and a fresco in the apse of San Giorgio in Velabro {pos-
sibly late 1290s).
In 1308 Cavallini was lured to Naples by King
Charles II, who offered him a yearly salary of thirty
ounces of gold with a further two ounces to maintain
a house. Fresco fragments associated with Cavallini,
his workshop, or his immediate followers that survive
there exhibit the monumental design principles and
atmospheric subtlety of his Roman works. The frescoes
in Santa Maria Donna Regina (c. 1320), for example,
manifest a rigorous understanding of form, a profound
characterization of the fi gures, and continued experi-
mentation with lighting effects.
Critical reception and posthumous reputation. A
marked decline in Cavallini’s reputation began in the
sixteenth century, when Vasari claimed that Cavallini
had been a pupil of Giotto; this notion, refl ecting the
general line of argument in Vasari’s Vite, supported the
idea of the superiority of Tuscan art. The falling-off
of Cavallini’s stature was exacerbated by the gradual
destruction of his work, especially in the wake of the
Counter-Reformation, when many churches in Rome
were remodeled or refurbished.
The discovery of the frescoes in Santa Cecilia in 1900
revived interest in Cavallini, since Vasari’s chronology
was no longer considered tenable. Through the twentieth
century, scholars restored Cavallini’s reputation and
emphasized his role as a the pioneering fi gure in the
history of early Italian art. The discovery of the frescoes
in Santa Maria Aracoeli in 2000 brought about another
new wave of interest in and debate about Cavallini, late
Duecento Roman art, and the attribution of the frescoes
in the upper church at Assisi.
See also Giotto di Bondone
Further Reading
Barbero, Alessandro. “Un documento inedito su Pietro Cavallini.”
Pamgone, 40, 1989, pp. 84–88.
Gardner, Julian. “Copies of Roman Mosaics in Edinburgh.”
Burlington Magazine, 115, 1973, pp. 583–591.
——.“Gian Paolo Panini, San Paolo fuori le Mura, and Pietro
Cavallini: Some Notes on Colour and Setting.” In Mosaics
of Friendship: Studies in Art and History for Eve Borsook,
ed. Omella Francisci Osti. Florence: Centro Di, 1999, pp.
245–254.
Ghiberti, Lorenzo. I commentarii, ed. Lorenzo Bartoli. Florence:
Giunti, 1998, pp. 86–87.
Hetherington, Paul. “Pietro Cavallini: Artistic Style and Patron-
age in Late Medieval Rome.” Burlington Magazine, 114,
1972, pp. 4–10.
——, Pietro Cavallini: A Study in the Art of Late Medieval Rome.
London: Sagittarius, 1979.
Pestelli, Livio. “‘Ficus latine a fecunditate vocatur’: On a Unique
Iconographic Detail in Cavallini’s Annunciation in Santa
Maria in Trastevere.” Source, 20, 2001, pp. 5–14.
Tiberia, Vitaliano. I mosaici del XII secolo e di Pietro Cavallini
in Santa Maria in Trastevere: Restauri e nuove ipotesi. Todi:
Ediart, 1996. Tomei, Alessandro. “Bonifacio VIII e il Giubileo
del 1300: La Roma di Cavallini e di Giotto.” In Bonifacio
VIII e il suo tempo: Anno 1300 il primo Giubileo, ed. Marina
Righetti Tosti-Croce. Milan: Electa, 2000a, pp. 93–98.
——. Pietro Cavallini. Cinisello Balsamo (Milan): Silvana
Editoriale, 2000b.
Vasari, Giorgio. Le vite de’più eccellenti pittori, scultori, e
architettori, ed. Gaetano Milanesi, Florence: G. C. Sansoni,
1878–1885, Vol. l, pp. 537–543.
Zanardi, Bruno. Giotto e Pietro Cavallini: La questione di Assisi e
il cantiere medievale di pittura a fresco. Milan: Skira, 2001.
Flavio BoggiCAXTON, WILLIAM (1415/24–1491/92)
Printer, publisher, translator, and merchant. Caxton was
born in Kent, though probably not at Strood, which has
been suggested as his birthplace. After (or perhaps to-
ward the end of) his apprenticeship as a mercer Caxton
engaged in trade between England and the Low Coun-
tries, where he may have moved in the 1440s. Eventually
he was appointed Governor of the English Nation at
Bruges, a major commercial town. As part of his offi -
cial functions he took part in foreign trade negotiations
for the English government. In 1471, presumably after
resigning his offi ce, Caxton traveled to Cologne. In the
course of a stay of some eighteen months he learned
the technique of printing, possibly participating in the
production of an edition of Bartholomaeus Anglicus’s
De proprietatibus rerum. After returning to Bruges
Caxton established a press and produced the fi rst printed
English book, The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye,
his own translation from the French, begun in 1469 and
encouraged by Margaret, duchess of Burgundy.
In 1476 Caxton returned to England and set up his
business in the precincts of Westminster Abbey (i.e.,
in premises belonging to and near the abbey). The fi rst
major work printed there was probably his fi rst edition
of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. In the next fi fteen years
he published some 100 or mote works. Caxton died in
late 1491 or early 1492, bequeathing his business to his
long-time assistant, Wynkyn de Worde.
Caxton’s choice of texts to print was both a response
to and an infl uence in shaping fashionable demand and
taste. Besides two editions of the Canterbury Ta l e s, one
of Troilus, and other collections of Chaucerian verse he
published Gower’s Confessio Amantis, several works by
Lydgate, and Burgh’s Cato. In 1485 he printed Malory’s
Morte Darthur, and this edition and its reprints remained
the sole witness to the Morte until the Winchester Manu-
script was discovered in 1934. Infl uenced by Burgundian
or French taste, he translated and published prose works
in the courtly mode, including Jason, Godefroy of Bou-
logne, Aesop, The Order of Chivalry, Charles the Great,
Blanchardin and Eglantine, and Eneydos.
Moral and religious works published by Caxton
include Chaucer’s Boethius, Mirk’s Festial, and TheCAVALLINI, PIETRO