IT was rare for a single patron in renaissance Italy to com- mission a large number of altar-pieces. The Florentine, Leonardo di Giovanni Buonafe (c. 1450-1545) was respon- sible with varying degrees of personal intervention for about fifteen. This article will deal principally with the painted altar-pieces with which he was concerned as director, between 1500 and 1528, of S. Maria Nuova, the most import- ant hospital in Florence. Examination of the hospital's ledgers permits, in most cases for the first time, firm docu- mentation of eight of the ten paintings ordered for altars under the hospital's jurisdiction during his tenure. Up to now the best known of these have been the two ordered by Buonafe late in life from Ridolfo Ghirlandaio and his pupil Michele Tosini: a Virgin and Child with Sts Jacob, Francis, Claire and Lawrence, for S. Jacopo on the Via Ghibellina in Florence, and a Meeting of Joachim and Anna at the Golden Gate with Sts Joseph and Leonard, for the oratory of the SS. Concezione dei Preti (Figs.1-2). Both include a donor portrait of Buonafé in their lower left corners, and they can be dated, on the basis of new documents, to c. 1531-44.

, for S. Jacopo on the Via Ghibellina in Florence, and a Meeting of Joachim and Anna at the Golden Gate with Sts Joseph and Leonard, for the oratory of the SS. Concezione dei Preti (Figs.1-2). Both include a donor portrait of Buonafé in their lower left corners, and they can be dated, on the basis of new documents, to c. 1531-44.

OUR knowledge ofthe briefyet formative period Francesco Mazzola, better known as Parmigianino, spent in Rome between 1524 and 1527 relies almost entirely on the account given by Giorgio Vasari.* According to Vasari, the young artist travelled to Rome with an uncle. His presentation paintings found immediate and enthusiastic reception in the court of Clement VII, but the papal patronage he an- ticipated was not forthcoming. Nevertheless, Parmigianino managed to attract a number of more modest commissions before the Sack forced him to flee the city in 1527. In the absence of any documentation, the identification of these works and their Roman dating has been based largely on Vasari's descriptions and on stylistic evidence. The dis- covery of the contract for a major altar-piece painted by Parmigianino towards the end of his Roman sojourn - the so-called Vision of St Jerome, now in the National Gallery, London (Fig.15) - affiords the opportunity to put Vasari's authority to the test.  In addition, the documents published here expand our knowledge of the intended context and significance of Parmigianino's painting.

, now in the National Gallery, London (Fig.15) - affiords the opportunity to put Vasari's authority to the test.  In addition, the documents published here expand our knowledge of the intended context and significance of Parmigianino's painting.

THE discovery of Parmigianino's contract, dated 3rd January 1526, for the Vision of St Jerome (Fig.15) now in the National Gallery in London (see the Appendix below, and Mary Vaccaro's article on p.22 above), offers an opportunity to re-examine the original context of this work in the church of S. Salvatore in Lauro.

(Fig.15) now in the National Gallery in London (see the Appendix below, and Mary Vaccaro's article on p.22 above), offers an opportunity to re-examine the original context of this work in the church of S. Salvatore in Lauro.

TWO biographies of Michelangelo Buonarroti published during the artist's lifetime offier vastly diffierent accounts of his beginnings as an artist.* In 1550 Giorgio Vasari described how the artist's father Lodovico had apprenticed his son to Domenico Ghirlandaio for three years, alluding to a written agreement between the men which he had seen in Domenico's ricordi, in the possession of Domenico's son, Ridolfo. Vasari goes on to tell how Ghirlandaio recommended the young artist to Lorenzo de' Medici, who had started a school for painters and sculptors in his garden on the Piazza S. Marco.  Vasari's account of Michelangelo's apprentice- ship was firmly denied in Ascanio Condivi's biography, published in 1553. As he relates in his preface, Condivi had been a pupil of Michelangelo in Rome, had been collecting notes on the master's life and teaching for the benefit of other students, and was now publishing them - perhaps at Michelangelo's urging- to correct Vasari's account. He relates that the young Michelangelo was occasionally brought to the workshop of Ghirlandaio by Francesco Granacci, and after recounting marsy instances of Ghirlandaio's jealousy toward Michelangelo- in one instance, Ghirlandaio refused to lend him his book of drawings with 'shepherds with their sheep and dogs, landscapes, buildings, ruins, and such things' - Condivi caustically adds:

I wanted to mention this is because I am told that Domenico's son attributes the excellence and divinitå of Michelangelo to a great extent to his father's teaching, whereas he gave him no help whatever, although Michelangelo does not complain of this; indeed he praises Domenico for both his art and his manners.

THE account books of the Dominican monastery of S. Paolo in Treviso contain several payment documents which amplify our knowledge of a commission undertaken by Lorenzo Lotto in the l 540s for the nuns of that monastery.* During this decade Lotto produced approximately ten altar-pieces of various sizes and prices, some with and some without frames, for various desti- nations. The picture in question here is the Pietà now in the Pinacoteca di Brera in Milan (Fig.19), executed on canvas and supplied to the patrons without a frame.

now in the Pinacoteca di Brera in Milan (Fig.19), executed on canvas and supplied to the patrons without a frame.

IN the wake of the recent exhibition devoted to Artemisia Genti- leschi, which followed closely on the publication of the first monograph on her work, Artemisia's œuvre is undergoing a long overdue re-examination. New questions are being asked about received attributions and, inevitably, newly attributed paintings are surfacing. Among the latter is one that can securely be added to her œuvre, a large signed work representing a woman in a landscape running away from a seated satyr, who holds a swatch of hair in his hand (Fig.20).

, a large signed work representing a woman in a landscape running away from a seated satyr, who holds a swatch of hair in his hand (Fig.20).

CARL NORDENFALK who died on 13thJune 1992 was a scholar of the greatest distinction who, though his main contribution to art-historical studies lay in the medieval field, also published important work on later western European painting, on Rem- brandt, on Watteau and particularly on Van Gogh. His pro- digious energy and dedication to his work is demonstrated in the list of his publications included in the Festschrift presented to him in 1987. Starting in 1931, it totals three hundred and sixty items written in German, French and English as well as his native Swedish. That was achieved in addition to his being for most of the period a museum keeper, first at Goteborg from 1935 to 1944, then at the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, where he was in charge of Loans, Exhibitions, and Education until 1949, then of the Department of Painting and Sculpture until 1958, and finally as Director until 1968. In this post-war period he was responsible for a series of important exhibitions culminating in the Council of Europe show on Queen Christina of Sweden of 1966.