68 
House & Garden 
The Art of the Ancient Medalists 
(Continued from page 66) 
they were destined rather to serve the 
purpose of the painted portrait or of 
the modern photograph. The noble 
families of the time welcomed with a 
natural eagerness this new art, which 
not only portrayed their features with 
all the power of painting, but which 
rendered them in a material which was 
readily available for transmission from 
friend to friend.” 
Vittore Pisano 
Vittore Pisano of Verona must stand 
forth as the greatest of these early mas¬ 
ters of the medal. From 1439-1449 he 
devoted his skill to productions of this 
sort, some thirty examples from his 
hand being extant. As his medals often 
bear the signature “OPUS PISANI PIC- 
TORIS”, we have in this a reference to 
Pisano’s position as a painter—his St. 
Eustache in the National Gallery will 
be recalled by the reader. 
It must be remembered that medallic 
engraving, which attained perfection 
with the Greeks, had reached a sorry 
and miserable state during the Middle 
Ages. Pisano and his successors lifted 
medallic art from this mire of deteriora¬ 
tion, lending to it their training in paint¬ 
ing and in sculpture. As the large 
medals of these new masters were not 
possible from dies such as were known 
to the mechanical processes of their 
time, nearly all the early medals (and 
many 16th Century medals as well) were 
cast in metal from molds instead of 
being struck from engraved dies. 
“The first Italian medallists,” says 
Wroth, “made their models from the 
life in wax-working, in fact, as did the 
sculptor of bronze who modelled in clay 
—and from these wax-models they pre¬ 
pared, by a careful and elaborate proc¬ 
ess, a mold into which the metal was 
finally poured.” 
Pisano’s first distinguished follower 
was Matteo Pasti, of Verona, whose 
work begins about 1446. Then there 
was Sperandio, who made many medals 
for the Este and the Bentivoglio. In 
the ISth Century there also comes Gio¬ 
vanni Boldu, with Guacciolotti, Enzola, 
Melioli, Lixignolo, Pollaiuola and others, 
precursors of Pomedello, Spinelli, Ben¬ 
venuto Cellini, Francia, Ronano, Cara- 
dossa, Valerio Belli, Lione Lioni, Pas- 
torino of Siena, Pier Paolo Galeotti, An- 
nibali Fontano, Jacopo da Trezzo, Ales¬ 
sandro Vittoria, Federigo Bonazagona, 
Lodovico Leoni and the rest. 
Vassari tells us that Francia’s medals 
obtained for him “not only immortality 
and fame, but likewise very handsome 
presents”, and we know from Cellini’s 
Autobiography what store Cellini set by 
his medallic productions. Pastorino’s 
many portrait-medals were most dis¬ 
tinguished in quality. “He has copied 
all the world,” sgid Vassari, “and per¬ 
sons of all kinds, great nobles, distin¬ 
guished artists, and persons of unknown 
or of low degree.” Truly it has been 
remarked that we have in the Italian 
Renaissance medals (few of which com¬ 
memorate events, portraiture being their 
main purpose), an astonishing series of 
portraits in which the chief actors in 
the tragedies and comedies of their times 
pass before us. 
Decline of the Art 
Italian medals decline in merit with 
the beginning of the 17th Century. G. 
F. Hill, the English authority, says “The 
decay of the medal was assisted by an¬ 
other development which craftsmen like 
Cellini, so proud of their improvements 
of old methods, doubtless hailed as the 
greatest technical advance of the age. 
A few bold spirits of the 15th Century 
such as Enzola of Parma, following the 
example of the artist of the Carrara 
medals of 1390, had attempted to em¬ 
ploy engraved dies, and hammers or 
striking machinery for making medals. I! 
But the process of casting fortunately 
held its ground until the 16th Century. 
By that time the machinery had been 
so greatly improved that many medal- j 
lists began to employ it. Once the labor 
of engraving and punching the dies was 
over, an indefinite number of specimens 
could be produced without the trouble¬ 
some preparation of fresh molds, and, 
more important still, without the sub¬ 
sequent chasing which was necessary in 
almost every case to remove the im¬ 
perfections left by the process of cast¬ 
ing.” Extreme finish resulted from the 
die method, but dryness and hardness 
resulted in this more mechanical process. 
Where The Sign Still Swings 
(Continued from page 47) 
bar-keeper, discreetly keeping both 
hands below the bar, gestured with 
a wink and a crooked elbow towards a 
door that led out again, whither the 
guide propelled her with accelerated 
gait, quite neglecting the door-casings. 
She was proudly told that no one 
seemed to know the exact age of the 
Flagstaff Inn, formerly called the Ches¬ 
ter Cross-roads House, but that the 
masons imported to build the Brick 
House, now the Chester House Hotel, 
down the street, were boarded at the 
Cross-roads hostelry, and that was in 
1812 or thereabouts. Dr. Green could 
tell her more, but Dr. Green was never 
found, for hunger prevailed, and just 
out of Chester the luncheon kit was 
unpacked. 
Mendham yielded a wealth of sketch¬ 
ing treasure right on the four-corners. 
We made for the bare-swept and lonely 
bar-room of the Black Horse Inn, where 
lounged the proprietor to whom until 
recently, thirty-three years of possession 
had given no such opportunity for 
leisure. This older house had suffered 
much by being modernized. Seventeen 
thirty-five is the date claimed of its 
erection, and over the bar hangs a series 
of pictures showing the desecration to 
which it has been submitted in the years 
of its existence. It is now, undoubtedly, 
a neat country hotel with no frills about 
it, and the old stable yard is bare of 
wagons and teams. Gone, whither, are 
the trucksters and drovers who fre¬ 
quented its tap-room until scarce a year 
ago? 
No one had prepared us for the 
shadow-flecked Phoenix House across 
the street, and we blundered into it, 
thinking to find possibly, a musty par- ; 
lor and a dark-painted uninteresting in¬ 
terior, but surprise and joy awaited us. 
Cool, long, gray-painted rooms pre¬ 
sented a neutral background for the ef¬ 
fective placing of most beautiful old 
furniture, and charming arrangement 
of garden flowers. Quaint chintzes, 
sparingly used, exquisite orderliness, and 
all the calm invitation to repose of soul 
and body a motorist could desire but 
rarely finds, were miraculously present. 
Up through the wide hall swept a 
beautifully proportioned spiral staircase, 
with spindles and rail so delicately slen¬ 
der that their survival is a thing of 
note. The bedrooms were delightfully 
adequate, with an air of sturdy com¬ 
fort in the deep mahogany dressers, the 
rag rugs, and the attractive chairs. The 
beds were modern reproductions of the 
old designs, but gained thereby, per- 
haps, an added charm. 
We returned to the end of Washing¬ 
ton’s route, at Morristown, full of his¬ 
torical interest but lacking somewhat in jj 
picturesque inns, and so on to Madison 
(Continued on page 70) 
