BRYAN'S DICTIONARY OF PAINTERS AND
ENGRAVERS.* NIS is a useful contribution to the library of reference on art ; but still it falLs so far short of a manifest desideratum, as to provoke surprise that the undertaking should not have been made more complete. Bryan's Dictionary has held its ground against Fuseli's edition of Pilkington, be- cause it is fuller in its collection of names, and because it includes en- gravers. In every other respect it falls short. Mr. Bryan belonged to an antiquated school of critics and compilers' with whom a certain feeble and vague idea of what they were pleased to call "taste" was the standard, and with whom a repetition of errors from previous compilations was a venial because a customary sin. Fuseli's vigour, his devotion to art, and his learning, made him break through the old cant of "taste" and the vice of dishonest idleness in compiling; and if he wrote his additions to l'ilkington too much eurrente calamo for thorough correction, at all events he introduced a living spirit of discrimination both in criticism and history. And Pilkington though more meagre, was a less intract- able basis than Bryan, partly from his very matter-of-fact dryness. Bryan's writing indicates the possession of a taste stronger than that which prevailed in his day ; but his style has all the weakness of an in- ferior school, and in compilation he has the most wholesale indiscrimi- nateness—bad authority and good mixed up inextricably. The new editor, Mr. Stanley, has gone over the ground with considerable industry, has corrected errors, supplied omissions, and strengthened the criticism. And it should be remembered, that in a work of reference like the present, the critical portion embraces information often as much needed by the
.* A Biographical and Critical Dictionary of Painters and Engravers, from the Re- vival of the Art under Chnabue, and the alleged Discovery of Engraving by Pint ti - rerra, to the present me : with the Ciphers, Monograms, and Marks, used by each
„Luraver. By Michael Bryan. Anew edition revised, enlarged, and continued to the • _"-wecit time • comprising above one thousand' additional Memoirs, and large acces- ....._"'"i to the 'Lists of Pictures and Engravings ; also new Plates of Ciphers and Mono- by George Stanley. Published by Bohn.
inquirer as the merely biographical or historical portions. Bryan's work is still useful; Mr. Stanley has in a great measure brought it up to the day ; but the question is, in what degree has he supplied its original and structural defects ? We are bound to say that he has done so in a very imperfect degree.
One great object to be attained by any book of the kind, is to make it complete in all branches, so that the searcher may be sure of having all that he needs in one field. Now, in Bryan's book there was a very glaring and sweeping omission, which has been seriously felt by all who need works of the kind—the omission of the sculptors. It is true that some sculptors were also painters, like Michelangelo; but a dic- tionary of art is incomplete which sends the inquirer elsewhere to seek for Cellini, John of Bologna, or Canova. Much of Bryan's matter, both critical and biographical, is a mere useless encumbrance. In the intro- duction, for example, the explanatory treatise on the practice and techni- cology of art is in great part obsolete ; the very meagre, lax, and trivial account of the modes of engraving, would not be tolerated, nowadays, in a penny periodical: yet these passages are reproduced, without amend- ment, in what ought to be a standard book for the library. Again, the life of Correggio is disfigured by the old fables of his obscurity and poverty. It is true that Mr. Stanley has gone back to authorities, and has profited by the labours of the accurate Tiraboschi and others; • but for that correction you must look into various foot-notes which dodge the text ; so that you are called upon to read two versions—the con- nected but perfectly absurd account of Bryan, and the correct but dis- jointed account in the notes. Now it would have been far better to grapple with Bryan's text more vigorously: one sweeping acknowledg- ment of his share in the labour might have sufficed, and then Mr. Stanley might have slashed away all this superfluous and erroneous matter, aiui.ply inserting the correct matter in situ. Or he might have treated the original as Mr. Stephen has treated the text of Blackstone—rewriting the book as a whole, but distinguishing the parts borrowed by a simple ty- pographical distinction. Next to accuracy, the great desideratum in a dictionary is facility : but accuracy is not served by respectfully retain- ing an original error, nor facility by complication. Omissions of critical facts essential even to the briefest identification of a painter and his genius may be noted in almost any page, opened at random. Bryan notices the unbookish turn of Annibal Carracci, but misses the independence of mind and. stern devotion to art which explain his ascendancy over his more cultivated relatives, and his singular po- tency of design. The well-born Cimabue has the merit of first breaking through the pattern-painting of his day, and of discovering the genius Giotto : the latter at once carried architectural beauty to its perfect type —we could almOst requote Ruskin's beautiful tribute to the author of the Campanile at Florence, but will invite the reader to look back for it into our last number but one ; and in Giotto are clearly discerned the same grace and intense expression which were afterwards developed in Raphael : in the book before us, an equal space is given to the two men, Cimabue and Giotto. For want of a sufficient critical grasp, Bryan allows the subject of the great Florentine to slip through his fingers, scarcely marking the nature of Giotto's genius or his effect on the pro- gress of painting : Mr. Stanley attests his own knowledge, by referring to Lord Lindsay's book on Christian Art, but does not supply the want in the text ; though it is in the dictionary, and not in a separate volume, that the inquirer ought to find at least one sufficient sentence emphati- cally stamping the character of so great a man. In this way, Mr. Stan. Icy has done much to prevent the reader of Bryan from being misled, but not enough to make good the ladies of the original, and still less to super- sede the want of another book.
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