ed, and excellent painter, who made many works in fresco at
Milan; and in particular, for the Frati della Passione, a most beautiful
Last Supper, which remained unfinished by reason of his death. He also
painted very well in oils, and there are many highly-esteemed works by
his hand at Vercelli and Veralla.

ANDREA DEL SARTO

LIFE OF ANDREA DEL SARTO

A MOST EXCELLENT PAINTER OF FLORENCE

At length, after the Lives of many craftsmen who have been excellent,
some in colouring, some in drawing, and others in invention, we have
come to the most excellent Andrea del Sarto, in whose single person
nature and art demonstrated all that painting can achieve by means of
draughtsmanship, colouring, and invention, insomuch that, if Andrea had
possessed a little more fire and boldness of spirit, to correspond to
his profound genius and judgment in his art, without a doubt he would
have had no equal. But a certain timidity of spirit and a sort of
humility and simplicity in his nature made it impossible that there
should be seen in him that glowing ardour and that boldness which, added
to his other qualities, would have made him truly divine in painting;
for which reason he lacked those adornments and that grandeur and
abundance of manners which have been seen in many other painters. His
figures, however, for all their simplicity and purity, are well
conceived, free from errors, and absolutely perfect in every respect.
The expressions of his heads, both in children and in women, are
gracious and natural, and those of men, both young and old, admirable in
their vivacity and animation; his draperies are beautiful to a marvel,
and his nudes very well conceived. And although his drawing is simple,
all that he coloured is rare and truly divine.

Andrea was born in Florence, in the year 1478, to a father who was all
his life a tailor; whence he was always called Andrea del Sarto by
everyone. Having come to the age of seven, he was taken away from his
reading and writing school and apprenticed to the goldsmith's craft. But
in this he was always much more willing to practise his hand in
drawing, to which he was drawn by a natural inclination, than in using
the tools for working in silver or gold; whence it came to pass that
Gian Barile, a painter of Florence, but one of gross and vulgar taste,
having seen the boy's good manner of drawing, took him under his
protection, and, making him abandon his work as goldsmith, directed