great difficulty in attributing their existing pictures to
certain masters, or even certain schools. There are plenty of pictures
in Italy to-day that might be attributed to either Florence or Sienna,
Giotto or Lorenzetti, or some other master; because though each master
and each school had slight peculiarities, yet they all had a common
origin in the art traditions of the time.

[Illustration: FIG. 23.--ORCAGNA, PARADISE (DETAIL). S. M. NOVELLA,
FLORENCE.]

FLORENTINE SCHOOL: Cimabue (1240?-1302?) seems the most notable
instance in early times of a Byzantine-educated painter who improved
upon the traditions. He has been called the father of Italian
painting, but Italian painting had no father. Cimabue was simply a man
of more originality and ability than his contemporaries, and departed
further from the art teachings of the time without decidedly opposing
them. He retained the Byzantine pattern, but loosened the lines of
drapery somewhat, turned the head to one side, infused the figure with
a little appearance of life. His contemporaries elsewhere in Italy
were doing the same thing, and none of them was any more than a link
in the progressive chain.

Cimabue's pupil, Giotto (1266?-1337), was a great improver on all his
predecessors because he was a man of extraordinary genius. He would
have been great in any time, and yet he was not great enough to throw
off wholly the Byzantine traditions. He tried to do it. He studied
nature in a general way, changed the type of face somewhat by making
the jaw squarer, and gave it expression and nobility. To the figure he
gave more motion, dramatic gesture, life. The drapery was cast in
broader, simpler masses, with some regard for line, and the form and
movement of the body were somewhat emphasized through it. In methods
Giotto was more knowing, but not essentially different from his
contemporaries; his subjects were from the common stock of religious
story; but his imaginative force and invention were his own. Bound by
the conventionalities of his time he could still create a work of
nobility and power. He came too early for the highest achievement. He
had genius, feeling, fancy, almost everything except accurate
knowledge of the laws of nature and art. His art was the best of its
time, but it still lacked, nor did that of his immediate followers go
much beyond it technically.

Taddeo Gaddi (1300?-1366?) was Giotto's chief pupil, a painter of much
feeling, but lacking in the