PIETRO TESTA was more secure in his lifetime as an etcher than as a painter. Lack of patronage for his canvases forced him to express his ideas in his Trattato and in his etchings, whose symbolism reveals again and again Testa's preoccupation with the profession of painting and with the role of the artist in society. In his planned treatise and in some of his etchings he stresses the importance for art of both intellect and practice. An allusion to these disciplines appears in the Liceo della Pittura of about 164I (Bartsch 34), Altro diletto ch'imparar non trovo of about 1648 (Bartsch 32), and the Allegory of the Arts (Bartsch 29). The last named print, an early etching of about 1637–38, already foreshadows Testa's concern with the obstacles to the artist's success, such as time or death and simultaneously the reward in terms of Fame. These concepts are expressed at the right of the etching with Fame seated, gloating slightly over the bound figure of Saturn. The setting for this idyll of the arts is a hilltop reminiscent of Parnassus, a location which will become more clearly defined in his later etchings.