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In the autumn of] 1478 I began the two Madonna [pictures].
Footnote: Photographs of this page have been published by BRAUN,
No. 439, and PHILPOT, No. 718.
1. Incominciai. We have no other information as to the two
pictures of the Madonna here spoken of. As Leonardo here tells us
that he had begun two Madonnas at the same time, the word
'incominciai' may be understood to mean that he had begun at the
same time preparatory studies for two pictures to be painted later.
If this is so, the non-existence of the pictures may be explained by
supposing that they were only planned and never executed. I may here
mention a few studies for pictures of the Madonna which probably
belong to this early time; particularly a drawing in silver-point on
bluish tinted paper at Windsor--see Pl. XL, No. 3--, a drawing of
which the details have almost disappeared in the original but have
been rendered quite distinct in the reproduction; secondly a slight
pen and ink sketch in, the Codex VALLARDI, in the Louvre, fol. 64,
No. 2316; again a silver point drawing of a Virgin and child drawn
over again with the pen in the His de la Salle collection also in
the Louvre, No. 101. (See Vicomte BOTH DE TAUZIA, Notice des
dessins de la collection His de la Salle, exposes au Louvre. Paris
1881, pp. 80, 81.) This drawing is, it is true, traditionally
ascribed to Raphael, but the author of the catalogue very justly
points out its great resemblance with the sketches for Madonnas in
the British Museum which are indisputably Leonardo's. Some of these
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