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Updated: May 13, 2025
Parri di Spinello Spinelli, painter of Arezzo, having learnt the first principles of art from his own father, was brought to Florence by the agency of Messer Leonardo Bruni of Arezzo, and was received by Lorenzo Ghiberti into his school, where many young men were learning under his discipline: and since the doors of S. Giovanni were then being given their finish, he was put to labour on those figures, in company with many others, as it has been said above.
In fact, whether in the society of Beatrice or not, Spinello now found that the terrible form of Lucifer, which his genius had created, was ever present with him, standing, as it were, like a mighty shadow, between him and the external world, and eclipsing the glory of earth and heaven.
By the hand of Spinello, also, on a wall of the Hospital of Spirito Santo, is a scene of the Apostles receiving the Holy Spirit, which is very beautiful; and so, too, are the two scenes below, wherein S. Cosimo and S. Damiano are cutting off a sound leg from a dead Moor, in order to attach it to a sick man, from whom they had cut off one that was mortified; and likewise the very beautiful "Noli me tangere," which is between those two works.
For it was his intent therein to glorify the leader of the hosts of Heaven for the victory he won before the beginning of time. Accordingly Spinello represented St. Michael fighting in the air against the serpent with seven heads and ten horns, and he figured with delight, in the bottom part of the picture, the Prince of the Devils, Lucifer, under the semblance of an appalling monster.
Spinello Spinelli was sprung of a noble family of Florentine exiles, and his graciousness of mind matched his gentle birth; for he was the most skilful painter of his time. He wrought many and great works at Florence; and the Pisans begged him to complete Giotto's wall-paintings in their Campo Santo, where the dead rest beneath roses in holy earth shipped from Jerusalem.
They were grateful to him beside for having by his works spread the fame of their city over all Tuscany. For all these reasons they welcomed him with high honours on his return. Still full of vigour in his old age, he undertook important tasks in his native town. His wife would tell him: "You are rich, Spinello. Do you rest, and leave younger men to paint instead of you.
For it was his intent therein to glorify the leader of the hosts of Heaven for the victory he won before the beginning of time. Accordingly Spinello represented St. Michael fighting in the air against the serpent with seven heads and ten horns, and he figured with delight, in the bottom part of the picture, the Prince of the Devils, Lucifer, under the semblance of an appalling monster.
Angelo, in that city, there is found the very extraordinary story of the painter Spinello Aretino, to which Lanzi alludes briefly, in his History of Painting in Italy.
As this idea rushed upon the mind of Spinello, the wind, moaning through the aisles, and multiplied by the echoes, sounded like the voices of wailing and desolation, which, the imagination may suppose, mingled in dismal concert when the spirits fell from heaven; and the artist, overpowered by the crowd of horrors which fastened like hungry vultures upon his fancy, sprang from the altar, and, stumbling in his haste, extinguished his torch.
Spinello, then, began to be reputed a good painter, and Messer Dardano Acciaiuoli, having caused the Church of S. Niccolò to be built near the Sala del Papa, behind S. Maria Novella, in the Via della Scala, and having given burial therein to one his brother, a Bishop, caused him to paint the whole of that church in fresco with stories of S. Nicholas, Bishop of Bari; and he delivered it completely finished in the year 1334, having been at work on it two years without ceasing.
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