TINTORETTO, JACOPO. 



TIPPOO SAIB. 



M 



a Crucifixion, very large ; and in the church of the Trinita, the 

 Temptation of Eve and the Death of Abel, besides some others. 



Tintoretto was BO eager for employment, and so desirous of public 

 notice and applause, that he undertook every commission which 

 off'-red itself, and rather than be inactive or unoccupied with any 

 public work, he frequently volunteered his services, or at most 

 required no futher outlay from his employers than would cover the cost 

 of the materials. He painted upon such terms the facade in fresco of 

 a large houso near the Ponte dell* Angelo ; on the lower part of the 

 house he painted a very spirited representation of a cavalry battle, 

 above which he placed an ornamental cornice in bronze j over this he 

 painted a large historical composition containing many figures; 

 between tho windows he introduced various figures of women ; and at 

 the top a rich frie/.e : the great extent and the boldness of these paint- 

 ings astonished the Venetian painters of that period. Upon very 

 similar terms he executed two of his greatest works, at Santa Maria 

 dell' Orto, where he painted, for 100 ducats, two immense pictures 

 fifty feet high. In one waa the Procession of the Jews with the 

 Golden Calf, and Moses upon a rock in the background receiving the 

 Tablea of the Law, which were supported by a group of naked angels ; 

 the other was a representation of the Last Judgment, containing an 

 immense number of figures; an extraordinary work, which, in the 

 opinion of Vasari, would have been perhaps without its rival as a 

 work of art, if the execution of the parts had been equal to tho con- 

 ception of the whole. 



The following works also are accounted amongst Tintoretto's master- 

 pieces: Saint Agnes restoring to life the son of the Praefect, painted 

 for the chapel of Cardinal Contarino ; the Miracle of St. Mark, called 

 'II Miracolo dello Schiavo,' where the saint delivers a Venetian, who 

 had become a Turkish slave, from a punishment ordered by his master, 

 by rendering him invulnerable, so that hammers and other instruments 

 of torture were broken upon his body without hurting him; this 

 picture, which is generally considered the best of all Tintoretto's 

 works, was painted in his thirty-seventh year, for the brotherhood of 

 St. Mark, and when it was finished and put up, the worthy friars 

 disputed with one another about the price, a dispute which Tinto- 

 retto settled by ordering the picture to be taken down and sent home, 

 and telling the brotherhood that they should not have it at any price. 

 He however, after some entreaty, restored it to its place and received 

 his own price, and the friars further gratified him by ordering him to 

 paint three other subjects from the life of the same saint, the Ex- 

 humation of the Body of the Saint at Alexandria, through the two 

 Venetian merchants Buono da Malamocco and Rustico da Torcello ; 

 the Transport of the Body to the Ship ; and the Miraculous Preserva- 

 tion at Sea of a Saracen Sailor through the Saint : the miracle of the 

 slave is in the Academy of Venice ; it has been engraved by J. Nathan ; 

 the other three are in the Scuola di San Marco. Pietro di Cortona is 

 reported to have said, that if he lived in Venice, he would never pass 

 a holiday without going to see these works ; he admired chiefly the 

 drawing. The pictures he painted for the Scuola di San Rocco are 

 equally celebrated : they comist of the famous Crucifixion, which was 

 engraved by Agostino Caracci, to the greatest satisfaction of Tinto- 

 retto; the Resurrection of Christ, engraved by E. Sadeler; the 

 Slaughter of the Innocents and the Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes, 

 engraved by L. Kilian; and several others of less note. To these 

 must be added three painted for the Padri Crociferi, an Assumption of 

 the Virgin, and the Circumcision of the Infant Christ, painted in 

 competition with Schiavone ; and a Marriage at Cana, now in the 

 church of Santa Maria della Salute. The Miracolo dello Schiavo, the 

 Crucifixion at San Rocco, and the Marriage at Cana, are said to be the 

 only pictures to which Tintoretto put his name. There is an engraving 

 of the Marriage at Cana, by Volpato, and a spirited .etching by E. 

 Fialetti. 



Tintoretto executed many great works for the government of Venice, 

 both in oil and fresco ; and such was his activity, perseverance, and 

 success, that ho left little to be done by others. He was always 

 occupied, and he worked with such unexampled rapidity that he used 

 to be called II Furioso. Sebastian del Piombo said that Tintoretto 

 could do as much in two days as he could do in two years. He 

 painted for the senate, in the council-hall, the Coronation of Frederick 

 Barbarossa, by Pope Adrian IV., at Rome ; and in consequence of 

 Paul Veronese painting a picture in the same hall, Tintoretto procured 

 permission to paint another, in which he represented Pope Alexander 

 III. surrounded by cardinals and prelates, excommunicating the same 

 emperor : the pope was represented throwing the extinguished candle 

 amongst the populace, and a crowd of people was rushing forward to 

 endeavour to catch it. He painted also for the senate, in the hall 

 dello Scrutinio, the celebrated naval victory of the Venetians over the 

 Turks in 1571. He painted many other works in the ducal palace, 

 historical and allegorical, commemorating the history of Venice, of 

 which the most famous are the capture of Zara by storm ; and the 

 great picture of Paradise, upon canvas, 74 feet by 34, containing a 

 surprising number of figures. This was his last great work ; he com- 

 menced it in several pieces in the Scuola Vecchia della Misericordia, 

 and finished it, with the help of his son, in its place on the ceiling of 

 the great council-hall of the Senate, now the library. 



