Vincenzo Foppa of Brescia, founder of the Lombard school, his life ...

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CHAPTER IX
1499 TO c. 1515-1516
Last Pavian records relating to Foppa—Documents referring to him at Brescia—The
quarters of the city—The Archives of S. Alessandro— Identity of Foppa with the son
of Giov. da Bagnolo—Foppa's house— " Livello " to the Administrators of the quarter—
Position of Foppa's house— Foppa's accounts— P. CayHna—Foppa's death
— Burial—Will—Tombstone—Origin of the mistake relating to date of his death
Polizza d' Estimo of Paolo Caylina—Works wrongly ascribed to Foppa : Camera di
Commercio, Brescia— Poldi, Milan—Crespi Collection—Verona Museum—Brera,
Milan—Gallery of the Academy of Painting, Pavia—Borromeo Collection, Milan
— Sessa Collection—Casa Castani and Cologna Collection, Milan— Late Cernuschi
Collection—Malaspina Gallery, Pavia— Ravicsz Collection—The Betrayal by Parentino
(Borromeo Collection, Milan)—Drawings ascribed to Foppa : Frankfurt
Berlin— London.
We have now reached the final stage in our painter's career, and must once
more turn to the documents in Appendix II as our only source of information
touching the last decades of his life ; but Pavian and Brescian records here
overlap one another, and we have thought it best for clearness sake first to
give the results of research in the Archives of Pavia and then to touch upon
the documents found at Brescia.
After December 13, 1499, on which day, as we saw, Foppa was paid in the
Audience Hall of the Episcopal Palace at Pavia for his altarpiece for S. Maria
that city.
Gualtieri, we have no further record proving his personal presence in
He kept up his connection with Pavia in matters of business, but apparently
empowered others to act for him, and never came there himself. Thus in
November, 1500 and 1501, the "livello" for his house was paid to the Administrator
of the hospital not by Foppa himself in person, but by his representative
Cristoforo Gazzaniga, whose friendship with the painter, to which we
have several times had occasion to allude, was doubtless due in the first
instance to the fact of their having been near neighbours in the parish of
S. Invenzio.
Other representatives of Foppa, who might almost be termed his
at Pavia, were the brothers Leggi,' belonging to a noble Pavian family,
agents
many
^
See Appendix 11, B, Nos. 7, g, 10.
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