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DEDICATED, BY, PERMISSION, TO HER MAJESTY.

BIOGRAPHY

OR

Third Division of "The English Cyclopædia,"

CONDUCTED BY

CHARLES KNIGHT.

VOLUME I.

LONDON:

BRADBURY, EVANS, & CO., 11, BOUVERIE ST., FLEET ST., E.C.

SCRIBNER, WELFORD, & CO., 654, BROADWAY, NEW YORK.

1866.

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of the Pentateuch.

Abati's own works however, in Modena and Bologna, were productions of the greatest merit, according to the Carracci; and in a sonnet of Agostino, which is a sort of recipe for making a great painter, he is mentioned in conclusion as combining in himself all the required excellences. There are few of Abati's works remaining, and these are chiefly frescoes; he seems to have painted comparatively little in oil. It is not known who his master was, or whether he had any other master than his father Giovanni Abati, who was an obscure painter and modeller of Modena. From a similarity in his works to the style of Correggio, some have supposed that he was a pupil of Correggio; he is also said to have studied under the sculptor Begarelli: if so he was probably well acquainted with Correggio, with whom Begarelli was intimate.

His earliest essays upon his own account were in partnership with another painter, Alberto Fontana, a practice not unusual at that period in Italy, when there was little or no distinction between artists and artisans in the manner of employing them or estimating their works. In 1537 he painted with Fontana, at Modena, some frescoes in the butchers' market, by which he obtained some reputation; and he acquired great distinction by some frescoes in the Scandiano Palace, from Ariosto and the Eneid of Virgil, which are still extant; they have been engraved by Gajani. These with some conversation-pieces and concertos in the Institute of Bologna, a Nativity of Christ under the portico of the Leoni Palace, and a large symbolical picture in the Via di San Mamolo, in the same city, are the only frescoes now extant by Abati; and his oil-pictures are likewise very scarce.

AARON, the first high-priest of the Jews. He was the elder brother lished in Paris in 1630: the original works were destroyed with the of Moses, and was, by the express appointment of Heaven, asso-building in 1738, to make room for a new structure. ciated with that illustrious legislator in the enterprise of delivering their countrymen from Egyptian bondage, and conducting them to the promised land. Under the direction of his brother, Aaron, who was a ready and eloquent speaker, announced the command of God to Pharaoh, and attested it by the series of miracles recorded in the earlier chapters of the book of Exodus. During the sojourn in the wilderness he was far from manifesting the steady confidence and undaunted disregard of popular clamour which characterised the conduct of Moses; but, notwithstanding his timidity and weakness, in yielding to the demand of the multitude that he would make them a golden calf to worship, he was consecrated to the priesthood, of which the highest office was made hereditary in his family. Having ascended the summit of Mount Hor, in company with Moses and his eldest son Eleazar, he died there, after Moses, as commanded by God, had stripped him of his sacerdotal robes, and put them upon his son. This event happened when Aaron was in the 123rd year of his age, forty years after the departure of the Israelites from Egypt, and, according to the commonly received chronology, in the year B.C. 1451, or 2553 years from the creation of the world. The history of Aaron is to be found in the book of Exodus, and the three following books ABA'NO, PIETRO DI, or Petrus Apónus, was born in 1250 at Abano, the Roman name of which was Apónus, a village which is 5 miles from Padua. He studied first at Padua, then went to Constantinople to learn Greek, and afterwards to Paris, where he devoted himself to mathematics and medicine. He travelled in England and Scotland, whence he was recalled to Padua, in 1303 or 1304, to take the professorship of medicine, then vacant. His reputation was very great, and his charges for attendance very high. He combined astrology with astronomy, and perhaps made some pretence to magic. At all events he was regarded as a magician, and in 1306 he was brought before the tribunal of the Inquisition as a heretic and atheist; but defended himself so well as to obtain an acquittal. In 1314 he removed to Treviso, in compliance with the invitation of the inhabitants. In 1315 another accusation was brought against him before the Inquisition; but he died before the inquiry was completed, in the year 1316, at the age of 66. His judges however continued the inquiry after his death, found him guilty, and ordered his body to be burnt. Abano wrote several works on philosophy and medicine, and made translations of ancient and Arabic medical writers. In his expositions there is little of his own observation or of original thought; but in the knowledge acquired from the works of others he was not surpassed by any physician of his time.

ABATI, or ABBATI, NICCOLO', was born at Modena in 1512. He is more frequently called Dell' Abate, but erroneously according to the showing of Tiraboschi, as his family name was Abati. Before Tiraboschi, Niccolo's surname was supposed to be unknown, and the name of Dell' Abate was given to him from the circumstance of his being less known for his own works than as the assistant of Primaticcio, who was called L'Abate by the Italians, after he was made Abbé of St. Martin near Troyes, by Francis I. of France. Abati executed in fresco the Adventures of Ulysses and other works from the designs of Primaticcio, for the palace of Fontainebleau, the decoration of which was entrusted to Primaticcio after the death of Il Rosso. Prints from the Adventures of Ulysses, by Van Thulden, were pub

BIOG, DIY, VOL. L.

Of the works in the Institute, Zanotti has written an account'Delle Pitture di Pellegrino Tibaldi e Niccolo Abbati,' &c., in which there are engravings of them: Malvasia also has given a laudatory description of them: they have been compared with the works of Titian. The Nativity of the Leoni Palace, which has been engraved by Gondolfi, is mentioned in the highest terms by Count Algarotti, who discovered in it "the symmetry of Raphael, the nature of Titian, and the grace of Parmegiano." Of his easel-pictures in oil the most celebrated is the Martyrdom of St. Peter and St. Paul, a large picture on wood, which was painted for the Church of the Benedictines at Modena in 1546. It is now in the Dresden Gallery, and has been engraved by Folkema for the Recueil d'Estampes après les plus célèbres Tableaux de la Galerie de Dresde.'

From about 1546 until 1552, when he accompanied Primaticcio to France, Abati lived in Bologna, and his Bolognese works were painted during this interval: he died in Paris in 1571.

Abati's principal faculty was painting in fresco, in which he had surprising facility. According to Vasari he never retouched his works when dry, which cannot be said of many fresco-painters; yet, says Vasari, the paintings of an entire apartment were executed with such uniformity that they appeared to be the work of a single day. Abati excelled in landscape, for his period; there is a Rape of Proserpine in the Duke of Sutherland's collection, of which the background is an extensive landscape; it was formerly in the Orleans Gallery, and was sold at the sale in this country for 160%.

Several of Abati's relations also distinguished themselves as painters: his brother Pietro Paolo was a clever horse and battle painter; his son Giulio Camillo, his grandson Ercole, and his great grandson Pietro Paolo the younger, were all painters of ability, especially Ercole, who

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