; and Velazquez, who was essentially


）
№.
~
---
|
|-
|-
NARG-E-O-T. SCULP-
MURL1-LO PIN-

BARZozouz ESTEBAw Morſzzo. 73
a portrait-painter. But Murillo Was Wider than either or all of them perhaps,
and the beauty of his treatment, and mastery of his technique, has made him, in
spite of a commonplace character and coarseness of mind that places him below
the greatest of the Italian masters, the representative name in the art of Spain.
Yet we must acknowledge Murillo to be an artistic intellect of the highest
class. A less complete nature has a more distinct province, and rarely works
out destiny by degrees, or expresses himself and his age, but at once attains
the knowledge of what he can do, and remains doing it for the rest of his
life. Murillo's art we shall find to be multiform, but throughout the whole
of it there is a distinct personality. º, -
He was born at Seville on the 1st January, 1618, not at Pilas in 1613, as
Palomino erroneously stated. Throughout Spain, as we have seen, Seville was
spoken of always as a wonderful place, and its school of painting was one of the
causes of this. The first master of the boy was his uncle Juan del Castillo, who,
brought up in the Florentine traditions of a much earlier period, was a dry and
hard colourist, according to Bermudez; but to make up for that, his design was pure
and good, likely to form the pupil’s taste with advantage. Murillo learned easily,
until the day when Castillo went to establish himself at Cadiz, when he found
himself adrift before having mastered his art, and too young to know what to do
next. Without money he must also have been, because he immediately tried to
make some for himself by painting a whole load of such things as were then
exported from Spain to the Americas, coloured banners and other wares sailors
found Saleable at the other side of the Atlantic. These were the modest
beginnings of Murillo, and if such exercise gave him freedom and facility, as
scene painting has frequently done, it was lucky for him.
Happily for Murillo, a fellow-pupil in Castillo's atelier came in his way. This
was Pedro de Moya, who had been studying under Wandyke in London, whose
firm and clear texture of colour he had managed to acquire, and as the manner
U
74 SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
of the Flemish portrait-painter was unknown in Seville, every one was taken by
Moya's works. For Murillo, above all, the sight of these was a revelation; he
felt at once the importance of the soft and easy light of Wandyck, and began to
despise the hard contours of Castillo. If such splendours as these could be carried
away by a short visit to London, what mighty advantages might there be in travel,
in going from place to place, in Flanders and in Italy I True, Vandyck was just
dead, but other great painters were alive, and if not, their pictures remained.
But how was he to travel without fortune? especially how was he to get over
the first long and expensive sea-voyage 2 He found resources, however; he bought
a, quantity of canvas, cut it into squares of the sizes he thought likely to meet the
readiest market, primed and prepared them himself, and painted all kinds of subjects
upon them—Madonnas, devotional daubs, flower groups, landscapes, St. Francis,
sacred hearts, fanciful cascades The mass of these he sold wholesale to a
shipowner, and set off to go to Italy; disappeared, as it is said, without informing
his family or friends. --
Velazquez was in great favour at Madrid at that time, and instead of starting
direct for Naples or other seaport, Murillo appeared before him at the capital,
and was very favourably received. Twenty-five years of age, he was ready to
benefit by every advantage, and the numerous works going on as well as already
collected in the Escorial, in the palace, and other places, made a vivid impression
on the youth. Titians, Rubenses, and many others appeared quite wonderful to
Murillo, and made him forget his intended journey for a time. -
It was, then, without going further than the apartments of the Cierzo and the
Escorial, under the eyes of Velazquez and with his advice, that Murillo 3.0CODOl-
plished the end he had in view when he left Seville. He copied many of the
masterpieces he saw here, spent nearly three years indeed doing little else,
especially those of the Venetians, but also of the Flemish colourists; but to neglect
nothing he drew much, both from casts and from the life, followed out, in fact, a
APARZOZOME ESTEBAAW MURIZZO. 75
system of education, under the advice of Velazquez. There are stories of Murillo
having gone to America to be found in many biographies, derived from Sandrart
and others; but these stories have been apparently founded on his early ventures
of ship-loads of crude paintings that crossed the Atlantic while he remained at
home. Italian writers, unwilling to believe he was not indebted to them, have
insisted on his having visited Venice and Florence; but, as Palomino says, how
could such journeys have been made when his numerous friends knew him all
through these educational years, and indeed all his time is accounted for? The
result was that he returned to Seville in 1645, and immediately produced the
pictures for the little cloister in the convent of St. Francis, that astonished every
one. In these there was no direct imitation as in his old fellow-pupil’s work;
there was, indeed, a unity and distinct character of his own, but there were also
refinements and qualities derived from all the masters he had studied so slavishly.
Here and there Titian was discovered, and Rubens, or Ribera's forcible and lurid
manner betrayed itself, but, nevertheless, there was something more than these.
The angels appearing to St. Francis in his ecstasy might pass for Ribera; the
dying St. Clara, which is one of the finest, recalls Vandyck in the movements s
and air of the heads, and in the refined colour of the flesh. Again, St. James
attending to the poor shows the influence of Velazquez. Nevertheless, all this
electicism was only the result of the years of educational imitation, and showed
the consciousness that he was late in the day, and had to follow where it was
impossible he could lead. -
“Who would believe it?” says M. Charles Blanc, “it is not to these cloisters
we must now go to see the works in question; it is to Paris, whither the
fourgons of our generals carried some of them, as ‘l’Extatique à la Cuisine,’
which enriched the collection of Marshal Soult; or “La Mort de S. Claire,’
one of the jewels of the Galerie Aquado.” Belonging to the same transitional
period of Murillo are other well-known pictures; the “Brigand,” for instance, a
76 SPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PA/WTVAWG.
half-naked villain, in the manner of Spagnoletto, arresting a monk ; and a “Flight
- into Egypt,” where the group is powerfully painted against the blackness of night. -
In a country like Spain, Murillo became easily the favourite of the crowd.
He was one of themselves, and had all the gifts they valued. Not like Velazquez,
reproducing by choice only the noble and dignified side of the national character,
Murillo preferred the vulgar, but had sufficient versatility to change his theme
as often as he chose. He, like all the older Spanish pºinters knew how to give
the blessed fervour of the devotee, or the ecstasy of the glorified monk, but he
could also (and this was his own) paint to perfection the rags and the happiness
of the gipsy beggar boys, a flower-girl grinning at you with a lapful of flowers,
or the precocious sentiment of the Good Shepherd, with the lamb by his side,
painted to a miracle. Pious, and profoundly Catholic, he often prayed for long
hours in the church of his parish, and did not fail to remark, after vespers,
the donnas and damsels liming their masks, to give him a glimpse of their faces.
He mixed happily the mundane and the celestial, and found it possible to enjoy
them together; nor was his taste exclusive—the filthy mendicant child catching the
troublesome vermin is one of his most favourite minor works, and the subject scarcely
attracts our attention, the splendour of the colour and chiaroscuro being so complete.
From this time, the time of his return to Seville, Murillo must have painted
incessantly, and with a sure hand, for many years, as the number of his works,
all nearly equal in mastery and force of colour, attest. Everything the successful
artist sees, if his mind is unoccupied and his bodily health perfect—the penitent
on his knees, he might happen to stumble against in the twilight, on leaving the
sacristy where he was employed, or the lazzaroni in the midday sun, blessed
with their melons or their flies, are immediately transferred to canvas with a
full brush and a rapid hand, as an interlude in the execution of some huge
canvas of the Holy Family or the Mystery of the Immaculate Conception. The
picture we particularly allude to above is the “Young Mendicant” in the Louvre,
º
º -
%z.




