Raphael's earliest documented activity as a painter was in Cittai di Castello, where he painted three altar-pieces and a confraternity banner. Investigation of the individuals who commissioned the altar-pieces sheds new light on Raphael's work in the city and reveals that the artist's private patrons there formed a close-knit coterie whose commissions should be seen as part of the extensive renovation of chapels in the city's churches in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth cen- turies.

Santi di Tito (1536-1603) was one of the Florentine painters who, in the last quarter of the sixteenth century, provided a way forward from the bewildering stylistic diversity of the previous decades. His emphasis on light, simplicity of composition and drawing from life parallels the interests found in the contemporary Carracci academy in Bologna. Santi's pupils and followers, who included Antonio Tempesta, Gregorio Pagani, Lodovico Cigoli, Andrea Boscoli and Agostino Ciampelli, formed the basis of the Florentine baroque and were also extremely influential in Rome during the first part of the new century. A newly-discovered inven- tory of Santi's house made shortly after his death (see the Appendix below) provides a valuable insight into the state and contents of his studio at this time, also offering useful concrete evidence of his patrons and working methods, and of the activity of his painter-son Tiberio.

Bonifacio de' Pitati, called Veronese (1487-1553), is a curious figure who is found at a surprising number of nodal points in the development of Venetian renaissance painting. As the proprietor of one of the city's busiest workshops, he was involved in the early careers of Jacopo Bassano, Tintoretto, and Andrea Schiavone,' and he is named in the recently discovered first will of Lorenzo Lotto, in which he was delegated to finish off the latter's incomplete commissions.2 The crucial role he played in the sustenance of one of Venice's most important artistic dynasties, the Palma family, remains in need of clarification. The family tree illustrated in Fig.22 and an unpublished will of 1533 may prove helpful in this task.3

The Veronese painter Altichiero (documented 1369-84) has long been associated with the Lupi di Soragna family. Originally from Parma, but exiled for their Guelph associations, several branches of Lupi settled in Padua in the 1360s. Bonifacio Lupi is well documented as a condottiere and as the patron both of the hospital on the Via S. Gallo, Florence, and of the chapel of S. Giacomo in the Santo, Padua, frescoed by Altichiero. His uncle, Raimondino, commissioned the oratory of S. Giorgio on the Piazza del Santo, also decorated by Altichiero.' We know less about the myriad of everyday commissions Altichiero is likely to have undertaken, especially since there is no extant panel signed or dated by him. The purpose of this note is to publish in full documentary evidence about the context and patronage of one domestic painting by the artist, which has unfortunately not survived. The recipient of the work was Margareta, the daughter of Corradino Lupi, a kinsman and trusted agent of Bonifacio. The panel formed part of her trousseau on the occasion of her first marriage with the Paduan apothecary Giacomo da Bragazo, and was paid for in 1384.2 Since Margareta's father had died on 15th September 1383, it was Bonifacio Lupi who, as executor, carried out Corradino's wishes and kept a meticulous record.