223 



UDALL, NICHOLAS. 



UQHELLT, FERDINANDO. 



224 



opinion of Vasari, bavo been one of the most remarkable painters that 

 had lived, from Giotto until Yasari's own time, had he bestowed as 

 much labour on men and animals as he did on perspective. Uccello 

 was the first Italian artist who reduced the principles of perspective to 

 rule : he was acquainted with geometry as a science, which he learnt 

 of his friend the mathematician Giovanni Manetti, with whom he used 

 to read Euclid. He painted in fresco and in distemper, but most of his 

 works are now destroyed. His pictures were generally of such subjects 

 as admitted of the introduction of animals ; and he contrived in all 

 his works to display his power of foreshortening. His best works 

 were those painted in Santa Maria Novello, in green earth, where he 

 illustrated the histories of Adam and Eve, and of Noah, the Creation, 

 and the Deluge. In these works he painted numerous animals, 

 amongst them many birds. He acquired his name of Uccello on 

 account of his predilection for painting birds. Vasari does not men- 

 tion his family name : it was not Mazzocchi, which is a name given to 

 him by Orlandi through misunderstanding a passage in Vasari. He 

 was skilful also in landscape-painting, and the backgrounds of some of 

 his paintings were the best specimens of this department of art that 

 had been produced up to his time. 



Uccello painted also in green earth, in the cathedral, a colossal 

 equestrian portrait of au Englishman who was a captain of the Floren- 

 tine republic, and who is called Giovanni Aguto by Italian writers : he 

 died in 1393. This painting still exists, and is marked at the base, 

 Pauli Uccelli Opus. He had a high opinion of his proficiency in his 

 own peculiar line, and he painted on the same panel his own portrait, 

 with the portraits of four other men distinguished in different arts or 

 sciences. He painted Giotto for painting, Brunelleschi for architec- 

 ture, Donatello for sculpture, himself for perspective and animal 

 painting, and Giovanni Manetti for mathematics. He died, according 

 to Vasari, in 1432, aged eighty-three, very poor, having latterly devoted 

 his whole time to perspective, which was a very unprofitable study to 

 himself, although succeeding artists derived great advantages from his 

 labours. Bottati supposes 1472 to have been the date of Uccello's 

 death. 



UDALL, NICHOLAS, was born in Hampshire, in 1506. He was 

 admitted a scholar of Corpus Christi College Oxford. January 13, 1520, 

 and took the degree of B.A. September 3, 1524. After he left college, 

 he became master of Eton school, and obtained the degree of M.A. in 

 1534, which had been refused to him at college on account of his 

 inclination to the tenets of Luther. He was afterwards master of 

 Westminster school. In the early part of the reign of Edward VI. 

 he was appointed to a canonry at Windsor. He died in 1564. 



Udall published ' Flovres for Latyne Spekynge,' London, 1533, 

 which consists of selections from Terence's comedies, with au English 

 translation; he also published translations from some of the Latin 

 works of Erasmus ; but his chief claim to notice is, that he was pro- 

 bably the first writer of regular English comedies divided into acts 

 and scenes. Wood says that he wrote several comedies, all of which 

 however had been lost, till a printed copy of one of them was discovered 

 in 1818: this is 'Ralph Royster Doyster.' 



Warton (' Hist. Engl. Poet,' iii. 213) quotes from the ancient Consue- 

 tudinary of Eton School, a passage importing that yearly, about St. 

 Andrew's day, November 30, the master was accustomed to select, 

 according to his own discretion, such Latin plays as were best and 

 fittest to be acted by the boys, in the following Christmas holidays, with 

 scenic decorations, before a public audience ; and that sometimes also 

 he ordered the performance of plays in English, provided that he 

 found any with sufficient grace and wit. The author of the piece in 

 question calls it, in his prologue of four seven-line stanzas, a " comedie 

 or enterlude ; " the latter, as we have already intimated, being at that 

 date the ordinary appellation for a dramatic production in general ; so 

 that, in employing also the less usual term ' comedy,' Udall seems to 

 claim to have his play regarded as of more 'regular' and ' classical ' 

 construction, making at the same time express reference to the works 

 of Plautus and Terence, as precedents which he had endeavoured to 

 imitate. The scene of tbis comedy is laid in London ; and it is in a 

 great degree a representation of the manners and notions of the 

 middle classes of the metropolis at that period. It is divided into 

 acts and scenes, has nine male and four female characters, and the 

 performance must have occupied two hours and a half, while few of 

 the moral plays would require more than an hour, for of those which 

 were in two parts, each part was exhibited on a separate day. The 

 plot is amusing and well constructed, with an agreeable intermixture 

 of serious and humorous dialogue, and a variety of character to 

 which no other English play of a similar date can make any preten- 

 sion. Udall also wrote, probably for his scholars at Eton, a Latin 

 tragedy, ' De Papatu,' 1540. 



UFFENBACH, ZACHARIAS CONRAD VON, a learned German, 

 was born on the 22nd of February 1683, at Frankfurt on- the-Main, 

 where his father was a senator, and belonged to an ancient and noble 

 family of the place. He was educated at the gymnasium of Rudol- 

 stadt, whence he proceeded in 1698 to the University of Strasburg to 

 study law. In 1700 he lost both his parents, which obliged him to 

 return to Frankfurt ; but as soon as he got over his grief he wont to 

 Halle, where he completed his academical studies, and in 1702 he took 

 his degree of doctor of law under Christian Thomasius, after having 

 written an inaugural dissertation, ' De Quasi-emancipatione Germano- 



rum occasione Reformationis Frnncofurtensis.' Uffenbach from his 

 youth showed a great love of books, and while Le was at the univer- 

 sities he considerably increased the library left him by his father. 

