Identifier: florenceinpoetry00ryan (find matches)
Title: Florence in poetry, history and art
Year: 1913 (1910s)
Authors: Ryan, Sara Agnes
Subjects:
Publisher: Chicago, Mayer and Miller Co.
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto

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following hand made vis-ible the Magnificat of his heart. He magnifiedthe Maid, and Florence rejoiced in her Queen. Cimabue died in 1302, but he left an heir tohis greatness—a pupil, a protege— Tis morning. Let us wander through the fieldsWhere Cimabue found a shepherd-boyTracing his idle fancies on the ground. —Rogers.This is Cimabues epitaph: Creditut ut Cimabue picturae castra tenere Sic tenuit vivins; nunc tener astra poli. Cimabue held supremacy in the field of paint-ing while he lived,And now he still holds it among the stars ofheaven. Dante, commenting upon the epitaph in the1 Purgatorio, says: 0 powers of man! how vain thy glory, niptE en in its height of verdure, if an ageLess bright succeed not. Cimabue thoughtTo lord it over paintings field; and nowThe cry is Giottos, and his name eclipsed. Giotto, so mentioned in the greatest religiouspoem of all ages, reciprocates by placing hisfriend, Dante, whom he had met in Rome andRavenna, in the Paradiso, a fresco he later 38
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The Artists and the Churches. made in the Bargello, as an illustration of thegreat poem. He so handed down the poets face to pos-terity. It is the profile we see copied so exten-sively in Florence, as elsewhere. Mrs. Browning, from her Casa Guidi Win-dows, continues: Yet rightly was young Giotto talked about,Whom Cimabue found among the sheep,And knew, as gods know gods, and carried homeTo paint the things he had painted with a deepAnd fuller insight and so overcomeHis Chapel-Lady with a heavenlier sweep oflight. I hold, too,That Cimabue smiled upon the lad,At the first stroke which passed what he could do,Or else his Virgins smile had never hadSuch sweetness int. All great men who fore-knewTheir heirs in art, for arts sake have beenglad. That Santa Maria Novello Church, whosealtar is adorned by the so-called CimabuesMadonna, is the early Church built by the Do-minicans. Michael Angelo called it, on accountof its grace and beauty, La Sposa. 39 Florence. From that small spire just caug

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