About this time two plans were set on foot for erecting monuments to Michelangelo’s memory.  The scheme started by the Romans immediately after his death took its course, and the result is that tomb at the SS.  Apostoli, which undoubtedly was meant to be a statue-portrait of the man.  Vasari received from Lionardo Buonarroti commission to erect the tomb in S. Croce.  The correspondence of the latter, both with Vasari and with Jacopo del Duca, who superintended the Roman monument, turns for some time upon these tombs.  It is much to Vasari’s credit that he wanted to place the Pieta which Michelangelo had broken, above the S. Croce sepulchre.  He writes upon the subject in these words:  “When I reflect that Michelangelo asserted, as is well known also to Daniele, Messer Tommaso dei Cavalieri, and many other of his friends, that he was making the Pieta of five figures, which he broke, to serve for his own tomb, I think that his heir ought to inquire how it came into the possession of Bandini.  Besides, there is an old man in the group who represents the person of the sculptor.  I entreat you, therefore, to take measures for regaining this Pieta, and I will make use of it in my design.  Pierantonio Bandini is very courteous, and will probably consent.  In this way you will gain several points.  You will assign to your uncle’s sepulchre the group he planned to place there, and you will be able to hand over the statues in Via Mozza to his Excellency, receiving in return enough money to complete the monument.”  Of the marbles in the Via Mozza at Florence, where Michelangelo’s workshop stood, I have seen no catalogue, but they certainly comprised the Victory, probably also the Adonis and the Apollino.  There had been some thought of adapting the Victory to the tomb in S. Croce.  Vasari, however, doubted whether this group could be applied in any forcible sense allegorically to Buonarroti as man or as artist.

Eventually, as we know, the very mediocre monument designed by Vasari, which still exists at S. Croce, was erected at Lionardo Buonarroti’s expense, the Duke supplying a sufficiency of marble.

III

It ought here to be mentioned that, in the spring of 1563, Cosimo founded an Academy of Fine Arts, under the title of “Arte del Disegno.”  It embraced all the painters, architects, and sculptors of Florence in a kind of guild, with privileges, grades, honours, and officers.  The Duke condescended to be the first president of this academy.  Next to him, Michelangelo was elected unanimously by all the members as their uncontested principal and leader, “inasmuch as this city, and peradventure the whole world, hath not a master more excellent in the three arts.”  The first great work upon which the Duke hoped to employ the guild was the completion of the sacristy at S. Lorenzo.  Vasari’s letter to Michelangelo shows that up to this date none of the statues had been erected in their proper