An introduction to 15th century Italian painting and the social history behind it, arguing that the two are interlinked and that the conditions of the time helped fashion distinctive elements in the painter's style.

I have frequently heard the lovers of art express a doubt whether the Roman School possesses the same inherent right to that distinctive appellation as the schools of Florence, Bologna, and Venice. Those of the latter cities were, indeed, founded by their respective citizens, and supported through a long course of ages; while the Roman School, it may be said, could boast only of Giulio Romano and Sacchi, and a few others, natives of Rome, who taught, and left scholars there. The other artists who flourished there were either natives of the cities of the Roman state, or from other parts of Italy, some of whom established themselves in Rome, and others, after the close of their labours there, returned and died in their native places. But this question is, if I mistake not, rather a dispute of words than of things, and similar to those objections advanced by the peripatetic sophists against the modern philosophy; insisting that they abuse the meaning of their words, and quoting, as an example, the vis inertiæ; as if that, which is in itself inert, could possess the quality of force. The moderns laugh at this difficulty, and coolly reply that, if the vis displeased them, they might substitute natura, or any other equivalent word; and that it was lost time to dispute about words, and neglect things. So it may be said in this case; they who disapprove of the designation of school, may substitute that of academy, or any other term denoting a place where the art of painting is professed and taught. And, as the learned universities always derive their names from the city where they are established, as the university of Padua or Pisa, although the professors may be all, or in great part, from other states, so it is with the schools of painting, to which the name of the country is always attached, in preference to that of the master. In Vasari we do not find this classification of schools, and Monsignor Agucchi was the first to divide Italian art into the schools of Lombardy, Venice, Tuscany, and Rome.[1] He has employed the term of schools after the manner of the ancients, and has thus characterised one of them as the Roman School. He has, perhaps, erred in placing Michel Angiolo, as well as Raphael, at the head of this school, as posterity have assigned him his station as chief of the school of Florence; but he has judged right in classing it under a separate head, possessing, as it does, its own peculiar style; and in this he has been followed by all the modern writers of art. The characteristic feature in the Roman School has been said to consist in a strict imitation of the works of the ancients, not only in sublimity, but also in elegance and selection; and to this we shall add other peculiarities, which will be noticed in their proper place.

"Focuses primarliy on the social and historical context in which art was made and used"--Bibliographic essay (p. 326).