AEAR7 O/OME ES7/CAEAN MUR/// O. 77
a picture often engraved, which was called by the Spaniards, with great enjoy-
ment, el piojoso, which we had better not translate. That engraved in this volume
of the two gipsy boys, one of them having a piece of bread in his mouth, is
another of this class, in every one of which Murillo seems to enter into the
Bohemian squalor of the life he paints with brotherly sympathy and without
Boy and Dog.
the least shade of contempt. And so it is with the spectator; the squalor
is so splendid in colour, laid on with a full brush, the ragamuffin is so full of
character, from the cropped head of hair to the dusty sole of his brown foot,
we look on with pleasure, and see only the work of art.
“Il n'est pas de pouilleuw
Qui par l'art invité ne puisse plaire aux yeux.”
This varied application of his powers was new in Spanish practice in a
X

78 SAPAAWISH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTING.
©
great degree, and Murillo found himself the favourite of all classes and equally
honoured by the Church and the people. But we must not imitate his previous,
or at least his foreign biographers, and find him as great in depicting a Holy
Family as he was skilful in other walks. His versatility is external and his
power of execution and command over drawing and colour has hidden the
tremendous fact that his saints are mean, and even his Blessed Virgin, so much
esteemed, is a soulless and ordinary young woman, upplying the place of
intrinsic elevation of nature by a dramatic exhibition of sentiment.
Of these we shall say a few words again; but to follow the narrative of his
life, we find him immediately the most popular artist Spain had ever seen, and
becoming rapidly rich and powerful. The more he painted, the more completely
he asserted his own personality and the less can he be said to be eclectic, either in
his manner o: in his inventions. He was essentially a man of strong individuality,
and his warm admiration for the men he had begun by copying, and more lately
by imitating, showed him to be honestly determined to educate himself—to be
humble-minded, in a way, and ready to acknowledge himself inferior, as long
as he really was so. The contemporary of Velazquez, and almost of Vandyk,
he could not help being subject to the same influences; but long before he
did his finest works, the Soult picture, those in our National Gallery, and others,
all trace of imitation of earlier masters was gone, he had stamped on every work
he did only one sign manual, and that was the name of Bartolome Esteban
Murillo. He now married, and, as we might expect from all the traits of
character we have already given, his choice was una persona de conveniencias,
belonging to a distinguished family of the town of Pilas, the Doña Beatrix de
Cabrera y Sotomayor. This marriage took place in 1648, only three years after
his return to Seville, in which short space of time he had painted as many
pictures as some of our artists complete in the course of a lifetime ; and to a
year or two later, those best acquainted with his works, attribute his final or
scules
BL-N-HA-R-L)
Pin-
MUR-LLLC.

BARTOZOME ESTEBAAW MURIZZO.
third partial change of manner, after which the softness and amenity of his light
and shade and absence of blackness in the latter, had attained perfection.
As far as I remember, Murillo is the first great painter to whom the power
of painting air, or of giving atmosphere between the parts of his figures and
groups, was attributed. This phrase has with our landscape painters become a
mere slang, indicating a tričk which threatens to destroy the solidity of nature
in their works, a folly generated by imitation of Turner's later manner but the
painting of air spoken of by Moratin and quoted by M. Charles Blanc had no
affectation in it, every part of Murillo's pictures being rich in tone and possessed
of a powerful unity. He had, moreover, by inheritance, as we may say, the
power of preserving colour and warmth, and yet expressing grey grounds and
cool distances. This is excellently said by M. Charles Blanc. “Il on conserva
de plus un excellent ton gris qui ordinairement sert de fond de Velasquez, où
la gravité des personnages vētus de noir se combine si heureusement avec ce
fond tranquille et froid. Mais que dis-je ? Les tons froids de l’Espagne sont
encore des tons chauds.”
The two painters at the head of the school of Seville, when Murillo began
painting there, were Juan de Valdes Leal and Francisco Herrera the younger,
who were not disposed to abdicate; the place of caposewola, however, was clearly
his, and his house was the centre of interest, not only in art, but in all that
belonged to taste and fashion; and from many other places messengers arrived
to negotiate for pictures of the Virgin in many varied actions, and of the young
Christ, painted now from his own children, two boys, and a daughter who after-
wards took the veil, eight years before the death of her father.
The Virgin Mary received at this time, and for a long period, nearly the entire
worship of Spain; the orders of monks, Capuchins, Augustines, and Franciscans,
and especially Dominicans, had their founders to engage their veneration and
employ their artists, but all of them united in regard for the mother of Christ.

8o SPANISH SCHOOL of PAINTING.
Pacheco, who wrote with the immediate advice of intimate friends who were all of
the Society of Jesus, dwelt very much on the proprieties of treatment of the
person, and especially on the mythical subject of the Immaculate Conception, which
became formalised and settled in all its parts. But the painter who carried it out
on canvas with most complete success, to the delight of the whole religious com-
munity, was Murillo. Speaking from an unbiassed critical point of view, indeed,
one would say that this representation of Mary, not as a real woman, but as a
Creature without weight, floating in an undescribed region of air filled with infants
• fledged with insignificant coloured wings, was an unwarranted, and, indeed,
unorthodox proceeding, destructive of the evangelical narrative; we might even
go the length Q of saying, when they were burning so many heretics and holding
periodically their diabolical Acts of Faith, the perpetrators of an invention like
this might have had a benefit among others. But whatever redounded to the
honour of the Virgin was right, and Murillo painted the subject many times.
For the high altar of the cathedral and for many parish and convent churches
he painted this and many other incidents, wherein angels surround and minister
to the Virgin mother.
In some respects, indeed, the prescribed rules can scarcely be said to have been
carried out by Murillo. The age of the Virgin, Pacheco says, must be from twelve
to fifteen ; but in every one of the master's works she appears more than that, and
of nearly the same period of life, rather older indeed than is usual in Italian works.
Altogether considered, what an extraordinary development of Christianity these
pictures show ! Wested in blue and white, as she appeared to Sister Beatrix de
Silva, the drapery flowing down so that all trace is lost of the limbs below the
knees, and folded over the moon, which does not support her, but merely adorns
the cloud round the region of her feet (if she has any) about the size of a
reaping-hook, she lays her hand upon her bosom, and looks up through a glory
of thick yellow light that seems to proceed from herself. Round her innumerable
BARTOLOME ESTEBAN MURIZZO. 81
cherubs, not the mystical winged heads of older painters, but infants quite natural
(as is the treatment of the Virgin herself), with lovely carnations on their sturdy
limbs. These are the Zephyrs of Christian mythology that fill the upper air,
fluttering round her, and giving her a presentiment of maternity; some sitting
on the more solid clouds approaching the dark below which belongs to the earth,
and many above fading away into the golden mist behind her.
This naturalism in treatment and mysticism in conception it is that makes these
Works of Murillo, and, indeed, the works of all the masters of the Spanish school,
so satisfactory to the Catholic, and at the same time so enigmatical to the reason.
The pleasure given by a work of art is, no doubt, its raison d'être, but still we may
analyze the materials, and find an interest in tracing them to their metaphysical
sources. The early practice WaS w make Mary a lady living in a great house or
cloister. This was the Italian view of respect for the mother of the body of Christ;
but in Murillo we find her belongings represented as humble. In his Annunciations
she is surrounded with the accessories of domestic life, a workbag and Scissors
beside her—not an ornamental prie-dieu and illuminated missal. Fidelity to the
traditions of the early Renaissance had fallen away, not out of decreased respect,
but out of increased naturalism and a sense of truth to the narrative; but the
supernatural element, the glory in which Gabriel comes to her is much enhanced,
giving a greater contrast, dramatically considered. -
The freedom of treatment by Raphael and others had been much widened in
Italy; naked feet were but a small matter; but in Spain, since Ribalta and Vargas,
it had, on the contrary, shrunk to the narrowest limits, and Murillo did his best to
unite the virginal character with the strictest attention to the proprieties. But
the dark hair and eyes are not favourable to the result desired; divine transport,
after all, is not the emotion expressed—or at least we cannot think of her as the
* chosen of God from all the women in the world. How different from Giotto’s,
although what is vulgarly called so much more beautiful! Nor can we understand
how it could be possible to M. Charles Blanc to write thus of the Infant Saviour
Y
82 SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
as realised by Murillo: “Il a su imprimer au fils de Marie un caractère vraiment
surhuman. On croit voir autour de la tête de cet enfant une auréole que le peintre
n'a point figurée pourtant; sa belle tête s'illumine; son regard ouvert, pénétrant,
a la fois wif et doux, lance des éclairs de génie, et il parait si grand, même dans la
tranquillité du sommeil, qu'on se sent averti de la présence d’un Dieu: patuit Deus.
‘Chez Raphael,” dit un de nos critiques, . la Vierge est plus vierge; chez Murillo,
l'enfant-Dieu est plus Dieu.’” This last opinion is that of M. Thoré, in his
“Etudes sur la peinture espagnole,” published in the Revue de Paris ; but it
appears to the present writer that Murillo’s “Young Christ” is like his Madonnas,
weaker in elevation than in execution, poor intellectually, great only artistically.
When the stranger visits Seville he is taken to the cathedral, called by some
the finest in Spain, as it is certainly the largest, and the pictures by our master,
still remaining, are pointed out to him. But before the French occupation there
were many more. The superb “Birth of the Virgin” and “Repose in Egypt.”
which, on Soult's arrival, were concealed by the chapter, are now gone. A traitor
to the town informed him, and he sent to beg them as a present, hinting that if
refused, he would take them by force. So says Mr. Ford with a reference (Toreno
xx.), and proceeds to relate an anecdote, illustrative of the Marshal's manners.
“One day, showing Colonel G–– his gallery in Paris, Soult stopped opposite a
Murillo, and Said, ‘I very much value that as it saved the lives of two estimable
persons.” An aide-de-camp whispered, “He threatened to have both shot on the
spot, unless they gave up the picture.’”
But the master is still to be seen in all his glory at Seville. In the Caridad,
or charity dedicated to St. George, rebuilt by Miguel Mañara, a friend of Murillo,
whose splendid portrait of him is now at Bowood, there are still hanging in their
original places “The Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes,” “ Moses striking the
Rock,” a “St. John,” and “The Infant Saviour.” Four others were carried off
by Soult, two of which he sold to the Duke of Sutherland, viz., “The Angels
and Abraham,” and “The Prodigal Son,” the blank spaces remaining in ever-
-
，
|-
|-
|…
|×
：
| /
：
，
R№. ..……
R.
№.
№，
|×
|×
-
，
：
-//
)///
/////////////
//////////√
cº-sº
PIN-X-
MURLLLC.

