ster, as may be seen from some facades
and other works in fresco that he executed at that time; and his first
works, which are in Narni, have in them not a little of the good. In a
chapel of the Church of the Santo Spirito, in Rome, he has painted a
number of figures and scenes in fresco, which are executed with much
industry and study, so that they are rightly extolled by everyone.
That work was the reason, as has been related, that there was allotted
to him one of the smaller scenes that are over the doors in the Hall
of Kings in the Palace of the Vatican, in which he acquitted himself
so well, that it can bear comparison with the others. The same master
has executed for the Cardinal of Augsburg seven pieces with scenes
painted on cloth of silver, which have been held to be very beautiful
in Spain, where they have been sent by that same Cardinal as presents
to King Philip, to be used as hangings in a chamber. Another picture
on cloth of silver he has painted in the same manner, which is now to
be seen in the Church of the Theatines at Forli. Finally, having
become a good and bold draughtsman, a well-practised colourist,
fertile in the composition of scenes, and universal in his manner, he
has been invited by the above-named Cardinal with a good salary to
Augsburg, where he is constantly executing works worthy of much
praise.

But most rare among the other men of Romagna, in certain respects, is
Marco da Faenza (for only so, and not otherwise, is he called), for
the reason that he has no ordinary mastery in the work of fresco,
being bold, resolute, and of a terrible force, and particularly in the
manner and practice of making grotesques, in which he has no equal at
the present day, nor one who even approaches his perfection. His
works may be found throughout all Rome; and in Florence there is by
his hand the greater part of the ornaments of twenty different rooms
that are in the Ducal Palace, and the friezes of the ceiling in the
Great Hall of that Palace, which was painted by Giorgio Vasari, as
will be fully described in the proper place; not to mention that the
decorations of the principal court of the same Palace, made in a short
time for the coming of Queen Joanna, were executed in great part by
the same man. And this must be enough of Marco, he being still alive
and in the flower of his growth and activity.

In Parma there is at the present day in the service of the Lord Duke
Ottavio Farnese, a painter called Mi