A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country/Angosciola-Lomellini, (Sophonisba)
ANGOSCIOLA-LOMELLINI, (SOPHONISBA) a female Painter, of a noble Family, at Cremona, Died 1620.
Studied under Bernardino Campi, then under Sojaro, and obtained so great a reputation, that Philip II. invited her to Spain, in 1559; caused her to take his portrait and that of the queen, (one of the latter was also sent to pope Pius IV. at his particular request) and she was so highly esteemed by both of them, that she was assigned a pension, and received many valuable presents. They afterwards married her to Don Fabrizio di Moncada, a Sicilian nobleman, with a splendid dowry, and a pension of one thousand ducats, on the duchy of Palermo. She was sent to her husband with every mark of royal bounty; but soon became a widow, and married, secondly, Orazio Lomellini, who was of one of the most illustrious families in Genoa. She lived to be extremely old, and lost her eye-sight; but still delighted to talk with painters on the difficulties of the art. Anthony Vandyke used to say, that "he had received more instruction from the painting of a blind woman, than from his master." She taught her art to her three sisters.