BARTOLOME ESTEAAAW MURIZZO. 83
lasting memory of French war-morality, some day, perhaps, to be returned upon
them. In the museum there is a Sala de Murillo containing many of his finest
Works; particularly those that came from the Capuchin convent for which they
were painted at his best period; “The Nativity,” “ Adoration of the Shepherds,”
“St. Francis embracing the crucified Saviour,” “The Virgin and Angels with
the Dead Christ,” “The Annunciation,” and some others.
There is also a picture still pointed out by the cicerone to which an anecdote
is attached. This is the “Conception,” painted for the cupola of the Franciscans,
• which, being painted for a distance, was executed with such extraordinary bravura
and vigour, that the assembled fathers, on its being brought into the convent
and left standing on the ground, where they could see all its roughness and
none of its merits, refused to have it when the painter came to put it in its
place. Before taking it away again, which he immediately determined on doing,
he asked if they would let him see it in its place. It was accordingly raised,
when the curiosity of the monks brought them all back, and they, insisted on
retaining it; the rude force of the execution had now a wonderful effect, and
they saw at once the mistake they had committed. It was then the painter's
turn to triumph, and he exacted double the price he was to have had, before
consenting to leave the insulted work.
Besides the beggar boys and the pictures wherein the Virgin or the infant
Christ, or both, appear, there is a third class of inventions quite as characteristic
of Murillo—subjects full of figures. In these he has frequently managed to
express in contrast, the rich and the poor, the extremities of life and of character,
luxury, or benign charity and misery, rags and silken attire, flourishing health
and sickness. A typical work of this kind is the St. Elizabeth of Hungary,
who, with her crown over her white veil of fine tissue, washes the Sores on the
head of the leprous boy, while, lying on the ground, or standing round, are
lepers of all ages and court ladies of rare beauty. The charity which is
penitential, and the objects of it—the blind, paralytic, lame, leprous, and dying,
84. SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
has always had a pious fascination in Spain, and Murillo found models in plenty,
the streets of Seville being a vast hospital, without either wards or beds. This
picture of St. Elizabeth was carried to Paris, and exhibited at the Louvre,
with all the others from Spain, in 1812, when the impression made was very
great. M. Viardot has much to say of it, and finds the triumph of religion
expressed in the self-sacrificing tremble of the queen's white hands on the
head of the kneeling boy. “The Prodigal Son,” “The Paralytic at the Pool,”
are pictures of this class. “The Multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes” is
another, but without the repulsive; it is also one of his largest works. Of
this M. Thoré speaks with rapture, and, in the absence of personal knowledge,
We may quote his words: “Si le Christ a nourri cinq mille hommes avec cinq
pains d'orge et deux poissons, Murillo a peint cinq mille hommes sur un espace
de Vingt-six pieds. En vérité, il n'en manque pas un des cinq mille; c'est une
multitude inouie de femmes et d'enfants, de jeunes gens et de veillards, une
nuée de têtes et de bras qui se meuvent à l’aise, Sans confusion, Sans géne, sans
tumulte. Tous contemplent le Christ au milieu de ses disciples, et le Christ
bénit les pains, et le miracle est opéré ! . Magnifique enseignement de charité
que le peintre a magnifiquement traduit !”
All the works of very great painters have something in them of oneness
and reality that looks like creation—as if they had been called into existence
as they are, not elaborated piece by piece. And Murillo's have this great
quality, although they come later into the field than any other of the pictures
We think of in this way; because in this we moderns are entirely deficient, nor
can We recall any in any school which so impress us, except, perhaps, the “Wreck
of the Medusa,” and some of those of David Scott, of Edinburgh, who died in
1848, and who remains totally unknown in London.
The character of Murillo was amiable and soft, although he was subject to
gusts of passion, and to sudden impulses. Pious by temperament, he became
APAA-7'OZO//E ES7"E.BAN MURILZ.O. 85
more devout as age increased upon him, and would remain alone in church,
forgetting all the world in his reverie, from the midday till he was lost in the
twilight. And now we come to his end: he went to Cadiz to paint the “Marriage
of St. Catherine” for the great altar of the Capuchins. In a fit of absence of
mind, he fell from the scaffold, which brought on disease, and he returned home
to pass the remainder of his life in suffering and prayer. This did not last
long; every day he was carried to the church of Santa Cruz, and said his
prayers before the famous “Descent from the Cross,” by Peter Campana, an earlier
painter of a dry manner, Murillo's admiration of whom would suggest a doubt
of his contentment with his own successes. One day the sacristan finding him
sitting there for hours inactive, asked him if he was ready to go. “ I wait here,”
Murillo answered, “till the pious servants of our Lord have taken him down; ”
and before this picture he expressed a wish to be buried. He died on the 3rd
of April, 1682, in the arms of Chevalier Pedro Muñez de Villavicencio, his
intimate friend and one of his best pupils, at the age of sixty-three.
Zhe Extacy of S. Francis (formerly in the Aguado Gallery).
Z

CONCLUSION,
(FROM THE DEATH OF MURILLO TO THE PRESENT.)
§HE transcendent success of Murillo was the beginning of the end of
the history of Spanish art. National prosperity was waning, and the
public spirit was no more. Literature had spread into many channels
everywhere but in Spain, and art had associated itself with social interests at the
end of the seventeenth century in France and the Low Countries, and even with
us in England. But in Spain it was still limited to the field of church decoration,
already so well filled. Spain became poor, and the rest of Europe rich. It is
said hardihood of character began to decline from the day of the conquest of
Granada, and all the cardinal virtues were tarnished by the wealth of Mexico
and Peru, which suddenly ceased when it became necessary. Nothing remained
but pride and piety, the one taking the hard form of orthodoxy, and the other
depriving the Spaniard of the luxuries of arts and letters.
The number of painters living and working with reputation and success at
the same time with Murillo, and dying nearly at the same time, is very great.
The works of many of these remain to attest the thorough accomplishment and
splendid vigour of the various Peninsular schools of art, but their subjects, when
not employed on portraits, are still exclusively the mysteries of the calendar, the
horrors of martyrdom, or the childish and repulsive acts of humility of the
Saints, all of which, characters or actions in actual life, for good or ill, time and
science had nearly vetoed. -
Let us enumerate these men, with a few words of history, or estimate as far
as their works are known to the writer, which is indeed but little. With them
died out the art of painting in Spain.

