Page:An Elementary History of Art.djvu/365

 In the Middle Ages. .335 and the Late Roman, — a style which may be called purely Christian, and which owes its rapid growth mainly to the patronage of the Church. In the mosaics of S. Maria in Trastevere at Rome (1139 — 1153), and of the basilica of S. Clemente, also at Rome, a marked improvement is noticeable ; but the art apparently did not advance further until the commencement of the thirteenth century, when the fusion of the two conquering races of Sicily — the Normans, and their predecessors the Arabs — had become complete, and the conquest of Constantinople by the Latins in 1204 had led to the immigration into Italy of artists well acquainted with all the technical processes of painting, although unable to turn them to truly artistic account. Henceforth the history of painting is the history of individual men, — a fact significant alike of the new position to which art was promoted and of the new political freedom enjoyed in the Republics. We have already alluded to the important part taken in the revival of sculpture by Niccolo Pisano (see p. 238), and there can be no doubt that he greatly influenced his cotemporaries in every branch of art. The distinctive feature of this revival, in which Tuscany took the lead, was — as remarked by Mrs. Jameson in her ' Lives of the Early Italian Painters' — "that art became imitative as well as repre- sentative, although in the first two centuries the imitation was as much imaginary as real ; the art of looking at nature had to be learnt before the imitating her could be acquired." The first Italian painters to take part in the new move- ment were Giunta of Pisa, Guido of Siena, Buonaventura Berlingieri of Lucca, Margaritone of Arezzo (a work by