to learn from Michelangelo, and his determination to compete with him.  Condivi and Vasari are agreed upon this point, and Michelangelo himself, in a moment of hasty indignation, asserted many years afterwards that what Raffaello knew of art was derived from him.  That is, of course, an over-statement; for, beside his own exquisite originality, Raffaello formed a composite style successively upon Perugino, Fra Bartolommeo, and Lionardo.  He was capable not merely of imitating, but of absorbing and assimilating to his lucid genius the excellent qualities of all in whom he recognised superior talent.  At the same time, Michelangelo’s influence was undeniable, and we cannot ignore the testimony of those who conversed with both great artists—­of Julius himself, for instance, when he said to Sebastian del Piombo:  “Look at the work of Raffaello, who, after seeing the masterpieces of Michelangelo, immediately abandoned Perugino’s manner, and did his utmost to approach that of Buonarroti.”

Condivi’s assertion that the part uncovered in November 1509 was the first half of the whole vault, beginning from the door and ending in the middle, misled Vasari, and Vasari misled subsequent biographers.  We now know for certain that what Michelangelo meant by “the portion I began” was the whole central space of the ceiling—­that is to say, the nine compositions from Genesis, with their accompanying genii and architectural surroundings.  That is rendered clear by a statement in Albertini’s Roman Handbook, to the effect that the “upper portion of the whole vaulted roof” had been uncovered when he saw it in 1509.  Having established this error in Condivi’s narrative, what he proceeds to relate may obtain some credence.  “Raffaello, when he beheld the new and marvellous style of Michelangelo’s work, being extraordinarily apt at imitation, sought, by Bramante’s means, to obtain a commission for the rest.”  Had Michelangelo ended at a line drawn halfway across the breadth of the vault, leaving the Prophets and Sibyls, the lunettes and pendentives, all finished so far, it would have been a piece of monstrous impudence even in Bramante, and an impossible discourtesy in gentle Raffaello, to have begged for leave to carry on a scheme so marvellously planned.  But the history of the Creation, Fall, and Deluge, when first exposed, looked like a work complete in itself.  Michelangelo, who was notoriously secretive, had almost certainly not explained his whole design to painters of Bramante’s following; and it is also improbable that he had as yet prepared his working Cartoons for the lower and larger portion of the vault.  Accordingly, there remained a large vacant space to cover between the older frescoes by Signorelli, Perugino, Botticelli, and other painters, round the walls below the windows, and that new miracle suspended in the air.  There was no flagrant impropriety in Bramante’s thinking that his nephew might be allowed to carry the work downward from that altitude.