º º º | º
"º |
| | º " º |
Murºnino ºr * Llººr sºul ºr

COWCLUSION. 87
Don Juan CARRENo DE MIRANDA, who was sixty-seven at the time of Murillo's
death, having been born at Aviles, in the Asturias, in 1614, is, after that master
and Velazquez, one of the most sympathetic of Spanish artists. His portraits
had something of Vandyck in them, and his pious subjects the executive qualities
that made the fame of Murillo, in some degree. When ten years of age, his
father took him to Madrid, and arrived just at the time Velazquez had settled
there and been made pintor de Camera, painter to the court, at the age of
twenty-four. Except him, however, the most esteemed and best employed painters
in that rising town were still foreigners, Vincencio Carducci, Eugenio Caxes, and
others, and four years later Rubens appeared there. Murillo went to Madrid in
1643, and Pedro de Moya, who had worked under Vandyck in London, returned
home just then. Carreño now made himself known to Murillo, then incessantly
employed on the Escorial or painting in the studio of Velazquez.
Thus Carreño, who was in some degree eclectic, as all but the highest genius
is at the time of complete development of any school, assimilated something of
the manner, not only of Velazquez and Murillo, but also of Rubens and Vandyck.
In 1650 he had himself an atelier with many pupils, and began several of
the great series of frescoes in the churches of Madrid, and was associated with
Francisco Ricci, in the cathedral of Toledo. These still are among the sights of
Toledo, to which the stranger is conducted; but Carreño was most celebrated as
a portrait painter, and his portraits are of the very highest excellence, passing
frequently by the better-known name of Velazquez. That of Marianna of
Austria, second wife of Philippe IV., in the museum of Madrid, a full-length,
sitting at a writing-table, vested in the white habit of a nun, is a superb example
of Spanish portrait painting. There are many others in the same gallery of
nearly equal excellence.
Carreño, a patrician by birth, was a man above fortune, possessing natural
dignity, independence, and simplicity ; Palomino and Cean Bermudez both
88 - SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
recounting many anecdotes of him showing these qualities. When painting the
portrait of the king, Carlos II, in the presence of the queen mother, the king
asked him of what habit, that is to say, of what order he was, to which he
answered that he needed no honours of that kind, having the honour of serving
the king, who immediately gave him the medal of the order of Santiago. His friends,
however, were critical, and said, as he was noble by descent, he did not want such
a decoration, when Carreño answered again, “It is true; painting has no need of
these honours, it is she who gives honours.” He died in 1685, three years after
Murillo, leaving behind him still several great painters, whom we must shortly notice.
JUAN BAUTISTA DEL MAZO, who has been mentioned as the fellow-pupil of
Murillo, was a portrait painter for the most part, although his landscapes have
still a reputation among the curious in the old dark manner. His fame may be
said to have been lost under the shadow of Velazquez, except in Spain. Mr. Stirling
speaks of him with great regard in his book on Spanish painters, but out of
Spain he is unknown. He died in his apartments in the palace at Madrid, where
he had lived some time, on the 10th of February, 1687.
To his name we may add those of JUAN DE SEVILLA ROMERO Y ESCALANTE,
another of the exclusively religious painters, occupied with celebrations of
St. Francis and St. Benedict, and subjects relating to the Virgin, who died in
1695; and MATE0 CEREzo, who combined portraits with pious subjects, dying at
the age of forty, in 1675, at Madrid, before we pass to two greater men, Claudio
Coello and Juan de Valdes Leal, the last of the painters who can truly be called
great in the history of Spain.
JUAN DE WALDES LEAL was born at Cordova in 1630, and became the pupil
of Antonio del Castillo, a painter who kept up the old traditions and held by the
COWCA, US/OAV. - 89
Italian manner of the sixteenth century. From thence he went to Seville, and we
find him there about the time of Murillo's return, and much talked of among his
brother artists on account of his difficult temper. After the great period has
passed away in all the countries whose history boasts such an age in art, when the
artist has a professional character, he demands an academy, a public educational
body to which he may belong, and which may assist in supporting the credit of
the calling. Murillo, when his influence increased, gave himself up with energy
to this idea, and a union was formed of architects, sculptors, painters, and
engravers. Herrera, El Mazo, and Waldes Leal only opposed the scheme, which,
however, was carried into effect, and the Academy was constituted and opened
in January, 1680. To please Waldes, he was made majordomo; but this was
far from satisfying him, and the members gave way to his pride and pretensions,
and elected him president, which office he held for a time, till new quarrels
arose, and he left the Academy altogether. Other anecdotes that illustrate the
violence of his passions are numerous. On one occasion a travelling Italian
appeared in the school of the institution, and was allowed to enter as a student.
This Bohemian wayfarer drew so well and so rapidly with charcoal that all the
members present congratulated him, at which Waldes took offence, shut the
door against him, and would not admit him again. The stranger, whose name is
not preserved, in a few days took his stand on the steps of the cathedral with
a crucifix and a St. Sebastian done by himself, and addressed the crowd on the
jealousy and injustice of Waldes, who had refused him the benefits of the newly-
constituted Academy, which was for the improvement of all the world. This
drove Waldes into such a fury that the Italian only saved his life by disappearing
from the place.
One of the pictures of the most repulsive but also most impressive character
ever painted is in the Hospital of Charity at Seville, from the hand of Waldes
Leal. It is called “The Two Dead Men,” and represents a charnel house, wherein
A. A
90 SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
lie coffins broken open and exposing their partially decayed occupants, one a bishop,
the other a noble. So dreadful is this, and especially the face of the bishop, that
Murillo said he never could approach its neighbourhood without fancying he smelt
the horror. The man who had created this repulsive realism was flattered by the
criticism, and answered, “Ah, my compeer, it is not my fault; you have taken all
the sweet fruit out of the basket and left only the rotten ſº
On the death of Murillo, Waldes Leal enjoyed the credit of being, without
doubt, the best painter of the school of Andalusia, and had many pupils who
continued for many years the tradition. of the time that was gone, without adding
to them. His two daughters, Maria and Louisa, distinguished themselves in
portraits and miniatures.
CLAUDIO COELL0, the second of the two we mentioned as the last fruits on
the tree, belongs to Castile. Toledo had long given place to Madrid as the
centre of art, and there Coello was born and lived, the last Spaniard of that
school as Waldes was of Seville. In spite of his defects, Cean Bermudez says,
whom I quote in all these later notices through the medium of the writers in the
“Ecole Espagnole,” edited by M. Blanc, “In spite of his defects, he was one of
our greatest naturalists, and we may compare him to Annibal Carracci, who united
in his practice all the good maxims of his predecessors and contemporaries because
in him we see the drawing of Alonzo Cano, the colour of Murillo, and the effect of
Velazquez: he was the last painter of Spain, when its art was about to precipitate
itself into the abyss.” Coello felt the approaching decadence, and when Don
Cristobal Ontañon said to him on the arrival of Luca Giordano, “This Jordan
comes here to take our money away.” “Yes,” was his reply, “and we too will
gain, he will make our vices forgotten.” .
“Alas,” says M. Bürger, who relates the conversation, “ it was this Italian
made poor Coelo die with chagrin. The interventions of the stranger in the arts
CONCA, US/OW. . - 91
of a country are never happy. But apart from the triumphant invasion of Giordano
into Spain, the national genius was becoming moribund, and it was not destined to
have a resurrection, except by the mad fires of Goya's caprices.”
The date of Coello's birth is uncertain. He was the son of a Portuguese;
and his father coming to live in Madrid, placed him with Francisco Ricci, son of
a Bolognese, and pupil of the Florentine Vicente Carduche. Thus at the end as at
the beginning of the two centuries of Spanish art-history We find the Italian
influence, Luca Giordano and the Italian by education, Raphael Mengs, coming
on the stage just before the fall as they did at the rise, of the curtain. Coello
very soon began to paint large Works in the churches, even while still in the
atelier of Ricci; and, afterwards, forming a close intimacy with Ximenes Donoso,
just then returned from Rome after seven years absence, they painted together
many extensive works, in the presbytery of the church of Santa Crux, in the
cathedral of Toledo, the Chartreuse del Paular, the church of st Isidro el Real
(since then the College of the Jesuits), and elsewhere. After executing the
frescoes in the cupola of the College of the Augustins at Saragossa, Claudio
returned to Madrid, and was named painter to the king, succeeding in this office
the deceased Dionysius Mantuano, an Italian. Many other offices fell in to him
by the death of his master, Ricci, Herrera the younger, formerly pintor de
camera, and others.
The death of Ricci made over to him an important work in the Escorial.
There was here preserved a consecrated wafer (hostie, or forma, as it is variously
called) that the fanatic disciples of Zuinglius were said to have profaned in some
sacrilegious way; and this blessed treasure the king, Charles II., determined to
shrine in a gorgeous manner, for the veneration of the faithful and the greater
glory of God, an act of thanksgiving for the preservation of Vienna from the
Ottoman army. The altar on which it stood was to have a retable of bronze and
marble, the hostie was to be enshrined in a reliquary of splendid workmanship
92 - SPANISH SCHOOL OF AAAAWTING.
and a picture was to be painted of the ceremony of conveying the outraged but
still divine creature to its new abode. This picture is called “El Cuadro de la
Forma,” and cost Coella three years of assiduous labour, why we cannot quite
make out, as it was only small, and a portrait picture; but the result was a
triumph for him. From that time all the court sat to him for portraits. In 1691
Coella was at the head of art in Spain. as far as prosperity and court favour and
his own great talents could place him there. The year following Luca Giordano
came, and he was nowhere—dethroned and forgotten. Next year again he died,
on the 20th of April, 1693.
Luca had the melancholy honour, both in Italy and in Spain, to conduct the
funeral obsequies of the art. At the time we speak of he was nearly sixty years
of age. A Neapolitan, his father had lived next door to Ribera, there called
Spagnoletto, and he had been so precocious that he did some little pictures at
the age of seven, sufficiently good to be admired. Urged continually by his
father to work, the anxious parent called out to him from morning to night,
“Luca, fa presto,” a phrase which became proverbial, and if we may believe
the reported number of the pictures he did during his ten years in Spain, two
hundred for public monuments and many for private friends, the admonition must
have had the desired effect. -
These pictures it is happily unnecessary to particularise, although they have
a correctness and a dexterity unquestionable, and certain easily appreciated
beauties of a scenic kind. It is enough to say, as far as Spanish art is
concerned, he absorbed like a sponge all the lucrative and honourable commissions
to be found in the country and left it dry. He quitted Madrid in February,
1702, and from that time till lately there are no painters of sufficient importance
to call for notice, except one other foreigner, who visited Madrid in a similar
way, to the further degradation, if possible, of the native art. This was Rarhart
MENGs.


