Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 5.djvu/195

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taddeo zucchero
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stroyed, but if satisfactory might remain as a commencement. Having set hand to the work therefore, these two stories proved successful to such a degree that Messer Jacopo was not only satisfied but astonished 4 nay, when the work was completed, which was in the year 1548, Taddeo Zucchero was highly extolled by all Rome, and with very good reason, seeing that since Polidoro, Maturino, Vincenzio da San Gimignano and Baldassare da Siena, there had been no artist who had equalled what Taddeo, still but a youth of eighteen, had there produced. The stories of these works, which were from the Life of Purius Camillus, will be best comprehended hy the following inscriptions. The first is as follows:—

tusculani pace constanti vim romanam argent.

The second:—

m. f. c. signiferum secum in hostem rapit.

The third:—

m. f. c. auctore insensa urbs restituitur.

The fourth:—

m. f. c. pactionibus turbatis praelium gallis nunciat.

The fifth:—

m. f. c. proditorem vinctum falerio reducendum tradit.

The sixth:—

matronalis auri collatione votum apollini solvitur.

The seventh:—

m. f. c. junoni regina: templum in aventino dedicat.

The eighth:—

signum junonis regina: a veiis romam transfertur.

The ninth:—

m.f.c.... anlius dict. decem... socios capit.[1]

Prom this time until the year 1550, when Pope Julius III. ascended the Papal throne, Taddeo Zucchero was employed in works of no great importance, but from which the gains that he made were nevertheless considerable. In that year, which was the year of the Jubilee, Ottaviano, the father of Taddeo, with his mother and a little son of theirs, came to Rome, partly to take their portion of the most Holy Jubilee, and partly to visit Taddeo. Having passed some weeks with the latter they returned home, leaving with him the boy above-mentioned, who was called Pederigo, to the end

  1. These works have totally perished.