Rosa, Salvator, an admirable painter, born at Naples in 1614. He was first instructed by Francesco Francazono, a kinsman; but the death of his father reduced him to sell drawings sketched upon paper for anything he could get; one of which happening to fall into the hands of Lanfranci, he took him under his protection, and enabled him to enter the school of Spagnolotto, and to be taught moreover by Daniel Falcone, a distinguished painter of battles at Naples. Salvator had a fertile imagination. He studied nature with attention and judgment; and always represented her to the greatest advantage: for every tree, rock, cloud, or situation, that enters into his composition, shows an elevation of thought that extorts admiration. He was equally eminent for painting battles, animals, sea or land storms; and he executed these different subjects in such taste as renders his works readily distinguishable from all others. His pieces are exceedingly scarce and valuable; one of the most capital is that representing Saul and the witch of Endor, which was preserved at Versailles. He died in 1673; and as his paintings are in few hands, he is more generally known by his prints, of which he etched a great number. He painted landscapes more than history; but his prints are chiefly historical. The capital landscape of this master master at Chiswick is a noble picture. However, he is said to have been ignorant of the management of light, and to have sometimes shaded faces in a disagreeable manner. He was however a man of undoubted genius; of which he has given frequent specimens in his works. A roving disposition, to which he is said to have given full scope, seems to have added a wildness to all his thoughts. We are told that he spent the early part of his life in a troop of banditti; and that the rocky desolate scenes in which he was accustomed to take refuge, furnished him with those romantic ideas in landscape, of which he is so exceedingly fond, and in the description of which he so greatly excels. His robbers, as his detached figures are commonly called, are supposed also to have been taken from the life.

Salvator Rosa is sufficiently known as a painter; but he is little known as a musician. Among the musical manuscripts purchased at Rome by Dr Burney, was a music book of Salvator, in which are many airs and cantatas of different masters, and eight entire cantatas, written, set, and transcribed by this celebrated painter himself. From the specimen of his talents for music here given, we make no scruple of declaring, that he had a truer genius for this science, in point of melody, than any of his predecessors or contemporaries: there is also a strength of expression in his verses, which sets him far above the middle rank as a poet. Like most other artists of real original merit, he complains of the ill usage of the world, and the difficulty he finds in procuring a bare subsistence.