COWCZ USION. º 93.
Mengs was the child of an enameller in Bohemia, who bestowed on his
son the Christian names of Allegri and Sanzio, calling him Antonio Raphael.
Like Giordano, he showed early talents, and, on his travelling into Italy, he met
with much success, adopting it as his country. Invited from Naples by Charles III.,
he visited Madrid at the age of thirty-three, where, at that time, 1761, were few
to contest the palm with him. For that matter, indeed, it was much the same in
Italy; there were no giants in those days, and Italy had closed the mighty volume
of her art-history. Mengs was an accomplished artist, thoroughly educated and
able; he is the first thoroughly modern - painter, without leaving the field of church
work or abandoning traditions. All over Europe his works have been in request,
and even now they have much value. He died in Rome—having left Spain with
a presentiment of his approaching end—in 1779.
All this time, and up to the French invasion, Spain had been gradually going
down in many ways. The most powerful nation in the world, at the end of the
fifteenth century, it had gradually lost all its sovereignties and possessions beyond
the Pyrenees, and at the time of the rise of Napoleon was cursed internally with
a degenerate court and royal family, which opened the gate to his victorious
armies. w
Before the death of Murillo we have seen the united artists of Seville forming
an Academy with professors and all the appliances of education. This institution
went on prosperously and doubled the number of its members; but gradually
these disappeared, without making one great painter, or educating any other
professional artist—not even a copyist came out of it, and towards the end of
the century its doors were closed.
At Madrid the same history is recorded. Ferdinand WI. created the Academia
de San Fernando, and Charles III. lodged it in a vast edifice. In vain, no
successors to the mighty dead came out of its Schools, the only name of note at
the end of last century being that of Goya, possessor of a peculiar talent, truly
B B
94. SPAN/SH SCHOOL OF PA/AWTIAWG.
bizarre and fantastic, indebted to the past for nothing and giving nothing to the
future—an isolated figure of abnormal proportions.
Francisco jose Goya (1746-1828).
FRANCIsco Jose Goya y LUCIENTEs, the last of the names we will call upon
our readers to remember, was born in 1746, and lived to 1828, painting much,
drawing in crayons, and publishing in etchings, designs of an extraordinary
power of invention.
His parents were peasants, nor was his education much attended to, and it
was only an accident that brought him under the notice of a monk of the convent
of Santa Fe, near Saragossa, who was an amateur, and painted a little himself,
carrying him away from the fields and placing him in the atelier of Don Jose
Lujan Martinez. During four or five years this artist took charge of him,
and tried to temper a kind of ferocity he showed in his manner and in his
choice of subjects.

COWCZ USION. 95
At this time in Arragon, parties of young men were formed in all the parishes,
whose business and pleasure it was to fight for the honour of their localities or
patron saints; and Goya got himself so deeply implicated in a bloody fray that
the Inquisition, the one institution still fresh and strong, was about to take posses-
sion of him, on which he left that part of the country, and reappeared in Madrid
at the time when Mengs was painting in that city. A little later he became
acquainted with Louis David in Rome, and continued besides to distinguish -
himself there, as in Spain, by daring escapades.
On returning home he began by genre subjects, designs for tapestry, and
decorations of various sorts, and also by portraits, to take the place of acknowledged
artist at a time when little public taste existed. He also began to publish the etchings
which have spread his name over Europe. The principal of these is “The Miseries
of War,” many of the scenes being, very probably, studied from Nature, during the
excesses of the French invasion. Much as our neighbours complain of the conduct
of their German conquerors, the armies of Germany that have overrun France are
armies of gentlemen compared to theirs in Spain. The Spaniards, on the other
hand, became Savages, hung up groups of stragglers in the trees, and labelled them
“Frutos Franceses.” Another set of etchings are called “Caprices,” extraordinary
in the last degree, and quite unique in a certain combination of horror and beauty.
His manner of painting, however, is so bright and luminous, that the singular
repulsiveness frequently seen in his themes is rendered piquant, as in the two
pictures now at South Kensington, and his portraits, of which there are two hundred,
including all the leading people of his time and country, are said to be equal to
“Velazquez, Prudhon, and Reynolds.” At the sale of Louis Philippe's pictures
in London, 1853, four of these, besides another picture of “Old Women,” were
sold for ridiculously low prices, especially as they were all of celebrated people,
including one of himself. Duchess d’Albe, £6; Charles III., £10; Goya himself,
£10 5s. ; Lazarillo de Tormes, £11 10s.
96 SPANISH schooz or PAINTING.
These few words on Goya are all we can say here, our book dealing with the
elder School of Painting, and yet, in the opinion of the writer, however startling
may be the assertion, Goya is exactly the most interesting genius Spain has
produced in art, although he has no value in history. His province is not in any
* degree definable by the technicalities of the studio; he had not the training of
Ribera or Velazquez, nor the assimilative capacity of Murillo; but all the masters
of all the schools of Spain were more or less self-sacrificed slaves of the LAMP,
the Church, that is - to say, and the court but still slaves; and can scarcely be
said to have done the world good except by increasing its material wealth. Goya
Was an inventor, a thinker in the modern manner, and gives us the most vivid and
novel sensations, although he serves us with vinegar as well as wine.
When our International Exhibition of 1862 was organized, Spain responded to
the invitation to contribute with an energy that showed a new day had risen, and
the national spirit had revived. True there was a strong French influence, such
as we see operating also in Italy, and there was little to recall the traditions of
the School. This, however, might be accounted for partly by the whole of the
pictures sent being historical, not one religious or Church work appearing among
them. One of the most important was the “Deaths of Padilla, Bravo, and
Maldonado,” and represented the first-named apostrophizing the body of Juan
Bravo, who was executed before him—“Lie there, thou true gentleman l’” This
large picture, by Antonio Gisbert, belongs to the Congreso de los Diputados.
Another was the execution of the favourite of Juan II., Don Alvaro de Luna, at
Walladolid, on the 2nd of June, 1453, by Eduardo Cano, now in the Museo Nacional.
Since that time Spain has thrown out the Bourbons and inaugurated a new
régime. The invasion of the French, whatever pain it may have inflicted, at least
freed the Peninsula from some of the old incubi that remained sitting on its
chest for centuries. The one institution ceased to exist, the doors of the Inquisi-
CO/WCA, US/OM. s 97
tion were closed for ever, and when, in 1870, a motion was made in the Cortes
in favour of freedom of religious opinion, while Canon Manterola was actually
speaking, and indirectly defending the Holy Office, the labourers employed in
excavating for a new * at the Quemadero, the place where the old Autos de
Fé used to take place, were heaping up mountains of horrible black matter—
the residuum of the thousands who died in fire—accused of heresy, witchcrafts,
Judaism, or any opinion that was supposed to impair the purity of the mediaeval
Christianity, still so passionately loved in Spain. The report of what workmen
were doing at the Quemadero was brought into the debate, and the Canon
and his party sink down upon their seats. The vote of that day, making
all forms of worship in future free in Spain, shows that the nation, once the
greatest in the world, is rising again, and we may yet see other artists as great
as those we have recorded, but, like Goya, obeying entirely new motives in the
history of Art.
C C
X|[INGIdd W
º º
º Nº. º Nº.
- wº-
- -> º
Mº-
º
º
º
sº
y \OMºgo)|Qºţ.
__
= - - - - = * - &
º Fº s N
ºº: º
º-º-º-º-
S-

