ANIMAL LIFE IN ITALIAN PAINTING 



has dropped : Ulysses in his eager entry seems 

 bound to tumble over it. A jackdaw or some other 

 coiuus walks across a beam with the jerky consequential 

 strut of his kind. These birds are difficult to identify, 

 as the differences of form and colour are apt to be 

 confused in old painting, though unmistakable in the 

 living bird — the size of the raven, the greyish bloom 

 of the jackdaw, the white skin at the base of the beak 

 of the rook. Very possibly some of my identifications 

 in this species are wrong. A figure on the right has a 

 falcon on his wrist ; on the island seen through the 

 window are wild boars and a lion. 



In one of the splendidly decorative frescoes in the 

 Piccolomini Library of the Cathedral of Siena, Pius II. 

 at Ancona, a falcon chases a pheasant across the sky 

 directly above the Pope's head, and a dog runs over a 

 bridge, ^neas Sylvius sets out for the Council of 

 Basle with knights on horseback, and a greyhound in 

 leash with a double row of bosses on its collar is a 

 conspicuous object. A hawk pursues a wild-duck while 

 y^neas is being invested as Poet Laureate before 

 Frederick 1 11.^ Indeed, Pinturicchio could hardly bear 

 to leave a space of quiet sky ; there must be a hawk 

 and some bird which it is chasing. 



^ Enea Sylvio de' Piccolomini wrote a treatise On the Nature and Care 

 of Horses. 



62 



