Note 163 — BOOK I. (continued 3)

Bottari, in his Notes to the Letter of Preziado, doubts whether this supposed scholar of Michelangiolo be Galeazzo Alessi, remarking at the same time that this last was rather an architect than a painter. I am inclined to think that the Matteo in question may have been the foregoing Matteo da Lecce, or da Leccio, and that owing to one of those errors, which Clerche in his "Arte Critica," calls ex auditu, his name in Spain became D'Alessi, or D'Alessio, the letters c and s in many countries being made use of reciprocally. Besides, this Leccese, of whom we write in the fourth volume, flourished in the time of Vargas, went to Spain, affected the style of Michelangiolo, and never settled himself in any place from his desire of seeing the world. Memoirs of him appear to have been collected in Spain, by Pacheco, who lived in 1635 (Conca, iii. 252), who in his account, at this distance of time, must have been guided by vulgar report; a bad authority for names, particularly those of foreigners, as was noticed in the Preface. That he should further be called Roman instead of Italian, in a foreign country, and that he should there adopt the name of Perez, not having assumed any surname in Rome, can scarcely appear strange to the reader, and the more so as he is described as an adventurer—a species of persons who subsist upon tricks and frauds.