| -1，1，1））ſix， d'1，1，1）

I.
MURILLO's PICTURES IN THIS COUNTRY.
Family” (the Pedroso Murillo) is one of the most approved works in his latest manner.
The other two, “A Spanish Peasant Boy” and “ St. John and the Lamb,” are also very
fine. At Hampton Court are three accredited to him, one of them being a portrait of Don Carlos, Son
of Philippe IV., the others a “Spanish Boy” and a “Boy eating Fruit.”
Dulwich Gallery contains no fewer than eleven, several of them important and excellent. “The
Flower Girl,” engraved in this book; “The Two Gipsy Boys” and the “Christ with the Lamb” are
there, also a “Mystery of the Immaculate Conception,” all engraved in this book. The others are
“Peasant Boys,” “Jacob and Rachel,” “Adoration of the Magi,” “Two Angels,” “A Child Sleeping,”
and a smaller “Immaculate Conception.” - - *
In the National Gallery of Scotland there is one picture by Murillo, “A Boy Drinking." bequeathed
by Lady Murray. w -
In the Exhibition of the Works of the Old Masters at Burlington House in 1870 were seven Murillos
“An Angel,” sent by W. R. Bankes, Esq., of Kingston Lacy; a “Holy Family,” Sir W. Miles, Bart. ;
“Portrait of Andrade,” Thomas Baring, Esq., M.P. ; “The Good Shepherd,” Baron Lionel de Roths-
child; “The Assumption of the Virgin,” Captain A. C. Tupper; “Santa Rufina” and “Santa Justa,”
both sent by the Duke of Sutherland. º -
In the similar exhibition of the following year were no fewer than nineteen. The Marquis of West-
minster sent “St. John with the Lamb” and “The Infant Christ sleeping;” Earl Dudley no fewer than
ten (some, however, of inferior character), “An old Gipsy Woman, Boy, and Dog,” “Santa Justa,”
“The Virgin covering the Body of S. Clara with a Mantle brought from Heaven” (a large work of
great power and character), “St. John and the Lamb,” and a series of six giving the story of the
Prodigal Son, coarsely conceived but dramatically powerful. Besides these were “Christ crowned with
Thorns,” a fine picture in perfect condition, sent by F. Cooke, Esq.; “A Magdalen,” W. Wells, Esq.;
“The Flight into Egypt” and “The Assumption,” Mrs. Culling Hanbury; a “Virgin and Child,”
Lord Overstone; “Madonna de la Faja,” R. W. Billings, Esq.; “The Boyhood of S. Thomas Willa-
nueva,” Lord Ashburton. -
Since the publication of Mr. Stirling's “Annals of Spanish Artists,” in 1848, the sale of the Louis
Philippe pictures in London and other sales have taken place, adding to the number of Murillos in this
country. Proprietors also have died, their pictures having been dispersed. Recording such changes as
we are acquainted with, and omitting those we have already mentioned in public galleries, the following list,
mainly from that in the “Annals of the Artists of Spain,” will show how large a number we possess:—
Abraham receiving the three Angels. Formerly in the Hospital of Charity at Seville, whence it
was stolen by Marshal Soult. 7 ft. 9 in. by 8 ft. 6 in. wide. (Duke of Sutherland, Stafford House.)
The Patriarch Isaac in Bed blessing Jacob: Rebekah standing near: with other figures. (Duke of
Wellington, Apsley House.)


I O2 SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
Jacob placing the peeled Wands on the Water Troughs of Laban's Cattle. Formerly in the collection
of the Marquess of Santiago, Madrid. (Lord Northwick, Thirlstone House, Cheltenham.)
Laban seeking for his God, in the Tents of Jacob and Rachel. Formerly in the same collection. A
large landscape with many figures. 8 ft. by 10 ft. 1 in. wide. (Marquis of Westminster, Grosvenor House.)
Joseph and his Brethren. This was offered for sale at Christy and Manson's in 1846, and bought
in at £1,800. (J. Cave, Bristol.) •
Ruth and Naomi departing from Moab : Orpah in the distance. Figures full-length, and somewhat
less than life. 5 ft. 10 in. by 6 ft. 11 in. wide. (Earl of Radnor, Langford Castle, Wilts.)
Cherubs gathering Flowers. 8 ft. by 9 ft. wide. (Duke of Bedford, Woburn Abbey, Bedfordshire.)
Angel with a Cardinal's Cap. 2 it. by 2 ft. 10 in. wide. (G. Bankes, Esq., Kingston Hall, Dorset.)
The Annunciation. Formerly in the collection of the Marquess de las Marismas, Paris. Purchased
for £2,000 by the Marquis of Hertford. (Sir Richard Wallace.)
Ditto. 4 ft. 4 in. by 3 ft. 4 in. (W. Miles, Esq., Leigh Court, Somerset.)
Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception. With ten cherubs above and about her feet bearing
palms, &c., and three at the top, besides winged heads. Formerly in the collection of the Infant Don
Gabriel at Madrid. 6 ft. 8 in. by 5 ft. 43 in. (Messrs. Woodburn, 112, St. Martin's Lane ; now
uncertain where.)
Ditto. With dark hair, upborne by four cherubs bearing palms, &c. Formerly in the collection of
Mr. Grey. Full-length, life-size. (R. Sanderson, Esq., 48, Belgrave Square.)
Ditto. Rather less than life-size. Formerly in the collection of M. Zachary, Esq. (Marquis of
Lansdowne, Lansdowne House.) -
Ditto. Purchased at the sale of M. Lebrun's pictures, 1810, and said to have come from the Convent
of Barefooted Carmelites, at Madrid. Large. (Sir F. Baring, Stratton Park, Hants.)
Ditto. Standing on a globe and clouds, supported by seven cherubs. The Virgin is supposed to be
Murillo's daughter s:. Formerly belonging to Queen Isabella, and purchased from Marshal Sebastiani.
2 ft. 1 in. by 1 ft. 6 in. (Lord Ashburton, Piccadilly.)
Ditto. Brought to England by the late Sir J. Brackenbury. 1 ft. 3 in. by 10} in.
Ditto. Very small. Also brought by him. (Now uncertain where.)
Ditto. With a yellow scarf across the bosom : four cherubs at her feet bearing palms, &c. On
copper. 11% in. by 8 in. (George Vivian, Esq., Claverton Manor, Somerset.)
Ditto. Bust, life-size. (Colonel Baillie, 34, Mortimer Street, Cavendish Square.)
The Virgin kneeling. Small full-length figure. (Marquis of Lansdowne, Lansdowne House.)
Assumption of our Lady : borne to heaven by cherubs. Purchased from a picture-dealer named
Cassanova at Cadiz. Full-length, half-size. (Late Sir J. Brackenbury.) *.
Virgin and Infant Saviour, who holds an apple, whence the picture was known in Spain as La Virgem
de la Manzana. Purchased from Don Julian Williams, Seville. Tull-length, life-size. 5 ft. 3 in. by
8 ft. 3 in. (Sir W. Eden, Bart., Windlestone Hall, Durham.) .-
Our Lady of the Rosary : with the infant on her lap. Mentioned by Cean Bermudez as being -
