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

Chap. IX. FOPPA'S PAYMENTS FOR HIS HOUSE 223
of the account-book, we find that Francesco da Mantua the massaro
collected from Master Vincenzo the painter on August 12, 1501, the sum
of 9 lire 10 soldi (Doc. No. 71), this sum being, as we gather from subsequent
entries, Foppa's "livello, " due to the quarter for two years,^ and
we may therefore conclude that about the year 1499 he may have purchased
the house in the first ward of S. Alessandro which, according to the Estimo,
he was occupying in 1498. The entry further refers to fol. 36, where, it
notes, the bollettino will be found. Unfortunately, however, this reference
does not coincide with any page in this volume, for fol. 36 here is in the rentbook,
and contains no allusion whatsoever to Foppa and his affairs. We
have numerous other references of a similar character in the account-book
which do not apply to any part of this volume (Mass., 1°), and we must therefore
conclude that all these boUettini were entered in a volume which is now
lost.
For the next notice of the painter we must turn to the beginning of the
Libro dei Livellarii, and here on fol. 2 v. we find that he had purchased the
house in the quarter of S. Alessandro from a certain Matteo Caccia who
was now dead. The page contains a statement of annual payments made by
Master Vincenzo to the massaro of the quarter for the " livello " charged
upon his house. The payments date from the ist of April, 1502, up to the
time of his death, and were continued by his heir Paolo Caylina up to 1523,
when a new lease was granted to Caylina in his own name." This page (2 v.)
must have been the continuation in a new volume of that fol. 36, in the lost
book to which we have referred, where all the payments made by Foppa from
the time when he bought the house up to 1502 were undoubtedly entered.
From page 2 v. in the rent-book we gather that the sum paid by Foppa
to the quarter, and due every ist of April, was 4 lire 15 soldi, which explains
the nature of that former payment of 9 lire 10 soldi,^ a sum collected, as we
saw, by Francesco da Mantua in 1501. In this list of payments on p. 2 v.
(Doc. No. 72, see illustration), he is called "Master Vincenzo Foppa the
excellent painter," and there can be no doubt that the artist there alluded
to is identical with the painter mentioned in the Provvisioni between 1489 and
if
^ It was the duty of the massaro to collect all moneys due to the quarter, which duty
neglected would have disqualified him for re-election.
^ A note at the bottom of page 2 v. states that Paolo Caylina succeeded Foppa in
the house :
" Quod de suprascriptis bonis investitus fuit Mag' Paulus de Caylina
pictor, ut apparet in isto a f. 71." Fol. 71 here alluded to contains the reference to the
new lease drawn up in the name of Caylina and to the list of his payments to the
massaro of the quarter (Doc. No. 81).
^ Twenty soldi being equal to one lira planet, this sum represents the "livello" for
two years.