 After completing his studies, he travelled for two years through Ger- 

 many, and collected manuscripts and rare books. In 1704 he returned 

 to Frankfurt and settled there. The next five years were chiefly spent 

 in completing his library, which became one of the most extensive 

 private collections in Germany. In the mean time some offer was 

 made to him at Oxford, and it was partly with a view to see whether 

 the offer would suit his taste, and partly with the view of making 

 some acquisitions for his library, that in 1709 he visited England, and 

 spent some time at Oxford. But various circumstances, and especially 

 the English climate, which did not agree with his delicate constitution, 

 induced him in 1711 to return to his native place. He took back with 

 him upwards of 4000 rare and curious books, which he had purchased 

 in England and Holland. In 1721 he was raised to the rank of a 

 senator of Frankfurt, and distinguished himself so much among his 

 fellow-citizens, that in the course of nine years he was twice elected 

 mayor : in 1731 he was raised to the office of chief-justice. He died 

 on the 6th of January 1734. 



Uffenbach was a man of extraordinary diligence. As long as his 

 health permitted it, he devoted all his leisure time to bibliographical 

 and other studies, and to the composition of most laborious works. He 

 made and published three different catalogues of his library ; one in 

 1720, and another in 1729, under the title ' Bibliotheca Uffenbachiana 

 apocrypha vel latens, hoc est, librorum in corpus redactorum vel aliia 

 insertorum Catalogus.' This catalogue was believed to have been 

 made by the author with the view of disposing of some parts of his 

 library, as his official duties prevented his attending to it as much as 

 before. A third catalogue, in 4 vols. 4 to, was published after Uffen- 

 bach's death in 1735. Besides these catalogues he commenced i-everal 

 other works, but was prevented from completing them partly by his 

 official engagements, and partly by ill health. These works were, 1, 

 ' Glossarium Germanicum Medii ^Evi;' 2, ' Commentarius de Vita 

 propria,' that is, an autobiography; 3, 'Selecta Historise literarise et 

 librarise,' the manuscript of which formed several quarto volumes; 4, 

 ' Adversaria, sive Excerpta Realium ad Rem Librariam et Literariam 

 facientium,' in nine quarto volumes. The work most advanced 

 towards completion was Uffenbach's autobiography ; but when in the 

 latter years of his life he lo^t all hopes of ever finishing his work?, 

 he gave the manuscripts of them to his friend J. G. Schellhorn of 

 Memmingen, together with his literary correspondence, forming eigh- 

 teen thick quarto volumes, and allowed him to make any use of them 

 he pleased. Schellhorn did not indeed complete or publish the works 

 thus bequeathed to him, but he made much use of the materials 

 collected by Uffenbach for his 'Arncenitates Literariaj,' in the ninth 

 volume of which he gives an account of the earliest printed works 

 contained in the library of Uffenbach. He also wrote a Life of his 

 friend, which is prefixed to a collection of Uffenbach's letters, ' Com- 

 mercii Epistolaris Uffenbachiani Selecta,' &c., 5 vols. 8vo, 1753, &c. 



UGGI'ONE, or UGLO'NE MARCO, called also Marco of Oggione 

 in the Milanese, was one of the best scholars of Lionardo da Vinci. 

 He did not, like most of the disciples of that great matter, confine 

 himself to easel pictures, executed slowly and highly finished, but 

 became an eminent painter in fresco, and his works in the Place at 

 Milan have retained even to our time their tone and colour almost 

 unimpaired. Some of them are in the body of the church, but tho 

 most remarkable of them is in the refectory : this is the Crucifixion, 

 which is equally admirable for the skill evinced in the composition, 

 the spirited execution, the variety in the numerous figures, and the 

 taste of the draperies. For the refectory of the celebrated monastery 

 of the Certosa, near Pavia, he made a copy of the Last Supper of 

 Lionardo da Vinci, which is peculiarly valuable on account of the 

 ruinous condition of the matchless original. 



The church of St. Euphemia, at Milan, contains one of his master- 

 piece?, representing the Virgin and Saints. He died in 1530, but his 

 age is not known. 



UQHELLI, FERDINANDO, born at Florence about 1595, entered 

 the order of Citeaux, in which he rose to the dignity of abbot. He is 

 chiefly known for his great work, ' Italia Sacra,' published at Rome, 

 in 9 vols. fol., 1642-48, in which he gives the history of the various 

 Italian sees, with the series of their respective bishops, and illustrates 

 them by numerous documents from the episcopal archives, which 

 also reflect much light on the general Listory of the country. As it 

 was impossible for the author to examine himself all the archives of 

 the numerous Italian sees, he was often obliged to employ others; and 

 the consequence is, that the execution of the work is unequal. Still 

 Ughelli's history is very valuable, and has served as a model for 

 similar compilations of the episcopal history of other nations, and 

 especially of that of France, which was published about fourteen years 

 after the appearance of Ughelli's first volume, under the title of 

 ' Gallia Christiana,' in 1656. A new edition of Ughelli's work was 

 published at Venice, in 10 vols. fol., 1717-33, with considerable addi- 

 tions, and with the ' Sicilia Sacra ' of Rocco Pirro. 



Ughelli wrote a work in illustration of the history of the Colonna 

 family, 'Imagines Columnensis Familiae Cardinalium,' Rome, 1650; 

 and another work in Italian, entitled ' Albero e Istoria della Famiglia 

 de' Conti di Marsciano,' Rome, 1667. Ughelli died at Rome in 1670. 





