Flemish painter, which were afterwards copied in reduced proportions, and published on small copper-plates, by Valverde, who wrote on Anatomy, after Vessalio.
Among the numerous plates, moreover, which have issued from the hands of the Flemish engravers within the last ten years are some very fine ones designed by one Michele,[1] a painter who worked many years in Some, and painted two chapels in the Church of the Germans. These plates are the story of Moses with the Serpent in the Wilderness, with thirty-two stories of Love and Psyche[2] which are reputed to be very beautiful. In like manner, Jeronimo Cocca, also a Fleming, has engraved a large plate after the invention and design of Martin Hemskerk: the subject of this work is Dalilah cutting the locks of Sampson; the Temple of the Philistines is seen in the distance, and here, amidst the ruined towers and the desolation of all around, may be perceived the fall and destruction of the dead and dying, with the terror of the survivors, who are seeking safety in flight. In three smaller plates the same master has engraved the Creation of Adam and Eve, the Eating of the Forbidden Fruit, with the Angel expelling our First Parents from Paradise; and in four other plates of similar size, he represented the Devil imprinting avarice and ambition in the heart of man, in the first; with the passions which proceed from this operation in the other three.
By the hand of the same master are twenty-six stories, in size resembling those just described, and setting forth those events of the Old Testament histories which succeeded the Expulsion of Adam from Paradise, all which were designed by Martin with a bold and practised hand, the manner being very like that of the Italians. Jeronimo afterwards engraved the History of Susannah in six circular plates, with twentythree Stories, in addition to those before-mentioned, from the history of the Old Testament, and similar to those of Abra-
- ↑ Michael Coxis or Coxcie, bom at Mechlin in 1497; died at Antwerp, 1592.
- ↑ Bottari expresses amazement that Vasari should attribute the story of Psyche to the Fleming, since all know it to be by Raphael; but our author is most probably speaking of a totally different work from that of Raphael, although on the same subject; and this seems the more likely from his here giving thirty-two as the number of the plates; those of Raphael’s work, as engraved by Marcantonio and his scholars, behig thirty-eight.
