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In any case, in Vasari's text the evidence is two to one in favour of 1489-90 as the right date, and thus we come to the agreeable conclusion that our two oldest authorities, Dolce and Vasari, are at one in fixing Titian's birth between 1488 and 1490 in other words, about 1489.
According to Vasari, then, Titian was "above seventy-six years" when the second edition of the Lives was written, and as from the explicit nature of the evidence this must have been between 1566, when he visited Venice, and January 1568, when his book was published, it follows that Titian was "above seventy-six years" in 1566-7 in other words, that he was born 1489-90.
He now, therefore, devoted himself to this purpose, and in a short time so closely imitated Giorgione that his pictures were sometimes taken for those of that master.... At the time when Titian began to adopt the manner of Giorgione, being then not more than eighteen, he took the portrait," etc. Thus in two places out of three Vasari is consistent in fixing 1489-90 as the date.
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