The second picture also represents an incident from the life of Pope Leo IV.: here the master has depicted the Port of Ostia occupied by the fleet of the Turks, who had come to make his Holiness prisoner. On the sea without are seen the Christians engaged in combat with the Turkish Armada, and numerous prisoners are already observed to be entering the harbour; the latter are seen to issue from a boat whence they are dragged by soldiers, the attitudes and countenances of whom are exceedingly spirited and beautiful. The prisoners are clothed in a variety of vestments proper to seamen, and are led before St. Leo, whose figure is a portrait of the then reigning Pontiff, Leo X. His Holiness, who is in full pontificals, is enthroned between the Cardinal of Santa Mariain-Portico, Bernardo Divizio da l^bbiena namely, and Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici, who was afterwards Pope Clement VII. It would not be possible minutely to describe the admirable thought with which this most inventive artist has depicted the countenances of the prisoners, in whose expression all necessity for speech is superseded, so eloquently does it set forth their grief, their terror, and the bitter foretaste which they are enduring of the death preparing for them.[1]
In the other two pictures is first Leo X. consecrating the most Christian King,[2] Francis I.L of France. He is chanting the mass robed in full pontificals, and is blessing the oils wherewith to anoint the monarch at the same time that he likewise blesses the royal crown; a vast body of Cardinals and Bishops, also in their episcopal robes, are serving the mass, and there are, moreover, numerous ambassadors and other personages portrayed from nature, with several figures dressed in the French manner of that period. The second picture represents the Coronation of the above-named King,[3]
- ↑ This picture has suffered more than the others; it is said to have been executed principally by Guadenzio da Ferrara, but re-touched by Sebaatiano del Piombo, who received a sharp reproof from Titian for liis pains. —Passavant, ut supra.
- ↑ The Coronation is that of Charlemagne, by Leo III., but the figure of the emperor is a portrait of Francis I., as that of the pontiff is of Pope Leo X. The work has been engraved by Aquila.
- ↑ Here also Vasari is in error as to the subject, which is generally called the Justification of Leo III., that Pontiff taking an oath on the Gospels, and in the presence of Charlemagne, that he is not guilty in the matter of the charges brought against him by the nephew of Adrian I. The picture, according to Passavant, was executed by the scholars of Raphael.
