Page:The painters of Florence from the thirteenth to the sixteenth century (1915).djvu/61

1335] The exact date of these frescoes remains uncertain, but they were probably painted soon after 1320. Recent research has as yet thrown little light upon the chronology of Giotto's life, and all we can discover is an occasional notice of the works which he executed, or of the property which he owned in Florence. Vasari's statement, that he succeeded to Cimabue's house and shop in the Via del Cocomero, to the north of the Duomo, is borne out by the will of the Florentine citizen Rinuccio, who, dying in 1312, describes the excellent painter Giotto di Bondone as a parishioner of Santa Maria Novella, and bequeathes a sum of "five pounds of small florins" to keep a lamp burning night and day before the crucifix painted by the said master, in the Dominican church. Of Giotto's eight children, the eldest, Francesco, became a painter, and received commissions as early as 1319. When his father was absent from Florence he managed the small property which Giotto had inherited at his old home of Vespignano in Val Mugello, and which he increased by purchases of land and houses. The painter's family seem to have lived chiefly at this country home, where his daughters Chiara and Lucia married burghers of Vespignano, and one son, a second Francesco, became a parish priest. The eldest sister Caterina became the wife of an artist, Ricco di Lapo, and the youngest, Beatrice, belonged to the Third Order of Dominic, and married soon after her father's death. Giotto himself was fond of his country home, and contemporary writers give us pleasant glimpses of the great master's excursions to Val Mugello. Boccaccio tells us how one day, as he and the learned advocate Messer Forese, who, like himself,