FRANCESCHI, PIERO DE', called PIERO DELLA FRAN CESCA (c. 1418-1492), Italian painter of the Umbrian school. He was born at Borgo San Sepolcro in Umbria. His father, a well-to do cloth merchant, was married twice; and it is supposed that the second wife, Francesca Cenci of Arezzo, was Piero's mother— hence his name "della Francesca." From early youth he showed a bent for mathematical sciences. His first studies in art were probably made in his native town. He may have chosen Sasetta as his master, the naïve and graceful inheritor of the decorative aims of the early school of Siena, who was then employed on an altar piece for San Francesco in Borgo. The earliest record of Piero describes him as assisting Domenico Veneziano in painting the choir of Sta. Maria Nuova in Florence. His stay in that city broueht him into touch with a aroun of artists_ who were absorbed in problems of form and perspective, which naturally appealed to his mathematical mind. He was indeed able to carry investigations farther than Brunelleschi and Uccello, for he was a great mathe matician and he applied his science to his art. Vasari, who speaks of him with admiration, does not fail to emphasize his twofold accomplishment, and calls him the greatest geometrician of his time. In his first extant work, an altarpiece which he was commis sioned to paint in 1445 for the Compagnia della Misericordia of Borgo san Sepolcro (now in the Palazzo Comunale), his style is already fully developed. In 1451 he was at Rimini painting Sigis mondo Malatesta kneeling before his patron saint, on a fresco in the church of San Francesco. According to Vasari he then worked in Pesaro and in Ancona. He was called to Ferrara by Duke Borso d'Este, and to Rome by Pope Nicholas V. ; but the paintings then executed by him no longer exist. Between 1452 and 1466 he was at work on his great masterpiece, the series of frescoes illustrating the "History of the Cross" in the choir of S. Francesco in Arezzo. This legend gave scope to many picturesque and suggestive inci dents. The planting of the tree on Adam's grave at the beginning of things; the recognition of its destiny by the queen of Sheba on her visit to King Solomon, the dream of Constantine in his tent; his victorious battle ; the finding of the cross by St. Helena, and finally its recovery from the Persians, 30o years later, by the emperor Heraclius. Here Piero can be seen at the height of his powers. The scenes are scientifically composed arrangements. Art and geometry combined in the creation of a severe and monu mental style. Natural form was simplified and translated into decorative design. Moreover, his art reveals an interest in effects of light and "plein air" ; and in more than one respect tends towards naturalism, when compared with the art of his predeces sors. About this time Piero painted the impressive "Resurrection" in the Palazzo Comunale in Borgo, mystic in conception, consid ered by Vasari to be his masterpiece. In the '6os, we find him employed on work for Federigo of Montefeltro, the art-loving and cultured duke of Urbino. He painted Federigo's portrait and that of his wife, Battista Sforza, two clear-cut profiles facing each other in a diptych (Uffizi, Florence) ; also the "Flagellation" in the cathedral of Urbino, and the altarpiece representing the duke kneeling before the Madonna surrounded by saints (Brera, Milan) . At the end of his life Piero retired to his native town in Umbria and wrote two mathematical treatises, one on perspective, and another on the five regular solids, with the object of providing a guide and mathematical foundation for the coming generation of artists. Fra Luca Pacioli, the mathematician and friend of Leo nardo da Vinci, was his compatriot and pupil. Indeed Vasari accused the friar of plagiarizing Piero's mathematical writings. According to Vasari, Piero became blind at the age of sixty. In his will, however, dated July 5, 1487 he is described as fit both in body and mind. He died in Oct. 1492 and was buried on the 12th of that month in the family tomb in the Badia of Borgo San Sepolcro.
He was one of the greatest personalities of the Quattrocento, exercising a widespread influence on the development of art. Luca Signorelli was his most distinguished pupil. Though Piero was for some time neglected and forgotten, he has of late come into his own again, for his art, which so happily combines the decorative element of two-dimensional design with the representation of three-dimensional space, seems to contain much that certain mod ernists are striving after. The following works, besides those men tioned above, are generally recognized as being by the master : "St. Jerome with a man kneeling in a landscape" (Academy at Venice) ; an altarpiece representing the "Madonna and Saints" and the "Annunciation" (Pinacoteca at Perugia), "St. Thomas of Aquinas" (Poldi-Pezzoli collection at Milan) and St. Louis of Toulouse (Palazzo Comunale at Borgo). Only very few of his pictures have left Italy. The National Gallery, London, is the for tunate possessor of three of these :—"The Baptism of Christ," an early work, the "Nativity," a late work, and a "St. Michael and the Dragon." In Mrs. Gardner's collection at Boston is a young Hercules, a fresco from a palace in Borgo San Sepolcro.
See Vasari, Milanesi II.; Crowe-Cavalcaselle, III. (ed. 1914), W. G. Waters, Piero della Francesca (2nd ed., i 9oi) ; C. Ricci, P. della ; Evelyn, P. della Francesca (1912) . Piero's theo retical prospectiva pingendi; published by C. Winter berg (1899) ; manuscripts in the Royal library at Parma, in the Ambrosiana at Milan, in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, and in the library at Bordeaux ; Libellus de V corporibus regularibus, manu script in the Vatican library. (I. A. R.) FRANCESCHINI, BALDASSARE Italian painter of the Tuscan school, named, from Volterra the place of his birth, Il Volterrano, was the son of a sculptor in alabaster. At a very early age he started as an assistant to his father and then studied under the Florentine painter Matteo Rosselli. From 1652— 166o he was employed on paintings in the cupola of the Niccolini chapel in S. Croce, Florence, which constitute his most noted per formance. Among his best oil paintings of large scale is the "St. John the Evangelist" in the church of S. Chiara at Volterra. One of his latest works was the fresco of the cupola of the Annun ziata, Florence, which occupied him for two years towards 1683. Franceschini died of apoplexy at Volterra on Jan. 6, 1689. He is not to be confounded with Marco Antonio Franceschini (1648 1729), who was a Bolognese,a pupil of Carlo Cignani and a famous painter in his time.