LIPPI, FRA FILIPPO, was born in Florence in 1412. His father and mother died while he was yet a child, and his father's sister, Mona Lappaccia, sent him, when eight years of age, into the Carmelite convent Del Carmine. The prior, perceiving his inclination and talent for drawing, wisely permitted him every day to study the paintings in the convent chapel, and to be present when Masaccio was engaged in painting them. Lippi profited so well by his visits to Masaccio, that his frescoes on the walls of the convent and church soon became equal to those of his master. Their works in this place, however, were destroyed by fire in 1771.
Elated with his success in painting, Lippi threw off the clerical habit in 1430, and retired to Ancona. Here, when on a pleasure excursion, he and his companions were seized by a Moorish vessel and carried off to Barbary, where he remained for eighteen months in a state of slavery. He owed his liberation to his favourite art. One day, for amusement, he sketched on a wall, with a piece of charcoal, a portrait of his master, who, surprised and delighted with this proof of the young painter's skill, released him from prison, and after he painted some other pieces for him, sent him to Naples in safety. For Alfonso, the Duke of Cala-
bria, he executed a work on panel, which was placed in the chapel of the castle; but he soon left Naples for Florence, where he painted an admirable picture for the nuns of Sant' Ambrogio, which was the means of bringing him under the notice of Cosmo de' Medici. About the same time he painted a work for the chapter-house of Santa Croce, another for the chapel of the Medici palace, and a third for the wife of Cosmo de' Medici, all of which still exist in the picture galleries of Florence. Lippi was restless and fond of sensual pleasure; and, on one occasion, when employed by Cosmo, it was thought necessary to imprison him beside his work; but the impetuous artist, after two days' confinement, made ropes from the sheets of his bed, and dropped himself from the window into the street.
In 1459 he was commissioned by the nuns of Santa Margherita, to paint an altar-piece, when he was so much struck by the beauty of Lucrezia, the daughter of Francesco Buti, who lived in the convent, that he begged the nuns to let him paint her likeness for the Virgin in his picture. They consented, and greatly to their grief, Lippi carried off the young lady. They had a son called Filippo Lippi, who also became a distinguished painter.
Fra Filippo Lippi died at Spoleto in 1469, being at that time 57 years of age. Some have maintained that he was poisoned by the relations of Lucrezia, but this does not seem probable. His death was deeply regretted by very many, and by none more than by his friend Pope Paul II. Lorenzo de' Medici, anxious to do the great painter honour, asked his remains from the Commune of Spoleto, in order that they might be placed in the Cathedral Santa Maria del Fiore, at Florence. The people of Spoleto begged to have the honour of retaining them, and Lorenzo then, at his own expense, placed a marble monument to his memory in the cathedral at Spoleto.
One of the greatest works of this master is his Death of San Bernardo, painted for the capitular church of Prato (and still there); and The Life of Stephen, in three parts, namely, "The Disputation," "The Stoning," and the "Death of the Protomartyr." This is, perhaps, the finest specimen of the artist's genius. On the other side of the chapel is his History of John the Baptist, in which he has painted his own portrait and that of Lucrezia. There are also The Annunciation, St Jerome doing Penance, and many others. His paintings are characterized by inventive genius, admirable drawing, good colouring, and great power in expressing deep emotion.