Note 265 — BOOK II.

I conjecture this on the authority of Vasari, who says, that he died in 1345, at the age of 60. In the genuine books at S. Domenico, of Siena, we find this sentence "Magister Simon Martini pictor mortuus est in curiâ; cujus exequias fecimus ... 1344." Since Vasari approaches so near the truth in the time of the painter's death, we may reasonably credit him also in his age. Mancini says he was born about 1270; which gives occasion for P. della Valle to mention Simone as a contemporary, and a competitor of Giotto at Rome. I cannot agree with him on this date, and the information drawn by him from books belonging to the Sienese hospital, that Simone was in Siena in 1344, only a few months before his death, at the court of the Pope at Avignon, strengthens my opinion. I cannot believe that an old man of seventy-four would transfer his residence from Siena to Avignon. If we credit Vasari the difficulty vanishes, inasmuch as Simone, being then scarcely sixty, might be equal to undertake so long a journey.