Note 100 — BOOK IV.

The history of the art in Messina enumerates a series of pictures from the year 1267, of which period is the S. Placido of the cathedral, painted by an Antonio d'Antonio. It is supposed that this is a family of painters, which had the surname of Antonj, and that many pictures in S. Francesco, S. Anna, and elsewhere, are by different Antonj, until we come to Salvatore di Antonio, father of the celebrated Antonello di Messina, and himself a master; and there remains by him a S. Francis in the act of receiving the Stigmata, in the church of his name. Thus the genealogy of this Antonello is carried to the before mentioned Antonio di Antonio, and still further by a writer called il Minacciato (Hack. p. 11), although Antonio never, to my knowledge, subscribed himself degli Antonj, having always on his pictures, which I have seen, inscribed his country, instead of his surname, as Messinensis, Messineus, Messinæ.