BIANCA SFORZA 



described as " a profile portrait of Madonna . . . 

 daughter of Signor Lodovico of Milan . . . after- 

 wards married to the Emperor Maximilian, by the 

 hand of ... Milanese." Taddeo Contarini was a 

 wealthy Venetian banker, who often supplied Isabella 

 d'Este and her lord with loans of money, and who 

 owned several fine paintings by Giorgione and other 

 choice works of art. Nothing would be more likely 

 than that, after the sack of the Castello of Milan 

 by the French in 1499, and the dispersion of the 

 Moro's treasures, this picture fell into the hands of 

 some Venetian dealer, who sold it to Contarini. But 

 there was some evident confusion in the Anonimo's 

 mind as to the two Bianca Sforzas. It was not 

 Lodovico's daughter, but his niece, the sister of the 

 reigning Duke, who in 1498 became the wife of 

 Maximilian I. Two superb portraits of the young 

 Empress are still in existence. Both were painted by 

 Ambrogio de' Predis, who at the Emperor's request 

 was sent to Innsbruck in his bride's suite, and who 

 took refuge there in 1502, after the conquest of 

 Milan by the French. One of Bianca's portraits is 

 now in the Widener Gallery, at Philadelphia, U.S.A., 

 the other remains in the possession of the Countess 

 Visconti-Arconati, in Paris. In the one she wears a 

 sumptuous court robe and a profusion of jewels, in 

 the other she is clad in a simple tight-fitting bodice, 

 cut square at the neck, with a single string of pearls 