Tintoretto painted at Venice eight friezes for the Duke of Mantua, 

 recording the duke's feats, to be placed in hia castle, and he visited 



the duke at Mantua, witli all his family, and was splendidly entertained 

 by him. He painted also the portrait of Henri III. of France aud 

 Poland, when that king visited Venice; of which picture Ridolfi 

 relates a curious history. Tintoretto was engaged with Paul Veronese 

 in painting some figures in chiar'oscuro upon the arch of triumph 

 erected by Palladio at Venice in honour of the landing of Henri III., 

 king of France and Poland ; but wishing to take a portrait of the 

 king as he landed, he prevailed upon Paul Veronese to complete the 

 arch; and he dressed himself as one of the doge's attendants, and 

 went in the Bucintoro, the state barge, with the others to receive the 

 king, whose portrait he drew in small, in crayons, unknown to the 

 king, whilst he waa proceeding in the barge to the landing-place. This 

 portrait he afterwards enlarged in oils, and procured permission from 

 the king to retouch it from life. The king expressed himself very 

 much pleased with the portrait, and accepted it from the painter, 

 whom he wished to create a cavaliere ; but Tintoretto declined the 

 aonour, upon the plea that to bear a title was inconsistent with his 

 habits. Henri III. afterwards presented the portrait to the dot;e 

 Luigi Mocenigo. Tintoretto painted many portraits, all in a remark- 

 ably bold style ; he painted several of the series of doges' portraits 

 along the frieze of the great council-hall. 



It has been said above that Tintoretto was a remarkably rapid 

 painter : he was however as careless about the execution of the parts 

 as he was bold. There are pictures by him painted in his youth that 

 are extremely carefully finished, but these are very few : Susanna at 

 the Bath with the two Elders, is of this class ; several of his large 

 pictures are merely dead coloured, and many of them were painted 

 off without the slightest previous preparation. His rapidly-executed 

 and low-priced productions were a frequent source of complaint to 

 his fellow-artists. Upon one occasion, when the brotherhood of San 

 Rocco requested Paul Veronese, Salviati, Zuccaro, Schiavone, aud Tinto- 

 retto to send them designs for a picture of the Apotheosis of San Rocco, 

 that they might select the best of them, Tintoretto sent his finished 

 picture as soon as the others sent in their designs, affirming that he 

 had no other way of drawing ; and to ensure its being fixed in its 

 destined place, he made the institution a present of tho work. 

 Although Tintoretto professed to draw in the style of Michel Angelo, 

 and to colour like Titian, there are few traces of either quality in the 

 great majority of his works ; they are however all conspicuous for 

 his own peculiar style of chiar'oscuro, which is frequently both heavy 

 and cold. In his larger compositions a principal characteristic is the 

 number of figures, which are often crowded and confused, and the 

 spectator looks in vain for a spot of repose to relieve the mind ; this 

 is however not the case with such pictures as the Miracolo dello 

 Schiavo and other earlier productions. Annibal Caracci has well 

 expressed the inequality of this great painter that if he was some- 

 times equal to Titian, he was often inferior to Tintoretto. The Vene- 

 tians used to say that he had three pencils, one of gold, one of silver, 

 and the other of iron. In his design Tintoretto was muscular, but 

 lean, and often incorrect ; and in the cast of his draperies frequently 

 mean and confused ; his colouring was not gaudy, like that of many 

 of the Venetians, but was often even cold, and shadow predominates 

 in perhaps all his pictures. He was once asked which were the pret- 

 tiest colours, and he answered " black and white." It was also a 

 maxim of his that none but experienced artists should draw from the 

 living model, as they were alone capable of distinguishing between the 

 beauties and the imperfections of an individual model. Tintoretto 

 painted Aretin's portrait, and Ridolfi relates the following anecdote 

 connected with it : Aretin was a great friend of Titian's and was in 

 the habit of abusing Tintoretto occasionally : the latter one day 

 meeting the poet, invited him to come and sit to him for his portrait, 

 to which Aretin assented ; but he had no sooner seated himself in 

 the painter's studio, than Tintoretto pulled out with great violence a 

 pistol from underneath his vest and came towards him : up jumped 

 Aretin in a great fright, and cried out " Jacopo, what are you about 1" 

 " Oh ! don't alarm yourself," said Tintoretto, " I am only going to 

 measure you ; " and suiting the action to the word, he said, " you are 

 just two pistols and a half." " What a mountebank you are ! " 

 returned Aretin ; " you are always up to some frolic." The poet was 

 afterwards more cautious, and they became friends. Ridolfi records a 

 few other whimsical feats of Tintoretto's. He died at Venice in 1594, 

 aged eighty-two. He had two children a son, Domenico, and a 

 daughter, Marietta who both practised painting. Domenico was born 

 in 1562, and died in 1637. He followed in the steps of his father 

 both in history and portrait ; but, says Lanzi, as Ascanius did those 

 of ^Eneas, non passions cequis. Marietta was born in 1560, and died 

 before her father, in 1590. She painted very excellent portraits. The 

 only picture by Tintoretto in the National Gallery is one of no great 

 merit, ' St. George destroying the Dragon.' 



(Ridolfi, Lc Maraviglie dell' Arte, ovvero le Vite degli Illustri Pittori 

 Veneti, e dello Stato ; Zauetti, Delia Pittura Veneziana, e delle Opere 

 pubbtiche de' Veneziani Maestri, <kc.) 



TIPPOO SAIB, sultan of Mysore, was born in the year 1749. His 

 father Hyder Aly Khan [HYDER ALY], sensible of the disadvantages 

 under which he himself laboured from want of education, procured 

 for his son the best masters in all the sciences which are cultivated 

 by the Mohammedans. But Tippoo, although he had acquired a 

 taste for reading, did not make any considerable progress, and he 



