S. Giorgio, S. Anastasia: The Cavalli Family.

_Pisanello._

Padua. S. Anastasia: St. George and the Dragon.
Verona. S. Fermo: Annunciation.
London. S. George and S. Jerome; S. Eustace and the Stag.

CHAPTER IV

THE SCHOOL OF MURANO

The important little town of Murano, a satellite of Venice, lies upon an
island, some ten minutes' row from the mother State, distinct from which
it preserved separate interests and regulations. Its glass manufacture
was safeguarded by the most stringent decrees, which forbade members of
the Guild to leave the islet under pain of death. Its mosaics, stone
work, and architecture speak of an early artistic existence, and we
recognise the justice of the claim of Muranese painters to be the first
to strike out into a more emancipated type than that of the primitives.
The painter Giovanni of Murano, called Giovanni Alemanus or d' Alemagna,
names between which Venetian jealousy for a time drew an imaginary
distinction, had certainly received his early education in Germany, and
betrays it by his heavier ornamentation and more Gothic style; but he
was a fellow-worker with Antonio of Murano, the founder of the great
Vivarini family, and the Academy contains several large altarpieces in
which they collaborated. "Christ and the Virgin in Glory" was painted
for a church in Venice in 1440, and has an inscription with both names
on a banderol across the foreground. The Eternal Father, with His hands
on the shoulders of the Mother and Son, makes a group of which we find
the origin in Gentile da Fabriano's altarpiece in the Brera, and it is
probable that one if not both masters had been studying with the Umbrian
and absorbing the principles he had brought to Venice. It is easy to
trace the influence of Giovanni d' Alemagna, though not always easy to
pick out which part of a picture belongs to him and which to Antonio
working under his influence. In S. Pantaleone is a "Coronation of the
Virgin," with Gothic ornaments such as are not found in purely Italian
art at this period, but the example in which both masters can be most
closely followed is the great picture in the Academy, the "Madonna
enthroned," where she sits under a baldaquin surrounded by saints. Here
the Gothic surroundings become very florid, and have a gingerbread-cake
effect, which Italian taste would hardly have tolerated. Many features
are characteristic of the German; the huge crown worn by the Mother, the
floriated orn