ame man made, on a
brick-pier in the Loggia that Lapo had built on the Piazza
d'Orsanmichele, that Madonna which worked so many miracles, not many
years later, that the Loggia was for a long time full of images, and is
still held in the greatest veneration. Finally, in the Chapel of Messer
Ridolfo de' Bardi, which is in S. Croce, where Giotto painted the life
of S. Francis, he painted a Crucifix in distemper on the altar-panel,
with a Magdalene and a S. John weeping, and two friars, one on either
side. Ugolino passed away from this life, being old, in the year 1349,
and was buried with honour in Siena, his native city.

But returning to Stefano, of whom they say that he was also a good
architect, which is proved by what has been said above, he died, so it
is said, in the year when there began the jubilee, 1350, at the age of
forty-nine, and was laid to rest in the tomb of his fathers, in S.
Spirito, with this epitaph:

STEPHANO FLORENTINO PICTORI, FACIUNDIS IMAGINIBUS AC COLORANDIS
FIGURIS NULLI UNQUAM INFERIORI, AFFINES MOESTISS. POS. VIX. AN.
XXXXIX.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 14: See note on p. 57.]

PIETRO LAURATI

[Illustration: _Alinari_

THE MADONNA ENTHRONED

(_After the polyptych_ by Pietro Laurati [Lorenzetti]. _Arezzo: S. Maria
della Pieve_)]

LIFE OF PIETRO LAURATI

[_PIETRO LORENZETTI_],

PAINTER OF SIENA

Pietro Laurati, an excellent painter of Siena, proved in his life how
great is the contentment of the truly able, who feel that their works
are prized both at home and abroad, and who see themselves sought after
by all men, for the reason that in the course of his life he was sent
for and held dear throughout all Tuscany, having first become known
through the scenes that he painted in fresco for the Scala, a hospital
in Siena, wherein he imitated in such wise the manner of Giotto, then
spread throughout all Tuscany, that it was believed with great reason
that he was destined, as afterwards came to pass, to become a better
master than Cimabue and Giotto and the others had been; for the figures
that represent the Virgin ascending the steps of the Temple, accompanied
by Joachim and Anna, and received by the priest, and then in the
Marriage, are so beautifully adorned, so well draped, and so simply
wrapped in their garments, that they show majesty in the air of the
heads, and a most beautiful manner in their bearing. By reason of this
work, which was the first introd