formerly in the Convent of the Shod Carmelites, Seville, and bought in 1884 from Don J. Williams.
Life-size. 5 ft. 5 in. by 3 ft. 6; in (Sir W. Eden.)
APPEAWD/X. . I O2
Our Lady of the Rosary. With the infant standing on one knee, holding the rosary in his hand.
Purchased at the sale of Mr. Carr, London, about 1810, 3 ft. 6 in. by 2 ft. 8 in. (Right Hon.
E. Ellice, 18, Arlington Street.) -
Virgin with the Infant standing on her Knee. Full-length, life-size. (Colonel H. Baillie, 34,
Mortimer Street, Cavendish Square.) '•
Ditto. Formerly the altar-piece in the chapel of the palace of the Marquess of Saniago, Madrid.
Brought to London by Mr. Buchanan, and valued by him at £2,500 guineas. Afterwards bought by
Lord Berwick. 5 ft. 33 in. by 8 ft. 64 in. (S. J. Lloyd, 22, Norfolk Street, Park Lane.)
Virgin standing with the Infant in her Arms. Supposed to be the upper half of a composition repre-
senting the Virgin standing on clouds supported by cherubs, the remainder formerly in the Soult gallery.
From Mr. Grey's collection. 8 ft. 4 in. by 2 ft. 64 in. (Colonel H. Baillie.)
Madonna and Infant. (Sir A. Aston, G.C.B., Aston Hall, Cheshire.)
Ditto. Formerly in the possession of Joseph Buonaparte, ex-King of Spain. (Lord Northwick,
Northwick Park, Gloucestershire.) - -
Ditto. With young St. John. 1 ft. 6 in. by 1 ft. 1 in. (Lord Ashburton, 82, Piccadilly.)
Ditto. Seated and adored by Saints: a composition of seven figures. The Virgin receives from a
kneeling boy in a Franciscan's habit two white roses. Besides these are four cherubs, on the clouds.
Figures life-size. (Lord Rutland, Belvoir Castle, Leicestershire.) -
S. Joseph seated with the Infant on his Knee. Purchased by Samuel Rogers, the poet, from the
collection of H. Hope, Esq. (Uncertain where.)
Flight into Egypt. 4 ft. 24 in. by 5 ft. 8 in. (Earl of Wemyss, Gosford House, East Lothian.)
Ditto. Our Lady seated on a stone watching the infant asleep at her side ; St. Joseph standing
behind. 4 ft. 2 in. by 5 ft. 7 in. (W. Miles, Esq., Leigh Court, Somersetshire.)
Holy Family and Infant St. John grouped under a Tree. A tower and pleasant landscape in the
background. (Duke of IRutland, Belvoir Castle.) W
Ditto (doubtful). Figures third life-size. (Duke of Devonshire, Chatsworth.)
Ditto. Figures seen to the knee. 4 ft. by 8 ft. 4 in. (W. Miles, Esq.)
Ditto. The Virgin adored by a kneeling prelate. A greyhound is asleep under a low arch.
(W. Miles, Esq.)
Ditto. The Virgin, holding a delicate drapery which covers the sleeping infant, shows him to St.
John. Circular, 3 ft. 9 in. diameter. (Lord Heytesbury, Heytesbury House, Wilts.)
Ditto. (Lord Northwick, Northwick Park).
Two of the same subject are at Stratton Park, Hants. (Sir F. Baring.)
Three small studies in one frame : Nativity, John Baptist with Lamb (twice given). 7 in. by 5 in.
(Duke of Sutherland, Stafford House.)
St. John Baptist. As a child seated on a rock, with reed cross in his hand and lamb at his foot.
Formerly in collection of H. Hope, Esq. (G. Vivian, Esq., Claverton Manor, Somerset.)
Ditto. Lamb by his side : Small. (Earl of Elgin, Broom Hall, Fife.)
Ditto. As a child, with lamb by his side. Purchased at Lisbon. 8 ft. 6 in. by 2 ft. 7 in. (Lord
IHeytesbury).
1 O4. SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAIAWTING.
St. John Baptist. As a child, with lamb. Purchased for £200 from Don J. M. Escazena. The
monogram B. M. E. seems to have been marked with the stick of the brush on the wet paint. (George
Field, Lister House, Clapham.)
Ditto. With a lamb. (Earl of Lovelace, Ockham, Surrey.)
Ditto. With the same. (Marquis of Westminster, Grosvenor House.)
John Baptist questioned by the Jews. John is in a Roman tunic and red mantle. Formerly in the
Nunnery of St. Leandro, Seville, and purchased from them by Mr. N. Wetheral, an English merchant,
by whom sold to the late Mr. Purvis, Q.C. Presented by the late Mr. W. W. Burdon, of Newcastle-
on-Tyne, to a college at Oxford. 8 ft. 6 in. by 5 ft. 7 in. A very poor picture. ,
Head of St. John in a Charger. (Earl of Clarendon, 1, Grosvenor Crescent.)
Ditto. 2 ft. by 2 ft. 5 in. (W. Miles, Esq.)
Adoration of the Shepherds. Bought at the sale of the Saltmarche collection (Higginson's pictures),
1846, for £3,018, by the Marquis of Hertford. (Sir Richard Wallace.)
Adoration of the Wise Men: a composition of nine figures. Large. (Duke of Rutland.)
Our Lord as a Child asleep on a Cushion with a Cross. Formerly in the gallery of the Infant Don
José de Salamanca, minister of Isabella II., who presented it to Mrs. Abel Smith. (In Mr. Smith's
possession in 1848, at Dale Park, Sussex.) *
Ditto. Same composition. (Marquis of Westminster, Grosvenor House.)
Ditto. The head pillowed on a skull. (Earl of Clarendon, Grosvenor Crescent.)
Ditto. Left hand resting on a globe, said to have been transferred from fresco to canvas. Full
length, life size. (Marquis of Lansdowne, Bowood.)
Ditto. Seated on clouds, with a cross in his hand: three cherubs. (G. Vivian, Cleverton Manor,
Somerset.) -
Ditto. Also a child as the Good Shepherd. Formerly in the Lassay, Presle, and Robit collections,
bought from the last by Sir J. Clarke, whose son sold it for £3,900. 5 ft. 5 in. by 3 ft. 7 in. (Baron
de Rothschild, Gunnersbury House, Middlesex.)
A repetition of the above. (Earl of Wemyss.) - -
Our Lord as the Good Shepherd seated beneath a rock amongst sheep, and holding in his hand
the crown of thorns: engraved by Sir R. Strange. Somewhat less than life. (Glasgow University.)
Our Lord baptized by St. John. Purchased by Mr. R. Williams from the nuns of S. Leandro.
8 ft. 6 in. by 5 ft. 7 in. (Mr. Debuts Burdon, Saville Row, Newcastle-on-Tyne.)
Our Lord with the Blessed Virgin at the Marriage of Cama. Bought from Collection Robit of Paris
by G. Hibbert, Esq., M.P., sold at his sale for £8,709. (Earl of Ailesbury, Tottenham Park, Wilts.)
Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes. Small, carefully painted sketch. (H. A. J. Munro, 113, Park
Street.) -
Apostle and Lad with two Fishes. A sketch from former picture. 1 ft. 4 in. by 1 ft. 1 in. (In
possession of the late T. Purvis, Q.C.) - -
Our Lord healing the Paralytic at the Pool of Bethesda. Stolen from the Hospital of Charity at
Seville by Marshal Soult. Life size. (George Tomline, 1, Carlton Terrace.)
Ecce Homo. Bust life size. (Lord Ashburton, Grange, Hants.)
-
ST-Cºs ºu Lºº
-
Mu Rillio PINX
~♥~



