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

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APPENDIX I 285
name " De Fopa" or " Foppa," "of the moat" or "fosse," may have been adopted
by the ancestors of the painter in early times as a distinguishing name, and eventually
became the surname of the family, deriving originally perhaps from the position of
Bagnolo, even now a place of many waters intersected by streams and ditches, and
with its parish church surrounded on three sides by a river.^ In Brescian dialect the
word is usually spelt "Fopa";^ in Milanese " Foppa" ;^ and it is noticeable that in
the only document in which Vincenzo was directly responsible for the spelling, viz.
his own letter to Pigello Portinari (Doc. No. 12), he uses the Brescian form "Fopa."
The Milanese form usually appears in the Italian documents of the years when the
painter was living at Milan and Pavia.
Note 5. Painters of Brescia bearing the name of Vincenzo
It was stated in chap, x (p. 261) that the painter known in the history of art as
Vincenzo Foppa the younger never existed, but was invented in order to account for
certain chronological discrepancies difficult to explain away with the material at the
disposition of art historians some few years ago. We now know, however, that any
reference to a "Vincenzo Foppa" refers to our painter, who was the only one of his
name at Brescia. On the other hand, we meet with several painters who are spoken of
as Vincenzo Bresciano in the first half of the sixteenth century. First among the
artists so designated must be mentioned the Vincenzo da Brescia who on November 26,
1513, is named as having been associated with Cesare Cesariano in executing paintings
in the Council Chamber of the Fabbriceria of the cathedral at Milan ; on the abovenamed
day the two masters were paid 45 lire 12 soldi impertali for the work on which
they had been engaged for nearly two months. That this Vincenzo was not Foppa
seems certain ; for it is scarcely to be assumed that a master who at that date was over
eighty would have been able to undertake fresco painting at Milan, or that he would
have been mentioned (as in this document) after Cesare Cesariano, almost as though
he were an assistant of that artist. The entry is as follows :
November 26, 1513.
" Magistris Cesare Cesariano et Vincentio de Brixia pictoribus, 1. 45 s. 12
imperialium, occasione operum 57 per eos factorum in pingendo salam residentice
dominorum deputatorum noviter refectam," etc.*
'
In an early register relating to the letting of houses in Bagnolo (a volume in the Curia
at Brescia labelled Poscssionum et Fictonim in Bagnolo, unpaged), the following names occur
in the year 1274: "Jacobin! dela fosina ; Gyrardus fr. dni Benini dela fossina ;
Guielmo
dela foxina." Here, possibly, we may have the origin of the Foppa family and the ancestors
of Giovanni da Bagnolo and his son Vincenzo.
2 See Gabriele Rosa, Vocabolario Bresciano-1taliano : "Fopa—buca, fossa"; and Diaktti,
etc., delle Provincic di Bergamo e di Brescia : " Fopa, pofa—caviti, lat. fovea." In the Brescian
Archives we occasionally find the name "Foppa" spelt " Poflfa " (see Cast. Notturne, 1465,
quadra 3* S' Johannis).
^ Cherubini, Vocab. Milanese-Italiano : "Foppa— buca, fossa, sepoltura."
* Annalidella Fahbrica del Duovio, Vol. Ill, p. 165, and App. Ill, 210.