o the drawings.

While the havoc of the sack had destroyed Rome and driven away the
inhabitants and the Pope himself, who was living at Orvieto, not many
remaining in the city, and no business of any kind being done there,
there arrived in Rome one Niccola Viniziano, a rare and even unrivalled
master of embroidery, the servant of Prince Doria. He, moved by his
long-standing friendship with Perino, and being a man who always
favoured and wished well to the men of our arts, persuaded him to leave
that misery and set out for Genoa, promising that he would so go to work
with that Prince, who was a lover of art and delighted in painting, that
he would commission Perino to execute some big works, and saying,
moreover, that His Excellency had often told him that he would like to
have a suite of rooms adorned with handsome decorations. It did not take
much to persuade Perino, for he was oppressed by want and burning with
desire to leave Rome; and he determined to depart with Niccola. Having
therefore made arrangements for leaving his wife and daughter well cared
for by relatives in Rome, and having put all his affairs in order, he
set off for Genoa. Arriving there, and making himself known to that
Prince by means of Niccola, his coming was as welcome to His Excellency
as any agreeable experience that he had ever had in all his life. He was
received, therefore, with the greatest possible warmth and gladness, and
after many conversations and discussions they finally arranged that he
should begin the work; and they decided that he should execute a palace
adorned with stucco-work and with pictures in fresco, in oils, and of
every kind, which I will strive to describe as briefly as I am able,
with all the rooms, pictures, and general arrangement, saying nothing as
to where Perino first began to labour, to the end that I may not obscure
this work, which is the best of all those by his hand, with words.

I begin, then, by saying that at the entrance of the Prince's Palace
there is a marble portal composed in the Doric Order, and built after
designs and models by the hand of Perino, with all its appurtenances of
pedestals, socles, shafts, capitals, architrave, frieze, cornice and
pediment, and with some most beautiful seated figures of women, who are
supporting an escutcheon. The masonry and carving of this work were
executed by Maestro Giovanni da Fiesole, and the figures were finished
to perfection by Silvio, the sculptor of Fiesole,