174 The Picture Gallery of the Vatican. 



It is difficult to say what can have been the cause of such misrepre- 

 sentations. It cannot have been wantonness or profaneness, for we 

 do not find that such paintings were disapproved of by the clergy of 

 those times. That the early artists had some authority for even 

 greater absurdities than they have committed, will appear from the 

 following' extracts. 



In " Barachoth," a Talmud treatise, it is said that " God formed 

 Adam with a double visage : he made him with two faces, one before 

 and one behind, and cut him in two parts and out of one part he 

 made Eve." 



" Adam/' it is said, in another treatise, " when created, reached 

 from earth to the firmament of heaven ; but that after he had sinned, 

 God laid his hands upon him, and reduced him to a less size." 



Adam reached in length so far, that " an hundred years would be 

 spent in travelling from one end to the other." 



These latter subjects, however, would be rather difficult to paint. 



No. 31. Roman School. The Annunciation, by Baroccio. 



This painting is always considered as the best work of Baroccio, 

 both for finish, for elegance, and for composition. The artist him- 

 self was so satisfied with his production, that he made an engraving 

 of it, which succeeded admirably. Till 1797 it belonged to the Ba- 

 silica of Loretto, and when it was removed to Paris a mosaic copy 

 was substituted in its place. 



No. 32. Florentine School.' Pope Sistus IV., by Melozzo da Forli. 



This large fresco painting, which used to ornament one of the walls 

 of the old Vatican library, by the order of Leo XII. was taken off 

 the wall on which it had been painted, and transferred to canvass as 

 we see it at present. Besides the interest attached to so curious an 

 operation, the fresco has great merits of its own, which consist in the 

 admirable exactness of the portraits, and the truth and harmony which 

 appear in every part. A minute description of the composition would 

 by no means amuse a general reader, as the interest attached to it is 

 entirely local; but for those who desire to know every particular, 

 there is an erudite dissertation on this celebrated painting by the 

 Marchese Melchiorri, whose antiquarian productions are well known 

 in Rome. 



Melozzo da Forli, the title of this painter, is, as usual, merely a nick- 

 name, his real name being Degli Ambrogi. 



D. 



