y,
we find Art at a very low ebb. The background is flat gold, not a blue
heaves with its golden stars, as in the early mosaics of the fifth and
sixth centuries. The figures are ill-proportioned; the faces consist
of lines without any attempt at form or expression. The draperies,
however, have a certain amplitude; "and the character of a few
accessories, for example, the crown on the Virgin's heads instead of
the invariable Byzantine veil, betrays," says Kugler, "a northern and
probably a Frankish influence." The attendant saints, generally St.
Peter and St. Paul, stand, stiff and upright on each side.

But with all their faults, these grand, formal, significant groups--or
rather not groups, for there was as yet no attempt either at
grouping or variety of action, for that would have been considered
irreverent--but these rows of figures, were the models of the early
Italian painters and mosaic-workers in their large architectural
mosaics and altar-pieces set up in the churches during the revival
of Art, from the period of Cimabue and Andrea Tafi down to the
latter half of the thirteenth century: all partook of this lifeless,
motionless character, and were, at the same time, touched with
the same solemn religious feeling. And long afterwards, when the
arrangement became less formal and conventional, their influence may
still be traced in those noble enthroned Madonnas, which represent
the Virgin as queen of heaven and of angels, either alone, or with
attendant saints, and martyrs, and venerable confessors waiting round
her state.

The general disposition of the two figures varies but little in the
earliest examples which exist for us in painting, and which are, in
fact, very much alike. The Madonna seated on a throne, wearing a red
tunic and a blue mantle, part of which is drawn as a veil over her
head, holds the infant Christ, clothed in a red or blue tunic. She
looks straight out of the picture with her head a little declined to
one side. Christ has the right hand raised in benediction, and the
other extended. Such were the simple, majestic, and decorous effigies,
the legitimate successors of the old architectural mosaics, and
usually placed over the high altar of a church or chapel. The earliest
examples which have been preserved are for that reason celebrated in
the history of Art.

The first is the enthroned Virgin of Guido da Siena, who preceded
Cimabue by twenty or thirty years. In this picture, the Byzantine