Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 1.djvu/267

Rh and, by order of the sixty citizens forming the council above named, he reconducted the water which rises at the foot of the hill of Pori, three hundred braccia from Arezzo, beneath the walls and into the city. In the time of the Romans this water had been originally brought in for the service of the theatre, of which we still see some vestiges; and from this edifice, which was on the heights where the fortress now is, the water was led to the amphitheatre of the same city, which was in the plain. All these buildings and aqueducts were ruined and destroyed by the Goths. This water, then, having been again brought in beneath the wails, as we have said, by Jacopo di Casentino, that master constructed the fountain then called the Guizianelli, but now, by a corruption of the name, the Yiniziana fountain. This work endured from 1354 to 1527, and no longer, partly because, in the pestilence of that period, and in the war succeeding it, many of the citizens turned the water aside at different points to their own gardens, and for other private uses, but principally from the fact that Jacopo had not carried it sufficiently deep beneath the earth. From these causes the fountain is not now in the state that it should be.

While the aqueduct was in progress Jacopo did not discontinue his paintings, but executed various works in the palace, which was then in the old citadel, but is now entirely destroyed. His subjects were taken from the lives of the bishop Guido and of Piero Sacconi, men who, whether in peace or war, had done great and highly estimated services to the city. He also painted the life of St. Matthew, beneath the organ of the capitular church, with other works in considerable numbers. While thus executing various designs in different parts of the city, Jacopo di Casentino instructed Spinello of Arezzo in the principles of his art, as he had himself been instructed in them by Agnolo, and as Spinello afterwards taught them to Bernardo Daddi, who, labouring constantly in his native city, adorned it with very beautiful works in painting; for which cause, and on account of his many excellent qualities, he was much esteemed by his fellow citizens, who confided to him several offices of trust in the magistracy, and employed him in other public affairs. The paintings of Bernardo were numerous, and highly prized; those in the chapels of San Lorenzo and San Stefano, in the