APPENDIX. I O 5
Our Lord crowned with Thorns, in a brown robe. Purchased from Marshal Sebastiani. Bust,
life size. (Lord Ashburton, 82, Piccadilly.) -
Our Lord's Face on the Veronica. A fine specimen, Mr. Stirling (Sir W. S. M.) says, of Murillo's
second manner. Oval: face life size. (S. Jones Loyd, Esq., Wickham Park, Surrey.)
Our Lord on the Cross: on a small cross of panel. Purchased from Don Salvado Gutierrez, a painter
of Seville, 1845. 1 ft. 63 in. by 113 in. (Sir W. Stirling Maxwell, Keir, Perthshire.)
Deposition from the Cross. Our Lady kneeling by the dead body, attended by weeping cherubs;
on an octagon plate of copper, 12 in. diameter. (H. A. J. Munro, Esq.)
Ditto. Described like the last. (W. Miles, Esq., Leigh Court.)
Return of the Prodigal Son. Formerly at Hospital of Charity, Seville. Stolen by Marshal Soult.
Figures life size. (Duke of Sutherland.) -
Rich Man and Lazarus: study for a large picture. (Earl of Ellesmere, 18, Belgrave Street.)
St. Peter delivered from Prison by the Angel. Sketch, 12 inches square. (H. A. J. Munro, Esq.)
Martyrdom of Sebastian. 4 ft. 3 in. by 5 ft. 6 in. (W. Miles, Esq.)
St. John writing the Apocalypse. 5 ft. 9 in. by 8 ft. 11 in. (The same.)
St. Athanasius: a head. (Earl of Clarendon.) .
St. Augustin kneeling at Prayer. Full length, life size. (G. Tomline, Esq., 1, Carlton House
Terrace.) -
St. Gil standing in the air in an ecstasy in presence of Pope Gregory II. : a composition of five
figures. Painted for the small cloister of the Franciscan convent, Seville, whence it was stolen by
Marshal Soult. 5 ft. 1 in. by 5 ft. 10 in. (W. Buchanan, 46, Pall Mall, 1848; now uncertain where.)
Peter the Dominicam kneeling at an Altar; his head about to be cut off by two ruffians. An angel
and three cherubs in the upper part. (In the possession of the late T. Purvis, Q.C., 2, Stone Buildings.)
Ferdinand in Robe and Crown. A small bust portrait in oval border. (Late Sir J. M. Bracken-
bury.)
The Porciuncula. Our Lady and Saviour appearing to St. Francis of Assisi kneeling at prayer.
3 ft. 5 in. by 2 ft. 7 in. (Sir W. Eden, Bart., Durham Co.) . -
St. Francis of Assisi kneeling at Prayer. Small. (Duke of Wellington.)
A Franciscan praying over the dead Body of a Grey Friar. Formerly in the small cloister of
Franciscans, Seville. The only one not stolen by Soult. By whom removed, or in what way,
Mr. Stirling does not say. (Richard Ford, Heavitree, Devon.)
St. Anthony of Padua kneeling with the Infant Saviour in his Arms. (H. A. J. Munro, Esq.)
Ditto. Caressing Infant Christ. 1 ft. 3 in. by 1 ft. (Duke of Sutherland.)
St. Thomas of Willanueva, the Almoner, Archbishop of Valencia, dividing his Clothes. Figures
life size. 7 ft. 1 in. by 4 ft. 9 in. (Lord Ashburton.)
Sketch for the above. 2 ft. 1 ft. 3 in. (The same.)
St. Thomas giving Alms at the Door of a Cathedral. Sold to Mr. Wells for £1,000. Figures
somewhat less than life. Formerly in the possession of Mr. Wells, Redleaf, Kent, now in that of Sir
Richard Wallace (?). -
Santa Justa with Pot and Palm Branch: bust, life size. (Duke of Sutherland.)
E E
Ioé SPANISH SCHOOL OF PAINTING.
Santa Rufina, ditto. (The same.)
Santa Rosa of Lima, with the Infant Saviour. Life size. 5 ft. 8 in. by 4 ft. 4 in. (George Banks,
Esq., Dorset.) -
Same subject. (The late Sir J. Brackenbury.)
Female Saint, with Palm Branch: bust, life size. (Duke of Wellington.)
Two Boys eating Fruit. 4 ft. 5 in. by 4 ft. 8 in. (John Balfour, Balbirnie, Fife.)
Ditto, ditto. 5 ft. 4 in, by 4 ft. 4 in. (G. Bankes, Esq.) -
Boy herding Cattle and ridding himself of Vermin. 4 ft. 6 in. by 8 ft. 3 in. (Earl of Lonsdale,
Lowther Castle, Westmoreland.)
Two Boys eating Fruit. 1 ft. 1 in. by 10 in. (The same.)
Boy eating Pie: a Dog snuffing at the Meat. (Earl of Elgin, Broom Hall, Fife.)
Beggars Regaling. (Marquis of Exeter, Burghley Hall, Northamptonshire.)
Two Beggar Boys. (Duke of Marlborough, Blenheim, Oxford.)
Diogenes throwing away his Cup. (Marquis of Exeter, Burleigh Hall.)
A laughing Boy crowned with Ivy Leaves, a Pipe in his Hand: on panel. Bust, life size. 1 ft. 9 in.
by 1 ft. 6 in. (W. Coningham, 26, Sussex Square, Brighton.)
A Woman and a Girl at a Window. 4 ft. by 3 ft. 4. (Lord Heytesbury.)
Repetition of the above. (H. A. J. Munro, Novar, Ross-shire.)
Girl with a white Mantila. Life size. (R. S. Holford, Dorchester House.)
Girl with Fruit. Bust, life size. (Duke of Sutherland.) -
A Bacchante crowned with Grapes and Wine Leaves. A head, life size. (Formerly in the possession
of W. Wells, Redleaf.)
Fruit. A square basket of pomegranates and grapes on a table, with other matters. (Sir
W. Stirling Maxwell, Keir, Perthshire.)
PORTRAITS.
Don Justino Neve y Yevenes, Canon of Seville, seated. Full length, life size. (Marquis of
Lansdowne, Bowood, Wilts.)
Don Andres de Andrade, with a white Dog. Full length, life size. (Sir A. Aston, G.C.B.,
Aston Hall, Cheshire.)
A Knight of Santiago. Bust, life size. (Collection of H. Baillie, 34, Mortimer Street, Cavendish
Square.)
A Gentleman. Bust, life size, painted within an oval border. (Duke of Sutherland.)
A Lady with long auburn Hair, a loose white Robe and violet Mantle. Formerly in possession of
Lucien Buonaparte. (R. Sanderson, 48, Belgrave Square.)
At Saltmarsche, E. Higginson, Esq., Herefordshire, was a Rocky Landscape. In the Print Room,
British Museum, are four drawings on paper.
Mr. Stirling's entire list only contains 385 pictures and 29 drawings, so that we in England possess
a fair proportion. In the Old Masters' Exhibition at Burlington House, 1872, were three—one, at least
APPEAVOXX. - 107
not mentioned in this list—"Ecce Homo,” 86 in. by 28}, Colonel Birchell, and “Moses in the
Bulrushes,” 59 in. by 42%, Duke of Devonshire, both fine pictures. The third was “St. Thomas of
Villanueva giving Alms,” I believe the picture mentioned above as formerly belonging to Mr. Wells. The
“Moses in the Bulrushes” is not by Murillo. It is well known by engravings, one of which, a mezzotint
of considerable size published last century, attributes the picture to Wandyck, whose work it resembles
more than that of Murillo.
In many of the public galleries of Europe Murillo appears. In Spain, of course, we expect to
find him; and in the Royal Museum, Madrid, there are forty-seven; in the Academy there are three;
and in the National Museum, two. The Louvre contains nine, including the picture that has been
so much spoken of already, bought at the sale of Marshal Soult, at the price of 615,300 fr.—£23,440.
The Pinacothic at Munich possesses seven, most of them very fine; Royal Gallery of Dresden, two;
Vienna and Berlin, one each. The richest of all out of Spain is the Gallery of the Hermitage,
St. Petersburg, where are twenty-five to thirty, many of these being very celebrated, especially the
“Death of St. Clara,” mentioned already. Italy does not seem to possess many Murillos, but the
number that have been lately under the hammer is so great, particularly in the Aquado (1843),
the Soult (1852), and the Louis-Philippe (1858) sales, it is impossible to give a complete catalogue
of the works of a painter so astonishingly prolific. Many of them are intrinsically of little value,
although any work by Murillo is worth a considerable sum of money in the market.
II.
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE OF THE MASTERS OF THE SPANISH SCHOOL.
BORN. DIED
Rincon, Antonio del ............................................. 1446 (?) 1500 (?)
Berruguete y Gonzalez, Alonzo .............................. 1480 (?) 1561
Willoldo, Juan de ................................................ 1480 (?) 1555 (?)
Vargas, Luis de ................................................... 1502 1568
MoRALES, Luis de (called THE DIVINE)........................ 1509 1586
Coello, Alonzo Sanchez .......................................... 1515 1590
Becerra, Gaspar ......... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1520 1570
Campaña, Pedro ................................................... 1503 1580
Villegas Marmolejo, Pedro ....................................... 1520 1597
Juan de Joames . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1523 1579
NAVARRETE (called THE MUTE) ................................. 1526 1579
Cespedes, Pablo de ............ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1538 1608
Blas del Prado ............... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1540 (?) 16—
Io8
SPA/V/SH SC HOOL OF PA/AWTAVG,
THEorocopUL1, Dominico (called THE GREER) ............... e (?)
Ribalta, Francisco ...... .......................................... 1551
Pantoja de la Cruz, Juan ....................................... 1551
Roelas, Juan de las ...... ....................................... 1558 (?)
The Carducci. Two brothers. Bartolommeo ............ 1560
» Vincenzio .................. 1578
The Castillo Family, Augustin del.......... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1565
3 y Juan del ... .............................. 1584
93 Antonio del ............... ............... 1603
The Herrera Family, Francesco de ........................... 1576 (?)
3 3 «-. Franceso de (el Mozo) ............... 1622
Orente, Pedro ......... ... ........................ ...... ... ... ...... 1570 (?)
Pacheco, Francisco .................. ........................ ... ... 1571 (?)
- Tristan, Luis ........................... ... .................... a e o e º es 1586 (2)
RIBERA, Joseph (called SPAGNOLETTo) ........................ 1588
The Ricci Family, Antonio........................... ............
y 9 Fray Juan... ............... ... ... ...... ... ... 1595
3 y Francisco ..................... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1608,
Zunnanas, Francisco ......... ...... ... ... ............ ... ... ... ... 1598
Collantes, Francisco ............ .................. .... ..... ...... 1599
VELAZQUEZ, Don Diego ........................ ... ... . . . . . . ... ... 1599
Pereda, Antonio de ........................ ...... ...... ... ... ... ... 1599
Cano, Alonzo ......... ... ... ... ... ...... ...... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 1601
Pareja, Juan de ... . . 1606
Moya, Pedro de ..................... .... .. ... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1610
Toleda, Juan de ... ... ......... ............ ... ...... ... ... . . . ... ... 1611
Carreno de Miranda, Don Juan ............... ............... ... 1614
Mazo, Juan Batista del .................. ... ...... .... ..... ...... 1615 (?)
MURILLO, Estaban .......................................... ...... 1618
Juan de Sevilla, Romero y Escalante........................... 1627
Coello, Claudio... ......... ... ... ......... ...... ... ... .. .... ... ...... 1630
Valdes Leal, Juan de ... ........................... ... ... ... ... ... 1630
Cereso, Matteo ...... ... ... ... ... ... ...... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 1635
Goya y Lucientes, Francisco Jose..................... ......... 1746
THE END.
LONDON : PRINTEld BY VIIRTUE AND Co., CI Y ROAD.
DIED. .
1625
1628
1610
1625
1608
1638
1626
1640
1667
1656
1685
1644
1651
1640
1656
1610 (?)
1675
1685
1662
1656
1660
1669
1667
1670
1666
1685
1685
1687
1682
1695
1694
1691
1675
1828
W
N
i
5877
i.
390
, ' OC
Ulſ
> ===
：z=
zò
-----=========
=
）===
==

-∞ºr-·-×，* . . . . . . * *§ ¶ • ¡ ¿șaeae … ：º） .TT: ? }
- ·--¿***********, ***}; :！**?）（ *）ſae aes{
| ** :§ . .ș***
s ****.p************ • ** * · · ·-
！ * ， ！~--~
######
ſººſ （* 3.
* ***
* * * · · · · · · ·
*（?：）: ºſsº
:**º
º
· · · * *
v ſº
، ، ، ، ،
*：）*',
º
sº
º
Lºſ
tº a sasº a º
gº tºº º
. . . º.º.
is sº
* Gºº. ..
ºº: .
sº."
as sº a
º
. . sº º ºs
wºº & A
Fº
sº
！
�
ſºk
;
}
& º tº as a -
& .
agº. --.
º:
* º *■
º.º. º.s.
|stae,' .x * * .
ţ,