ocial status he enjoyed, for both
Priori and Councillors were chosen from the richest and most influential
families, although not necessarily noble.[11] His official life began in
a time of tumult and bloodshed. It was the year after the failure of the
Pazzi Conspiracy, and all around Cortona were pitched the camps of the
rival troops of Sixtus IV. and the excommunicated Florentines. Cortona
itself, as a frontier town of the Medici, was in the very centre of the
fray; and besides these more important quarrels, there were the
incessant internal bickerings between the nobles and the populace, which
at that time divided every Italian city against itself. Altogether, the
position of Magistrate in such a town, at such a time, could have been
no sinecure, and it is difficult to understand how the hard-working
painter could have found time or inclination to accept the citizen's
duties, which were so weighty an occupation in themselves.

Much time has been spent in the vain search for documents relating to
Signorelli's supposed visit, in 1484, to Rome, where, it is said, he was
summoned to paint, with Perugino, Pintorricchio, Botticelli, and Cosimo
Rosselli, the walls of the Sistine Chapel. Later criticism has perhaps
accounted for the absence of such a record. Of the two frescoes there,
formerly attributed to him, it is now no longer doubted that one--"The
Journey of Moses and Zipporah"--is by Pintorricchio, and the opinion is
gradually gaining ground that the other--"The Death of Moses"--although
much nearer to Signorelli's style, is not sufficiently so as to permit
us to accept it as his work.[12]

The notices of the next few years contain little of interest beyond the
facts, that in 1484 Signorelli painted the altar-piece in the Perugia
Cathedral, the first dated picture remaining, and that in 1488 he
received the much-coveted honour of citizenship from Citta di Castello,
for the "great ability" with which he painted a standard for the
brotherhood of the Blessed Virgin,[13] a work which no longer exists.
Soon after follows a document dated 1491, which bears witness that Luca
had been invited by the authorities of Santa Maria dei Fiori in Florence
to assist in judging the models and designs for the projected facade of
that church.[14] This is important as a proof of the high esteem in
which he was held in Florence, implying also that he must have
understood something of architecture. He declined the invitation,
perhaps for